Members' AreaThe six winners of our Sylvia Plath inspired members’ competition are Sarah Wimbush, Stanley Iyanu, Victoria Gatehouse, Kathryn Bevis, Audrey Molloy and Peter Wallis. The winning poems are published in the Poetry News and on The Poetry Society website. This members’ competition was theme was ‘Magical Nature.’ The topic was picked by competition judge Ian Humphreys […]
News
The Poetry Society names Savannah Brown as patron of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2022
The Poetry Society is excited to announce writer, poet and YouTube sensation, Savannah Brown, as patron of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2022. Organised by The Poetry Society and supported by the Foyle Foundation, The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award, is the leading international competition for young poets aged 11 […]
About Us: Poetry Competitions and Workshops for Young People
About Us is all about exploring the many ways life across the universe is connected. A competition and a series writing workshops are now available for free to young poets as part of the About Us project. Poets must be 4-18 to enter the poetry competition. Workshops are open to all poets aged 25 and […]
Diverse new voices added to OCR GCSE syllabus
Exam board OCR has announced 15 new poems that they are adding to their GCSE English Literature specification this September. The OCR anthology for GCSE English Literature students will feature many poets that have never been on a GCSE syllabus before and represent diverse voices, including living poets of British-Somali, British-Guyanese and Ukrainian heritage. Of […]
Forward Prizes for Poetry Shortlist 2022
The Poetry Society congratulates the shortlisted poets for the Forward Prizes for Poetry 2022. Among the shortlisted poets are Kim Moore, guest editor of The Poetry Review’s Autumn 2022 issue, who is shortlisted for Best Collection with her book All The Men I Never Married, and former Foyle Young Poets Holly Hopkins and Helen Mort. […]
‘Poems that are events in themselves’: Launch of the National Poetry Competition 2022
The National Poetry Competition 2022 is now open for entries, with Greta Stoddart, Jason Allen-Paisant and Michael Symmons Roberts announced as judges. Three distinguished poets come together to judge this years National Poetry Competition. Jason Allen-Paisant’s critically acclaimed debut collection, Thinking with Trees, won the Poetry category of the 2022 OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean […]
About Us show – watch at home
About Us has completed its 5-stop tour around the UK and can now be experienced as a short film. Lasting 30 minutes, the film is a composition of the show as seen in Paisley, Derry-Londonderry, Caernarfon, Luton and Hull. About Us was a free open-air spectacular event using cutting-edge projection mapping, animation, music and poetry […]
Hannah Lowe and Kim Moore to guest-edit The Poetry Review Autumn 2022
The Poetry Society is delighted to announce Hannah Lowe and Kim Moore as guest editors for the Autumn 2022 issue of The Poetry Review, to be published in September. Hannah Lowe is a poet, memoirist and academic. Her latest book, The Kids, was selected as a Poetry Book Society ‘Choice’ for Autumn and won the […]
Foyle Young Poets celebrates 250,000 poems
The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award, one of the biggest and most esteemed poetry prizes for young people in the world, has in the past week reached a quarter of a million entries, cumulatively over the history of the competition dating back to 1998. The Foyle Young Poets Award, now in its 25th […]
Young Poets Network heads to Newcastle with Human Cell Atlas winners
Young winning poets will perform their winning works from last year’s Human Cell Atlas challenge on The Poetry Society’s Young Poets Network, at the Newcastle Poetry Festival on 7 May, 12-1pm BST. The reading will feature Kitty Joyce, Nadia Lines, Lauren Mappledoram, Alannah Young, and be introduced by Poetry Society Education Officer, Helen Bowell. This […]
Love Poems Published in Young Poets Network’s Most Popular Challenge Ever
The Poetry Society is delighted to announce the winners of its Young Poets Network’s love poetry challenge, which received more entries than any other challenge in its eleven-year history. Since 2011, Young Poets Network has run nearly 150 writing challenges for writers aged 25 and younger worldwide, offering writing prompts, resources to develop their craft, […]
‘Mozart’s Starling’: Jay Gao goes behind the poem
Jay Gao discusses the thought process behind his poem ‘Mozart’s Starling’, which appears in the spring 2022 issue of The Poetry Review. Gao recalls ‘experimenting with a type of [form, constraint] that I have been calling a stack, inspired by the sea stacks which occur wherever coasts and oceans meet. Over time, wave erosion weakens […]
