Troubadour of the Hills, Jean Atkin was commissioned to write One uncertain history of the Malverns by Ledbury Poetry Festival and Malvern Hills AONB. Please feel free to add your own poem, using the form below, inspired by the Malvern Hills or your own hills. As Jean says, “We are looking forward to reading small mountains of new poems.” Update, March 2019: Troubadour of the Hills went walking with BBC Radio 4’s Clare Balding for “Ramblings”! Read about it and listen to it here. One uncertain history of the Malverns Wide horns and white medieval flanks. Heavy as August the cattle lin ..read more

Hear Ledbury, a poem by Eloise Unerman, Ledbury Poetry Festival Young Poet in Residence         https://www.poetry-festival.co.uk/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Ledbury-Eloise-Unerman.mp3   As winner of the Young Person’s category of the Ledbury Poetry Festival Poetry Competition , Eloise was asked to be the Festival’s Young Person in Residence. Phillippa Slinger, Festival Manager says: I can’t tell you how lovely it was to have Eloise here. She read beautifully at the Launch event featuring Young Foyles and all visiting poets including international sta ..read more

Ledbury Poetry Salon with Featured Poet David Clarke and the Open Mic! Tuesday 12 April 7pm – 9pm £5 to include a glass of Poetry Gold cider!No need to book – sign up for the open mic on the night Recording now available http://www.poetry-festival.co.uk/audio2016/david-clarke-2016-04-12.mp3 David Clarke was born in Lincolnshire and now lives in Gloucestershire. He works as a teacher and researcher. His poems have appeared in magazines including Magma, Tears in the Fence, Iota, Anon, Under the Radar and New Walk. His pamphlet, Gaud, was published by Flarestack Poets in 2012 and won the Michael ..read more

Talking Poetry Poetry Salon with Damian Walford Davies Tuesday 10 November A final Poetry Salon for 2015. The first part of the evening will involve a reading from Judas and conversation. The second part is open to you, with short reading slots available. Featuring Damian Walford Davies reading his poems and in conversation with Ledbury Poetry Festival Artistic Director Chloe Garner. 7pm – 9pm, £5 to include a drink and festive nibbles! (no need to book – just come along!) The Panelled Room, The Master’s House Damian Walford Davies’s latest collections are Judas (Seren, 2015), Alabaster Girls ..read more

Dom Hale Five Years of Winners Hosted by our Young Poet in Residence, Dom Hale The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award is the key award for young poets aged 11-17. Over 7,000 poets submitted to the 2013 competition, from a total of 75 countries worldwide, drawing entries from Belgium to Barbados and Vietnam to Venezuela. With such fierce global competition, to be selected by the judges is an extremely impressive achievement, and for many poets is a career-defining moment. This reading brings together winners from the last five years of the award – Phoebe Power, Hattie Grunewald, Philip Coale ..read more

This event involves a performance of Deryn Rees-Jones’s new poem by actress Juliet Stevenson accompanied by the exquisite animated collages of artist Charlotte Hodes, in collaboration with Kristina Pulejkova. This event involves a discussion on the historical context and sources that inspired the poem and all the artists will reflect on the collaborative process. And You, Helen is published by Seren Books as a result of this commission. Chaired by poet, translator and publisher, Tony Rudolf ..read more

Elizabeth Parker grew up in a garden nursery in The Forest of Dean and now lives in Bristol. Her poetry has been published in various journals including Magma, The Stony Thursday Book, The Interpreter’s House and Agenda. Among others, she has been shortlisted for The Bridport Poetry Prize and The Gregory O’Donoghue Poetry Prize. She was a prizewinner in the 2016 Troubadour International Poetry Prize. Following her 2016 pamphlet, Antinopolis (published by Eyewear), Elizabeth’s first full collection, In Her Shambles, was published by Seren in April 2018 ..read more

Gen Winner of the People’s Choice Award, Wales Book of the Year 2019, Gen contains humour, warmth and is a worthy follow-up to Ledbury Poetry Competition winner, Jonathan Edwards’ popular and critically-lauded debut. Gen is a book of lions and rock stars, street parties and servants, postmen and voices. In the opening sequence’s exploration of youth and young manhood, the author sets his own Valleys upbringing against the ’50s youth of his parents. Other poems place a Valleys village and the characters who live in it alongside explorations of Welsh history and prehistory, and the collection co ..read more

Jonathan Davidson is a poet, director of Midland Creative Projects, Joint-Founder of the Birmingham Literature Festival and Chief Executive of Writing West Midlands. He is Chair of the National Association of Writers in Education. Jonathan Davidson is fascinated by how poetry is found and how it is heard. In On Poetry, he traces his own development as a listener and reader of poetry through a period of over fifty years. ‘From attentive close readings to thoughts of how poems might best be shared, his belief in poetry and its ability to touch and transform us shines throughout. This small book ..read more

Launch of the new anthology, Home on the Move: Two Poems go on a Journey. Featuring Jim Dening, Margaret Adkins, Jacqui Rowe, Home on the Move explores notions of ‘home’ that are challenged and reshaped by unprecedented migration. The anthology interrogates ideas of home, belonging and language from poetic perspectives. The creative responses are the results of a journey undertaken by two poems about ‘home’: Deryn Rees-Jones’ poem travelled from the UK via France to Spain and back whilst Polish poet Rafa? Gawin’s travelled to the UK via Romania and back to Poland. The poems and their literary ..read more