The Drowned Places with Damian Le Bas

Wayward: The Drowned Places: Diving in Search of Atlantis with Damian Le Bas

Join us in welcoming writer and filmmaker Damian Le Bas to discuss his latest book The Drowned Places, exploring the meaning we find in sunken ruins around the world and their connection to history and myth.

The Drowned Places

Thousands of years ago, an island off the Straits of Gibraltar went to war with Athens. The battle was lost, and overnight the island sank beneath the waves – or so legend tells.

As a boy, Damian Le Bas was captivated by the story of Atlantis. As an adult, he dreams of diving to discover its ruins. After the death of his father, torn between his lifelong desire and the taboo Romany culture places on the ocean, he comes across a dive shop. He can’t help but go in.

Under the waves, Damian enters a breathtaking world. As he masters the skills of this exhilarating sport, diving with seals in the Farne Islands, exploring submerged Roman ruins in Naples and mapping the sunken city of Port Royal, he is entranced by wonders both man-made and natural. Plato's writings on Atlantis were a parable about the hubris of humankind; in witnessing our effects on oceans and ocean communities, Damian finds echoes of this in the modern world.

A spellbinding love letter to diving, The Drowned Places is also a profound examination of the power that myth has over us, and what happens when it crosses over into reality.

About Damian 

Damian Le Bas is a writer, filmmaker and visual artist. His book The Stopping Places won the Somerset Maughan Award, a Royal Society of Literature Jerwood Award, and was shortlisted for the Stanford Dolman Travel Book of the Year. Damian is widely published as a journalist and poet and has taught for the Arvon foundation. A recipient of a Society of Authors Travelling Scholarship, he is a member of the European Film Academy, holds a first-class degree in Theology from the University of Oxford, and was awarded an honorary Master of Education by the University of Chichester.

Besides getting in the sea, he loves music, walking, and spending time in the woods and hills with his family and friends. The Drowned Places is his second book.

Books will be available at the event or at Falmouth Bookseller from 17th April

For more information about Wayward Book Festival head to Wayward Book Festival – Falmouth's celebration of wild and wilful stories

The Drowned Places with Damian Le Bas

Wednesday 30th April, 6:30pm

The Poly, Falmouth

Tickets: £8

A £1 Poly Fund payment is added to each ticket sold. A 50p booking fee is also applied per ticket for online and telephone transactions.

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