Bristol Poetry Festival 2017
6 - 19 October
A mobile and tablet friendly Bristol Poetry Festival website can be found here: www.bristolpoetryfestival.co.uk
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Sarah Howe, Karen McCarthy Woolf, Rishi Dastidar, Tara Bergin, Liz Berry, Lois P Jones, Martin Figura,
Helen Ivory, Lucy English, Bob Beagrie, Lydia Towsey, Dru Marland, Paul Scott, Kyra Pollitt,
Victoria Punch, Helen Dewbery and Chaucer Cameron, Claire Williamson and Elvis McGonagall hosting The Bristol Poetry Festival Poetry Slam, Hannah Davies, David C Johnson, Mike Scott.
plus
How I Came To Be Where I Never Was, Raise the Bar, SPEL, Hammer & Tongue, Satellite of Love, Bristol Dead Poets Slam, 20 Poets Perform, Spotlight, Word Wizards Comedy Cabaret, Out-Spoken Press Tour.
DesignWild Associates is proud to support Bristol Poetry Festival 2017.
We are long standing admirers of the Festival and the wide variety of poets whom it hosts.
The DesignWild team is interested in the space between literature, art and the landscape, and the rhythms found in each,
often taking imagery as a starting point in the development of a design for public and private landscapes. In the past we have brought these sources of inspiration together in presenting poetry events for the Chelsea (Flower Show) Fringe Festival in London and Bristol.
Urban gardens cover about a quarter of the area of cities, and increasingly provide habitats for animals and plants whose natural environments are in decline. Gardens can be rich in biodiversity, while expressing style, order and beauty.
DesignWild exists to create places where people and wildlife can thrive … because gardens are not wild places, but they do support wild things.
Scroll down to see the full line-up or use the links on the calendar to jump to specific events.
| Wed 27 Sept | Thur 28 Sept | Fri 29 Sept | Sat 30 Sept | Sun 1 Sept | ||
| Raise the Bar | How I Came to be Where I Never Was | Voices in the Garden | SPEL | |||
| How I Came to be Where I Never Was | ||||||
| Mon 2 Oct | Tue 3 Oct | Wed 4 Oct | Thur 5 Oct | Fri 6 Oct | Sat 7 Oct | Sun 8 Oct |
| Poetry Unlimited | Hammer & Tongue | Festival Can Openers | Bristol Poetry Festival Poetry Slam | |||
| Wet Weather Words | ||||||
| Mon 9 Oct | Tue 10 Oct | Wed 11 Oct | Thur 12 Oct | Fri 13 Oct | Sat 14 Oct | Sun 15 Oct |
| Drawn Chorus book launch | Tara Bergin Liz Berry Lois P Jones |
Dr Zeeman's Catastrophe Machine | Air Poems in the Key of Voice | Bristol Dead Poets Slam | Twenty Poets Perform | |
| Milk @ TFT |
Spotlight | A House With No Doors | ||||
| Satellite of Love | ||||||
| Mon 16 Oct | Tue 17 Oct | Wed 18 Oct | Thur 19 Oct | |||
| Still Doing It | Sarah Howe, Karen McCarthy Woolf, Rishi Dastidar |
The Venus Papers | Leasungspell | |||
| Word Wizards Comedy Cabaret | ||||||
| Out-Spoken Press Tour | ||||||
Wed 27 Sept
Venue: Watershed Bristol, 1 Canon's Rd, Bristol, BS1 5TX
Time: 7.30pm doors
Price: £7 adv / £9 on the door
Tickets: www.watershed.co.uk/raise-the-bar-feat-dizraeli
Raise the Bar gives artists a high quality platform to perform their work, as well as showcasing some of the best spoken word poets in the world.
Headlined by Dizraeli.
