Guerrilla poets will be roaming Gatehouse of Fleet on Saturday 26 May as part of the Dumfries and Galloway festival’s Big Lit Day in the town. The poets will be accosting folk – in the nicest possible way – in hairdressers, on doorsteps, in bars and along the High Street during the day. In addition there will be poets reading from their own work or launching books, including Katrina Porteous (pictured), John Hudson, and Hugh McMillan, a publishers market of the cream of Scottis...

Charlotte Henson is guest poet at Write Out Loud Bolton on Sunday 20 May, at its new home of the Booklyn pub, in Green Lane, Bolton. Guest MC is Bill Brierley, and event mastermind is Jeff Dawson (Jefferama!) Entry is £1 for this bi-monthly open mic event, and doors open at 7pm for the 7.30 start. Contact: jeffinbolton@yahoo.com or 07984197175 Map...

Write Out Loud Marsden, right in the heart of Simon Armitage country and Pennine poetry trails, reconvenes on Wednesday 16 May under the expert eye of WOL co-founder Julian Jordon. The open mic event encourages beginners and is open to all to read a poem – your own or a favourite – and also to tellers of short tales, and singer-songwriters. Entry is £2. It starts at 7.30pm, Marsden library, Marsden Mechanics Hall. Map...

With Hay imminent, does the world need another Literature Festival? The answer appears to be yes as Ways with Words lands at Opera Holland Park from 18th - 20th May 2012. The line up includes Jung Chang, A.S. Byatt, Andrew Marr, P.D. James, Owen Jones and many others. There do not appear to be any poets listed on the programme but this is a first outing for the festival, so lets give them a chance. Tickets and further information from www.wayswithwords.co.uk...

There are still a few places left for would-be contestants for the Lamplight poetry slam at Stanley, Co Durham, presented by Leisureworks in association with Talking Pen and Lamplight arts centre. Up to 16 of the north-east’s finest spoken-wordsmiths will battle it out in the Auditorium bar of Lamplight arts centre in Stanley on 21 May for a cash prize. Those rhymers, ranters and monologists ready to perform in a series of three-minute bursts should contact Steve Urwin at steveurwin@talkta...

Kathleen Jamie, Paul Farley, Penelope Shuttle, and National Poetry Competition winner Allison McVety are among the poets appearing at the Bridlington poetry festival from 8-10 June at Sewerby Hall, Bridlington. The winners of the Larkin and East Riding poetry competition will perform their poems at the festival on Saturday 9 June. More details

An open mic venue is pleading for more floor performers – because so many of its audiences are turning up just to hear the star guests.
Write Angle at Petersfield is boasting another star turn on Tuesday 15 May, when poet, comic, raconteur, writer and literary event organiser Richard Tyrone Jones, pictured, is appearing. He is reckoned to have appeared at more than 300 gigs, as well as hosting over 50 events. That’s all very well. But Write Angle still needs more poets for its open...

The future of Aldeburgh poetry festival has been safeguarded, after it has won significant arts lottery funding. This year’s festival from 2-4 November will be expanding into the world-famous concert facilities at nearby Snape Maltings as a result of the extra cash, according to organisers the Poetry Trust.
That means that this year the main readings will take place in Snape’s Britten studio, which seats 340, with a big foyer area for the bookstall and a poetry festival caf&eacu...

It must be spring! The St Ives literature festival in Cornwall starts on Saturday 5 May and runs until Sunday 12 May. There's a host of events at the St Ives Arts Club, St Ives Library and Café Art. A highlight will be the daily open mic poetry and music, happening in Norway Square from 12.30-2pm and hosted by the wonderful Bob Deveraux. There will also be an open mic of tales and poetry called Free Speech at Cafe Art on most afternoons from 5-6pm. Not-to-be-missed if you are in Kerno...

You’d better book early for this! Tony Walsh (pictured with John Cooper Clarke at Latitude festival) is one of the finest poetry performers on the circuit, one whose success has taken him to great heights: from Write Out Loud committee member in the early days, via Glastonbury poet-in-residence, taking in Warsaw’s Palace of Culture, the British Library, Ledbury Poetry Festival and much, much more besides. What he doesn’t know about writing poems to perform, and delighting audie...

A formidable intelligence roars through these poems, published by AuthorHouse, with a tenacious grasp of the idea that the smallest thing contributes to the whole. Or, perhaps, that no thing in our daily routines is a small thing. As a surgeon severs flesh, Fatima Al Matar dissects emotions with discerning imagination and brutal realism.
Her poems are written mainly in the first person (or third party “she”, which seems a studied reflection of “I”). They give the impres...

After its sell-out nights in Manchester Dominic Berry is taking his Wizard poetry-fantasy-theatre show on tour. After appearing in Petersfield last week, on 1 and 2 May he is in London, at the Cockpit, Gateforth Street, Marylebone, at 7.30pm. Tickets are £10/£6, book online or phone 020 7258 2925. On Thursday 3 May he is at the ACE Centre, Cross Street, Nelson, at 6.30pm. Tickets: £8/4, book online or phone 01282 661 080. A week later the Wizard will appear at Oxford Universit...

