On Friday July 8th, a distinguished audience of invited guests from across the UK’s North west region and overseas in the USA, India and Singapore gathered live and online for the launch of the first Heartstone Odyssey Book Festival at the University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), one of the key partners for this project, in the City of Preston, and who hosted the event.
An event eagerly anticipated for over a year but put on hold due to the pandemic, the unexpected space had allowed the addition of new individuals, organisations, community groups, schools and impressive contributors representing the three books of the Heartstone Odyssey trilogy.
The High Sheriff of Lancashire, Martin John Ainscough, DL, opened the event welcoming all those assembled on behalf of the Lord Lieutenant of Lancashire, Lord Charles Shuttleworth, the Book Festival Patron who had helped to initiate the Festival in 2020. Now with involvement in every part of the North west as well as London and Scotland, and historic figures from the USA and major institutions and organisations in India, the Festival was at last underway as had been intended but with even greater involvement than had been anticipated in 2020.
The Mayor of the City of Preston, Councillor Neil Darby, the 694th Mayor, of itself a historic position which dates back to 1327, gave his address to all the guests and made the following statement after the event:
“The Launch of the Heartstone Odyssey Book Festival was astounding, showing the width and breadth of support that the project enjoys. And rightly so! The passion of all involved shines through and the work they are striving to achieve in educating children in the values of tolerance and acceptance is wonderful. All books open our minds to new ideas, especially when we are young – but the Heartstone Odyssey Project is taking this further by linking children to communities around the world to forge connections that will stay with young people for a lifetime. Children in Preston are lucky to have had the opportunity to be involved in the project and they will be the richer for the experience, I know they are already looking forward to the next stage of this exciting journey.”
Cllr Nweeda Khan, Cabinet Member for Communities and Social Justice for Preston, thanked what was a long list of supporters and funders who had enabled this event and the project behind it to take shape. She had been the first in Preston to see the potential of the initiative and had introduced it to the City bringing both funding and support. Two years later, the project has blossomed into a programme involving children across Preston and the rest of Lancashire and also the centre of the first Heartstone Odyssey Book Festival reaching out across the world with the first overseas Story Circles initiated in India and the USA, some of them partnered with Story Circles in Preston.
Other special guests included Veronica Afrin, Chair of Preston & West Lancashire Racial Equality and Diversity Council (5th from left in photo – right), who alongside Cllr Nweeda Khan had helped with funding and support to bring Heartstone to Preston and Lancashire and David Smith, Chair of LANPAC (1st right), Lancashire Partnership Against Crime, also amongst the initial funders to bring Heartstone to Preston and Lancashire.
David Smith said: ‘LANPAC is a registered charity and forms a special and, in many ways unique, collaboration between the Police, Businesses, Public Services and the Voluntary Sector. Our aim is a short and simple one, to help the Lancashire Constabulary’s efforts to reduce levels of crime and disorder across the county. Our membership fees create a pot of money which takes funding applications from members of the Constabulary, and gives grants to implement local initiatives which aim to prevent crime and disorder, and which would not otherwise attract mainstream funding, or could otherwise have been delayed, reduced in scope, or lost altogether through insufficient time or resources. We at LANPAC are delighted to have been part of the early development of the Heartstone Story Circles in Lancashire. Going back some three years ago we have supported funding applications from Burnley, Preston and Lancaster. These have often been part of larger schemes which draw matched funding from other public sector and voluntary bodies.
It was a delight for Vice Chair, Wendy Walker, QPM, and myself to be invited to the Heartstone Odyssey Book Festival launch event at UCLAN in July and to hear from the young people and see how much progress has been made since we first became involved. It is most encouraging to see how great oaks can grow from small acorns, and we wish you well as the project moves forwards.’
Ishwer Tailor, DL, is pictured at left (2nd from left). He was among the first Lancashire supporters for Heartstone and had initiated the contact with the Gujarat Hindu Society in Preston and the Lord Lieutenant of Lancashire to bring his support. The GHS Story Circle have become one of the outstanding community based Story Circles nationwide.
What followed was a special introduction from Sir Derek Jacobi, Heartstone’s Patron, to mark this as the start of a new journey. Following an inspiring introduction, he read from Chapter 1 of The Heartstone Odyssey, setting the scene for the next part of the event and to remind everyone of its purpose.
Children and young people from three Story Circles, in Wirral (right), the Gujarat Hindu Centre in Preston, and Cheshire, provided a powerful presentation in their own words following from the book’s themes.
All three groups were presented with Awards for their Story Circle contributions, trophies kindly donated by Timpsons and secured for the project by Deputy Lieutenant, Suzana Sheldon-Edwards, who had assisted with promotion of the event over the previous months. (GHS Story Circle representatives at right)
This was followed by an introduction and welcome to the overseas presenters through Indian dance mudras, led by Sitakumari together with the Cheshire children (right). All those who would be present and contributing to the Festival over the weekend of 9th and 10th July gave brief introductions.
