Darwin, Dawkins and the Left

By Ken MacLeod - Genomics Forum Writer in Residence

A few months ago Chris Williams, an OU history lecturer and political activist whom I've known for years online, asked me to give this year's Darwin Memorial Lecture to the Leicester Secular Society. I suggested the topic because, a couple of years earlier, I'd put together a stash of notes and links for a blog post that I'd never quite got around to writing.

The event, at the Society's splendid Victorian red-brick Secular Hall on 13 February 2011, drew a large and lively audience, from that cross-section of radical England that you so often find in its socialist, secularist and peace movements. Their searching and informed questions often had me thinking fast on my feet.

Here's the gist of what I said - a longer version will no doubt appear on my own blog.

Show Time! ESRC Genomics Forum/Traverse Theatre Resident Playwright 2011

By Alison Caldecott - Genomics Forum Press and Communications Officer

My initial reaction to the idea that the subject of genomics can inspire creative works was, I must admit, one of skepticism.  But that was before I took on my new role as communications officer for the Genomics Forum.  Before I had been introduced to the Fourm writers in residence - Ken MacLeod and Pippa Goldschmidt and had a chance to relish a collection of genomics short stories by writers who had let their imaginations go wild on the bizarre sounding Zipper, Mad/Max, Hip/Hop, and Disheveled Zinc Finger genes.

Now that I have inherited a successful poetry competition attracting entries from across the globe, and learnt about the Forums visual artist in residence Alistair Gentry and designers Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg and James King, the enthusiastic ambition of the Forum to work with a playwright seems entirely reasonable. And one that on past experience is likely to deliver some exceptional outputs.