The 18 May deadline is only a few days away for a competition with health, wealth and happiness as the themes. Well Warrington Network’s poetry and short story competition will be judged by prize-winning performance poet Helên Thomas. First prize is £60, with an entrance fee of £3 per poem (up to 32 lines) or story (up to 1,000 words). The Well Warrington Network is a not for profit organisation, that aims to help people to regain their health and well-being. By entering...

A poet of whom it has been said, “what Wordsworth did for daffodils, John Davies does for sheds”, pops up in Hove on Friday 18 May in an event that is part of the Brighton Festival Fringe. John Davies will be premiering his Shed Show, based on his travels round Britain with his shed to celebrate this very British tradition, at Bali Brasserie, First Avenue, Hove. Doors open at 3.30pm for 4. Entry: two for one special: £5/£4. Contact: info@pighog.co.uk More details and Map...

Simon Armitage's poems hand carved into Pennine rocks form the outcome of Ilkley Literature Festival’s Stanza Stones poetry project, which launched in style in the Pennine watershed town of Marsden - home to a Write Out Loud poetry night - with an evening of poetry, dance and film. The session began with Simon reading his specially-commissioned sequence of poems on the theme of ‘water’ in all its states, each giving the title to a poem: Rain, Mist, Snow, Dew, Beck and Puddl...

An exhibition of illustrations has been launched at the Poetry Cafe in London in honour of Victorian nonsense writer and artist Edward Lear, and to mark his 200th birthday. Lear’s most famous work is probably The Owl and the Pussycat. He popularised the limerick, and invented such creatures as Pobbles, Dongs, Scroobius Pips, and Jumblies. As part of Saturday’s celebrations, a plaque was unveiled at Lear’s home in Stratford Place, north of Oxford Street in London, with a ceremon...

Take your places in the serene surroundings of Stockport art gallery on Monday 14 May for Write Out Loud Stockport. Share your poems at this friendly, open-floor poetry night, where beginners are especially welcome. Entry: £1 donation. It starts at 7pm. Map

This is a cracking book, especially for anyone wanting to understand this movement, this growing, UK-wide phenomenon of people getting together to read poems to each other, in open-mic, spoken word, live or performance poetry events.
As someone who has spent the last 10 years trying encourage this phenomenon, I was delighted to read this book, even if I quibble a bit with its conclusions.
To Austrian academic, Julia Novak, it was something of a novelty when, whilst studying in the UK, she enco...

The venue that boasts of being the bolshiest open mic in the north-west is back. After last month’s slam Write Out Loud Wigan returns to the Tudor on Thursday 10 May from 8-11 pm. There’s a special guest compere. More details and Map

Dominic Berry’s poetry-fantasy-theatre extravaganza Wizard, seen at the Cockpit theatre in north London, is a cri de coeur on behalf of those who need to weave spells to make sense of the world about them. It sparks with jokes and wit, and with a mesmerisingly energetic performance from Berry as the Wizard; but although often very funny it is not ultimately a bundle of laughs, and indeed is quite disturbing.
The Wizard, apparently so in control, is unable to leave his flat and is befriend...

A poetry collection by the daughter of a couple who fled Hitler’s Germany and were imprisoned in Russia and interned in England will be launched at the Poetry Cafe in London tomorrow night, Wednesday 2 May.
Poems from On Cigarette Papers will be performed by the poet, Pam Zinnemann-Hope, and by actors Anthony Schuster and Deborah Findlay. The poems – a story of love and exile, dislocation and survival - were written after the death of Pam’s mother in 1990, when she found a tin...

Leading poets, including Gillian Clarke, Geoffrey Hill, Brian Patten, Liz Lochhead, Christpher Reid, Wendy Cope, John Burnside, Simon Armitage, Philip Gross, Sean O’brien and Jo Shapcott, as well as the poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, have contributed to a book of poetry marking the Queen’s 60 years, each poet writing about one particular year. The final poem, The Thames, London 2012, is by Duffy. The poems can be read here...

Back in December 2011, I read a news article on WOL about a national poetry competition run in conjunction with the Leigh and Wigan Words literary festival. The core theme was the local environment, specifically Greenheart regional park, and the development of previously industrial land to provide beautiful green spaces for visitors to enjoy. Having spent many happy hours strolling around areas such as Haigh country park, Pennington Flash and the Three Sisters, I was intrigued and decided to e...

One of the legendary Liverpool poets, Brian Patten, is appearing at Poetry-next-the-sea, at Wells-next-the sea, Norfolk, a festival taking place from 11-13 May. Patten made his name in the 1960s, alongside Adrian Henri and Roger McGough, in the 1967 joint anthology, The Mersey Sound, which is now a Penguin Modern Classic. In recent years he has written a number of poetry collections for children. Others on the weekend’s bill include Dame Gillian Beer, Matthew Hollis, Jon Siddique, and Jean...

A poem last year about a giant, spiky plant from the Andes planted the seed of an idea … and now Write Out Loud’s regular performance poetry diarist, Mab Jones, has been appointed the first poet in residence at the National Botanic Garden of Wales. Mab, who recently represented Wales at a cultural festival in Japan, will be resident bard at the Garden from this weekend, the 21-22 April, just before Shakespeare’s birthday on the 23rd, and she will be offering readings and works...