*Please note this transcript is generated using an automated service and it may not be 100% accurate.
First Story presents: London Voice
Talia: Have you ever returned to your old school years after you left? Walked the old hallways, reliving the stress of not having done your homework, or who to sit with at lunch?
Well, I’m in my old school right now, but luckily, I’m not panicking about any of those things. I’m actually having a really nice time. That’s partly because the site has been totally rebuilt, so the visceral memories of my teenage years aren’t at the forefront of my mind. And it’s partly because I’m here to meet a group of young, talented writers who are going to share poems and stories with me, which is a glorious way to spend the afternoon.
My name is Talia Randall. I’m a poet, audio producer and educator, and I’m at Hampstead School in North West London. I’m here with First Story, England’s leading creative writing charity for young people in state schools.
First Story works with around 1000 students each year, in low-income communities, by providing greater access to creative enrichment. With the right support, anyone can be a writer.
This year, First Story has selected six of its schools to participate in a new project called London Voice. The aim is to help young people develop into writers with the voice, skills and the confidence to be heard.
This is a podcast that brings those creative voices to the forefront. In each episode, you’ll hear poems, stories and reflections from young First Story writers.
Which means, I’m going to stop talking now and hand the mic over to the writers of tomorrow.
Eden: You’re about to listen to poems that have been performed and written by students from Hampstead School.
Chancey: My name is Chancey, and I’m going to be reading my poem, ‘Planets’.
Her monkey pajamas is the old house, is the Pokemon cards, is the plastic IKEA cups, is the YouTube clay animations, and the blowing leaves from that giant apple tree, is the blue car named Toothless, is the tangy oranges, is a new house, was my childhood, is when we arrived at the new planet.
Her blue curtains is the fullness of the winter cold, and the giant dog named Hunter, is the lost TV remote, is the carelessly dancing in the sitting room, is the wet grass, is the crying laughing, and the toy penguin who sings, is the setting sun watching us eat McDonald’s, is when both planets merged, when what was once two different memories became just one thing, is then where I live.
Nuriyah: My name is Nuriyah, and my poem is ‘Thunder’. Thunder, thunder, why do you always scare my mother? Thunder, thunder. Are you all siblings, or are you all in love with each other? Thunder, thunder. Are you all close? Do you spend time alone, separating father? Thunder, thunder. Is it okay if we could talk together?
Thunder, thunder. What kind of emotions do you feel? Thunder, thunder. What kind of food do you like? Thunder, thunder. Do you remember that one summer? Thunder, thunder. How does it feel to be high up in the sky? Thunder, thunder. Do you like being loud? Or would you prefer to be quiet? Thunder, thunder. Do you know who I am? Or did you forget we met each other?
Leila: My name is Leila, and my poem is called ‘Green’. Green is her woolen sweater. It is my little frog ring I’ve had for longer than I can remember. It is the cool emerald hills fading away as the sun goes down. It is unpredictable. It is being forced to walk through a park in 35-degree heat. It is a scrunchie I tie in my hair.
It is visiting their house and being excited to climb my tree. It is the emerald city. It is the long airplane rides laying on her shoulder. It is honest, and therefore my favourite.
Talia: I love hearing these poems, particularly because I know the work that goes into them. Over the course of the year, these students have participated in weekly after school writing sessions. They play games, try out different exercises and look at they work other poets.
In fact, the poems you’ve heard from Chancey, Leyla and the one you’ll hear soon from Eden were inspired by a contemporary poem called ‘The Blue Dres’s by Saeed Jones.
Chancey: I like that it had the repetition of is throughout the poem
Leila: I like that is used lots of imagery and metaphors, that really like spoke out and jumped out at me
Talia: Running creative writing sessions myself, I find it joyful when young people connect with the work of other writers and you see those sparks igniting.
Chancey: Um, the thing I love about creative writing is that you can say what you feel without having to say it in a, like, a construct way. You can say it in very abstract ways.
Talia: It’s also a pleasure when students make up stories that seemingly come from nowhere, like this one:
River: My name’s River and I love, um, writing stories, especially like if there’s no genre and I can just, like, be free with it and write anything that I want about it, because then I’ll get creative and write what I want. I like learning about different types of poems. I normally just thought poems are all kind of the same, although I realise that there are way more different types of poems and you can write them all differently and creatively.
It was cold outside. I could hear the choppy waves crashing among the boat. It was almost midnight, but I felt sick. I had a bad feeling, a feeling that everything would go bad in about one minute. I was nervous, sweat running down my eyes, shivering. I could not tell if it was the cold or if it was the bad feeling.
Twenty seconds in, and I could hear the voices in my head getting louder. Now twenty seconds left until the one minute is over. I vomited over the boat, feeling nervous, but suddenly the one minute was up. I suddenly woke up on a party boat with my friends. All of them next to me, telling me to wake up.
They were all scared. I asked them, What? What’s wrong? They said I fell asleep, and I started shivering and sweating. I realized it was all a dream. I thought to myself, no, that cannot be a dream. It felt so real. But the day went on, and we were fine. I woke up the next day, went to the front of the party boat, and I had a croissant.
