Darwin inspires young poets at the Sedgwick
On Saturday a group of teenagers held an intimate audience of academics and curious visitors rapt with their poetical insights into Charles Darwin. The performance marked the culmination of an intensive poetry workshop caried out over two days at the Sedgwick Museum of Earth Sciences.
The Year 11 students were tutored in both poetry and performance by poets from the Roundhouse Theatre, London, Jacob Sam-La Rose and Jasmine Cooray. Further inspiration was provided by Museum staff and Department of Earth Sciences academics giving the students a glimpse into the varied histories behind the Darwin collections held at the Sedgwick. In a series of half-hour sessions the students explored the science behind studying the collections, the ways in which Darwin might have found out about his finds and the responsibilities of interpreting and caring for these historic objects.
The poems that came from these sessions surprised and delighted hardened academics and Museum staff alike. Subjects ranged from the psychadelic play of cross-polarised light on a microscope slide to the relationship between Darwin and Henslow.
The night was run as part of the Cambrigdge Festival of Ideas. It was also an early milestone in the runup to the Darwin 2009 festival to be held in Cambridge next summer. The best of the poems will be printed in a CUP booklet to be published in conjunction with the Sedgwick Museum’s ‘Darwin, Becoming a Geologist’ exhibition.