The Queen celebrated the “incurable itch for writing” that earned a group of talented teenagers awards in a global essay competition.
Camilla hosted the Queen’s Commonwealth essay competition presentation ceremony at St James’s Palace, where singer-songwriter Joan Armatrading, former Spice Girl Geri Horner and acclaimed children’s author Dame Jacqueline Wilson were among the celebrities reading the winning entries and runner-ups.
The King’s consort told the young essayists: “All of you here know all about the ‘incurable itch for writing’ and you know exactly what you are going to do with it – you have put it to excellent use, conjuring up people, places, myths and magic to describe, ‘Our Commonwealth Journey’.
“And in so doing, you have taken your readers on our own travels, from Namibia to New Zealand, from Pakistan to Papua New Guinea, from St Lucia to India, opening our eyes to life in every part of the globe.
“As our Commonwealth continues on its remarkable journey, I am certain that each one of our brilliant finalists has an exciting future ahead of you, using your literary skills to express your concerns and ambitions, to make the unknown accessible and to fill us with hope for the days to come.”
Vivaan Agarwal, 14, from Jaipur, India was named as the junior winner and the runner up was 14-year-old Lakshmi Manognya Achanta from Singapore, while Kaira Puri, 17, from New Delhi was the senior winner with Pandora Onyedire, 17, from Lagos in Nigeria the runner up.
Janet Cooper, chairwoman of the Royal Commonwealth Society (RCS), which has staged the essay competition since 1883, described the 53,434 entries this year from 54 Commonwealth nations as “truly remarkable”.
House of Commons speaker Sir Lindsay Hoyle was among the guests after he gave the winners and runner-ups a tour of the Commons earlier in the week.
He said: “They are the next generation who will deliver, the Commonwealth is safe in their hands – I genuinely mean that, they are the inspiration for the future.
“I said to them ‘will you remember me when you’re famous?'”.
During the awards reception Geri Horner chatted to author William Boyd and recounted how the acclaimed writer supported the development of the first of her Rosie Frost novel series, after they met at a Buckingham Palace event some years ago.
The singer said: “He helped me with my first novel. I went up to him and said ‘would you mind reading my first manuscript?’.”
She added: “He was so kind to me, he read it and said ‘you need to rewrite the whole thing in the third person and in the past tense’ and I was like ‘oh my god’ but it was a game changer.”
Joan Armatrading praised the young writers, describing them as “brilliant”, and said: “This is something that’s in them, that they want to express and they’re lucky enough and talented enough and good enough to be able to put that expression on paper.”
“If people are thinking ‘I’m 14, I have a good imagination, I really want to write’ – just do it.”
