Word Central at Central Library
Sarah-Clare Conlon, Literature Editor
Word Central is a long-standing live literature favourite that takes place every month at Central Library and features open mic performers and a special guest, brought to you by Manchester Libraries and Flapjack Press.
Join some of the award-winning wordsmiths of Salford-based publishing house Flapjack Press and performers from further afield for the latest instalment in what you can expect to be a no-holds-barred evening of performance poetry, all compered by the affable Tony Curry.
Stepping up to Word Central headliner duties in June is Ciarán Hodgers, a multi-award winning Irish poet based in the UK, whose second poetry collection, Solastalgia, was published by Burning Eye Books in November 2023. It explores everything from mental health and climate change, to landscape, language, spirituality, philosophy and healing.
His debut collection Cosmocartography was shortlisted for the Rubery Book Award 2019, toured the UK and Ireland for 30 dates, and was featured on BBC Radio 4’s Front Row. He cut his teeth on the spoken word scene of Salford and Manchester, and The Independent called him “one of the region’s most exciting spoken word performers”, and he was named a highlight of Guy Garvey’s Meltdown Festival at the Southbank Centre London and a “powerhouse poet at the top of his game” by Lingo Festival Dublin.
He has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize 2020 and won the Sean Dunne National Young Writer 2010, an International Pangaea Poetry Slam Champion 2015 and the Word War 3 Slam Champion. He’s been shortlisted for the OutSpoken Prize for Poetry two years in a row and longlisted for the Not The Foreword Prize and the Gingko Eco-Poetry competition. He’s performed in festivals and venues across the UK including The Royal Albert Hall, John Ryland’s Library, London Irish Centre, Contact Theatre, the Scottish Storytelling Centre, The 100 Club, the European Science Open Forum and Threshold Festival, Liverpool Irish Festival, WoWFest and Political Pride Manchester.
There’s a sign-up-in-advance open mic for Word Central, but if you fancy taking part, you need to be quick – the three-minute performance slots are bookable from noon two weeks before (this month, the list opens on 11 June) via email to the Flapjack address and are allocated on a ‘first come first served’ basis (if none are left you will be offered a space on the reserve list).