Ffi: www.facebook.com/RTBSpokenWord
How I Came to be Where I Never Was
Venue: Wardrobe Theatre, 25 West St, Bristol, BS2 0DF
Time: 8pm
Price: £10
Tickets: www.tobaccofactorytheatres.com/how-i-came-to-be-where-i-never-was
Jonny Fluffypunk presents a new lo-fi, stand-up, spoken word theatre show for anyone who has ever loved, owned a vinyl record or just been alive.
Jonny Fluffypunk grew up in suburban nowhere. This is a story about trying to find yourself, when you find yourself somewhere you don’t belong. It’s about unrequited love, John Peel and the importance of a good record shop. It’s about trains and memory and letting go. This is a new lo-fi stand-up spoken word theatre show for anyone who has ever loved, owned a vinyl record or just been alive.
“Acute social observation, intricate humour, surreal fantasy, sharp irony and wit.”
The Independent
“Sublime… well-crafted, tender and life-affirming. Highly recommended.”
FringeReview
“This man truly relishes language. Go see him.”
Tony Allen (‘the godfather of alternative comedy’)
Jonny Fluffypunk is a writer and performer who has been dragging his art around the spoken word and alternative cabaret circuits for over 15 years. A regular at gigs and festivals across the country, he has previously toured his show Man Up, Jonny Fluffypunk: One Man’s Struggle With Late Onset Responsibility and has two volumes of writing out with Burning Eye Books.
Produced in partnership with Strike A Light and supported by Bristol Old Vic Ferment.
Thur 28 Sept
How I Came to be Where I Never Was
Venue: Wardrobe Theatre, 25 West St, Bristol, BS2 0DF
Time: 8pm
Price: £10
Tickets: www.tobaccofactorytheatres.com/how-i-came-to-be-where-i-never-was
Jonny Fluffypunk presents a new lo-fi, stand-up, spoken word theatre show for anyone who has ever loved, owned a vinyl record or just been alive.
Jonny Fluffypunk grew up in suburban nowhere. This is a story about trying to find yourself, when you find yourself somewhere you don’t belong. It’s about unrequited love, John Peel and the importance of a good record shop. It’s about trains and memory and letting go. This is a new lo-fi stand-up spoken word theatre show for anyone who has ever loved, owned a vinyl record or just been alive.
“Acute social observation, intricate humour, surreal fantasy, sharp irony and wit.”
The Independent
“Sublime… well-crafted, tender and life-affirming. Highly recommended.”
FringeReview
“This man truly relishes language. Go see him.”
Tony Allen (‘the godfather of alternative comedy’)
Jonny Fluffypunk is a writer and performer who has been dragging his art around the spoken word and alternative cabaret circuits for over 15 years. A regular at gigs and festivals across the country, he has previously toured his show Man Up, Jonny Fluffypunk: One Man’s Struggle With Late Onset Responsibility and has two volumes of writing out with Burning Eye Books.
Produced in partnership with Strike A Light and supported by Bristol Old Vic Ferment.
Fri 29 Sept
Venue: Hamilton House, Stokes Croft, Bristol, BS1 3QY
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £6 on the door
Tickets: Pay on the door.
Julie-Ann Rowell presents the life of Joan of Arc in poetry with music by Mock Hobby Horse.
Ffi: www.jarowell.co.uk
Sun 1 Oct
Venue: The Bristol Fringe Cafe Bar(32 Princess Victoria St Clifton Bristol BS8 4BZ
Time: 8.30pm
Price: Free
Tickets: -
SPEL alt poetry and acoustic music open mic - book a slot on arrival with host poet Tim Burroughs.
Ffi: [email protected]
Tue 3 Oct
Venue: The Arts House, 108a Stokes Croft, Bristol, BS1 3RU
Time: 11.30am
Price: Free
Tickets: -
Bring a couple of poems to share, another poet's or your own. (Please try to keep each poem to 3 minutes or less, to include your introduction.)
There is a theme each month (not a strict theme, just a guide)
Wed 4 Oct
Venue: Smoke and Mirrors, 8 Denmark St, Bristol, BS1 5DQ
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £7 entry £5 for slammers and/or students.
