With the arrival of the new editor comes the revival of the national poetry magazine of Wales. In 2020, Poetry Wales is going on tour to meet the wonderful community of poetry readers and writers across the country. We’ve taken on board your suggestions for event venues and hope to see you there!
Poetry Wales in 2020 is primed to be a year for superb poetry as we organise workshops and performances around Wales, all of which will feature our talented contributors. If you’re interested in attending our evening performances or daytime workshops, please reserve your ticket as soon as possible as spaces are limited.
Poetry Wales Workshops
Are you looking to develop your writing skills and get feedback from some of the most respected and widely-read poets in the country? Are you based in Wales? If so, Poetry Wales Workshops are for you. Tickets for workshop days range from £15/session or £25/day for Poetry Wales magazine subscribers.
Dates:
Saturday 16th May 2020 10.30 – 4.30pm: Poetry Wales Online Workshop with Jonathan Edwards and Natalie Ann Holborow
Workshop 1, 10.30am – 1pm Beauty & Darkness – Creating Poems Out of Negative Experiences with Natalie Ann Holborow
‘I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I write and I understand.’ – Chinese Proverb
In recent years, writing as a form of therapy has gained increasing coverage in the mainstream media. From sufferers of PTSD to dementia, writing has proven to have beneficial effects where verbal disclosure may otherwise prove difficult. A pertinent topic at this year’s Hippocrates symposium for poetry and medicine, writing as therapy was hotly debated by medical professionals involved in both health and literature.
In this workshop, multi award-winning poet Natalie Ann Holborow sheds light on the writing process for her second collection, Small, due out later this year. It focuses on forming characters from the intangible to create striking prose-poetry – think Crow in Max Porter’s Grief is the Thing With Feathers, for example. Through metaphor and imagery, unique voices and quirky narrative, you will learn how to create art out of the negative through the magic of characters and voice in poetry.
___
Workshop 2, 2pm – 4.30pm: ‘Land of my Fathers’ – Writing About Wales with Jonathan Edwards
‘Brooded over by mist, more often than swirled about by cloud, drizzled rather than storm-swept, on the western perimeter of Europe lies the damp, demanding and obsessively interesting country called by its own people Cymru.’ – Jan Morris
In its history and geography, its people and landscape, its sense of humour and its sense of joy, Wales is one of the most fascinating and beautiful countries in the world. It is the country of Gillian Clarke and Dylan Thomas, Shirley Bassey and Gareth Bale, Snowdonia and the Pembrokeshire Coastal Path, the Chartist Rising and the Rebecca Riots. This workshop will aim to generate poems which draw on the beauty of our landscape and on the richness of our history. We will look at a number of poems as models, considering how Wales has been presented, as well as sharing stories of history, myth and local characters. If you would like to write in a way that celebrates the beauty of the Gower, explores the gritty reality of Welsh cities, or allows you to imagine yourself into the shoes of a nineteenth-century protestor, marching down Stow Hill in Newport, this is the workshop for you. Hopefully by the end we will have a range of poems which do justice to this gorgeous, gregarious, inspiring and passionate place called Wales!
An Evening with Poetry Wales
Enjoy a fantastic evening of poetry with Wales’ finest poets wherever you are. Poetry Wales will be touring its most recent published issue with editor Jonathan Edwards as he introduces and highlights fantastic local poets.
Dates:
Saturday 15th February 2020 7.30pm – 9.30pm: Wales Poetry Award Prizegiving and Poetry Wales Party at Seren Cardiff Poetry Festival
Now celebrating its 55th year, Poetry Wales is the premier magazine for new poetry in Wales. In this glittering event in the Art Deco Marble Hall of the Temple of Peace, Katherine Stansfield will announce the winners of the inaugural Wales Poetry Award, followed by readings from a range of exciting writers from the new edition of the magazine, with new Editor Jonathan Edwards and special guests including Marvin Thompson, Emily Cotterill, Abeer Ameer and Zoë Brigley. With music and poetry from Phil Jones of Dusty Cut.
£5 standard, £3 students, Free to current and new subscribers and prizewinners.
Monday 17th February 2020 7.30pm: An Evening with Poetry Wales at Gladstone’s Library
With readings from Robbie Burton, Briony Collins, Glyn Edwards, Pat Edwards, Jonathan Edwards, Liz Lefroy, Michael Loveday, Vicky Morris, Evrah Rose and Di Slaney.
Free tickets available, booking essential.
Wednesday 11th March 2020 7.30pm: An Evening with Poetry Wales at Murenger
With readings from Emily Blewitt, David Clarke, Jonathan Edwards, Emily Cotterill, John Freeman, Patrick Jones, Phil Jones, Anna Lewis, Clare Potter and Marvin Thompson.
Entry via donation on the door to support the Cwtsh Arts Centre/former Stow Hill Library.