‘Murder, She Wrote’: Jane Yeh goes behind the poem
Jane Yeh discusses the creation of her poem ‘Murder, She Wrote’, which appears in the spring 2022 issue of The Poetry Review. She writes: ‘I would also love to see more poems inspired by TV, or films, or music – popular artforms – instead of always taking inspiration from painting and sculpture. Enough of the […]
Dip your toe into the spring 2022 issue of The Poetry Review
The spring 2022 issue of The Poetry Review is causing a splash with new poems by Mildred K. Barya, Tara Bergin, Jay Gao, Fred D’Aguiar, Martha Kapos, Maya Krishnan, Rebecca Tamás, Mark Waldron and Jane Yeh among others, as well as and new translations of work by Athena Farrokhzad, Yaha Hassan, Toon Tellegen – and […]
The National Poetry Competition 2021 winner is Eric Yip
Top 10 winners range from 19 to 92 as Economics student takes top prize Judges Fiona Benson, David Constantine and Rachel Long have awarded first prize for the National Poetry Competition 2021 to 19-year-old student Eric Yip, for his poem ‘Fricatives’. ‘Fricatives’ is a poem that makes its way ‘through the murky and treacherous waters […]
The Peggy Poole winner 2021 is Lauren Garland
The Poetry Society is delighted to announce Lauren Garland has been chosen by poet and editor Paul Farley as the winner of the Peggy Poole Award 2021. The poet Paul Farley, who judged this year’s Award, selected Lauren from 442 poets in the North West of England who entered the National Poetry Competition 2021. Lauren […]
After Sylvia poetry competition winners announced
The Poetry Society is delighted to announce the winners of Young Poets Network’s After Sylvia poetry writing challenge. Ahead of Sylvia Plath’s 90th birthday in October 2022, Young Poets Network invited writers aged 25 and under to write poetry inspired by the Plathian themes of Nature or Magic. The top three poems will be published […]
Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2022 is now open for entries
The 24th Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award, one of the largest and most prestigious awards for young poets aged 11-17 writing original works in English, opens today for entries from young writers aged 11-17. Run by The Poetry Society, with the generous support of the Foyle Foundation, the competition invites entries from both […]
About Us open-air live show launches
Opening on March 1st at Paisley Abbey and running until the 6th of March every night from 7.00pm onwards is ‘About Us’, a spectacular free open-air event. Throughout the spring the show will then travel to Derry-Londonderry, Caernarfon, Luton, and Hull. Combining live performances, large scale projected multimedia installations, a soundtrack by Nitin Sawhney and […]
Shane McCrae podcast: Lady Lazarus, John Keats, and a conversion to metrical verse
The award-winning American poet Shane McCrae is the subject of the latest edition in The Poetry Review podcast series. In their engrossing and wide-ranging conversation, Shane McCrae and Review editor Emily Berry discuss Sylvia Plath’s ‘Lady Lazarus’ as the trigger, when he was just 15, of McCrae’s poetry career; John Keats and the Gothic; George […]
The Mythic Element: Zakia Carpenter-Hall goes behind the poem
“I broke away from the script of the poem, the direction that I thought the poem would go in: towards some formulation of a beanstalk. Both my parents are avid gardeners, but nothing of interest along those lines was forthcoming in my fragmented notes. So I thought, what if the tone shifted?” In the latest […]
Hannah Lowe claims Costa Book of the Year Award
Congratulations to Hannah Lowe who at last night’s ceremony was announced as the winner of the £30,000 Costa Book of the Year Award for her collection The Kids (Bloodaxe). A book of sonnets, The Kids draws on Hannah’s decade of teaching in an inner-city London sixth form during the 2000s, as well as her own […]
these endless ellipses: Ralf Webb goes behind the poem
“Maybe behind the poem, the unfathomable machinery of the subconscious is forever churning away, processing and casting off memories and images in the constant pursuit of meaning, some ever-deferred understanding.” In the latest addition to The Poetry Society’s online series ‘Behind the Poem’, the poet Ralf Webb, whose debut book Rotten Days in Late Summer […]
The Poetry Society has two new exciting vacancies for a Publishing Manager and Administrator