Tickets: On the door
Open poetry slam with guest headline artists.
Featuring Sally Jenkinson and Malaika Kegode.
Sally Jenkinson is a poet, writer and performer who lives in the Forest of Dean, but grew up in Doncaster (South Yorkshire), where they say poem like this: ‘poym’.
She has published two short collections ('Boys', 2016 and 'Sweat-borne Secrets', 2012) with Burning Eye Books, and her new book 'Like The Water' is definitely forthcoming sometime soon-ish (watch this space!). She also facilitates sensory workshops for people with PMLD (profound and multiple learning disabilites) and is working on a sensory poetry project specifically for PMLD audiences.
She writes mostly about feelings and families and trees and grief and sex and magic and water. If all goes to plan then on this tour she will be peddling a hot-off-the-press freshly homemade zine 'If The Divine Is In You Then The Divine Is In Everyone'.
Growing up the most (reluctantly) ‘exotic’ girl in a quiet Devon town, Malaika Kegode cut her teeth as a poet and performer opening for bands in music venues such as Exeter Cavern and LeftBank. Since those beginnings she has gone on to work closely with organisations such as Apples and Snakes, Roundhouse and BBC 1Xtra and is a member of the Raleigh Road Collective, formed as part of 1Xtra’s Words First initiative. Malaika has performed around the country at theatres, music venues, literary events and festivals such as WOMAD and Boomtown and has supported artists such as Matt Harvey and Saul Williams. She inspires young people as a workshop facilitator. Currently living in Bristol, where she feels happily less ‘exotic’, she is creator and host of Milk Poetry, a regular thriving event in the city. Her debut collection Requite is now available from Burning Eye Books.
Ffi: www.facebook.com/groups
Fri 6 Oct
Wet Weather Words
Venue: on Bristol's pavements
Time: whenever it's raining
Price: Free
Next time you’re walking along in the rain in Bristol, don’t forget to look down at the puddles on the pavement. You might be in for a surprise, because you might find that a poem magically appears at your feet.
During Bristol Poetry Festival, poems that go with specific sites around the city will be secretly written on the pavements in a special kind of material that only becomes visible in the rain. Some of the poems are by living Bristol poets and others by famous wordsmiths.
Nothing like this has ever been done in the UK before, and as is often the case, Bristol is the city bringing innovation, this time to the poetry world.
Wet Weather Words is the brainchild of Bristol poet Hazel Hammond, who, together with Dominic Fisher and Richard Devereaux, has picked out seven poems to be used throughout the city. The poems are by Dixon Lanier Merrit, Michael Donaghy, Hazel Hammond, Charlotte Perkins, Dru Marland, Robert Graves and Andy Brown.
Venue: Dance Studio, The Station, Silver St, Bristol BS1 2AG
Time: 12.30pm -2pm
Price: £3
Tickets: Pay on the door
Open platofrm for sharing poetry
with feature special guest Dru Marland reading from her new collection Drawn Chorus.
Ffi: [email protected]
Sat 7 Oct
Bristol Poetry Festival Poetry Slam
Venue: Arnolfii, 16 Narrow Quay, Bristol, BS1 4QA
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £10 / £8
Tickets: www.bpfslam2017.eventbrite.com
Hosted by Claire Williamson and Elvis McGonagal with special guest: Hannah Davies, winner of last year’s Bristol Poetry Festival Open Poetry Slam
Claire Williamson Elvis McGonagal Hannah Davies
A host of slammers compete for the £100 winner-takes-all prize in a battle of wit, wordplay and passion.
Starring Performance Poets from Bristol, the South West and the UK:
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| George Cook | Charlotte Souter | Erica England | Shaun Hill | Claire Guest | Jackie Juno |
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| Imogen Downes | Pascal Vine | Beth Calverley | Robert Garnham | Stefan Gambrell | Trev Meaney | |||||
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| Megan Chapman | Kathryn O'Driscoll | Melanie Branton | Andy Brown | Sam Boarer | Billy Fox |
Ffi: [email protected]
Mon 9 Oct
Venue: Monty's, 62 Bath Buildings, Montpelier.
