Live readings 2010
Hearing a poet read and talk about their work is often illuminating, can bring a poem to life and can open up new ways into poems. For anyone wishing to heighten their enjoyment of reading and writing poetry, these events are indispensable.
Michael McClure gave his first poetry reading at the legendary Six
Gallery event in San Francisco, where Allen Ginsberg first read Howl.
“The role model for Jim Morrison” according to the Los Angeles Times, he was a key member of the beat generation and Dennis Hopper says, “Without McClure’s roar there would have been no Sixties.” His play The Beard provoked numerous censorship battles and his songs include Mercedes Benz, popularised by Janis Joplin. McClure reads with an actor’s command and a singer’s timing and his impact transports audiences to a very different and intriguing place. Two collections of McClure’s poems are presently being
published, Mysteriosos and other Poems and Of Indigo and Saffron:
Selected and New Poems. A very rare opportunity to hear this iconic
American poet, whose poetry Allen Ginsberg described as “a blob of
protoplasmic energy.”
6. Poets and Artists: Jane Weir and Pascale Petit on Phyllis Barron, Dorothy Larcher and Frida Kahlo
This event will use poems, textiles and images to illuminate the lives
and work of three fascinating artists. Jane Weir’s beautiful new book, Walking the Block, is a poetic biography of the modernist handblock printers Phyllis Barron and Dorothy Larcher whose textiles attracted commissions from Coco Chanel and the architect Detmar Blow. Pascale Petit’s collection What the Water Gave Me – Poems after Frida Kahlo contains fifty-two poems in the voice of the Mexican painter Frida Kahlo. Petit draws on her experience as a visual artist to create alternative ‘paintings’ with words.
8. Amarjit Chandan and Stephen Watts
Ledbury Poetry Festival hosts the launch of Amarjit Chandan long awaited first full-length collection to be published in Britain, A Sonata
for Four Hands. Chandan is a leading Punjabi poet, born in Nairobi,
who lives and works in London. The distinguished writer John Berger, long-time admirer of Chandan’s work writes, “Chandan sees the universe as a book. Our experience in that universe constitutes its reading. The role of poetry is to clarify such reading.” He appears with one of his translators Stephen Watts, who lives in Whitechapel, East London. Watts’s most recent collection was The Blue Bag and forthcoming is a book of long poems.
9. Christopher Reid and Don Paterson
Two acclaimed poets in what is bound to be a stunning event.
Christopher Reid won the 2009 Costa Book of the Year Award for
A Scattering, a tribute to his wife Lucinda Gane. This places him in the
ranks of Seamus Heaney, Ted Hughes and Douglas Dunn, as the only poets to have won this prestigious and popular award. According to the chair of the judges, Josephine Hart, the book is “a masterwork which has universal power. Austere, beautiful and moving – we all felt this was a book we would want everyone to read”. Don Paterson’s Rain won the 2009 Forward Prize for Best
Collection. Chair of judges, the writer Josephine Hart, says Rain “is
a serious work showing his authority and total mastery of his art and his particular genius for rhythm.”
12. Billy Collins
American Laureate (2001 – 2003) Billy Collins takes to the stage for
his Ledbury debut. He combines high critical acclaim with broad popular appeal, preferring the term “hospitable” to “accessible” for his poetry. “Luring his readers into the poem with humour, Mr Collins leads them unwittingly into deeper, more serious places, a kind of journey from the familiar to quirky to unexpected territory, sometimes tender often profound.” (The New York Times)
His collections of poetry include Ballistics, Taking Off Emily Dickinson’s Clothes, Questions About Angels and The Art of Drowning.
20. Eco Poetry with Mario Petrucci and Neil Astley
Neil Astley will present a selection of poems from his anthology Earth Shattering. Eco poetry, he argues, “goes beyond traditional nature poetry, which he argues, “goes beyond traditional nature poetry to take on distinctly contemporary issues, recognising the
interdependence of all life on earth and the irresponsibility of our
attempts to tame and plunder nature.” Poet Mario Petrucci is also
a physicist, ecologist and regular essayist and broadcaster on
environmental concerns and he has explored scientific and environmental themes throughout his awardwinning
canon, including Bosco, Flowers of Sulphur, Heavy Water:
a poem for Chernobyl and more recently i tulips.