The Poetry Society is seeking a dynamic Publishing Manager to run its publishing programmes, responsible for the management and production of The Poetry Society’s acclaimed print publications and online publishing including prestigious poetry journal The Poetry Review and lively quarterly newspaper Poetry News, and a range of publications featuring commissions and new work from Poetry Society […]
“Open-minded, open-hearted, open”: a tribute to Chris Meade
“Forever opening the book, open-minded, open-hearted, open – that was Chris.” – Maura Dooley on Chris Meade The Poetry Society is very sorry to announce the death on 13 January 2022 of Chris Meade, former Director of The Poetry Society. As Director of The Poetry Society from 1994 to 2000, Chris was a hugely popular, […]
John Haynes: a tribute
John Haynes, who died on 8 October 2021, was born in Newquay, Cornwall, on 19 December 1936, the only child of seaside entertainers. His father was a pianist and his mother a singer; both had studied at the Royal Academy of Music. He writes beautifully about his early life on his website. After three years […]
Joelle Taylor wins T.S. Eliot Prize
“Remember this / Our whole lives are a protest” Joelle Taylor has been announced as the winner of the 2021 T.S. Eliot Prize for her book C+nto – described by Chair of Judges Glyn Maxwell as “a blazing book of rage and light”. C+nto is a rousing paean to and despairing elegy for the butch […]
Thomas Kinsella, 1928–2021
The Irish poet, translator, editor and publisher Thomas Kinsella, born on 4 May 1928, died in his home city of Dublin on 22 December 2021, aged 93. He was the author of over thirty books of poetry and of essays, many of which are published by Carcanet Press. In its tribute, Carcanet described him as […]
About Us competition judged by poets and scientists closes soon
The deadline of 9 January is approaching for the About Us poetry competition judged by Simon Armitage, Kathleen Jamie, Ifor ap Glyn, Stephen Sexton, Keith Jarrett and leading scientists. The winning entries will be selected by a panel of judges, including poet laureate Simon Armitage, Scots Makar Kathleen Jamie, National Poet of Wales Ifor ap […]
Hannah Lowe wins Costa Poetry Award
Hannah Lowe has won the prestigious Costa Poetry Award with her third collection, The Kids (Bloodaxe). A book of sonnets, The Kids draws on Hannah’s decade of teaching in an inner-city London sixth form during the 2000s, as well as her own experiences as a teenager and a mother. The Costa judges, with Rishi Dastidar […]
Poetry News and The Poetry Review: postal delays
The latest Winter 2021 issues of the Poetry Society publications, The Poetry Review and Poetry News, are in the post and on their way to all of our readers, members and subscribers, and hopefully will hit doormats soon. However, due to the disruption caused by the pandemic and the ongoing delays to postal deliveries worldwide […]
Deft hands: The Poetry Review’s winter issue
Deft hands make light work of the winter issue of The Poetry Review, which includes new poems by Stanley Moss, Leo Boix, Asmaa Jama, Tiffany Atkinson, Clementine E. Burnley, Sam Riviere, Maya C. Popa, Paul McMahon, Zakia Carpenter-Hall, Ralf Webb, Holly Corfield Carr and many others. We have new translations of the Portuguese poet Matilde […]
On survival and extinction: latest members’ poems winners
Karen Jane Cannon, Jennie Carr, Pamela Crowe, Hilaire, Christine Marshall and Rose Proudfoot are the winners of the hugely popular Poetry News members’ poems competition on the theme of ‘Survival & Extinction’. “It was an uncanny experience reading these poems,” wrote judge Sujata Bhatt, “as politicians, scientists and activists from all over the world gathered […]
Poetry News contributors pick their books of the year
There have been so many excellent contributors – poets, publishers, critics and booksellers – to Poetry News over the past year and, alongside penning News articles, they have been reading tirelessly, it seems. A request, asking them to say which recently published poetry books they would most like to recommend, has produced an irresistibly eclectic […]
Announcing the new Canal Laureate Roy McFarlane
The Poetry Society and the Canal & River Trust are delighted to announce the appointment of Britain’s new Canal Laureate: Roy McFarlane. Poet Roy McFarlane grew up in Birmingham and the Black Country, surrounded by canals. He says “I lived, played and loved by canals and rivers and am looking forward to recapturing those stories; […]
The Fourth King arrives in Trafalgar Square – the launch of a new Christmas poem
The Poetry Society premieres a new poem ‘The Fourth King’ by Sinéad Morrissey, as its annual Christmas commission to welcome the iconic Norwegian Christmas tree to Trafalgar Square Every year, The Poetry Society commissions a poet to write a new poem as part of the official celebrations welcoming the Christmas tree to London’s Trafalgar Square. […]