Time: 7.30pm
Price: Free
Tickets: -
Dru Marland officially launches her new collection Drawn Chorus
Ffi: www.dru-withoutamap.blogspot.co.uk
Milk @ Tobacco Factories
Venue: The Tobacco Factory, Raleigh Road, Southville, Bristol, BS3 1TF
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £8
Tickets: www.tobaccofactorytheatres.com/shows/milk-poetry-october-2017
Featuring: Tony Walsh, Jasmine Gardosi and Toby Thompson
Tony Walsh
Tony is a former Poet in Residence for Glastonbury Festival and a regular on tv and radio. Performing and teaching internationally from his base in Manchester, Tony's poem at the vigil for the 22 victims of the Manchester bomb put him in front of a global tv audience and has since been viewed more than twenty million times on YouTube.
Jasmine Gardosi
Jasmine is the current Cheltenham Poetry Festival Slam Champion, Mix It Up Midlands Slam Champion 2015 and one of the winners of the International Pangaea Poetry Slam 2015. She has appeared on BBC Radio 3’s The Verb and was shortlisted for Birmingham Poet Laureate 2016/18.
Toby Thompson
To witness Toby Thompson proclaiming his message of love and wonder is to peacefully commune with your deepest innermost self. He's written commissions for the RSC and the National Portrait Gallery. He's performed his work at festivals and venues including Latitude, Shambala, Leipzig Book Fair (Germany), Harare International Festival Of The Arts (Zimbabwe), the Photographers' Gallery and the Natural History Museum.
Plus emerging acts TBA
Tue 10 Oct
Tara Bergin, Liz Berry, Lois P Jones
Venue: The Mackay, Bristol Grammar School, Elton Road, BS8 1SR
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £10 / £8
Tickets: www.bergin-berry-jones.eventbrite.com
UNMISSABLE READING EVENT Pt 1
Tara Bergin was born and raised in Dublin city. In 2002 she moved to England. She won the Seamus Heaney First Collection Prize 2014 for This Is Yarrow, now Tara’s second collection The Tragic Death of Eleanor Marx is a 2017 Poetry Book Society Recommendation and it’s shortlisted for The Forward Prize for Best Collection 2017.
Liz Berry, Black Country genius, won the Poetry London competition in 2012 and her debut collection Black Country won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection in 2014. When Liz read at Bristol Poetry Festival in 2015 the beauty of her reading had the audience in raptures, don’t miss her!
Lois P Jones comes to Bristol Poetry Festival from South Pasadena, California, USA. Lois won the 2016 Bristol Poetry Prize with her dark, extraordinary poem Foal. She is the host of L.A. radio’s Poets Café (KPFK) and is the Poetry Editor for Kyoto Journal. Her debut collection Night Ladder was published this year.
Ffi: [email protected]
Wed 11 Oct
Doctor Zeeman’s Catastrophe Machine
Venue: The Mackay, Bristol Grammar School, Elton Road, BS8 1SR
Time: 7.30 p.m.
Price: £10 / £8
Tickets: www.dr-zeeman.eventbrite.com
By and starring Martin Figura with special guests Helen Ivory and Lucy English
Is there a mathematical equation for love and the behaviour of a beating heart? When our windshield is blurred with rain and we’re wearing our reading glasses, can we learn to look in the rear-view mirror and smile?
Doctor Zeeman’s Catastrophe Machine, is the new stage production from award winning poet Martin Figura. He turns to international mathematics guru Sir Erik Christopher Zeeman’s iconic machine, the moon and photographs to shed light on these pressing questions and to help him sort out love, loss and when to let go.
With projections, machinery and sound by Andre Barreau, Karen Hall and Paul Finlay.
Produced by Tilt and funded by Arts Council England, with support from Norwich Arts Centre and Writers’ Centre Norwich.
