A celebration and book launch of the Bicentennial Pen Pals anthology featuring readings by contributors.
The anthology has been developed throughout 2025 as a historical contemplation on the development and the global impact of the modern rail network and commemorates the opening of the Stockton & Darlington Railway in 1825.
It features an exchange of letters written by people living in 2025 and those in 1825, comparing lifestyles, beliefs, technologies, customs, work, leisure, travel, trade, employment and education. The anthology features creative work by local writers between the ages of seven and seventy five and has involved a process of life writing, archival research and historical interpretation.
Together the sequence of letters paint a collaborative portrait of life in the 21st century and a detailed imagining of ordinary lives during the first Industrial Revolution.
Wednesday 24th September
2.30pm
Centre for Local Studies, Darlington Library
Free, Booking Required