21. Poetry and Conflict: Tal Nitzan and Basem Nabres
We bring together Israeli poet Tal Nitzan and Palestinian poet Basem
Nabres. Basem Nabres has been writing since 1976 and has published eight books of poetry. The last was about the war in Gaza. Renowned for her poetry and translations, Tal Nitzan has published four collections of poetry: Domestica, An Ordinary
Evening, Café Soleil Bleu, The First to Forget and won many awards. Nitzan is the editor of the anthology With an Iron Pen: Hebrew Protest Poetry 1984 – 2004.
44. Fleur Adcock
Fleur Adcock returns with her first new collection for a decade, Dragon Talk. “Inspired by the letters her father wrote from England, where he was stationed, to his parents in New Zealand during the second world war, this collection returns Adcock to familiar territory: the family, and her own complex feelings towards her
native country” (Sarah Crown, The Guardian). These new poems tend towards a sparer, more concentrated style, but still with her usual sardonic eye for incongruities and absurdities.
This event will no doubt be one of the highlights of the Festival.
47. Acumen Launch with Ann Drysdale, Leah Fritz and Gary Bills-Geddes
Acumen, one of the best of the poetry magazines, reaches its 25th
anniversary in 2010. “acumen’s longevity is down to its editor’s
clarity of vision and generosity of spirit. It is that rare beast, a
genuinely successful and inclusive poetry magazine.” [Brian Patten.]
Join the editor, Patricia Oxley and acumen poets, Ann Drysdale, Leah
Fritz and Gary Bills-Geddes for a celebratory reading with a glass
of wine. To celebrate its birthday, acumen has published an anthology of poetry chosen from the first 60 issues of the magazine.
48. New Voices: Sián Hughes, Will Stone
and Sarah Holland-Batt
Siân Hughes first collection, The Missing, has won her many admirers,
not least as the only poetry longlisted in the 2009 Guardian
First Book Award. These are vivid poems about real life that read
like miniature stories, dealing with parenting, illness, loss and ill-fated love. Will Stone is much admired by Hugo Williams, who named him “aEuropean-leaning maverick”. Striking imagery and a visionary edge, make the poems in Glaciation both sublime and unsettling. An exciting new voice in Australian poetry, Sarah Holland-Batt possesses a wonderful attentiveness to the telling detail; in poems of startling freshness and immediacy, she bridges the quotidian and visionary worlds, and reminds us of poetry’s power to renovate and restore delight in ordinary things.
49. Roddy Lumsden presents the 50th Eric Gregory Award Winners
Previous winners of the prestigious Eric Gregory Awards includes Seamus Heaney, Carol Ann Duffy, Michael Longley, Geoffrey
Hill, Derek Mahon and Alice Oswald, to name but a few. There is a very good chance that the young poets you will hear at this event also have an illustrious career ahead of them, but for now they are just starting out. Poet Roddy Lumsden will introduce the event which also marks the 50th anniversary of the award.
50. Penelope Shuttle and Poets from Cornwall
A celebration of Cornwall in poetry and song, Penelope Shuttle
presents poets Caroline Carver, Alice Kavounas and Victoria Field.
They are accompanied in song by Nicola Clark whose folk inspired
songs are mesmerising. Caroline Carver’s collections include
Jigharzi An Me, Bone-Fishing and Three Hares. She is currently poet in
residence at Trebah Gardens in Cornwall. Victoria Field is a writer
and poetry therapist based in Cornwall. She is the author of two
collections of poetry, the second, Many Waters, was based on a yearlong residency at Truro Cathedral.
Alice Kavounas’s collections include The Invited and Ornament of Asia.
51. Meirion Jordan and Ruth Bidgood
Two Welsh poets will create an event full of contrast. A sparkling and exciting debut for Meirion Jordan, whose book Moonrise is written with an assurance that belies his youth. His poems range from visions of post global warming Wales to Saturday
night binge-drinking culture and the rich and complex history of Wales pops up in expected and unexpected ways. Time Being is
Ruth Bidgood’s 10th collection in a career that spans almost 40 years. It has been said, rightly, that Bidgood’s work is ‘emphatically a poetry of location’ and it is the history and nature of her particular
region of mid-Wales that most inspire the author.
54. Jenny Joseph and Elizabeth Cook
Jenny Joseph is best known for her internationally renowned poem
Warning and for how deftly she introduces cadences of common
speech into the lyrical movement of her verse. She returns to Ledbury with Nothing Like Love which brings together some of her best-loved early love poems, with previously uncollected poems and some new work all conveying the experiences of the ‘thinking heart’. Elizabeth Cook is a brilliant performer. Her books include Achilles, a remarkable short epic that is neither a poem nor a novel and Bowl, which is her latest collection of poems.
