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The inaugural Holcombe Festival of Literature proved to be a huge success as the whole school enjoyed a day of activities inspired by great books and literature. Once again the Holcombe reading community was ‘talking books’
The classroom activities focused on debate, performance and re-creative writing in response to what students learned about classic literature such as Frankenstein and the Island of Dr Moreau as well as modern vintage novels like Brave New World and The Great Gatsby.
At lunchtime students indulged in a range of activities that included poetry penalties in the sports hall, a banned books exhibition and a trail of teacher book recommendations.
The main event of the day was The Holcombe Whodunnit. Year 12 constructed an Agatha Christie crossed with Sherlock Holmes style narrative and gave a dramatic performance of the investigation as key characters performed their testimonies. Once Poirot and Watson summarised their theories – it was up to the students to hunt down clues at lunch time and approach offstage characters (teachers in varying degrees of period costume and wigs). The last session of the day was about creating and presenting their findings and theories before the revelation of the whodunnit – not to mention the unmasking of the Holcombe masked readers. We are looking forward to the festival being a permanent fixture in the school calendar.
