War reporter, MP and envoy Martin Bell turns to poetry
The former BBC war correspondent, independent MP and Unicef ambassador, Martin Bell, will be reading from his recently-published poems at the Words by the Water literature festival at Keswick, running from 2-11 March. Last autumn Bell published For Whom The Bell Tolls, described as a “collection of light and dark verse” and a “personal response to his life”. Bell has written poems about Tony Bl...
29th February 2012
The Write Out Loud interview: Fiona Sampson
Leading poet Fiona Sampson talks to Frances Spurrier.
It's a concern of some magazine editors that there are many people writing poetry but not enough people reading it. Do you agree?
Poetry Review gets 60,000 submissions annually. It has 4,000 subscribers. Why is this? ...
29th February 2012
Liver Bards seek Liverpool poems
Liverpool poetry group the Liver Bards is looking for poems about the city for its free-to-enter poetry competition and publication in an anthology.
The Liver Bards, who meet at the Ship and Mi...
29th February 2012
Loose Muse women launch anthology
An anthology of new writing by women, featuring the work of 34 UK and international writers, will be launched at Whitechapel Art Gallery in east London, on Wednesday, 29 February, at 7pm. Loose Mus...
28th February 2012
Last call for submissions to new north-east magazine
A new poetry group in the north-east, Out The Box, is making a last call for submissions for the first issue of its magazine. It describes itself as a “platform for writers to get their words in pr...
28th February 2012
Louise Fazackerley at Write Out Loud Sale
Louise Fazackerly, winner of last year’s Wigan heat in the Superheroes of Slam competition; rising local star Eve Machin; and Rosie Garland, just back from performing in Las Vegas, are the three g...
28th February 2012
Don Parry at Write Out Loud Middleton
Don Parry will be providing poetry and music as special guest at Write Out Loud Middleton on Sunday, 26 February, at the Ring O’Bells, St Leonard’s Square, Middleton, at 7pm. Entry is a £2 donation...
25th February 2012
Naked Muse poets venture down south
There’s a first chance tonight for southerners to see images from the famous Naked Muse Calendar project – in which male poets posed and female poets appended poems - with a private view and charit...
23rd February 2012
£3,000 e-book poetry prize competition
Poetic Republic has launched a new type of poetry competition, with participants as the judges and the resulting anthology being an e-book in various formats such as Kindle, iPad, etc.
Each pie...
22nd February 2012
Interesting competition from Templar
An unusual approach, and one to be welcomed perhaps: poems can be previously published and submitted simultaneously elsewhere in this interesting Templar competition. This means you can submit you...
22nd February 2012
Book now for a Poetry School course
Booking for the new term at the Poetry School opened this week. There are poetry courses, workshops and tutorials in London, Manchester, Leeds, Newcastle, Edinburgh, Durham, Oxford, Birmingham, Bri...
20th February 2012
Jarvis Cocker to give free reading in Cambridge
Pulp frontman and cultural man about town Jarvis Cocker will be reading from his song lyrics on Wednesday 22 February, at 7pm, at the Lady Mitchell Hall, West Road, Cambridge. Entry is free, with n...
19th February 2012
John Hegley at Otley Word Feast
An appearance by poet and comedian John Hegley and an open mic competition, plus a writing workshop are the poetic highlights of Otley Word Feast taking place from 9-11 March in the centre of the ...
13th February 2012
Places available on Arran poetry week
If you’re quick, there are 12 extra places available on the Arran Poetry Adventure, a week-long residential poetry/workshop event on the island of Arran in August. Organised by experienced publishe...
13th February 2012
Cardiff poetry competition comes with £5,000 first prize
Sinead Morrissey and Patrick McGuinness are the judges for this year’s Cardiff International Poetry Competition. The deadline is 2 March, and the first prize is £5,000, for a poem up to 50 lines. E...
13th February 2012
Star line-up at StAnza 2012's Poetry Cafe
Top performance poets will be joining the stellar line-up at StAnza 2012, which takes place over five packed days in March, with more than 90 events around the historic centre of the university tow...
