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Radical poetry publisher Andy Croft to close Smokestack Books

The radical poetry publisher Smokestack Books is closing at the end of the year, its editor, Andy Croft, has revealed, in a letter to the poetry magazine PN Review, in which he criticises the “uncomradely, uncongenial and frankly embarrassing world of contemporary British poetry”. In his letter Croft says: “The backlist will still be available to order, but Smokestack will no longer be publishing ...

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News

Question: 'What do you think of it so far?' Answer: 'Absolutely amazing!'

It’s 1.45 in the morning and the first day of the 2024 Morecambe poetry festival is drawing to a close. The last poet standing has just been awarded £100 prize money and a bottle of wine.

The opening day kicked off around 4pm at the Kings Arms, a pub which looks out across the spectacular Morecam...

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Morecambe poetry festival

National Poetry Competition is open for entries

The Poetry Society's £5,000 2024 National Poetry Competition is now open for entries. This year's judges are Stephen Sexton, Romalyn Ante and John McAuliffe, and the deadline for entries is 31 October...

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Competitions

Strange Husbandry: Lorcán Black, Seren

Lorcán Black, an Irish poet now living in London, is a Pushcart prize and Best of the Net nominee, and has been longlisted and shortlisted for the Two Sylvias prize and the Paris literary prize respec...

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Review

Restoring wildlife habitats to honour John Clare

A group of volunteers aims to honour the 19th century nature poet John Clare with a project to reclaim habitats and open up corridors of land to encourage wildlife. Clare grew up in Helpston, Cambridg...

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News

Coastline poet and artists portray a county’s heartland

Amble, for those that don’t know it, is a small town on Northumberland’s North Sea coast. There are parts of it that have seen better days. But there are other parts, including some colourful flats by...

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Review

Festival that welcomes grassroots poets: Morecambe is back!

A poetry festival that includes headline names but also welcomes grassroots poets with open arms returns to the north-west this week. Pam Ayres is topping the bill at Morecambe poetry festival, from 1...

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Events

Poems on exile sought to mark Byron bicentenary

The £1,000 Keats-Shelley prizes for essays and poems have opened for entries. The theme for this year’s prizes is ‘Exile’, to mark the bicentenary of Byron’s death. 

Entrants to the Keats-Shelley p...

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Competitions

Quick on the floor for Durham’s open-mic poets  

You could be forgiven for mistaking the Waddington Street Centre in Durham for just another terrace house at first glance, were it not for the Poetry Jam notice on the front door. Inside, the daytime ...

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Review

Italian Air / Radiant Days: Neil Leadbeater, Cyberwit.Net

This collection of snapshots from Neil Leadbeater is as clean-cut as the jewels that inspire ‘Diversion’, the fourth of its five sections. His perceptions alive to the details that assemble the world ...

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Review

Deadline nears for £2,000 Troubadour poetry prize

The 23 September deadline is nearing for entries to the £2,000 Troubadour international poetry prize, run by Coffee-House Poetry. The judges are Jane Yeh and Glyn Maxwell. More details

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Competitions

Prize-winner Trystan Lewis is guest at Write Out Loud Bolton

Winner of this year’s Plough poetry competition, Trystan Lewis, will be the guest poet at Write Out Loud Bolton on Sunday 8 September at a rearranged venue - see Dave Morgan's comment below. Doors ope...

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Events

Collected Poems: Fleur Adcock, Bloodaxe

Weighing in at over 600 pages, this is a substantial volume. Too big to be delivered through the letterbox, but handed in at the front door, it has given me an opportunity to renew my acquaintance wit...

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Review

Battery Rocks: Katrina Naomi, Seren

Katrina Naomi grew up close to the sea in Margate and now lives in Cornwall, where she combines her love of writing with sea swimming and a passion for wild places. Her poetry collections have won Aut...

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Review

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