This month marks the tenth anniversary of Nottingham Poetry Festival - a kaleidoscopic set of events that sees poetry collide with activities like musical open mics, meditation and arts and crafts, all the while celebrating the art form, and its age-old centrality to the city of Nottingham. To mark the occasion, festival producer and local poet Ben Macpherson told us about the festival’s importance to Nottingham, and what people can expect from this year.
Poetry - what’s your experience with it? For a sizable bracket of people it might be less something to be enjoyed, and more like a type of maths equation that secondary school thrust upon you each week to decipher. Perhaps you were made to feel like other people - those familiar with the ‘classics’ - would always know more about it than you.
If you’re a longtime Notts resident however you may well have overcome these preconceptions and had a mini creative awakening experiencing live or written poetry (or if not you’re probably open to doing so). Nottingham is, after all, a city with a rich tradition of poetically capturing the moment, whether we’re talking about individuals like Byron, Lawrence and Panya Banjoko, or organisations like City of Literature, Writing East Midlands, or the Nottingham Poetry Festival - which kicks off again this month. Local poet Ben Macpherson, who produces the festival, certainly agrees with my assessment of the city.
“The beautiful thing about Nottingham is that it’s got such an active poetry scene. It’s sort of Nottingham’s cultural superpower - we have big city resources, but a small town vibe,” says Ben. “So the fact that you can walk across the city centre in twenty minutes means that you get a cross pollination of people, saying “I can go to that event tomorrow because it’s only a half hour bus ride away.”
There’s so many roots in the skills of writing a poem. They’re the same that a stand up comedian uses to write their set, the same a musician uses to work out a chord progression, and they’re the same marketing copywriters use to create the right impact so that they sell a fancy product
When I meet Ben he’s in the thick of preparing for the festival’s 2025 instalment, which takes place from 13 - 25 June. Since its founding exactly ten years ago by The Confetti Institute’s Craig Chettle and writer Henry Normal, the festival has hosted some famous names like the late Benjamin Zephaniah, and Holly McNish, while growing to regularly encompass fifty or so events across the city. Ben takes care of the programme with Alma Solarte-Tobon, who is often found working her creative magic at City Arts, and mate of LeftLion, director-of-many-festivals Tommy “Farmyard” Rosley.
“We’re lucky that we’ve been running long enough that most of the really big names have come and played at least once, so we’ve got a contact order,” says Ben. “Then, I will be up at the Edinburgh Fringe, doing my own shows while using my energies to scout out new, interesting voices and bring them down, so that we can look towards mid-career folks who want to go beyond the open mic.”
One such poetic voice visiting for this year’s poetry festival is Scotland’s RJ Hunter, an award winning trans writer, theatre-maker and performance poet, whose debut show Stupid Sexy Poems has been met with critical acclaim all across the country.
“Not to fully out myself, but I have never been to Nottingham!” says RJ, when I ask them about their familiarity with the scene. “But I've been familiar with the festival and the scene since I started out and also inspired by the lyricism of several bands from the area (shout out Divorce and Sleaford Mods).”
Through their career RJ’s become known for their passionate and topical style of writing and performance - their show at Fishergate Point on 14 June, one of the main events commencing the festival calendar, is definitely one for the diary.
“The piece is sort of a time capsule for me now, of my earlier work and my experiences as a freshly 'out' trans-feminine performer,” says RJ about Stupid Sexy Poems. “I had my start in theatre and cabaret and wanted to bring my love and passion for those artforms to my spoken-word shows, and anyone that sees my performance will feel that love and passion too.”
But it’s not only critically lauded poet-performers that characterise the festival programme - most of it is put together by submissions from people around Nottingham via an ‘open pitch format’. Ben tells me that he, Tommy and Alma, welcome more-or-less any idea for a poetry event to the table, short of an event themed around “setting fire to goats” where people “actually set fire to goats,” (spoken like a true poet).
“A lot of mainstream poetry festivals are very, very heavily curated, whereas while we do have a curated core, and the acts we put on we’re incredibly proud of, the fact that we are directing people to come and take a chance on the people around them is really crucial.”
Two more events worth putting in the diary are taking place at Metronome and Peggy’s Skylight. First, on Friday 13 June, Metronome hosts Jah Digga, the mind behind collective Poets Off the Endz, loved local wordsmith Cappo and Cambridge-via-Notts rap royalty Jayahadadream, for a memorable evening intersecting with live music and poetry. Later, on Sunday 22 June, the Poets off the Endz close out the festival with an open mic night and party at Peggy’s Skylight. Beyond those, there’ll be well over a dozen options across the festival.
But if that all sounds a little overwhelming at the moment, don’t fret - if you attend the grand launch party at The Fox and Grapes Pub, Sneinton Market, you’ll find yourself well ingratiated with the vibrant creative community that the festival team will bring together. Ben tells me that he wants lots of people to turn up, from creatives set to participate in open mics through the festival to those with just a passing interest in the art form.
Poetry is one of the most malleable art forms, he continues - so he hopes that the festival will show that it's a well of creativity that anyone can access and find food for the soul, no matter what their interests might be.
“There’s so many roots in the skills of writing a poem,” says Ben, adding, “they’re the same that a stand up comedian uses to write their set, the same a musician uses to work out a chord progression, and they’re the same marketing copywriters use to create the right impact so that they sell a fancy product. It’s all different tools of poetry being pointed in different directions.” Words to live by.
The Nottingham Poetry Festival takes place from Friday 13 - Wednesday 25 June. Keep up with @nottmpoetryfestival on Instagram for updates about the events programme, or visit the website below.
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