Write Out Loud relives some memorable live poetry moments
During the coronavirus shutdown Write Out Loud is looking back at some wonderful live poetry moments over the last few years … and re-running some of our favourite reviews to refresh memories, and to remind ourselves that this won’t last for ever. Here Dave Morgan witnesses the dry absurdity of John Hegley at Gullvers in Manchester in 2012.
9th April 2020
John Hegley in Manchester, 2012
The magnificently shabby surroundings of Gullivers in Oldham Street, Manchester, provided the backdrop for what turned out to be a hugely entertaining bill on Wednesday night. The last time I scaled two flights of dimly lit uncarpeted stairs, only wide enough for one medium-sized person to ascend a...
9th April 2020
Poet and teacher Kate Clanchy on Orwell prize longlist
A book by poet and teacher Kate Clanchy has been included on the longlist of 12 for the Orwell prize for political writing. Clancy’s book Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me (Picador) is about ...
9th April 2020
Four contemporary poets respond to Wordsworth in BBC Radio 4 programme
BBC Radio 4 marked the 250th anniversary of William Wordsworth’s birthday with poems from four contemporary poets – Helen Mort, Kim Moore, Jacob Polley and Zaffar Kunial – in a programme called The Ne...
9th April 2020
Bolton Write Out Loud goes online on Wednesday
Bolton Write Out Loud will be the third Write Out Loud night to go online, on Wednesday 15 April at 7.30pm. Co-organiser Jeff Dawson is seeking a dozen readers to take part via the video conferencing ...
9th April 2020
Luke Wright live in his living room ... but not in front of the children!
Every night since the lockdown leading performance poet Luke Wright has been appearing on Twitter in his living room at 8pm – and last night was his 13th show. And what a treat for those confined to t...
7th April 2020
Andrew McMillan to judge £1,000 Winchester prize
Andrew McMillan will be judging the £1,000 Winchester poetry prize. The deadline is 31 July. More details
7th April 2020
Royal Mail launches Romantic Poets stamps to mark Wordsworth anniversary
A set of stamps commemorating the Romantic Poets to mark the 250th anniversary of William Wordsworth’s birth go on sale from today, Tuesday 7 April. As well as the quote from a Wordsworth poem, pictur...
7th April 2020
'Every butterfly knows that the end is different from the beginning'
I'm writing this column on a summer day when a hungry crowd of Monarch butterfly caterpillars are eating the upper leaves of the milkweed just outside my door in Nebraska, and my wife and I are joyful...
7th April 2020
No Far Shore: Anne-Marie Fyfe, Seren
The secondary heading of this literary-travel memoir - a combination of prose and poetry - is ‘Charting Unknown Waters’. And although Anne-Marie Fyfe had no thought of viruses when putting together th...
7th April 2020
New NHS poetry anthology raises £2,000 for Covid-19 Emergency Fund
Profits from a poetry anthology about the NHS, These are the Hands, have raised £2,000 for the NHS Charities Together Covid 19 Emergency fund since the anthology's launch two weeks ago. The anthology,...
6th April 2020
BBC radio programme You and Yours urges poetry-writing listeners to get in touch
The BBC Radio 4 programme You and Yours says it wants to hear from anyone who has taken to writing poetry as a result of the pandemic. In an item last week the programme looked at why some people, inc...
6th April 2020
CORONAVIRUS CRISIS: Popular poetry group launches anthology after being flooded with pandemic poems
Less than a month ago, poet Janine Booth set up a Facebook group for fellow poets wanting to write about the issues and experiences that people were facing during the coronavirus crisis – and was amaz...
6th April 2020
Pigeon Songs: Eoghan Walls, Seren
Born in Derry, Northern Ireland, Eoghan Walls has lived and taught in Germany, Rwanda and England, where he now lectures in creative writing at Lancaster University. He won an Eric Gregory award in 20...
6th April 2020
Heartwarming poem posted on Write Out Loud and set to music strikes a chord
An uplifting and comforting poem to help us through the coronavirus crisis and lockdown that was posted on Write Out Loud – and put to music as well – has struck a worldwide chord. ‘In the Time of Qui...
6th April 2020
Michael Rosen's poem 'These are the Hands' read on Today programme as author remains 'poorly' in hospital
A poem by Michael Rosen, ‘These are the Hands’, that is the title poem of a timely new poetry anthology about the NHS, was read on BBC Radio 4’s morning Today programme on Thursday at around 8.30 am b...
5th April 2020
Maura Dooley and Keith Jarrett to judge Foyle Young Poets of the Year competition
The Poetry Society’s Foyle Young Poets of the Year competition, for poets aged 11-17, is being judged this year by Maura Dooley and Keith Jarrett. The deadline is 31 July. More details
4th April 2020
Stockport Write Out Loud holds first online meeting
Stockport Write Out Loud, which usually meets at Stockport art gallery, has held its first meeting online. The group, which normally meets once a month, is switching to bi-monthly meetings via the vid...
4th April 2020
ITV ends London news programme with a poem
ITV’s London News has been ending its half-hourly bulletin just before 6.30pm this week with a poem by a London poet. Here’s a video of one of the poets, Ollie Feather from south London, reading Hour ...
2nd April 2020
Roger McGough and Brian Patten, in Liverpool, 2017
So, there I was, back in the city were I once spent three gloriously happy, if challenging years working and living; a city with a certain notoriety; a creative, canny, cocksure yet caring community; ...
2nd April 2020
