A personal story told by Leeds choir leader Frances Bernstein, with songs of liberation (Tuesday 22 November, 7.30-9.30pm, Clothworkers Hall, Leeds) Leeds University Centre for African Studies are offering a chance to see the special show: ‘Sing Freedom – a story with songs of liberation’, a personal story told by Leeds Free Range choir leader Frances Bernstein, set against …
Author Archives: Rachel Bower
Verse Matters November 2016!
After a wonderful Hive Verse Matters Young People’s Open Mic last week, Verse Matters is back on Thursday 3 November at The Moor Theatre Deli for the last event in 2016! Come down for fab poetry from Loma Sylvana, wonderful stories from SJ Bradley (Fictions Of Every Kind) and great music from Salt Pinchers (incl. Stella Sminkos) There will also be brilliant open …
Calling all young people (14-25)!
Verse Matters is teaming up with Hive South Yorkshire to run a young people’s open mic on Thursday 27 October at the Moor Theatre Deli in Sheffield! If you write poems, tell stories, compose lyrics, spit bars or have anything else to say out loud to a supportive audience, this is an evening to celebrate your words, ideas and talents …
Women of Steel #NationalPoetryDay
It was great to talk to Toby this morning on BBC Radio Sheffield‘s breakfast show about my new poem, Women of Steel, commissioned for National Poetry Day. In a new project from BBC Local Radio, the Forward Arts Foundation, and Apples and Snakes, the 40 stations of BBC local radio are marking National Poetry Day by …
Review: Memory, Mourning and Memorialisation
This is a proof of my review of three books, recently published in Stand 14.3 Bromley, Carole. The Stonegate Devil. Sheffield: smith|doorstop Books, 2015 (ISBN 978-1-910367-54-4) Madec, Mary. Demeter Does Not Remember. County Clare: Salmon Poetry, 2014 (ISBN 978-1-908836-31-1) Williams, Merryn. Letter to My Rival. Nottingham: Shoe String Press, 2015 (ISBN 978-1-910323-39-7) Carole Bromley’s striking second collection, …
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We Shall Overcome!
Come and join us at the next Verse Matters at the Moor Theatre Delicatessen on Thursday 6 October. It’s a special event for We Shall Overcome – a nationwide movment of artists, musicians and community organisers to protest against austerity and support those affected. It’s also National Poetry Day so what could be more auspicious! All cash donations will be donated to the Archer …
Reach for 100 rejections a year
Malika Booker recently posted a link to an article that advises writers to aim for 100 rejections a year. It’s all about accepting rejections as part of the process rather than as some kind of ultimate judgement. It turns out that it’s very sensible advice. I decided to send more writing of my writing off and have since had work accepted …
Leeds Peace Poetry 2016
I’m really pleased to be working with schools for the Leeds Peace Poetry Prize 2016. This year’s theme is refugees. This includes all categories of displaced people, including asylum-seekers. The competition offers an opportunity to raise awareness not only of the current situation, but of the long history of human migration and entrants are encouraged to think …
Unite against racism
On 23rd June 2016 we gathered in the Moor Theatre Deli for a special Verse Matters for Refugee Week and Yorkshire Festival. It was a powerful and moving event, balanced in that tense moment between the daytime voting for the EU Referendum and the results the following morning. Given the ‘Leave’ result and the rapid rise in race-related hate crimes since the vote, it is even …
Decolonizing Education
On 17th June we ran a symposium on Postcolonial Education: Teaching, Learning and Schooling in and After Empire’. The event was jointly organised by Leeds Beckett University and the University of Leeds, and put together by Rachel Bower, Matthew Whittle, Jonathan Saha and Emily Zobel Marshall. The aim was to bring together researchers, poets and community educators to think critically about …
Harrison and Simmons in Nigeria
More fascinating material continues to be accessioned into the Tony Harrison Archive in Special Collections at the Brotherton Library in Leeds. Most recently, Special Collections received manuscripts and correspondence relating to Aikin Mata: Tony Harrison’s translation of the Lysistrata with James Simmons in Zaria, Northern Nigeria. There is also a striking collection of letters between …
Rachel Bower 