Arts have 'key future role'

Sorrowful New Yorkers left poems for attack victims

The arts have a key role in rebuilding society after the US attacks of 11 September, a government minister has said.

Arts Minister Tessa Blackstone was talking on the future of the arts at the Cheltenham Festival of Literature on Friday.

In a time when people were re-evaluating the future, she said, the arts were relevant and "much more than trivial".

Baroness Blackstone: Arts "encapsulate life"

"In times of both crisis and joy we turn to the arts; to rebuild communities, to celebrate, to remember, to grieve, to record, to bond and to heal," she said.

"We turn to the arts to remind us of beauty and goodness, to express our emotions and to lift our spirits."

She referred to poems to the victims pinned up in the centre of New York after the World Trade Center disaster.

"People so often turn to poetry as a means of dealing with the loss of someone they love.

"I do therefore believe in the stories that the arts can tell.

"But I also believe in the lives they can rebuild, the courage and comfort they can give and the memories that they can keep alive. The arts after all encapsulate life."

In her speech, Ms Blackstone also said the arts had a role to play in dealing with the problems of inequality, social exclusion and poverty.

She also stressed how they could improve educational performance, employability, law-abiding activity and better health.

The Cheltenham Festival of Literature is the UK's biggest annual literary festival and attracts thousands of people each year.