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Ian Duhig to pick £1,000 Cafe Writers winner

Ian Duhig will be the sole judge of Norwich-based Cafe Writers’ £1,000 open poetry competition, which has a  30 November deadline. Second prize is £300, 3rd is £150,  and there are six commended prizes of £50. Entry fee is £4 per poem, £10 for three poems and £2 per poem thereafter. Other prizes are £100 for funniest poem not winning another prize, and £100 to the best poem from a permanent Nor...

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Competitions

All the way from Kathmandu - Selected Jazz Poems: John Clarke

I once saw John Clarke perform in Greenwich. He represents an exotic minority of performance poets who conceive their poems in a mindset earthed in jazz and blues. The poems are not lyrics in a conventional sense; but, like many lyrics, standing bare on the page, they don’t shine as they might. A...

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Review

Poets read in aid of the homeless at Camden

Write Out Loud regular David Cooke, Maggie Butt, Caroline Carver and Pam JT Zinnemann-Hope will be guest poets at the monthly Camden Poetry open mic event on Friday 2 November, at Trinity United Re...

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News

National Poetry Competition: last call for entries

There’s still time - just – to enter the £5,000 National Poetry Competition. The deadline is 31 October. Ok, there will be thousands of entries, but the judging is anonymous – they don’t know who y...

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Competitions

Angry Sam Berkson launches debut collection

Performance poet “Angry” Sam Berkson will be launching his debut collection Life In Transit, published by Influx Press, on 15 November at the Arcola theatre, Dalston, east London. He'll be backed u...

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News

Slouching towards Rotherham: Jackie Kay to read anti-racism poem at football match

It’s a whole new ball game: Jackie Kay will read an anti-racism poem on the pitch before a match between Sheffield United and Portsmouth on Monday night.

The initiative was the idea of Sue Beel...

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News

Deadline nears for £1,000 Crashaw first collection prize

The 31 October deadline is fast approaching for entries for the £1,000 Crashaw prize, an international annual prize for a first collection of poetry. Entrants must not have had a volume of poetry p...

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Competitions

Rod Whitworth at Write Out Loud Middleton

Rod Whitworth is guest poet at Write Out Loud Middleton on Sunday 28 October at the Ring O’Bells, St Leonards Square, Middleton. Contact  katie.haigh@sky.com.  It starts at 7pm, and entry is a £2 d...

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News

The art of reading out loud: Rhian Edwards passes on tips at Dylan Thomas festival

Rhian Edwards, who was shortlisted earlier this year for the Forward first collection prize – and interviewed by Write Out Loud  - is running a workshop on reading poems aloud at the Dylan Thomas f...

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News

'Fast and furious' poetry slam at Wantage: but would Betjeman approve?

A poetry slam billed as “fast and furious, X-Factor style” featuring slam champs from all over the UK is one of the highlights of the Wantage (not just) Betjeman literary festival taking place in t...

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News

Write Out Loud Stockport back fight to stop art gallery cuts

Members of Write Out Loud’s Stockport’s group are backing the fight against proposed cuts that would see their meeting place at Stockport art gallery closed to the public on weekdays from Tuesday t...

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News

Gillian Clarke branches out into John Lewis

We’ve had poems on show in shops in Bolton, and along the Rochdale canal – and now the national poet of Wales, Gillian Clarke, has teamed up with John Lewis, and written a poem that is being displa...

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News

Book fair day at Scottish Poetry Library

The Scottish Poetry Library is staging what it calls its “annual celebration of books and small creative presses” on Saturday 27 October between 11am and 6pm at the SPL building at 5 Crichton’s Clo...

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News

Magazine editor Paul Sutherland's new collection

The editor of Dream Catcher magazine, Paul Sutherland, will be reading from his brand-new collection, Journeying, at the Python Gallery, Middlesbrough on Friday 26 October. The reading starts at 7....

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News

Texperiments: there's still time to take part in a new type of poem

There are still several days left to take part in a new poetic experiment is being conducted by Write Out Loud’s regular conduit of the interesting and unusual, Winston Plowes. Backed by Jo Bell, o...

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News

Write Out Loud at Bolton tonight

Chris Co is guest poet at Write Out Loud Bolton on Sunday 21 October, upstairs at the Brooklyn pub, 7pm for 7.30pm start. Entry is £1 for this open mic event. Contact Jeff Dawson (Jeffarama!) at je...

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News

Marsden's poetry jam: exuberant, embracing, cyclists not excluded

Let me put my cards on the table, as a southerner who is in love with the north. It was the first time I had visited Marsden, and I’m afraid to say that as a result I no longer consider Hebden Brid...

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Review

Closing date nears for Northern Ireland's eulogy contest

The 26 October closing date is approaching for the Funeral Services of Northern Ireland poetry competition, launched earlier this month on National Poetry Day. The organisers are looking for poems ...

