Four Dorset poets will be reading a selection of Thomas Hardy’s strange and electrifying verse alongside their own work. Their poems, responses to Hardy's fiction, poetry and the landscape in which he lived and worked, create an animated conversation, reflecting the man, his legend and his words.

Paul Hyland, Kate Scott, Catherine Simmonds and Pam Zinnemann-Hope will be performing at the United Reform Church in South Street on July 29 at 7.30pm as part of the Thomas Hardy conference.

‘Who's In The Next Room?’ was developed during a National Trust/Poetry Society residency at Hardy’s Cottage in Higher Bockhampton.

It was originally performed at Max Gate, the house Hardy designed for himself in Dorchester.

A book of poems from ‘Who’s In The Next Room?’ is due from Happenstance in the September 2010.

Paul Hyland is a poet, travel writer and biographer. Kate Scott's collection, Stitches, was published by Peterloo Poets. Catherine Simmonds’ poetry has been published in journals in the UK and USA.

Her collection of prose poems are drawn from the diaries of Dorothy Wordsworth.

Pam Zinnemann-Hope is a children's author and playwright. Her poems have been published in a pamphlet, in anthologies and magazines.