Manchester Literature Festival online

Sarah-Clare Conlon, Literature Editor

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Manchester Literature Festival online

23-25 October 2020

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

Poet Rachel Long.
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It’s all change this year as Manchester Literature Festival goes digital and reduces itself down to a tasty jus of 16 online events during its weekend celebration of words, running Friday 23 to Sunday 25 October. Tickets for #MLF20 are now available to book via the MLF website, with the menu dishing up leading writers and the literary stars of tomorrow, from the local scene to the international stage. Says MLF: “Our shared humanity has never been clearer. This year’s Manchester Literature Festival celebrates this connection through stories that deserve to be heard, voices that call for change, and powerful expressions of hope and resilience.”

We’re looking forward to hearing from Daisy Johnson and Sophie Mackintosh, hosted by the Centre for New Writing’s Jeanette Winterson. Author of short story collection Fen, Daisy Johnson’s debut novel, Everything Under, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2018, when she was not yet 30, making her (beside Eleanor Catton) the youngest nominee in the prize’s history – Sophie Mackintosh’s debut The Water Cure was up for the gong the same year. The pair will be reading extracts from and discussing their latest novels – described as “powerful and disturbing” – Sisters and Blue Ticket respectively.

Jackie Kay hosts a Picador showcase featuring Raymond Antrobus, Jericho Brown, Rachel Long and Safiya Sinclair – “four prominent Black poets who speak powerfully to our present moment”

The #MLF20 programme also includes performances courtesy the new Manchester Poetry Library, work in translation, activities for families to enjoy together plus two partnership projects, including the participatory Poetry Exchange. Poet, playwright and recording artist Kae Tempest talks non-fiction with acclaimed author Max Porter, 2020 Booker Prize shortlistee Maaza Mengiste discusses her process with former Women’s Prize for Fiction winner Kamila Shamsie, and legendary writer, campaigner and civil rights activist Angela Davis is in conversation with poet and Scottish Makar Jackie Kay.

Jackie Kay, also a Patron of MLF, is then back to host a Picador showcase featuring Raymond Antrobus, Jericho Brown, Rachel Long and Safiya Sinclair – “four prominent Black poets who speak powerfully to our present moment and fuse the personal with the political”. Ted Hughes Award-winning Raymond Antrobus will read new work alongside poems from his debut collection The Perseverance, US poet and winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry Jericho Brown will present work from his collection, The Tradition, and Jamaican poet Safiya Sinclair will read from Cannibal.

British poet Rachel Long, meanwhile, will gives us a flavour of My Darling from the Lions – currently shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection, and described by Stylist as “the modern poetry we need to read right now”. Man Booker winner Bernardine Evaristo, author of Girl, Woman, Other, heaps on the praise: “An enchanting and heartwarming new voice in poetry.” Not to be missed.

Where to go near Manchester Literature Festival online

Interior of George St Chapel
Manchester
Event venue
George Street Chapel

This beautifully restored former Independent Methodist Chapel in the heart of Oldham is as much a creative hub as a heritage landmark.

Chinatown
Restaurant
Pho Cue

Family-run Vietnamese restaurant in Chinatown. Prepare to queue for Pho Cue.

Come to Swithens Farm for a great family day out in Leeds. Our farm has plenty to offer whatever age you are!Swithens Farm is a working farm. For many years now Ian and his wife Angela have built a following that they welcome in all year around. We now have a farm shop, café, playbarn and petting farm. When we first opened we only had the usual farm animals – cows, pigs, sheep, chickens and it was free entry. We now have llamas, alpacas, meerkats, rabbits, guinea pigs, donkeys and a pony.On the working farm, we breed our own cows, pigs and sheep and we sell the meat through the farm shop and the café. If you buy a sausage sandwich from the café the sausage will be from the butcher who has made the sausage by hand using our own pork. We also produce our own free-range eggs.
Leeds
Swithens Farm

Swithens Farm is a working farm. For many years now Ian and his wife Angela have built a following that they welcome in all year around.

Peak District
Restaurant
The Chequers Inn

The Chequers Inn is a 16th century, family-run, traditional country inn with an impressive dining space. The Peak District at its best.

Testbed Main Space
Leeds
Event venue
TESTBED

TESTBED is a newly renovated 10,000 sq foot event venue in Leeds that offers endless possibilities for creating unique and inspiring experiences.

Manchester
Restaurant
Salt & Pepper

Chinese inspired British food in the centre of Manchester, backed up by plenty of well-deserved local hype.

Morning Glory - Coffee Cup
Manchester
Café or Coffee Shop
Morning Glory

Morning Glory positions itself as a grab-and-go spot, with just 12 seats inside serving coffee, bagels and sweet treats.

The Warehouse In Holbeck
Leeds
Event venue
The Warehouse In Holbeck

Run by acclaimed theatre company Slung Low, The Warehouse in Holbeck is home to boundary-pushing performance and community projects.

What's on: Literature

Deryn Rees-Jones. Credit Alison Dodd Photography
LiteratureLiverpool
Deryn Rees-Jones at Open Eye Gallery

For the seventh Matt Simpson Memorial Reading, hosted by Liverpool Poetry Space (LiPS), Deryn Rees-Jones will be reading from her new collection, Hôtel Amour.

Free entry

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