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Competitions

Sheffield unveils digital poetry slam for Off The Shelf festival

A poetry slam with a difference – it’s digital – is being run in Sheffield with embedded videos of local poets performing at key locations across the city. 21 Poets for Sheffield is run by local po...

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News

Death of north-west poet John Clays

John Clays, a stalwart of Wigan and Write Out Loud, passed away recently. A much-loved character of the Wigan and Bolton events over the years, John often had a smile and a sestina to share. I firs...

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Obituary

Walking in the footsteps of Ted Hughes at festival

Walks round Ted Hughes’s boyhood village of Mytholmroyd, and nearby Heptonstall, where he later lived, films about the disappearing culture of the Pennine valleys that he documented in his poems, a...

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News

After the jam, it's Write Out Loud at Marsden tonight

This Wednesday, 17 October, sees the latest instalment in the story of poetry advancement in Marsden as we meet at the Mechanics Institute for another Write Out Loud poetry read-around. Be there fo...

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News

Fifteen teenagers from UK and US win Foyles Young Poets of the Year awards

This year’s Foyles Young Poets of the Year were announced yesterday, during National Poetry Day.  You can read the winning poems and see the list of commended young poets here. The prize, which hon...

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News

Council cuts threaten Write Out Loud at Stockport art gallery

Write Out Loud Stockport met last night at Stockport art gallery with a cloud hanging over future meetings there. Stockport metropolitan borough council is reported to be considering a drastic cutb...

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News

Write Out Loud at Sale tonight

Dominic Berry, who will be previewing a segment of his new poetry show, The Dragon Who Hates Poetry, and Polly Livsey and Nicole May are the guest poets at Write Out Loud Sale’s open mic, on Tuesda...

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News

Praise for PM's speechwriter - and poet - Clare Foges

The young woman behind David Cameron’s Conservative party conference yesterday is also a poet in her spare time. Clare Foges, who has been working for the Tories at No 10 for several years, gained ...

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News

Catch the bus as Aldeburgh moves inland

Aldeburgh’s famous poetry festival is moving some of its events this year – to the world-renowned concert hall and campus facilities at Snape Maltings, above, a few miles inland.

A shuttle bus ...

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News

Roll up for the jam at Marsden jazz festival

What a honky-tonking, stonking festival it is, with music belting out from every pub, café and orifice. Poetry too. Yours!

Don’t miss this chance. It’s been stanza room only for each previous W...

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News

Laura Taylor at Nantwich Words and Music festival

Write Out Loud’s Laura Taylor will be performing as a guest poet with Barbara Bentley and Sheila Blackburn at Poetry in the Museum on Sunday 14 October between 11am and 12.30pm, as part of the Nant...

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News

Write Out Loud Wigan - it's tonight

Write Out Loud Wigan reassembles at the Tudor House hotel tomorrow night, Thursday 11 October, with this month’s compere Isobel cracking the whip and keeping poets in order. Entry is free to this o...

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News

Poets add their voices to Pussy Riot protests

As the appeal of  Maria Alekhina, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Ekaterina Samutsevich, of the Russian punk band Pussy Riot, against their two-year sentences for hooliganism in a Moscow court was put b...

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News

Sam Riviere scoops Forward prize for best first collection

Belated congratulations to Faber’s Sam Riviere, who has won the Forward prize for best first collection. His 81 Austerities was an "effortless, wide-ranging and confident" look at everyday life in ...

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News

Gillian Clarke and Mimi Khalvati at Mayfield poetry festival

Gillian Clarke, above, Mimi Khalvati, Tim Liardet, John F Deane and Abegail Morley  are just some of the poets appearing at the Agenda/St Leonards school international poetry festival on 9 October ...

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News

What's brewing? Fire River Poets competition

The deadline is 31 October for Fire River Poets open poetry competition, with prizes £100, £75 and £50 and an invitation to read at the Brewhouse, Taunton. The competition will be judged by Anthony...

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Competitions

Just walking in the rain? Poetic tour of Manchester at the literature festival

Carol Ann Duffy, Simon Armitage, Paul Farley, Leonitia Flynn, Deryn Rees-Jones and Rosie Garland are just some of the poetic names appearing at Manchester literature festival, which runs officially...

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News

It's National Poetry Day ... today!

It's National Poetry Day today, Thursday 4 October  … and here are just some of the events happening around the country.

At London’s Southbank Centre it’s National Poetry Day Live, with free re...

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News

Full steam ahead for Marsden jazz festival's poetry jam

What a cracking session each previous poetry jam has been at Marsden jazz festival, filling the pub with poets and poetry, pies and pints all before noon on a Sunday - stanza room only! All part of...

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News

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