57. Anne Berkeley and Mick Wood
Mick Wood won the 2009 Ledbury Poetry Festival Poetry Competition with his arresting, lively and eccentrically witty poem Trashbots described by Judge Daljit Nagra as “a poem that demands the reader’s attention for the way it teases our attitude to consumption”. The poem is full of odd words and the verses are neatly packaged so as not to obstruct the quirky story. Anne
Berkeley’s first full collection is The Men from Praga. The collection opens in the Cold War, when Berkeley’s father was in the Air Force. Praised by the poet Sheenagh Pugh, who notes how little poetry has engaged with the childhoods of children who grew up in the shadow of the bomb, in this book the child’s eye view is “sharply observed”.
58. Nine Arches Poetry Reading: Myra Connell
Myra Connell’s second pamphlet From the Boat is measured yet
generous; experimental and adventurous, sharp, often angry and
yet tender. She has also published two collections of short stories with Tindal Street Press.
59. Mary O'Donnell and Doris Kareva
Doris Kareva is a iconic Estonian poet whose collection The Shape
of Time, is her first UK publication. Kareva’s themes are love and its
great enemies, death and time and her romantic bravado and
recklessness make her poems compelling. She reads with the Irish
poet Mary O’Donnell through whose fifth poetry collection The Ark
Builders “we can sense a constant and emphatic plea for a new
beginning.” (Stride Magazine) The Ark Builders is thoughtful, sensuous
and witty, combining the topical with the timeless. One of its themes is that of the ageing woman – her relationship with her body, her sexuality, her ability to ‘keep going’ – which she explores with a refreshing candour.
60. Nine Arches Poetry Reading: Simon Turner
Simon Turner’s second collection and most accomplished work to date, Difficult Second Album is not in fact difficult, but rather darkly precise, quick-witted and modestly bold. Turner has an eye for infectious and joyously offbeat lines.
62. Gillian Clarke and Philip Gross
Water is the theme that unites these two poets today. Philip Gross won the 2009 T.S. Eliot Prize for his book The Water Table. Poet Polly Clarke writes “While water in literature is often a metaphor for what cannot be expressed, in life it has a miraculous physicality all its own and Gross inhabits this completely.” Gillian Clarke, the National Poet for Wales, returns to Ledbury with a new collection composed with “an easy skill and a musicality”, according to fellow poet Carol Rumens. A Recipe for Water is zesty and immediate and
not withstanding her concerns over climate change, there is plenty
of celebration.
64. Nine Arches Poetry Reading Peter Carpenter
Peter Carpenter’s fifth collection is After the Goldrush and his most
recent poems have appeared in Poetry Review. His poetry is radiant
with quiet surprises, moments that take flight to uncover a distinctive take on both ‘the here and now’ and the echoes of public and private histories.
65. Corsino Fortes and Al-Saddiq Al-Raddi with Sarah Maguire
The Poetry Translation Centre presents two of Africa’s finest poets,
Al-Saddiq Al-Raddi and Corsino Fortes, reading alongside the PTC
Director, Sarah Maguire. The leading African poet writing in
Arabic today, Al-Saddiq Al-Raddi was born in Sudan in 1969. His four
remarkable collections of poetry have brought him widespread acclaim. Corsino Fortes was born in Cape Verde. His groundbreaking poetry made a significant contribution to the literature of decolonisation, confirming him as Africa’s foremost
Lusophone poet. Founder and Director of the Poetry Translation
Centre, Sarah Maguire has published four collections of poetry, most recently The Pomegranates of Kandahar.
66. John James and Paul Birtill
In performance John James is extremely enjoyable and charismatic
and now he has a new Collected Poems, described in The Guardian as,
“a vigorous breath of fresh air, full of variety, humour and surprise.” His poems are a striking mixture of the lyrical, the experimental and the immediate that brings to mind the work of the New York poets of the 1950s and 60s. Paul Birtill is a poet and playwright whose dark and punchy poems even appeared on London Buses. He says, “I was on the number 73 and number 38. Some of the poems were stolen from the buses – which is a good sign. I like poetry to be accessible and not too obscure. It should be from the heart
and based on experience”.
Another perspective on the rich and varied world of Arabic poetry:
Three strong Emirati voices writing poetry that is modern and
compelling – known around the Arab world, not only in the Emirates. Khalid Albudoor was born in Dubai and is at the forefront of the modern poetry movement in the United Arab Emirates. He has published five poetry collections and won the Al Khal Prize for Poetry in Lebanon. Khulood Al Mu’alla was born in Umm Al Quwain and now lives in Dubai. She has published four volumes of poetry and her poems are founded on a desire to challenge the world through Sufism, and are influenced by her scientific outlook.
