The Readathon

Bournemouth is celebrating 200 years of existence this year and all sorts of things are going on there. I took a bus there this morning and headed for the foyer of the Pavilion where the local Literary Luncheon Society was holding a Readathon that included as a guest reader, Michael Dobbs, who read extracts from All Quiet on the Western Front (by H M Remarque) and his own recent novel, The Reluctant Hero.

I timed it well as a group of them were outside with a local press photographer when I arrived. Some of them were unaware of my taking the first photo when they were still talking to her. You can see her hand and camera on the left but I managed to crop the rest of her out, and you can see those group members who were all dressed up in the costume of the period of the books they read from. Then some of them dispersed and the rest of them posed beautifully for me, with Michael Dobbs play-acting in the centre.

I only stayed for the next part of the programme, which did include the author himself, because there were other things I wanted to do in Bournemouth - more of that in another post.

It was a very pleasant interlude, and wasn't I lucky to get those photos? I have to print some off and send them to my friends.