Martin Figura’s previous collection and show, Whistle, was shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award and won the 2013 Saboteur Award for Best Spoken Word Show. It received a stand-up ovation at Bristol poetry Festival in 2012. His most recent publications are Shed and Dr Zeeman’s Catastrophe Machine. He lives in Norwich with Helen Ivory and sciatica, where he runs the literature event, Café Writers.
Helen Ivory is a poet and artist, a freelance creative writing tutor and academic director for creative writing for continuing education at the University of East Anglia, an editor for The Poetry Archive, editor of the webzine Ink Sweat and Tears, and co-organiser with Martin Figura of Café Writers in Norwich. She has published four collections with Bloodaxe Books:The Double Life of Clocks, The Dog in the Sky, The Breakfast Machine and Waiting for Bluebeard.
Lucy English was born in Sri Lanka and grew up in London. She is a Reader in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University. She has three novels published by Fourth Estate. She is best known as a performance poet, first winning the Bristol Poetry Slam in 1996, and going on to tour worldwide, performing her poetry at several international festivals including the Edinburgh Fringe, Austin International Poetry Festival, Wordfest, at Calgary in Canada and The Cuirt in Galway, Ireland. Her first poetry collection Prayer to Imperfection was published by Burning Eye books.
Ffi: [email protected]
RTB & Milk present 'Spotlight'
Venue: Crofters Rights, 117-119 Stokes Croft, Bristol, BS1 3PY
Time: 7:30pm
Price: £3
Tickets: Pay on the door.
Extended open mic with special guest Jake Wild Hall launching his new collection 'Solomon's World'.
Ffi: www.facebook.com/MilkPoetry // www.facebook.com/RTBSpokenWord
Venue: The Greenbank Pub, 57 Bellevue Rd Easton BS5 6DP
Time: 8.30pm
Price: Free (donations to refugee charities)
Tickets: -
In addition to the two featured readers there is a friendly, inclusive Open Mike (5 minute slots usually offered).
This is organised by Helen Sheppard and poets can sign up in advance, or on the night if there is still space.
October features two performers of experimental poetry who are both exciting and entertaining to watch.
Jude Cowan Montague is a poet, print maker and musician based in London. She hosts an arts show called the Newsagents on Resonance FM. She is the author of several poetry collections and a novel about the young Alfred Hitchcock. Here latest poetry publication The Originals was published by Hesterglock press and launched at this year's Venice Biennale.
www.judecowanmontague.com
Paul Hawkins is based in Bristol and together with Sarer Scotthorne runs Hesterglock Press. He organises a monthly experimental poetry event Anathema at the Arnolfini and is the author of several poetry collections including Place, Waste, Dissent (Influx Press) and a new work Go_Women forthcoming from Knife, Fork and Spoons press.
www.hesterglock.net
Thur 12 Oct
Venue: The Mackay, Bristol Grammar School, Elton Road, BS8 1SR
Time: 7.30 pm
Price: £10 / £8
Tickets: www.airpoems.eventbrite.com
with Paul Scott, Kyra Pollitt, Victoria Punch, Helen Dewbury and Chaucer Cameron.
A big hit at this year's Ledbury festival, this is a radical, multimedia, multisensory performance designed to introduce audiences to the beauty and vivacity of sign language poetry. Introduced by writer, artist and professional translator Kyra Pollitt, live sign language poetry performance by acclaimed BSL poet Paul Scott, live vocals by Victoria Punch, and film-poetry by Helen Dewbery and Chaucer Cameron, this is your portal to a whole new world of poetry.
Ffi: [email protected]
Fri 13 Oct
Venue: The Lansdown, 8 Clifton Road, Bristol, BS8 1AF
Time: 8.00pm
Price: £6 adv / £7 on the door.
Tickets: [email protected] 
The Dead Poets Slam returns to the Bristol Poetry Festival after taking a break last year.
