Slamovision Poetry Slam Comes to Nottingham

If, while enjoying a perfectly tolerable May, you’ve ever found yourself faced with a British Eurovision Entry and the need to pray for a continent-wide power-cut, I come with reassurance. Eurovision is old news.

Let’s go from bad to verse. There are several UNESCO Cities of Literature around the world, and for the past four years a group of them have come together in December for their own international slugfest, a remarkable head-to-head poetry slam - Slamovision. 

Happily, Nottingham has proven to be something of the Sweden of this contest - we’ve won both of the competitions so far (a win percentage, I calculate, of 100%) and our own City of Lit organisation, allergic to resting on its laurels, is desperate for a hat trick.

And that’s where you come in, budding poets: if you can tell your Rilke from your Rupi Kaur, if you wouldn’t try to find an amphibrach in a pond, if you have a goldmine of wisdom in your phone’s notes app, then head down to the heats on 6 October - you could be a contender to win £100 and to represent Nottingham at this December’s Slamovision final.

Need more arm-twisting? Reigning champion Abíọ́dún 'Abbey' Abdul, who represented Nottingham with her poem Strong Tea, was asked what she’d say to those who are unsure about entering: ‘I was also unsure, not just unsure - I was too busy. I had a hundred other things to do, and my focus was elsewhere…I went along [to the heats] to catch up with my friend and then she also dropped in “Hey Abbey, why don’t you share a poem?”...she brought along her really cute godmother…and it was like, OK, I can’t disappoint the cute godmother.”

All of which is to say, please start practising your poems, pronto. Rhyme is of the essence! (Is there a Eurovision for bad puns?)

Head down to the Slamovision heats at Nonsuch Studios on 6 October. The final will take place on 5 December at Metronome.