LiveCanon 2018 Christmas Poetry Treasure Hunt!
Tomorrow is the first day of December... and that means it is time for the LiveCanon Poetry Treasure Hunt to start. So if you would like to take part, make sure you are signed up, and poems will start arriving in your inbox. A poem a day might just be even more exciting than the chocolate in your advent calendar...
Livecanon are an ensemble performing poetry at theatres, festivals and events t...
30th November 2018
Famous Pub Crawl Brought to the Page
A popular Yorkshire pub crawl has inspired a new verse novella by award-winning Leeds poet - and Write Out Loud member - Joe Williams. 'An Otley Run' is based on the colourful characters Williams has encountered along the route of the famous Otley Run, which takes in pubs along the A660 Otley Road ...
30th November 2018
Jinx: Abigail Parry, Bloodaxe
Abigail Parry’s debut collection introduces Spook, Jack of Hearts, Snake, Goat, Bette Davis and others in a cast of characters fictional, cinematic and historical, threatening and threatened, monstrou...
30th November 2018
A History of Gay Poetry, 2: Two Giants
For centuries homosexuality was confined to an underworld, to the back streets, sleazy establishments, nuances where a covert existence could be lived out avoiding the condemnation of law and society....
29th November 2018
American Life in Poetry: The Girl From Panama
Clemens Starck of Oregon has fifty years' experience working with his hands, as a merchant seaman and then a carpenter, and he knows work and working people. Here's a typical poem, from his collected...
29th November 2018
Poems for the NHS: ed. Matt Barnard, Onslaught Press
Anthologies seem to be coming out thick and fast these days, often supporting the best of causes. Although it’s not possible to review them all, or even report their publication, here is one that cert...
27th November 2018
Poetry and the Affirmation of Life
The impulse to write poetry, for me, begins with a crisis of meaning. I use the word crisis in the original Greek sense of making a decision (krisis). One is faced with the possibility that nothing is...
27th November 2018
A Gold Creative Future For Our Own Jade Cuttle!
When someone from the Write Out Loud editorial team wins an award, please forgive us, but we like to make a little bit of a fuss about it! Well this time it is Jade Cuttle, our very own Contributing ...
27th November 2018
Our Poem of the Week is ‘Scooter Club and the Lost Boys’ by Beno
Beno describes himself as 'very new to reading and writing poetry'. His poem Scooter Club and the Lost Boys is still our poem of the week, though! It's a piece which pulses with energy. Read it and yo...
27th November 2018
Meet Rwanda's Rising Young Poets
If you know the likes of Caleb Femi, Solomon O.B, and Hollie McNish, then you know there's no denying the fact that the popularity of spoken or performed poetry is on the rise. Young poet and 2013 SLA...
26th November 2018
The Malvern Aviator: Richard Skinner, Smokestack
Opening The Malvern Aviator, Richard Skinner’s new Smokestack pamphlet, the words ‘not for the faint-hearted’ came into my mind. For this is not an easy read: Skinner’s eclectic gathering of source m...
23rd November 2018
Out of the Ashes: Frieda Hughes, Bloodaxe
In her extensive and valuable foreword to Out of the Ashes, which brings together work from four previous collections, Frieda Hughes explains that the importance of her parents’ poetry only dawned on ...
23rd November 2018
American Life in Poetry - Wild Creatures
I love accounts of people meeting up with wild creatures, as in Elizabeth Bishop's great poem, "The Moose," and here's another such encounter from Sonja Johanson, who is from Maine. Johanson's most r...
20th November 2018
‘Glenbrittle - the loch’ by Alan Travis Braddock is our Poem of the Week
Alan Travis Braddock has only started posting his work on Write Out Loud very recently – Glenbrittle - the loch is the second poem he's shared with us – but he's been writing for much longer, as his r...
19th November 2018
Bella: Nellie Cole, Offa's Press
The use of pause breaks instead of punctuation was the first thing that struck me about this debut collection from West Midlands poetry workshop leader and mentor, Nellie Cole. That may sound strange ...
19th November 2018
A History of Gay Poetry, 1: A Bare Canvas
The history of gay poetry lives in obscurity as it has only been in recent times and notably in the western world where it has emerged from dark isolation and condemnation. It would be impossible for ...
19th November 2018
2019 Words Weekend Announced for the North-East
Leading spoken word event producers Fane Productions today announce plans for WORDS WEEKEND, a series of festivals the first of which will take place at Sage Gateshead on 25 – 27 October 2019. Words W...
16th November 2018
American Life in Poetry: The Appearance of Modernism
Until about a hundred years ago, the worth of a poem was measured by how noble and elevated was its subject and its manner of delivery, but with the appearance of modernism all hell broke loose and su...
16th November 2018
Wilfred Owen and the Poetry of Trauma
Poets are often blessed and cursed with taking up a position at odds with public opinion. In and through their writing, they are often able to articulate sentiments that, otherwise, remain censored. T...
16th November 2018
Poetry & The Great War, a series: 6 Victory?
¨One is left with the horrible feeling now that war settles nothing, that to win a war is as disastrous as to lose one ¨.
On the 11 th day of the 11th month in the Year of Our Lord 1918 the Great W...