Come along to this light-hearted performance competition which celebrates the great poets of the past.
Entrants will be judged on their interpretations of great works.
The event will be hosted by the Bard of Windmill Hill and will feature 2015’s winner Tim Vosper – a kind of Dr Seuss for grownups.
There will also be musical entertainment.
Ffi: [email protected]
Fri 14 Oct
Venue: Cafe, Central Library, College Green, Bristol, BS1 5TL
Time: 12 - 3pm
Price: Free
Tickets: -
Twenty poets share their work.
Ffi: [email protected]
A House With No Doors anthology launch
Venue: St Stephen’s Church, 21 St Stephen's St, Bristol, BS1 1EQ
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £8.00 / £6.00 concessions
Tickets: www.georgian.eventbrite.co.uk
A night of Georgian poetry and music
Georgia, on the south side of the Caucasus mountains next to the Black Sea, has a rich culture of poetry and song.
Bristol is twinned with its capital, Tbilisi.
Launching the ground-breaking anthology ‘A House With No Doors’ published by Francis Boutle translators Victoria Field and Natalia Bukia-Peters read poems by some of Georgia’s finest contemporary poets.
Bristol’s Borjghali Choir is directed by Anthony Johnston and specialises in songs from Georgia. The choir sings heart-stirring songs that give voice to the loves, passions, losses and vitality of ordinary village people. Songs with ancient roots that resonate with the contemporary poems.
Mon 16 Oct
Venue: Alma Tavern Theatre, 18-20 Alma Vale Rd, Bristol, BS8 2HY
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £10 / £9
Tickets:www.almatavernandtheatre.co.uk/theatre/what-s-on or 0117 9735171
A show full of wit, songs, poetry, laughs and banter.
Mike Scott and David C Johnson will be reprising their successful show first seen at the Bath Fringe Festival 2017.
Their entertaining and original show reveals their experiences of School, Sport, Travel, Grammar and Getting Old.
Mike is a popular and talented stalwart of the West Country Folk scene.
David is a slam-winning performance poet and Radio 4 playwright.
Together they are 'Still Doing It'.
Tue 17 Oct
Sarah Howe, Karen McCarthy Woolf, Rishi Dastidar
Venue: The Mackay, Bristol Grammar School, Elton Road, BS8 1SR
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £10 / £8
Tickets: www.howe-woolf-dastidar.eventbrite.com
UNMISSABLE POETRY READING Pt 2
Sarah Howe is a British poet, academic and editor. Born in Hong Kong in 1983 to an English father and a Chinese mother. Her first book, Loop of Jade won the T S Eliot Prize and The Sunday Times / PFD Young Writer of the Year Award, and was shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney Centre Poetry Prize and the Forward Prize for Best First Collection. Crossing the bounds of time, race and language, Loop of Jade is an enthralling exploration of self and place, of migration and inheritance, and introduces an unmistakable new voice in British poetry.
Karen McCarthy Woolf is a writer, editor and critic, whose debut poetry collection An Aviary of Small Birds was selected as a Guardian/Observer Book of the Year, shortlisted for both the Forward and Fenton Aldeburgh prizes 2015 and described in The Poetry Review as ‘extraordinarily moving and technically flawless’.
She is the editor of four literary anthologies, most recently Ten: The New Wave and Ten: The Next Generation. Karen's new collection is Seasonal Disturbances in which, as a fifth-generation Londoner and daughter of a Jamaican émigré, McCarthy Woolf aims to inspire what the author describes as an ‘activism of the heart, where we connect to and express forces of renewal and love’.
Rishi Dastidar’s first full collection showcases one of contemporary poetry’s most distinctive voices, delivering effervescence with equal servings of panache and whiplash quick wit. From politics to pop, from the UK to California, wherever digital heartbeats flutter and stutter, Ticker-tape is a maximalist take on 21st century living. Here is sheer madcap ingenuity and also impressive breadth; ranging from odes of love to deconstructed diversity campaigns and detonations of banter’s worst excesses, plus appearances from ex-SugaBabes, a shark who comes to tea, to the matters of matchstick empires and national identity.