From Alabama, USA – Dr Valda Montgomery, Lynda Blackmon-Lowry and Meta Ellis, brought to the Book Festival through partners Rosa Parks Museum and the Selma-Montgomery Historic March. Rosa Parks Museum Director, Donna Beisel, together with Shirley Baxter from the Selma-Montgomery Historic March were both present. The only contributor from the USA who was absent was Karen Gray Houston, the US journalist and author, for a very important reason – she was at the White House together with her uncle, Fred Gray, receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Joe Biden for his work as an attorney during the Civil Rights Movement when he tried the Rosa Parks case and many other famous cases from the period. It had been a long wait for recognition but there at last!
To mark the start of the connection with India through Book 2 of The Heartstone Odyssey, Shri Bijay Selvaraj, the Consul General of India, joined and spoke from Edinburgh.
From India, Rajiv Bhartari from Corbett Tiger Reserve, Dr T V Ramachandra from the Bangalore Institute of Science, Arvind Paranjpye from Mumbai Nehru Planetarium and Vasant Nath, screenwriter from Mumbai all joined and spoke briefly of their contributions to be given over the weekend of the Festival.
The presentation from Barrie Osborne, Hollywood Oscar-winning producer of the Lord of the Rings trilogy of movies and other blockbusters, who joined from Los Angeles, describing his vision for The Heartstone Odyssey on big and small screens was particularly exciting giving everyone a sense of where this new journey was heading next, a development also put on hold due to the pandemic but on the move again.
Nila Joshi, Co-Director of Heartstone Confederation of International Story Circles (left) had travelled from Edinburgh to be at the event as had Jerry Piper, also a Co-Director of HCISC, and other key members of the Heartstone team, Elena Noel and Nina Rahel, both from London. In the Heartstone office in Dingwall, holding everything together behind-the-scenes, as always, was Alice Britton, Heartstone’s trusted longstanding manager and co-ordinator, working with Nina Rahel on the ground in Preston, making sure everyone was there and sorting any IT glitches for this first event making these global connections.
Jerry, Nina, Nila, Elena (pictured left centre) and Alice are all longstanding members of the Heartstone team, supporting the book and organisation since its earliest days and helping to bring profile and funding to ensure it could move over a period of 30 years since the organisation’s founding in 1990 to where it has reached today.
The event included an exhibition of photographs by Nick Sidle, Heartstone’s photographer/writer, one of its founders and its key creative input. The images were from the original three-day journey in India when The Heartstone Odyssey story was told and shown here for the very first time. Many of the real-life scenes from which the story followed were there, giving the audience an insight into the characters of both Books 1 and 2 and the visual imagery which gave rise to the story.
Sitakumari was one of the passengers on that train pictured here next to the top image of the elephant blessing a young girl in the crowd at the famous Mylapore Chariot Festival. This image is one of those leading to the Anju story in Ch 12 of Book 1 of The Heartstone Odyssey.
The exhibition included displays created by some of the Preston Story Circles, including the Gujerat Hindu Society Story Circle, pictured here meeting the High Sheriff and the Preston Youth Development Group, largely comprising Muslim boys. Both had created stunning painted images from the historical engravings provided by Heartstone to bring a local historical connection and link with Sailvoyage Stonekeeper from the book.
The Book Festival launch provided a wonderful opportunity for special guests to meet some of the key people behind The Heartstone Odyssey, from its earliest days, and some of the children and young people participating, the parents, teachers and others without whose support the Story Circles would not be happening. One of the members of the GHS Story Circle in Preston is pictured here (right) together with her mother.
The launch was an opportunity to see where the whole programme around the books is now, where it is going and meet some of the incredible partners who have joined us. From this event, the first Story Circle in Panipat, India has started and similarly Story Circles are about to start in Alabama led by the Rosa Parks Museum. The event left everyone looking forward to the Festival itself taking shape over the weekend and asking the important question, what will be happening next….
TO SEE WHAT HAPPENED DURING THE FESTIVAL, CLICK ON THE POST FOR THE EVENT ON THIS WEBSITE.
Our grateful thanks to UCLan, the City of Preston, the Lord Lieutenant and Deputy Lieutenants who have supported the Book Festival, Ishwer Tailor, DL and the Gujarat Hindu Society, Suzana Sheldon-Edwards, DL, PWLREDC, LANPAC and the many others who have facilitated this launch event for the first Heartstone Odyssey Book Festival. Also to Jerry Piper, Elena Noel and Nila Joshi for the photos used in this post.
