Ash Dickinson

Biography

Ash Dickinson has been full-time as a poet since 2008. He is a multiple slam champion, including Edinburgh, Cheltenham, the Museum of Scotland and BBC Radio. He has performed in Australia, Canada, USA, New Zealand, Spain, Jordan, the Czech Republic, Denmark, The Netherlands and Germany, and headlined many shows and festivals throughout the UK. Ash is in great demand to run writing workshops in schools, galleries, museums, prisons and with writing groups. His debut collection, ‘Slinky Espadrilles’, was the very first title published by Burning Eye Books. His second major collection, ‘Strange Keys’, came out in 2016 and a collection for younger years, ‘Show Cats In Transit’, followed in 2019. His newest collection, ‘Instructions For Outlaws’, was published in May 2022. PUBLICATIONS • ‘Slinky Espadrilles’ (2012) • ‘Strange Keys’ (2016) • ‘Show Cats In Transit’ (2019) • ‘Instructions For Outlaws’ (2022) • Full-time professional poet since 2008, published four times by Burning Eye Books, (burningeyebooks.wordpress.com). EDUCATION • Ash runs poetry and writing workshops in a variety of educational and cultural settings to include: o Schools and colleges (nursery, primary, junior, middle, secondary, special) o Museums and Galleries, through art education o Adult education, to include prisons, writing groups, libraries. • His poetry workshops were a case study in the Bloomsbury-published classroom aid, ‘Making Poetry Happen’ (2015). • Ash has been invited to showcase his workshops to Heads of English conferences for several local authorities to include Hertfordshire, Devon, Cheshire, Hull, as well as the Rugby Group. • Requested by international schools, Ash has been flown abroad to deliver work in Germany, Jordan, Spain, Denmark, The Netherlands and the Czech Republic. • Since 2006, Ash has visited schools/educational establishments in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and to every county of England, including Hertfordshire (34 different schools, 64 visits in total) and Lincolnshire (38 different schools, 77 visits in total), frequently returning to schools year after year e.g. Sheffield High School for Girls in South Yorkshire (16 visits), developing relationships with staff, students and the school communities. In 2018 he worked with 88 schools across the calendar year. • Ash was poet-in-residence between 2019 and 2021 at Coatbridge High School. He ran 17 sessions with a group of S3 students in-person, then through Teams as lockdown took effect, adapting to the quickly changing learning climate, adopting new practices and sustaining and maintaining relationships with students, pre-selected to improve their wellbeing and confidence, at a time of demanding mental health, stress and uncertainty for teen students. • For thirteen years running, Ash has featured at the Swindon Youth Festival of Literature performing and encouraging groups of up to 250 Year 7s- over 2,500 in total over the week- to write and express themselves. • Ash runs workshops relating to performance poetry, more traditional forms and general creative writing. He runs slams, judges competitions, gives addresses and emcees showcase events for parents. Ash looks at lyric writing and rap, works cross-curricular, and runs poetry analysis sessions relating to the curriculum for Scottish Highers, A-Level and GCSE (AQA, Edexcel, WJEC, unseen poetry etc). WELLBEING, MENTAL HEALTH AND AWARENESS • Ash ran poetry workshops in 2018 and 2019 in West Sussex as part of a ‘Wellbeing Day’, alongside other practitioners running tai-chi, meditation, art and yoga. • In 2019 and 2020 Ash was employed by Lapworth Museum of Geology in Birmingham to run ‘Museums And Wellbeing’ sessions with various local schools, improving confidence, assertiveness, self-esteem, communication and social skills through discovery and writing. • Ash was the guest performer and event opener at an ‘Aye Write’ event on the theme of ‘Happiness and Laughter’ at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall in 2019. • Ash has repeatedly worked in Ingfield Manor, a specialist school in East Sussex, engaging with students aged between 8-19 with neurological impairments such as cerebral palsy. Almost all of these young people are non-verbal. Elsewhere, he has worked widely with groups of students with a variety of complex needs including dyslexia, dyspraxia and ADHD. • He has (to date) run twenty-five sessions with Aviation Heritage Lincolnshire, working with local schools and RAF bases and historical sites to raise awareness of conflict and its impact on people’s lives. • Ash works with Glasgow Library Services, for whom he has (to date) run twelve sessions since 2018, several of these in connection with Amnesty International, educating and highlighting inequality and injustice and working to themes of freedom, power, change and respect. • Ash works with offenders in prison and with drink and drug rehabilitation groups and has working experience with the recovery community. Further evidence of his ability to work in challenging environments comes from a twenty-plus year performance career that has included stand-up comedy audiences and venues. • In May 2024 Ash ran a workshop during lunchtime for staff as part of a work’s wellbeing awareness week. • In September 2024 Ash worked with the Bethany Christian Trust running a workshop with a creative writing group some of whose members have experienced homelessness. PERFORMANCE • Ash is a multiple slam champion including BBC Radio, Cheltenham, Edinburgh and the Museum of Scotland. • He has headlined many shows and festivals throughout the UK and abroad to include Australia, Canada (where he had a six-date headline tour), the United States, New Zealand and Germany. • His performances include several appearances at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the Bristol Poetry Festival, the Cheltenham Poetry Festival, the Stratford Poetry Festival, the Glasgow Comedy Festival, StAnza, The Larmer Tree, The Wickerman, The Freedom Festival and The Camden Crawl. Ash has performed at venues such as Ronnie Scott’s (London), The Colston Hall (Bristol), Oran Mor (Glasgow), Jupiter Artland (West Lothian), The Engine Shed (Lincoln) and The Jazz Cafe (London). "Impressive wordplay" - The Times “Clever and funny” – The Scotsman “Brilliantly surreal invention...fabulous poems” - Edinburgh Evening News "Hilarious social commentary and wicked wordplay…a master of stand-up poetry” – Apples And Snakes "A very cool combination of rap, rhyme, repetition and wry wit...Dickinson proves not only to be an incredibly gifted poet, but also a great comedian with a sharp eye for social commentary" - Winnipeg Free Press "Ash Dickinson is a performance poet for the Lost Generation. If you haven't seen him, you haven't seen performance poetry" - Federation of Writers (Scotland) "Could do for poetry what Bill Hicks did for comedy" - The Skinny "Page Against The Machine": ?si=_WySqZ1Ed04Y3GxA "Method Poet": "In Prison":

Samples

METHOD POET as Britain’s foremost method poet I immerse myself deeply in any subject I tackle I become one with my words I disappear for my revered epic on barnacles I attached myself to the underside of a peeling trawler for four months eating only ocean detritus and phytoplankton if you see me at times like these and think it is me it is not- I have gone native my life is essentially dedication and sacrifice striking a balance between art and life the first casualty was my first wife she didn’t understand that for me to understand office supplies...fully I had to lie in a cabinet for close on a year living, breathing, being a Post-It note I was rewarded with the four finest lines ever written about stationery - and still she left me you grieve, you hurt like acid and you move on the poems keep you warm wife number two I met on location I’d been a plastic bag and the moon and I’d been the sea now I was researching the climatic impact of festival goers on native plants by attending Glastonbury in the guise of a field poppy she’d stooped knelt over and smelt me cradled me delicately like I was new born I was so overcome I had to break character if you catch me off-guard I will tell you she never loved me more than when I was a flower people ask how we cope all this time apart but she understands this is art this is what I must do occasionally I return to our house and find odd things there unfamiliar hairs pressed into the bedding photos from our wedding placed face-down on the mantelpiece a sock, strange keys and I think these are props objects that I once was or one day may be and I’m again clinging on like a barnacle once more I’m all at sea

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