Damian Barr’s Literary Salon

RoofTop 5, in the Pinheiros district of São Paulo, was yesterday’s venue for Damian Barr’s Literary Salon with Polly Samson; the Brazilian edition of her book, Um ato de bondade, was published here last week.

When Polly and Damian arrived at the 27-storey cultural centre, the building was suffering a power cut and they were nervously ushered into the emergency lift. Thankfully, five minutes later the power came back on and all concerned with organising Damian’s first literary salon in South America breathed a collective sigh of relief.

Damian both surprised and delighted the capacity audience by donning a tweed kilt and matching Highland jacket, a brave choice given the heat. Polly read two extracts from her book, The Kindness, and Paula the translator did a great job of reading the Portuguese version.

And then it was time to introduce the ‘special guest’, “he is the man who sings the lyrics that Polly writes”, and then enters David stage right to a delighted and rather non-plussed audience. Damian asked David and Polly about their songwriting partnership and how the process works; David played some bars from early versions of Rattle That Lock and A Boat Lies Waiting to illustrate how the two of them create and shape the songs. After questions from the floor there was a lengthy book signing, and then back to the hotel to prepare for an early departure to Curitiba, the next concert on this South American trek.