That’s What She Said featuring Jess Green at Tribeca
Sarah-Clare Conlon, Literature Editor
If you can’t make it down to that London for the “late-night” That’s What She Said: End of Year Special on 17 December (9pm start) as part of the Royal Albert Hall’s Christmas Season, fear not: the Evening Standard-dubbed “biggest spoken word night in London for women” heads back to Manchester in February with its first show of 2019.
If you can make it down to that London, you’re in for a treat – the “ridiculously iconic line-up” so far features award-winning literary hero (and That’s What She Said fave) Rosie Garland, iconic author Salena Godden, artist and social activist Reece Lyons, and poet and Guardian and Huffington Post writer Penny Pepper.
Run by For Books’ Sake and regulars at the Edinburgh Fringe, That’s What She Said showcases fantastic new writing and performance by women and non-binary writers, and was shortlisted for Best Spoken Word Night in the UK at the 2017 Saboteur Awards. Featuring established and emerging authors with a mix of performance, poetry, storytelling, slam and more, expect fierce, feminist truth, fiction, politics and poetry. The performers announced for Manchester’s February date include Jess Green and Roz Weaver, with more special guests to be added to the roster and an open mic with your name on it (just drop an email to hello@forbookssake.net to cadge a slot).
If you missed Jess performing at the Burgess Foundation for a Bad Language Special in October, this is your chance to catch the acclaimed performance poet and playwright. Crowned BBC Poetry Slam Champion in 2018, she has performed at festivals including Glastonbury, Latitude, Bestival and the Edinburgh Fringe, and her poem Dear Mr Gove is a YouTube hit with something like a third of a million views. Jess also runs Leicester poetry night Find The Right Words, which was shortlisted for Best Regular UK Poetry Event in the Saboteur Awards 2018.
Her first collection, Burning Books, published by Burning Eye Books, was shortlisted for the East Midlands Book Award 2015 and was the written-down result of her 5* spoken word show set in an inner city secondary school suffering under the Coalition government. The theatre adaptation of Burning Books was longlisted for the Bread & Roses Theatre Award 2016 and performed to sell-out audiences at Curve Theatre in Leicester, and has since been touring the country.
Jess’s second collection, A Self Help Guide To Being In Love With Jeremy Corbyn (also on Burning Eye Books), sees her falling head over heels in love with the Labour leader and his “raw Communist sex appeal”. She took the poetry and music show version to this year’s Edinburgh Fringe, where it got 4* reviews – plus an endorsement from Mr Corbyn, when he said it was “fantastic”.
Based in Leeds, Roz Weaver is a poet and spoken word performer who only took to the stage for the first time in 2018 after starting to write the year previous. Nonetheless, she has already had work published in a number of zines and journals, including Catalogue of Failure, Dear Damsels, Whisper and the Roar, Morality Park, Yellow Arrow Journal and Persephone’s Daughters, as well as appearing in three poetry anthologies and three multimedia exhibitions.
Keep your eyes peeled for further line-up announcements, but be sure to get hold of a ticket as soon as you can – TWSS is always a sellout!