16th November 2018
None Of My Business: Jade Cuttle talks to Jo Burns
I reviewed Jo Burns' pamphlet, Circling for Gods, for Magma and found it so fascinating that I simply had to learn more. Born in Northern Ireland in 1976, Jo Burns won the McClure Poetry Prize at the ...
16th November 2018
SPOTLIGHT: Poets Out Loud in Cockermouth
‘Poets Out Loud’ has been running in Cockermouth since September 2017. I spoke to Annie Kendall about how the night got started, and continues to grow.
EP:- So, what made you think you sho...
16th November 2018
All That Jazz and Other Poems: Adrian Green, The Littoral Press
The first poem in the first poetry book I bought, way back in the early 1970s, consisted of two lines: “He breathed in air, he breathed out light./Charlie Parker was my delight.” The poet was Adrian M...
16th November 2018
Devoid of Meaning and Dangerously Immoral
I have a deeply dark confession… I’m a poet, but I don’t read poetry. Furthermore unless they have videos on Youtube I probably haven’t heard of your favourite poets.
I mentioned in a previous post...
15th November 2018
Cut off Your Telephone, WH Auden in Theatres
The Habit of Art by Alan Bennett **** (Four stars)
The Original Theatre Company. Belgrade Theatre Coventry
These days it is somewhat rare to find the world of poetry represented in mai...
12th November 2018
Collected Poems: Ken Smith, Bloodaxe
How does one sum up the collected works of a writer when the book weighs in at a massive 630-odd pages of richly various poetry, in a way that truly does the man justice? From his first collection, Ke...
12th November 2018
Re-introducing Poetry in Higher Education
My earliest memory of creative writing is that it was a punishment for forgetting my P.E. kit. As I watched the other children playing outside on the field, I was perplexed at how the task I had been ...
12th November 2018
Mappa Mundi Poetica
Wolverhampton poetry collective 'Poets, Prattlers, and Pandemonialists' have always been passionate about the West Midlands and inspired by the energy, drive, and imagination of the people who live t...
12th November 2018
The Write Out Loud Poem of the Week is ‘Words’ by Jon Stainsby
This Monday sees poet Jon Stainsby chosen for the second time, with his piece Words awarded Poem of the Week. Our congratulations to Jon, who is another of our contributors living outside the UK, and ...
12th November 2018
Poetry & The Great War, a series: 5 Harsh Realities
As the conflict progressed it became a war of attrition, a war of little or no movement. It degenerated into a living hell for all concerned whether they be ally or enemy as no one was exempt the perp...
9th November 2018
The Joy of Writing - Polish Poetry Festival
I left this festival with an overwhelming sense - a reminder for me - of the joy of writing. Which is handy really, that being the festival title. In Polish it’s Radosc Pisania, the title taken from W...
8th November 2018
Free to Enter Life-Writing Prize from Spread The Word
The Spread the Word Life Writing Prize run in association with Goldsmiths Writers’ Centre, aims to find the best life writing from emerging writers from across the UK. The Prize defines life writing a...
7th November 2018
New anthology inspired by outsiders to help Shelter, Crisis Aid
Poetry publisher Isabelle Kenyon has launched a new anthology, Persona Non Grata, which is aimed at raising funds for Shelter and Crisis Aid UK. She said: “The book was inspired by the theme of societ...
7th November 2018
American Life in Poetry: Here and There
Do others of you think about what you'll miss when you leave this life? For me it will be the great skies over my part of the world. Here's Emily Grosholz's take on this, from her new book The Stars o...
6th November 2018
Don't Oil The Hinges: Heather Wastie, Black Pear Press
It’s not a question of sitting around, waiting for the muse to turn up. As a local poet laureate you have to get on with the job, look for inspiration in all sorts of places. That’s one of the message...
5th November 2018
The House of Ghosts and Mirrors: Oz Hardwick, Valley Press
This collection is haunted by 50 years of the poet’s psychic and physical life. It starts at the end of life, and finishes with his birth, when he screamed “a slapped baby scream / that clawed my thro...
5th November 2018
Album Release From Unusual Contemporary Poetry and Piano Duo
On Friday November 9th 2018, Testing the Delicates will be released worldwide on digital platforms, the first album by Fall in Green, an unusual music act of contemporary poetry combined with classica...
5th November 2018
Festivals: The Mild Irritation Behind the Joy
As readers of these pages may have observed, this summer I have kept myself very busy visiting, and writing about, quite a few poetry and literature festivals all over the UK. From the humble StoneFe...
5th November 2018
The Write Out Loud Poem of the Week is ‘The Dogs of Athens’ by John Short
This week, the poem The Dogs of Athens looks back to the time John Short spent living in that city, and brings it beautifully to life. We hope you enjoy reading it as much as we did. Our thanks to Joh...
5th November 2018
Poetry & The Great War, a series: 4 The Home Front
The absence of great numbers of men resulted in changes on the Home Front where they were replaced by women in many of the essential industries. At the height of the war one million women worked in mu...
3rd November 2018
Notes from a Poetry Crowd Surfer
I had started looking into the idea of reading my poetry, however there were seemingly a few obstacles in my way. The first being my self-confidence and speech impairment, the second being I didn’t t...
2nd November 2018
Knowing and Unknowing Performance with Nick Makoha
If you have attended any poetry festivals or events this summer there is a good chance you may already have had the pleasure of seeing and hearing Nick Makoha. Much of his poetry paints pictures of p...
1st November 2018
