Description: Monumental collection of bardic poetry bringing together 25 years of selected verse, plus an introduction to the author's practice as a performance poet, originally published as Speak Like Rain.
Brief description: Kevan Manwaring won the Bardic Chair of Caer Badon (Bath) in 1998 and became a professional storyteller in 2000. He is a founding member of Fire Springs and per-forms with his partner, Chantelle Smith, in the duo Bríghíd's Flame. He is the author of The Bardic Handbook (2006), The Way of Awen: journey of a bard (2010); Desiring Dragons: creativity, imagination and the writer's quest (2014); Ox-fordshire Folk Tales (2012), Northamptonshire Folk Tales (2013), Lost Islands: inventing Avalon, destroying Eden (2010), the Windsmith Elegy fantasy series (2004-12), and over a dozen collections of poetry. He is the editor of Ballad Tales (2017) and blogs and tweets as the Bardic Academic.
Review Quotes:
'Within Silver Branch, the ancient and modern worlds are woven together in the remaking with which we have to engage at every moment, perceiving the ancient and allowing its currency to irrigate our time and deepen our, often, surface culture. As ancestral structures fall away, as wise councils fall into argument ... as the beauty of nature is despoiled, so it becomes our bounden duty to listen harder and deeper to the mythic levels of our collective life ... Fall silent now and hear the voice of the bard!'
Caitlín Matthews, author of The Lost Book of the Grail and Celtic Visions
'In addition to a selection of Kevan's poetry, ranging from earliest to most recent, this book includes a detailed and enthusiastic exploration of what it takes to produce great performance poetry. "Speak Like Rain: Letters to a Young Bard", inspired by Rilke's famous "Letters to a Young Poet", feels like required reading for any poet - aspiring or experienced. Utterly absorbing and inspirational!'
Philip Carr-Gomm, author of The Prophecies and DruidCraft