forwords is a bi-weekly email bulletin,
offering a digest of information about poetry and spoken word events,
workshops, and other literary events in Sheffield and the surrounding
area (including Doncaster, Barnsley, Huddersfield, and Rotherham).

The organisation is now looking for a new editor, so if you live in the area and are interested please contact Robin for more information: Tel 0114 258 7270, or email forwords@lowtech.org...

From 9 -12 October 2008 the Literaturwerkstatt Berlin is organising the ZEBRA Poetry Film Festival, the international festival for poetry films.

Poets from Cocteau to Jandl to Handke have experimented with cinematographic forms of expression, while film-makers like Man Ray, James Algar and Tim Burton have made films inspired by poems. From 9 - 12 October, the Literaturwerkstatt Berlin will be showing over 150 new poetry films from all over the world at the 4th ZEBRA Poetry Film Fest...

we thought our poets might be interested in this coming-of-age drama that premieres in The Studio at Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre from Wednesday 24 September to Saturday 11 October, before transferring to London’s Young Vic Theatre.
Described as crackling, candid and witty, the play revolves around teenager Adam on his journey through a Pennine town secondary school to discover if the boy can ever become a man. Recounting his life, loves, family and friends, this poignant monologue...

Come and get your preconceptions shaken up at this public reading of the work of a highly creative group who open the windows of life, illuminating even the darkest corners of experience with wisdom and with their poems and prose.
Cadishead Creative Start 50 plus group have been working with poet Louise Jones - known to fellow Write Out Louders for her original, quirky, and more traditional, styles -who has inspired their boundless creativity as group tutor. This public exposition is the resu...

Talking Myself Home is Yorkshire poet, comedian & broadcaster Ian McMillan’s life story in poems.
Here’s a portrait of an unregarded place - Darfield, near Barnsley, a place mentioned (briefly) in the Domesday book and now trying to reinvent itself after the wholesale closure of the mining industry. And a love story between Lt Cdr J. McMillan, a Scottish sailor and Olive Wood, a young lass in Yorkshire.
The life story is that of John and Olive’s son, the Bard of B...

On Monday 6th October Nottingham’s Blackdrop celebrates its 5th anniversary, African history season and national poetry week by bringing to Nottingham, for the first time in almost ten years...

The amazing internationally acclaimed Linton Kwesi Johnson!

This event is not to be missed

Monday 6th oct 8.00pm Jongleurs, Castle Wharf, Nottingham
Tickets priced just £10..00 available now at Jongleurs.

Email Michelle Hubbard, mum.dukes@btopenwo...

SPINEBREAKERS ANNOUNCES ‘RHYTHM AND RHYME’ COMPETITION

London, 22 July 2008... Spinebreakers, Penguin’s teen online book community, and the National Year of Reading today launched Love Lyrics and invited teens to follow in the footsteps of Nirvana to re-write iconic books, such as White Teeth, as lyrics.

The competition will see the winning entry have their song performed live by popular electro poet duo Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip.

The Love L...

Last month's poem of the month writer, Pam Thompson, has chosen this month's poem. Pam says, "This poem is a little gem: vivid, resonant, believable. Those 'pocket money colours' say it all. I love the sound and the sense of the expression, 'Giggling mirrorless to St. Peter's..' and how rites of passage are nailed to specific places."#
Find out more about Hannah and her work at http://www.writeoutloud.net/poets/hannahkate
Delaunay’s Dye
We went halves on a 99p palette,
pocket...

Capital of Culture poems wanted for Orbis 145, Special Issue on the theme of Culture* (see below)
Or Liverpool, Or from poets with some link to the City of Liverpool, eg, used to play in a band there when I was in Uni - but
not if your neighbour used to live near somebody who used to know
somebody who said their sister’s friend may have gone out with Ringo…
Deadline: September 30
UK
4 poems by post with SAE (C5 preferred);
2 pieces of prose, maximum 1000 words (extracts can also be consi...

WEDNESDAY 8TH OCTOBER 2008 7PM - 9PM @ FONT BAR, NEW WAKEFIELD ST, MANCHESTER
Would you like to be “Not Part Of” in 2009? On the 8th of October we will be holding a get together for those who want to be involved.
This will be an opportunity to meet other artists and creators with ideas for the festival, and to discuss how to be involved with the directors of the “Not Part Of” festival.
So whether you're an artist or a creator or a promoter or even if you're unsure of how you c...

Poets studying for PhDs in Creative Writing (Poetry) at the Centre for New Writing, University of Manchester, will unveil their work to the public at a special lunchtime reading.

It will be the first chance to hear new poetry by some of the best emerging poets
in the region, including Sarah Corbett, Simon Howarth, Even Jones, Ian Pople & J.T. Welsch.

This free showcase of work by the students has been organised as part of
the Centre's 'Literature Live' series of events.

FREE...

A play in one act by
Brenda Read-Brown presented by Tewkesbury Arts and Drama Society at the
Cheltenham Literature Festival – 8:30 pm, Tuesday 14th October 2008.

A man and a woman meet, fall
in love, and get married; one of them dies. Not an unusual story, you might
think. But what makes Once this was a
poet different is that the man and
the woman are both performance poets, and the tale is told largely through
their poems – witty, thought-provoking and sad. Pau...

Congratulations to WOL regular Tony Walsh (pictured) who won a fiercely fought slam at Ireland's Electric Picnic festival recently. Another north west poet, Dennis (Just Dennis) from Nantwich's Words From The Wicky finished a close second. http://www.electricpicnic.ie/ Tony commented " There's people calling Electric Picnic the best festival in the world. You won't find me arguing as I had a truly fantastic time! The music line-up was great and the spoken word line-up...

The second Derwent Poetry Festival is staged over an autumn weekend (Oct 17th - 19th) in the spectacular Derwent valley gorge at Masson Mills in Matlock Bath. The festival features some of our best modern poets. The opening reception and presentation of the 2008 Templar Poetry Pamphlet and Anthology Prizes is followed by a reading from the acclaimed Liverpool-born poet, Paul Farley. On Saturday and Sunday the authors of four new Templar Poetry pamphlets, four collections and a poetic biography r...

The closing date for the 2010 Cardiff International Poetry Competition is fast approaching. With only days to go until the deadline of Friday 29 January 2010 now is the time to get writing and get posting. If you haven’t entered your prize-wining poem yet, don’t panic, there is still just enough time left to enter and be in with the chance of walking away with the First Prize of £5000. Further prizes available are £500 for second place, £250 for third and five runne...