Other projects
The Flag Project continues with Eekbatik artists, Marie-Thérèse King and Sarah Jones working with John Masefield High Schools students to make batik flags inspired by haiku. Look out for the flags along Ledbury High Street.
The Festival runs a reading group called Talking Poetry led by Martyn Moxley and poetry writing workshops, often in conjunction with The Courtyard in Hereford led by poets including Paul Henry and Zoë Brigley.
On Sunday 5 July Ledbury Youth Theatre will parade batik flags through the streets of Ledbury and perform their poems inspired by the elements, earth, air, fire and water. This project is organised in partnership with The Courtyard in Hereford.
Poetry in the community
The Festival undertakes a year-round programme of community activity with people who may never attend a Festival event, who have never attempted creative writing before, or have never taken part in any cultural activity. The impact this work can have is astounding and the opportunities for self-expression are clearly rewarding for all involved, as one participant writes, “You’ll be making us look at things differently. You’ve taken our shades off.” Poets Brenda-Read Brown, Sally Givertz and Sara-Jane Arbury offer workshops involving variously creative reading, writing and drawing opportunities to older people in residential or day care settings, people with a wide range of physical and learning challenges, adult literacy students and migrant workers or students learning English as a second language.
Schools programme
Every year the Festival places poets in local schools to inspire the pupils to read, write and enjoy poetry. During the Festival, the pupils perform their poems at the Out Loud event to an enthusiastic audience of over 200 people.
This year poets Julie Boden, Philip Wells, James Carter, Chris White, Anneliese Emmans-Dean and Nick Tocez will visit Ledbury, Eastnor, Cradley, Ashperton, Much Marcle, Pendock, Bromsberrow and Colwall Primary Schools. Frances Bradley, schools co-coordinator, writes: The power of the imagination and the opportunity for children to express their personal thoughts through words and pictures, are what the Festival Poets in Schools programme aims to foster.” The Anomalies are working with John Masefield High School students to produce words and music that they will perform at Festival in the Improvisation in Poetry event on Saturday 11 July.
Book online >
The Festival has published a gorgeous anthology of poems and illustrations by pupils on the Poets in Schools programme called Schools Out Loud. Email admin@poetry-festival.com to order a copy at £3.50.
Photo competition
We launched a competition among Hereford College of Art photography students to take a photo for the front cover of the2009 Festival programme, inspired by the theme ‘poetry in the everyday’. The winning photo above, by Carey Gough, invites you to hit the road with us and discover more about poetry. It was selected from a range of beautiful and intriguing images.