Helston's Postman Poet

Helston's Postman Poet

This event is part of Wordplay for Winter

Free - no need to book, just turn up.

Few people have heard of James Dryden Hosken (1861-1953), but his story deserves to be known. Born in poverty in Helston’s Pig Street, he left school at ten to support his family. He went on to become a postman, a poet and a playwright, and one of the first bards initiated into the revived Cornish Gorsedh in 1928.

Join Ernie Parsons as he explores the life of this neglected writer. Hosken’s work captured social injustice, vagrancy and religious tension, and his major poem Reuben Quinion follows a man trying to do good in a world of hypocrites. His own life was just as dramatic, taking in London, Australia and a lifetime of tramping in search of work, always with a pen close by.

Ernie’s talk draws on his research into…