Leeds Poetry Festival at various venues

Sarah-Clare Conlon, Literature Editor

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A Year In Poetry

1-7 August 2022

Always double check opening hours with the venue before making a special visit.

Louise Fazackerley. Photo by Richard Davis.
Louise Fazackerley. Photo by Richard Davis.
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It’s the second year of Leeds Poetry Festival with a week-long offer of events, mostly in real life at Left Bank and Hyde Park Book Club, but with some online action if you can’t make it in person. You can expect a series of workshops, live spoken word and poetry performances, as well as a multi-media art exhibition, ALL PAUL, which runs from 28 July until 10 August.

It’s the second year of Leeds Poetry Festival with a week-long offer of events, mostly in real life at Left Bank and Hyde Park Book Club, but with some online action if you can’t make it in person.

Leeds Poetry Festival 2022 proper gets under way on Monday 1 August with a two-hour creative writing workshop led by poet Joe Williams, a well-known face on the Leeds live lit scene and host of new night Chemistry. For five of your hard-earned pounds, Joe will introduce you to techniques for coming up with new and original ideas, and for turning them into something more substantial. The workshops continue all week, and include Poppy Jennings’ Brontë-inspired session, “invoking the wild nature of Yorkshire landscapes to form our poems” (Friday 12.30-2.30pm, £5), and NSFW Club’s magnificently named Let’s Stick Together, creating collage poetry using found objects, materials and texts (Saturday 10am-12pm, £5).

On the opening evening, the Festival’s 2022 anthology, Taking Up Space, will be launched (Monday 7-10pm, PAYF), with judges Poppy Jennings, Izzy Brittain, Simone Yasmin and Tom Sims all taking part, presenting poetry inspired by the competition theme and exploring society, the pandemic, the galaxy and beyond. Other showcases include Nymphs & Thugs Presents LIVEwire (Thursday 8-10pm, £7), featuring sets from Louise Fazackerley, Tai Ògún and Carla Mellor, hosted by Matt Abbott, Burning Eye Books (Saturday 12.30-2pm, £7), hosting a panel and Q&A with Abdullah Adekola and Jemima Foxtrot, and Bent Key Publishing (Sunday 11.15-12.45pm, £6), with founder Rebecca Kenny and a line-up of “incredible Northern voices”.

Individual writer highlights include Same Difference (Wednesday 5.30-6.30pm, £6), when Ben Wilkinson chats about tackling class, mental health and more in his poetry, which is written against the backdrop of Northern landscapes, 163 Days with Hannah Hodgson (Thursday 6.30-7.30pm, £6), discussing trauma, truth and care in her debut collection of the same name, and In Conversation with Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan (Friday 6-7pm, £6), including a reading from her collection, Postcolonial Banter, and new book, Tangled In Terror.

Open mic nights include Wednesday’s Pizza, Poetry & A Pint, which does what it says on the tin, and Saturday’s Unapologetic, when local talent shout about being loud, proud and unapologetically queer, while Tuesday’s The Collaboration is packed with collaborative performances from poets, musicians, dancers and visual artists, including Izzy Brittain, Laura Dickinson and Jamie Scrutton. The festival culminates in an end-of-year showcase, A Year In Poetry, celebrating 12 months since Leeds Poetry Festival’s inception. The festival bookshop will be open all evening too, so don’t forget to bring your pocket money.

Accessibility

  • Dementia-friendly
  • Relaxed

Where to go near Leeds Poetry Festival at various venues

Leeds
Music venue
Brudenell Social Club

Perhaps Leeds’ most beloved music venue, the Brudenell is a lively and fun-loving place that often hosts two shows simultaneously.

Leeds
Restaurant
Greasy Pig

Greasy Pig is an upbeat, colourful café with a range of wild and wonderful menu offerings like cheese-topped savoury pancakes or tasty veggie feasts.

Threshold is an artist-led project space for sculpture, located in the front garden of a traditional back-to-back house in Burley, Leeds. Exhibitions are open for all to view. Encounter sculpture on your daily walk, or way to work or school.
Leeds
Event venue
Threshold Leeds

Threshold is an artist-led project space for sculpture, located in the front garden of a traditional back-to-back house in Burley, Leeds.

Event venue
Leeds Aerial Arts

Step out of their comfort zone and realise what you’re truly capable with Leeds Aerial Arts and their diverse range of classes.

Headingley Lodge
Leeds
Headingley Lodge

Headingley Lodge is a neat, no-frills hotel in which every room boasts a view of Headingley cricket stadium.

Event venue
Open Source Arts

Open Source Arts is a place for people to learn new skills, develop existing ones and become inspired in Leeds.

Test event
Leeds
Gallery
Aire Place Studios

Aire Place Studios is a creative studio in Leeds which prides itself on an upholding of equality, solidarity and safe-space values.

Leeds
Event venue
Hyde Park Book Club

Wine. Beer. Arts. Food. Music. Coffee. Lots of events and even a webstore selling zines etc. Vegetarian menu served 10am to 10pm.

Leeds
Event venue
Freedom Mills

Freedom Mills is a multi-platform events space which runs a regular night programme alongside a range of events, including rave nights.

Demonstration taking place at Leeds Industrial Museum
Leeds
Museum
Leeds Industrial Museum

Leeds Industrial Museum, housed inside the Grade II listed Armley Mills, explores the history of manufacturing in Leeds since the 18th century, including textiles, printing, film and engineering.

What's on: Literature

JE NE SAIS BLAH
LiteratureManchester
Je ne sais Blah at Cafe Blah

Je ne sais Blah is a brand-new spoken word night at the recently revenued Cafe Blah in the heart of Withington Village.

Free entry
Poet Tom Sastry.
LiteratureManchester
Verbose at The King’s Arms

Verbose is one of Manchester’s longest-running spoken word events, and welcomes Tom Sastry and Molly Naylor for June.

Free entry
LiteratureLeeds
Chemistry at The Chemic

Leeds live literature regular Chemistry offers an exciting mix of open mic acts and invited poets – this month the headliners include Rosie Garland.

Free entry

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