Poems teach us how to read them: DeWeese on Leonard’s ‘Eclogue’
Christopher DeWeese offers a searching reading of Dominic Leonard’s ‘Eclogue’, in the latest addition to The Poetry Society’s ‘In Front of the Poem’ online series – the facts of it (“The horses are dying”) and the tensions within its language and form that “[keep] the poem slightly off balance”. “Poems teach us how to read […]
Young poets invited to respond to Sir David Attenborough’s speech opening COP26
Young poets from The Poetry Society’s Young Poets Network were honoured to be invited to respond to Sir David Attenborough’s speech at the opening of COP26 in Glasgow on 1 November 2021. Inspired by Sir David’s words calling world leaders to action, they have created new poems in immediate response to his speech to underline […]
A tribute to John Gohorry
The Poetry Society is very sorry to report the death on 17 October 2021 of John Gohorry, poet, critic, and longstanding member of both The Poetry Society and Poetry ID (North Herts Stanza). His fellow Stanza member David Smith said, “John was a brilliant poet – thoughtful and precise in his writing which he worked […]
Time hunted: Krisztina Tóth goes behind the poem
“All artists, including writers and poets, are constantly preoccupied with time. Writing itself is an act of magic, a struggle against the passing of time.” In the latest addition to The Poetry Society’s online series ‘Behind the Poem’, the Hungarian poet, novelist and sculptor Krisztina Tóth reflects upon her poem ‘Time, Time, Time’, which appears […]
Congratulations to the new Children's Laureate @JosephACoelho! We're very proud to have worked with Joseph to create many fantastic resources for children learning about poetry which can be found on #ThePoetrySociety website: bit.ly/3Ax8sj0
A brilliant edition of the magazine! @PoetrySociety twitter.com/AndreBagoo/sta… Retweeted by The Poetry Society
In the evening garden with tea and poetry. @PoetrySociety Retweeted by The Poetry Society
“Are you sure That we are awake? It seems to me That yet we sleep, we dream” Thanks for the most rare vision, Peter Brook.
As part of the #NationalPoetryCompetition, Peggy Poole gives a poet in the North West of England a year of mentoring with a top poet. Previous winner @YvonneReddick said 'My mentor, Deryn Rees-Jones, gave me the courage to enter poetic territory I’d been too scared to approach.'
I am supporting @McgoughRoger tonight @MerlinTheatre as part of the @Frome_Festival An honour and opportunity stirring equal parts excitement and anxiety in my swirling innards. Eek. Still a few tickets left. merlintheatre.co.uk/whats-on/perfo… Retweeted by The Poetry Society
The second part of this stunning poem by Carol Watts from the latest Poetry Review @PoetrySociety. ‘Time arrested. Words forego witnessing,’ Retweeted by The Poetry Society
Excited to have @Inadarkwood's @poetrybusiness pamphlet in #ThePoetrySociety office! Karl is one of our fantastic readers for #ThePoetryReview launch next Thursday. Book your spot if you haven't already: bit.ly/Summer22Review…
Poignant essay by Fran lock on Roddy Lumsden in the new Poetry Review sent me back to his haunted late stuff. Retweeted by The Poetry Society
The sagacious @r_vallen speaking on success and big breaks in the latest @PoetrySociety newsletter. ‘I learnt that it’s ok to walk away from things that aren’t serving you, even if many might see them as a rite of passage’ Retweeted by The Poetry Society
'Little Red' by @SarahWimbush is a recent winner of the Poetry News members' challenge judged by @IanHumphWriter & inspired by Sylvia Plath. Read more about the challenge here: bit.ly/3I3Tq6s
Great interview with @Samatar3lm1 (aka Knomad Spock) in the new issue of Poetry News from @PoetrySociety - insightful and funny - great stuff. Retweeted by The Poetry Society
Using #poetry to explore how young people feel about world events is a powerful and increasingly popular approach. Gareth Ellis – @poetrysociety – offers some principles, ideas & approaches for using poetry... bit.ly/3xJA2aZ #FoyleYoungPoets Retweeted by The Poetry Society
Did you know we're running a FREE day of poetry workshops & readings for 11-17 year olds next Sunday 10 July @natpoetrylib? ft. established & emerging poets like @JaneYeh3, @dansimpsonpoet, @JadeCuttle, Cia Mangat, @NadiallLines & Mukahang Limbu. Book now! bit.ly/findyourpoetry Retweeted by The Poetry Society
Calling Writers | Submit to our £5,000 Award We're looking to publish the best new poetry and short fiction – celebrating work that pushes the boundaries. The Aesthetica Creative Writing Award is open to submissions on any theme. Enter by 31 August. bit.ly/3I9HYp1 Retweeted by The Poetry Society