A Toast to Darwin

By Shrewsbury

The good folk of Shrewsbury are rightly proud of their most famous son, Charles Darwin. An annual festival has been established to celebrate his life, work and continuing influence in the world of science. They would also like to begin an annual ceremony to take place at noon each year on his birthday, 12 th of February so could you compose the toast? The organizers of Darwin Month would like to invite poets professional and non-professional to submit ideas in time for the next festival in February 2005. There is a great tradition of toasts for special occasions.

Robbie Burns wrote “a toast to the haggis”

“Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o' the Puddin-race!
Aboon them a' ye tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye wordy of a grace
As lang's my arm…”

And local to Shropshire is the “all friends around the Wrekin”

“So here's to all friends round The Wrekin
And may the devil rain pebble stones
On the toes of our enemies
So that we may know the buggers by their limp,
All friends round The Wrekin”

The location for the ceremony will be beside the Bellstone in the courtyard of the Morris Hall in Shrewsbury. The Bellstone is mentioned in Darwin’s autobiography. This granite boulder was Darwin’s first introduction to the science of geology. According to Darwin it was Mr. Cotton who pointed out this curiosity to him, remarking that it is a type of stone only found much further north in Cumbria or Scotland. Cotton went on to assure Darwin that “the world would come to an end before anyone would be able to explain how this stone came where it now lay.”

During his studies at Edinburgh, Darwin learned that it was almost certainly brought down with the encroaching glaciers of the Ice Age. The stone is symbolic of two attitudes that still flourish today, namely that “what we do not understand we will never understand” and conversely, “what we do not understand we can use our wits, observation and imagination to understand”. The latter being a decidedly Darwinian standpoint. Now the search is on for a toast fit for a scientific giant. The only prize is the knowledge that your work will be the centerpiece of celebrations leading up to and beyond Darwin’s bicentenary in 2009.

The toast should be limited to no more than ten lines.

Email your toasts to darwinfest@aol.com

Or write to: Darwin Month, 20 Dogpole, Shrewsbury, England, SY1 1ES

Competition Rules

Poets are invited to compose a toast to celebrate Darwin Day on February 12 th 2005, the anniversary of his birth in Shrewsbury.

  • Poems should be no longer than ten lines.
  • They should be typed (hand written entries will not be considered) and not bear the name or any identifying mark of the author.
  • The poet’s details and titles of poems submitted should be included on a separate page.
  • They should be in the form of a toast to celebrate his memory.
  • Entries are free and must reach the organisers by 30 th of November 2004
  • All competition entries will be read and assessed by an independent judge.
  • No correspondence will be entered into.
  • The winning entry and others of note will be published on the Darwin Month website.
  • The winner will be invited to perform his/her entry at the Bellstone in Shrewsbury.
  • The only prize is the knowledge that your work will be read out every year on Darwin’s birthday.

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