It was delicious, all the taste melted in my mouth. We went to the pool on the boat and listened to music. I could smell the salt from the salty sea as I watched my friends jump off the boat into the sea. It looked fun, so we all joined along and had pizzas for lunch and a special chocolate cake made by my best friend.
We were on our way to Mallorca. We knew it would take a while, but we were having the best time ever. We went into the pool for the last time before having dinner. I had a sandwich and some wine. I was about to go to sleep. But all of a sudden, that same thought came back into my head. The one where something was about to go bad.
But I shrugged it over my shoulder and I went to bed. I woke up in the middle of the night, the waves were choppy, it was like the exact same dream I had, but instead, it was happening right now. I shouted and told everyone to wake up, something bad is about to happen, and I mean bad. They all thought I had too much wine and that I was crazy, but I was 99 percent sure we were about to be in trouble.
I tried to explain to them that this is bad, very bad, but they didn’t listen. They all were about to go back to bed, but suddenly a huge wave came over, and then we were underwater in the rainy, cold, shark infested waters. I swam up to the surface, but then got hit by an 11 foot wave. I thought I was about to die.
I was sinking, and I knew it was over.
Eden: My name is Eden, and this is my poem, ‘Pellucid’. Her jacket is a bath of old cigarettes, is what used to be considered good for you. It’s now seen as sickening and grey. It’s the traces of mascara near her eyes. It’s the fading crimson of her hair. It’s the chip of her tooth like a porcelain vase. It’s the blue of the sea in her eyes.
It’s her dark red nail polish. It’s the burden of those before her. It’s the shame of those after. It’s proving how you can say that you don’t care, but you will still always remember. Her jacket is a bath of old cigarettes. It’s the energy drink always at her side. It’s the feeling of guilt as the sense of regret.
It’s all the nice things she said, it’s how easily you listened, it’s how she never made you feel bad until after, it’s the way you can never bring yourself to hate her no matter how hard you try, it’s the way her jacket is a bath of old cigarettes, it’s pinked into glasses glued to your eyes.
Miss Willcock: My name is Miss Willcock and we’re currently sitting in my English classroom at Hampstead School.
I think creative writing for my students is the ability to express themselves, to write something that they’re able to kind of go off on their own track with and it’s one of the few times where they’re not being told what to do, um, and they’re able to kind of express themselves.
I think that, increasingly creativity and the classroom is being stifled by the emphasis and focus on exams and whilst, you know, getting good results and exams are important and we want students to do well in life, exams aren’t the be all and end all, and it’s really important that, um, creativity doesn’t get stifled, doesn’t get forgotten about, and that we continue to promote creativity, not least because I think it improves, um, students confidence, and their sense of belonging, and their sense of self as well.
Talia: Even though I work with young people all the time, I couldn’t help but feel nervous about today’s session. We only had a short time to record these poems, and these students haven’t met me before. It’s a big thing to be recorded and know your voice is going to be out there, so I was worried it might feel too pressured.
But I was taken aback by how professional they all were. By how much they trusted their poems and their stories to speak for them.
It’s a reminder that you don’t have to be the loudest, most extroverted person in the room to have a powerful voice. It’s a reminder to adults that we sometimes need to lean in a bit to hear all of those voices; that we should make the effort.
I wanted to get some ideas about this from the young poets themselves, so I asked Chancey and Leyla what they thought.
Chancey: I’d say a lot of people might not have. that much of the ability to, um, give their voice. Um, but you can do that through different ways.
Talia: And why do you think that is? Why do you think young people don’t, or some young people don’t have much of a voice?
Chancey: Maybe they, they can’t really, uh, give their thoughts just from the get go. They have to have a way to, um, spread their message.
Leila: I hope this shows that young people can really create really interesting things.
Talia: Thanks for listening to First Story Presents: London Voice. I’ve been Talia Randall, your host for today’s episode.
In the next episode, I’ll be handing the mic to another writer who’ll guide you through the poetry and prose of students at St. Paul’s Way School in East London.
The idea for my poem came from the way past experiences shape the present and the future…
Talia Randall: First Story Presents: London Voice was produced by Talia Randall in collaboration with First Story. It was mixed by Jamie Payne. This was a First Story project.
This podcast is part of the wider London Voice programme, an exciting new oracy pilot delivered by First Story, England’s leading creative writing charity for young people.
Over the course of this academic year, First Story has been working with six non-selective secondary schools in Greater London as part of London Voice.
It’s aim? To help young people develop as writers who have a voice and the skills and confidence to be heard.
Students from Hampstead School, St Paul’s Way School, Platanos College, Skinners’ Academy, Trinity Acadamy and St Saviour’s and St Olave’s Church of England School have had the opportunity to take part in creative writing, performance and audio workshops led by skilled industry professionals. This podcast is one of the outcomes of their work.
London Voice has been made possible by the generous support of The Mercers’ Company, trustee of St Paul’s Schools Foundation.
To find out more about First Story and London Voice, visit First Story dot org dot uk and join the conversation on instagram by searching firststory_uk.
