Ruth Middleton is the community producer at the wonderful Slung Low.\xa0 She remotely connected to tell me about all of the amazing work they do and how she got involved.
Leeds theatre company Slung Low has published a children\u2019s book and launched an initiative that aims to give every child in Holbeck a copy. In early October three of the Slung Low team spent a week at Holbeck\u2019s Ingram Road Primary School reading \u2018Emergency Story Penguin\u2019 to the children and gave all 340 of them a copy.
\u201cIt was an absolute joy to take the book to the pupils at our localschool, we all loved it,\u201d says Ruth Middleton, Community Producer at Slung Low and one of the readers. \u201cWe do a lot of work with the school and when we discovered there were pupils who started at the school without books, we set about changing that. Now every one of those kids has at least one book.\u201d
The company is renowned for both its theatre and the work it does with its local community in South Leeds; they operate a food bank, acultural community college, and manage the country\u2019s oldest working men\u2019s club.
Artistic Director Alan Lane believes that theatre companies should redefine what they do and how they operate. \u201cThere are kids in Leeds without books, without crayons - how can that be?\u201d he says. \u201cEvery child should have a book and we\u2019redetermined that every kid in Holbeck will have one by Christmas.\u201d
This scheme is the first time the company is selling something that isn\u2019t \u2018Pay What You Decide\u2019, but all monies will go back into printing more copies to sell and give away.
The featured track is "Piece of Home" by the wonderful Beth Kilburn.
https://www.slunglow.org/
https://www.slunglow.org/espbook/
https://www.facebook.com/SlunglowTheatre
https://www.twitter.com/slunglow
https://www.facebook.com/beth.kilburn.37
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