Bowing out: Winston's message to all his friends on WOL
Write Out Loud's Winston Plowes - the man who puts out the WOL welcome mat for new members - has decided to relinquish his role as long-serving membership supremo at the end of the year because of his increasing workload and other commitments. WOL's founder, Julian Jordon, paid tribute to "my good friend Winston" as a stalwart of the WOL admin team, to his "concern for others" and "desire to he...
30th November 2011
Armitage fears online poetry piracy
One of Britain’s top poets has warned that the growing popularity of ebooks is threatening to put writers out of business. Simon Armitage told a book festival in India that making books available in digital form means authors could find their works being shared for free.
Armitage said that th...
28th November 2011
Calendar boys: Write Out Loud at the naked launch
It’s not often a girl gets to watch a man strip whilst tucking into cheese and grapes, washed down with fine wine… so when Julian Jordon suggested that Joy France and I should take a trip into Manc...
24th November 2011
Poems that will spook you: anthology of ghouls and ghosties
The Spoken Word and Stairwell Books are looking for poems, short stories and essays for their anthology on ghouls and ghosties, and things that go bump in the night. The anthology will be published...
24th November 2011
New Stanza group launched in Surrey
A new Stanza group in the Guildford, Woking and Chobham area of Surrey for those who want to listen to each other's poetry in a supportive environment and exchange feedback and publishing tips ...
24th November 2011
Magma marks big anniversary with poetry contest
The deadline is 30 November for two poetry contests run by Magma, to celebrate the past 50 issues of the magazine. The Magma judge’s prize is for a poem up to 80 lines. All poems submitted will au...
22nd November 2011
Roy Harper and the politics of poetry
Are poets supposed to do something, to make a difference? Watching Singer/Songwriters on the BBC just now made me look at Roy Harper’s website. I first inhaled his work with the smoke from my house...
22nd November 2011
Help wanted! We're looking for an assistant on WOL's Gig Guide
Feel you spend a lot of time on the computer and would like to put some of that time to more productive, satisfying use? Write Out Loud is looking for someone to help out our Gig Guide editor, Davi...
16th November 2011
Get into jail, free: workshops for performance poets
Poetry organisation Apples and Snakes is running two masterclasses in the north-west for poets interested in working in prisons. Breaking In, the beginners’ session, is led by Segun Lee-French, and...
15th November 2011
The male muse: poetic chaps bare more than their souls for charity
Forty-one UK-based poets and photographers have united to create a unique charity calendar to raise money for diabetes research. The calendar, which is being unveiled on Saturday in Manchester, was...
15th November 2011
A Means To An End launch at Chorlton book festival
Chorlton library in south Manchester will be rocking on Tuesday 15 November at 7pm when Write Out Loud regulars Andy N and Jeff Dawson’s group A Means To An End launch their first book of poetry – ...
15th November 2011
Mimi Khalvati at Derwent Poetry Festival
Mimi Khalvati is guest poet on Saturday night at the Derwent Poetry Festival, from 11-13 November, at Masson Mills, Matlock Bath, which celebrates the publication of new poetry titles from Templar...
12th November 2011
Paragram's first step in Chertsey
Down in the depths of Surrey something is stirring. Paragram writers are staging A Toe in the Water, an evening of poetry and stories, at the Chertsey Bookshop in Guildford Street, Chertsey, on Fri...
11th November 2011
Open-mic course near half-price - cancellation
We have had two last-minute cancellations so can offer two half-price places for the open-mic poetry course, from 14-19 November, at £195. replies by Wednesday evening latest. First come, first ser...
10th November 2011
Live in Dorset? Here's a competition for you
Bournemouth Festival of Words is running a poetry competition – for adults and children - for those living in Dorset, in advance of the festival itself which takes place in April next year. The the...
8th November 2011
Write Out Loud celebrates another record month
Write Out Loud has had another record-busting month. Almost 1,000 visits per day to this site in October – 30,616 in total - from a record 12,339 unique individual users, a bulging Gig Guide, recor...
4th November 2011
Mersey poet memories: Freda Davis at Sowerby Bridge
A writer whose first work was published in a Liverpool magazine in 1963 alongside Roger McGough and Brian Patten is guest poet at Puzzle Hall Poets open mic night at Sowerby Bridge on Monday 7 Nove...
4th November 2011
The word's on stage: four poets unveil new work
Poetry organisation Apples and Snakes presents The Word’s a Stage - four poets present four new pieces of writing that they’ve shaped over a series of masterclasses with top poetry producer Mike Ki...
4th November 2011
Spam, spam, spam, spam…
Thanks to you all for pointing it out to me.
I was hoping to tell you that Stephaine the spammer should now be gone from all your comments and profiles, as we did a global ‘remove’ yesterday, b...
3rd November 2011
Pygmy Hippopotamus at the Betsey
David Gilbert, one of the three winners of the inaugural Iota Shot Short Pamphlet Awards in 2011, is launching Liberian Pygmy Hippopotamus on Friday 4 November at 7pm, upstairs at that popular Lon...
3rd November 2011
Larkin, Heaney - and Jarvis Cocker at Faber
Poetry publishers Faber and Faber – think Philip Larkin and Seamus Heaney, among many others – have appointed Jarvis Cocker, frontman of Pulp, as editor-at-large. Faber has also just launched a boo...
2nd November 2011
Open Mic and the Mechanics, in Cornwall
Following its runaway success last month, the second shift of a regular monthly event will be sinking a new shaft of poetry at Miners and Mechanics’ Institute, St Agnes, Cornwall on Tuesday, 1st No...
1st November 2011