Nujoom Al-Ghanem is a poet, writer and independent filmmaker.
Following the performance food will be served in Hellens. Bar available
71. Dan Chiasson and Roz Goddard
Hailed as ‘one of the most gifted young poets of his generation’
(Frank Bidart), American poet Dan Chiasson makes a unique UK
appearance. His two collections published in the UK are Natural
History and Other Poems and Where’s the Moon, There’s the Moon. “Dan Chiasson has succeeded in writing the poetry many of his generation aim for: free swinging, gorgeous in phrase, bold in imagination, athletic in movement.” (Robert Pinsky). How to Dismantle a Hotel Room, by Roz Goddard is described as ‘terrific – sharp and funny, and horribly close to home’ (Deborah Moggach). Jean Sprackland writes that this collection ‘identifies moments of brilliance and darkness in our everyday lives.’ Her collection of Sopranos sonnets are inspired by the drama series of
that name.
72. Offa's Press Reading: Emma Purshouse
Emma Purshouse is a widely published poet and workshop leader
who’s performed across the country. She has an MA in Creative Writing from Manchester University. Her poetry CD for children Fair or Fowl has just appeared. She’s won a number of Poetry Slams and was second at Ledbury last year.
74. Offa's Press Reading: Jeff Phelps
Jeff Phelps’s poem River Passage won 2nd Prize in the Stand
International Poetry Competition in 2000 and was produced as a
pamphlet in 2005. Better known as a novelist with two novels (Painter Man & Box of Tricks) from Tindal Street Press he will perform with his son, Dan, a classically-trained composer, who wrote the delightful accompanying music.
75. Sinan Antoon and Fadhil al-Azzawi
We present two Iraqi poets, of different generations, able to give
varying perspectives on poetry and through poetry on Iraq and both are excellent performers. Fadhil al-Azzawi, a renowned and
distinguished poet, novelist and literary editor, was born in Kirkuk,
northern Iraq, in 1940. He left Iraq in 1970 and has settled in Germany. He has published many volumes of poetry, which have been translated into several languages, including In Every Well a Joseph is Weeping and Miracle Maker: Selected Poems. Sinan Antoon was born in Baghdad in 1967 and moved to the USA after the 1991 Gulf War. He is a poet, novelist, translator and filmmaker and his latest collection is Baghdad Blues.
76. Offa's Press Reading: Jane Seabourne
Jane Seabourne is a poet, workshop leader and teacher. Her work has been published in The Interpreter’s House, Raw Ege and Myslexia among others. Her poetry has been praised by Fleur Adcock and U. A Fanthorpe. Bright Morning is her first collection.
78. Andy Croft and Francis Combes
The French poet Francis Combes has published 15 books of poetry
including Cause Commune, or in the English translation Common Cause. It is a study in verse of the Communist movement in the twentieth century, the men and women who led it, as well as some of the artists who marched in their ranks. Common Cause is a ‘history of the defeated’, a book about enthusiasm and illusion, heroes and martyrs, saints and sinners. Andy Croft’s collections include Nowhere Special, Headland and Sticky and he edits Smokestack Books, which champions poets who are unconventional, unfashionable, radical or left-field.
Live readings 2010 highlights...
Sinan Antoon and Fadhil al- Azzawi represent different perspectives on modern Iraq
Fadhil al- Azzawi is renowned all over the world as an excellent performer of his poems and a fascinating conversationalist. We have tried for a couple of years now to persuade him to appear at the Festival and are genuinely delighted that he is finally coming!
Michael McClure: "Without McClure's roar there would have been no Sixties" Dennis Hopper. This is a rare chance to hear this iconic and charismatic poet.
Walking the Block by Jane Weir is a beautifully produced book, combining images of textiles by modernist handblock printers Phyllis Barron and Dorothy Larcher with her poems. Her readings are carefully thought through and presented and will no doubt be as much of a joy as her book is to read.
Pascale Petit
Christopher Reid
Don Paterson
Billy Collins
Tal Nitzan
Sian Hughes
Penelope Shuttle
Meirion Jordan
Ruth Bidgood
Leah Fritz
Anne Berkeley
Mick Wood
Mary O'Donnell
Simon Turner
Peter Carpenter
Will Stone