13th February 2012
Welcome to Britain theme for Buxton competition
Welcome to Britain is the theme for the Buxton festival poetry competition, deadline 6 April, in recognition of the Queen’s diamond jubilee and the Olympics. The organisers say: “Use this theme to...
11th February 2012
Eric Ormsby's vultures, cod-worms and baboons
The vulture and the cod-worm and other unsavoury creatures will be celebrated by Eric Ormsby when he reads from his collection The Baboons of Hada at Manchester’s Poet and Players at the Whitworth...
11th February 2012
Helping the homeless: poetry contest that makes a difference
There are just a couple of days left to enter a competition that is helping to keep open two London cold weather shelters in the Camden and King's Cross areas. In its first year the Lumen/Camden po...
11th February 2012
Wanted: the Dickens of a poet
In case you didn’t already know, this week marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Dickens - and we at Write Out Loud thought it time to remind you that he wrote a few poems, too. Here...
10th February 2012
Oxford professor Hill takes Carol Ann Duffy to task
Oxford’s professor of poetry, Sir Geoffrey Hill, has rapped Carol Ann Duffy, the poet laureate, over the knuckles over her linking of modern poetry with texting. In a lecture at Oxford entitled Poe...
10th February 2012
Lexicon of love at the Heart cafe
In honour of Valentine's Day, Becky Cherriman, pictured, is offering a poetic journey through the lexicon of love at the Heart café, Bennett Road, Headingley, Leeds, at 8pm on Friday 10 February....
10th February 2012
Jane Draycott and Bernard O'Donoghue to judge Troubadour prize
Jane Draycott and Bernard O’Donoghue will judge this year’s Troubadour poetry prize, deadline 15 October 2012. The prizes are 1st £2,500, 2nd £500, 3rd £250, plus 20 prizes of £20 each, plus a spr...
9th February 2012
The family way: Darby and Yates at Write Out Loud Wigan
Siblings John Darby and Christine Yates will be keeping it in the family when they take on the role of joint comperes at the Tudor, New Market Street, on Thursday night, 9 February, at Write Out Lo...
8th February 2012
Arts Council restores Poetry Society funding
The Poetry Society has had its funding restored by the Arts Council after a period of calm following the row last summer that led to a spate of resignations, an emergency general meeting, and the b...
8th February 2012
Nobel Prize-winning poet, Wislawa Szymborska, obituary
Nobel Prize-winning poet, Wislawa Szymborska, has died aged 88 in her native Krakow, Poland.
Merseyside Polonia, on behalf of Merseyside’s Polish community would like to express sadness at such...
6th February 2012
Prole magazine looks for new laureate
Young northern poet Andrew McMillan will judge Prole magazine’s Laureate poetry competition. Its closing date is 1 March. Prole is looking for a poet who challenges, entertains and whose work appea...
6th February 2012
Once More With Feeling at Bury College
Five north-west performance poets – Gemma Lees, Jess Green, Scott Devon, Rod Tame and Charlotte Henson – will be appearing in Once More With Feeling, the first performance poetry event at Bury Coll...
6th February 2012
STOP PRESS: Helen Oswald WON'T be at the Coffee Shop
We are informed that Helen is ill so will miss this evening, though we believe the rest of the programme will continue, with Melinda Walker and Dave Pelling, and your host Ken Champion. Contact: ke...
6th February 2012
Beg, steal or borrow a Troubadour ticket
London's Troubadour coffee house was THE place to be seen for the folksinger/songwriter of the 60s and early 70s. Where Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, Paul Simon, Tom Paxton, Joni Mitchell, Bert Jansch, ...
4th February 2012
Death of Geoff Stevens, editor of Purple Patch
Geoff Stevens, poet and editor of the small press poetry magazine Purple Patch for the last 35 years, has died in a hospice in Birmingham after a short illness.
His partner, Geraldine Wall, sai...
3rd February 2012
Chinese dissident faces jail for poem on Skype
A Chinese dissident who sent out a poem on Skype called It’s Time is facing a stiff jail sentence for “inciting subversion of state power”. Activist Zhu Yufu went on trial on Tuesday this week in H...
1st February 2012
