Other Cities/Other Lives Eleanor Rees, Zoë Scolding and Helen Tookey at the Bluecoat

Sarah-Clare Conlon, Literature Editor

Book now

Other Cities/ Other Lives

Bluecoat, City Centre
20 February 2020

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

Poet Eleanor Rees. Photo by Elly Lucas
Poet Eleanor Rees. Photo by Elly Lucas.
Book now

Three leading contemporary poets Eleanor Rees, Zoë Skoulding and Helen Tookey read from their new collections, each exploring more-than-human perspectives on place and landscape. Cities, rivers, parklands and docks all come to life as these innovative poets re-imagine, for these complex times, what it is to be human.

A senior lecturer in Creative Writing at Liverpool Hope University, Eleanor Rees’s poetry is described as “visionary”. Her latest collection of poetry, The Well at Winter Solstice (Salt, 2019), is her fourth. It received a Northern Writers’ Award in 2018.Her debut pamphlet Feeding Fire (Spout, 2001) received an Eric Gregory Award in 2002 and her first full-length collection, Andraste’s Hair (Salt, 2007), was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Irish Glen Dimplex New Writers’ Award. Her second collection is Eliza and the Bear (Salt, 2009) and third collections  Blood Child (Pavilion, 2015), published the same year as her long pamphlet Riverine (Gatehouse, 2015).

Cities, rivers, parklands and docks all come to life as these innovative poets re-imagine, for these complex times, what it is to be human

Anglesey-based poet, critic and translator Zoë Skoulding lectures in Creative Writing at Bangor University. Her collections of poetry, published by Seren, include The Mirror Trade (2004), Remains of a Future City (2008), longlisted for Wales Book of the Year, and The Museum of Disappearing Sounds (2013), shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry. Her new collection, also from Seren, Footnotes to Water, follows two rivers, one in Bangor and the other in Paris, via a detour through the wandering paths of sheep in the Welsh uplands. She received the Cholmondeley Award from the Society of Authors in 2018 for her body of work.

Helen Tookey is a poet and academic based in Liverpool, where she teaches creative writing at John Moores University. Her debut collection Missel-Child (Carcanet, 2014) was shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney Prize, and her second collection, City of Departures, also on Manchester-based Carcanet, was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Collection 2019. She has collaborated with musicians Sharron Kraus and Martin Heslop; in September 2019, Helen and Martin spent two weeks in the Elizabeth Bishop House in Nova Scotia, having been awarded a residency to make new work there responding to the location. Helen has also published critical work on modernist writers including Anaïs Nin and Malcolm Lowry; Remaking the Voyage: New Essays on Malcolm Lowry and In Ballast to the White Sea, co-edited by Helen with Bryan Biggs, is due out this year from Liverpool University Press.

What's on at Bluecoat

ActivityCity Centre
The Liver Bird Safari Walking Tour

Liverpool has over 100 Liver birds hidden within its architecture. Join ArtsGroupie for a Liver Bird Safari where you’ll learn about these mythical creatures and their heritage ties to the

From £10
Image of a performer dressed as a creepy moon, wearing a beige suit jacket, grinning in front of a lamp
EducationCity Centre
British Science Festival

Enjoy comedy shows to art installations, dynamic performances and more at this amazing celebration of all things science.

Free entry

Where to go near Other Cities/Other Lives Eleanor Rees, Zoë Scolding and Helen Tookey at the Bluecoat

Probe Records record shop in Liverpool
City Centre
Shop
Probe Records

For more than 40 years, Probe Records has stocked an immense selection of music and provided a hangout for vinyl addicts and musicians alike.

Photo of the shop's front window
City Centre
Shop
Bluecoat Display Centre

The Bluecoat Display Centre in Liverpool is a contemporary craft shop – and it’s been doing its thing for over 50 years – despite funding cuts and recessions.

City Centre
Shop
Root House Plants

The ultimate destination for seasoned plant lovers and beginners alike, Root sell a wide selection of gorgeous houseplants.

food and drink
City Centre
Bar or Pub
Brass Monkey

Brass Monkey is a quirky bar with swings serving delicious drinks, tucked away down a quiet street in the centre of Liverpool.

Mamasan Liverpool
City Centre
Mamasan Liverpool

Mamasan is a new three-floor South East Asian inspired restaurant and bar based in Liverpool One. It also has exciting cook-at-home options.

City Centre
Theatre
Epstein Theatre

The Epstein Theatre in Liverpool, formerly known as the Neptune Theatre, was renamed in honour of The Beatles’ Manager Brian Epstein.

What's on: Literature

LiteratureWest Yorkshire
Poetry at the Dusty Miller

Poetry at the Dusty Miller is a now regular night with invited readers, organised by poets Carola Luther and Ian Humphreys in the Coiners’ Room in the Mytholmroyd pub.

Free entry
Lorna Goodison
LiteratureManchester
Poets & Players at Burgess Foundation

Poets & Players is a must-go for lovers of words and music, presenting poets established and emerging, with the autumn season kicking off with headline poet Lorna Goodison.

Free entry
LiteratureManchester
Nikita Gill at Feel Good Club

Enter the Underworld with internationally bestselling poet Nikita Gill as she discusses her “propulsive, electrifying and enraging” new book Hekate.

From £18.99
Dan Coxon.
LiteratureLiverpool
Writing The Magic launch at Dead Ink Bookshop

Writing the Magic (Essays on Crafting Fantasy Fiction) is the fourth in Liverpool-based publisher Dead Ink Books’ award-winning series of guides, and this launch event hears from editor Dan Coxon.

From £5.00

Culture Guides

Detail of an abstract sculpture, with burned materials and rusty chicken wire at the centre, with rusted metal bars bent around it.
Exhibitions in the North

Chocolate fountains, beautiful batiks and medieval marginalia - this month's supersized Exhibitions Guide has it all.

Literature Events in the North

The autumn leaves might be falling already, but the harvest is plentiful as the live literature scene gets back into the swing of things after a summer break...

Theatre in Manchester and the North
Theatre in the North

This season’s theatre is gloriously eclectic: from radical cabaret and reinvented classics to new musicals and boundary-pushing performance.

Cinema in the North

This month we recommend a season of Film noir, cult Australian movies and a huge celebration of DIY community cinema.