Ticker-tape is bold, adventuresome and wry – an unmissable and irrepressible debut.
Ffi: [email protected]
Wed 18 Oct
Venue: The Alma Tavern Theatre, 18-20 Alma Vale Rd, Clifton, Bristol, BS8 2HY
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £10 / £9
Tickets: www.almatavernandtheatre.co.uk/theatre/what-s-on
Written by and starring Lydia Towsey
Venus, the Roman Goddess of love and beauty, has washed up on British shores in time to witness the frenzy and aftermath of the 2017 snap general election.
Through the filters of an immigration officer, the red top papers and the general public, Venus experiences what it means to be a 21st Century immigrant woman at a time of social, political and cultural upheaval.
Writer/performer Lydia Townsey's theatrical poetry show is one of landscapes, journeys and the tales of 21st Century women in our tumultuous times.
'Absolutely spectacular' - Jo Ivie, Poet in the City
'Lydia Townsey's poetry bubbles with wry observations and quick-witted delights that are genuine and loaded with charm' - Jane Commance, Nine Arches Press
Ffi: [email protected]
Venue: The Khan, Falafel King, 6 Cotham Hill, Bristol BS6 6LF
Time: 8.00pm
Price: £6
Tickets: On the door
Word Wizards return to one of their favourite venues.
Come early and enjoy the excellent food, to be followed by hilarious poems, witty songs, scintillating satire, titillating tales and things to join in with.
The show features the Bard of Windmill Hill, poet, satirist and award winning storyteller; the glittery gregarious razzle-dazzle of Mark Darkside with mystical mayhem and forest tales from Darren Hoskins. 'Funny, amazingly versatile and very entertaining' Everybody's Reading Festival, Leicester.
Ffi: [email protected]
Raise the Bar presents .... The Out-Spoken Press Tour
Venue: Bristol Improv Theatre, 50 St Pauls Rd, Clifton, Bristol, BS8 1LP
Time: 7.30pm
Price: (tbc)
Tickets: (tbc)
Featuring Anthony Anaxagorou, Joelle Taylor, Bridget Minamore, Raymond Antrobus, Fran Lock and Hibaq Osman.
More information to come.
Thur 19 Oct
Venue: The Mackay, Bristol Grammar School, Elton Road, BS8 1SR
Time: 7.30pm
Price: £10 / £8
Tickets: www.leasungspell.eventbrite.com
SPELLBINDING!
Bob Beagrie with Sara Dennis (folk singer), Peter Lagan (lutenist), Kev Howard (percussion), Dordeseal (Celtic horn), Stewart Forth (percussion and sound effects.)
'Astonishing, haunting, ambitious in scale and impressive in reach, Leasungspell is a feast for the imagination.' Pippa Little
Leasungspell is an epic poem published last year by Smokestack Books. It relates the story of an Anglo Saxon monk in 657AD as he travels from the monastery on the Hartlepool Headland to Whitby, carrying letters from St Hild. On route, he describes the landscape and reasons for travelling, but as with all epics, it is full of digressions and diversions, stories within stories. It is written in a thrilling hybrid of Old English, Modern English and Northern Dialect Forms.
'The language rings like the clashing of broadswords and from that energy and violence, a vivid new world, at once both archaic and strangely contemporary, emerges.' Steve Ely.
Bob Beagrie is a poet, playwright, and senior lecturer in creative writing at Teesside University. He has published six collections of poetry, including The Seer Sung Husband and SAMPO: Heading Further North (co-written with Andy Willoughby. His poetry has been translated into Urdu, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, Russian, Danish, Spanish, and Swedish.
Ffi: [email protected]
| Bristol Poetry Festival is supported by | ||||
| University of the West of England |
Design Wild | Clifton Hotels | ||
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Poetry Can is Funded by
Arts Council England
