The extraordinary poet and storyteller, John Row, has arrived in Tenby. John - who has performed around the world - aims to make the spoken word as exciting as the electronic world many of today's children inhabit. Far from passive, his listeners become participants in the poetry and storytelling as he draws them into a pattern of call and response he has developed over three decades of school visits. In the classroom, he holds his audiences spellbound as they travel through a multicultural landscape of wonder tales and mythology. At festivals of all varieties John works with both children and adults and is as happy to walk around a field - or a beach - telling tales and reciting poems to families as he is to be on the stage. The author of a book of children's poems, 'The Pong Machine', he is currently travelling the land collecting memories in communities to use in epic poems and CDs. John is 'text-collecting', as he calls it, on Tenby's South beach on the first four Wednesdays of August. He wants to use the thoughts, memories and dreams of the people he will meet there and fashion them into the 2006 Tenby Beach Poem. "I feel sure that the residents of Tenby and the visitors to the town will not be lost for words," said John. John's visits are accompanied by the school library bus parked next to the café on the South beach. On each Wednesday that John appears, children's books are available for anyone to read on the beach. Children visiting the bus are also be able to sign up to this summer's reading challenge. They can also take part in 'The Reading Mission' in Pembrokeshire libraries. For more information on John Row's visits or the reading summer challenge, contact Pembrokeshire County Council arts officer, Christine Willison, on 01437 775246. Email [email protected]">[email protected] or schools librarian Pam Harry on 01437 775243. Email [email protected]">[email protected]