Poetry Festival: The Forward Prizes - Vahni Capildeo, Nick Makoha and Mary Jean Chan
08 Jun 2018
An evening with Britain’s most coveted poetry awards, featuring a star-studded line-up celebrating the best new voices in poetry.
Performers:
Vahni Capildeo
Vahni's latest book, Venus as a Bear, explores the feelings we have for creatures, inanimate objects and places. The author elects to be identified as ‘they/them’ in the context of their work, though not in personal life. They came to the UK from Trinidad in 1991 to study Old Norse at Christ Church, Oxford. Their advice for anyone starting out in poetry today is: ‘Delete Facebook. Go outdoors’.
Nick Makoha
Nick was shortlisted for the 2017 Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection for his debut Kingdom of Gravity. As a boy, Nick fled Uganda’s civil war and came to the UK to study.
Mary Jean Chan
Mary is a poet and editor from Hong Kong, whose work has been praised as "simultaneously intimate, passionate and politically widely-scoped". Her debut collection is forthcoming from Faber & Faber (2019).
This is part of Second Home Poetry Festival running from 6-9 June. All profits will be donated to The Rugby Portobello Trust who support programmes set up in response to the fire at Grenfell Tower.
