Unmissable events

Poets taking part in the annual event include the first female Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, Windham-Campbell Prize winner Zaffar Kunial, Griffin Poetry Prize winner Valzhyna Mort and Forward Prize winner Kim Moore.

This year’s theme is community and will explore poetry’s contribution to different communities and the power of writing collectives to encourage creativity.

Newcastle University Chancellor, the acclaimed poet Imtiaz Dharker, is taking part. She said: “Poetry can speak for the human spirit through the worst and best of times, and the Newcastle Poetry Festival is a celebration of that.

“This year's Festival brings together a host of exceptional poets and speakers, exploring what connects or divides us, unafraid to take on the issues facing us and the communities we live in.

“With a dazzling programme of readings, panels, workshops, lectures, events for schools and young people, performances by youth groups and students, poems inspired by music and art and an open mic for local writers, these are three days of unmissable events.”

Community

This year’s event opens on Thursday 11 May with the Northern Poetry Symposium 2023, organised in partnership with the Poetry Book Society. It will bring together all strands of the poetry community from readers to writers, and students to publishers, for a day of inspiring poet-led panel discussions.  T.S. Eliot Prize shortlisted poets Zaffar Kunial and Fiona Benson will give the opening night readings.

Highlights for Friday 12 May include:

• Forward Prize winner Kim Moore and Costa Poetry winner Mary Jean Chan
• Saltire Poetry Book of the Year Award winner Claire Askew
• Poetry Live: Daljit Nagra, Owen Sheers, Sinéad Morrisey, Carol Ann Duffy, Imtiaz Dharker
• UK Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy with musician John Sampson and Imtiaz Dharker
• Griffin Poetry Prize winner Canadian poet Karen Solie

Other events include a showcase of poems by Creative Writing students inspired by the Wilhelmina Barns-Graham exhibition Paths to Abstraction at the University’s Hatton Gallery. Original performances across poetry, music, art and film on the theme of ‘Dear Neighbour’ will also be presented.

On Saturday 13 May, the Young People’s Theatre, working with poets Linda France and David Spittle, extend the festival theme of ‘Community’ to consider our human place as a symbiotic part of our environment. This playful reading, entitled ‘The Venn Diagram of Us’ showcases some of their exciting, ecologically aware explorations of the wild and strange inside and out.

Other highlights include:

• Picador showcase with Maya C. Popa, Jacob Polley and Sean O’Brien
• Griffin Poetry Prize winner Valzhyna Mort
• Seamus Heaney Centre Poetry Prize winner and Newcastle University Senior Lecturer Tara Bergin
• A Royal Society Lecture with Sandeep Parmar

The Young People’s Theatre, working with poets Linda France and David Spittle, extend the festival theme of ‘Community’ to consider our human place as a symbiotic part of our environment. This playful reading, entitled ‘The Venn Diagram of Us’ showcases some of their exciting, ecologically aware explorations of the wild and strange inside and out.

The winner of the Chancellor’s Poetry Prize for Newcastle University students will also be revealed.

An inclusive space

The festival is organised by Newcastle University’s Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Festival Director Dr Theresa Muñoz said: “It has been a privilege curating the Newcastle Poetry Festival 2023: Community. It’s been an enriching experience creating events with groups of young people, students, artists, spoken word poets and poetry collectives. This year, we are focusing on the strength of poetry communities: how poets band together to create an inclusive space that leads the way for change.”

Professor Linda Anderson, Founding Director of the Newcastle Centre for Literary Arts and Newcastle Poetry Festival said: “It's a great credit to Newcastle University and to the Arts Council that this festival is flourishing as it is and extending its range of collaborative work with organisations here and internationally. To be the home of Bloodaxe Books, The Poetry Book Society and The Newcastle Poetry Festival makes Newcastle one of the great centres for poetry in the UK.”

Newcastle Poetry Festival will take place at Northern Stage. The full programme and tickets are available here. 

Photograph of Valzhyna Mort by Tanya Kapitanova