10.30am-12.30pm | £5+VAT per student

Imtiaz Dharker and Daljit Nagra, with Examiner Tony Childs

Poetry Live! (www.poetrylive.net) is aimed at GCSE students, but all are welcome. To book, email bookings@poetrylive.net (ten student tickets = one free teacher ticket). 

14.00-15.00pm | £7/£3

Daljit Nagra, Sean O’Brien & Karen Solie

Daljit Nagra is a Professor at Brunel University London, Vice President of the Royal Society of Literature, and presenter of Radio 4 Extra's weekly Poetry Extra. He has five poetry collections, all with Faber & Faber, and they have won the Forward Prize for Best Individual Poem and Best First Book, the South Bank Show Decibel Award and the Cholmondeley Award. His most recent collection is Yiewsley (2026).

Sean O'Brien's twelfth collection, The Bonfire Party, appeared from Picador in January 2026. He has received numerous awards, including the T.S. Eliot and Forward Prizes and the E.M. Forster Award. He is Emeritus Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Karen Solie grew up in rural southwest Saskatchewan, Canada. She is the author of six collections of poems. Her most recent, Wellwater (2025), won the Forward Prize for Best Collection, the T.S. Eliot Prize, and the Governor General's Award for Poetry. Karen splits her time between Scotland and Canada.

15.15-15.45pm | £7/£3

Gráinne O’Hare

Gráinne O'Hare is a writer from Belfast based in Newcastle upon Tyne. Her first novel Thirst Trap (2025) was shortlisted for an An Post Book Award and the Betty Trask Prize, and won the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year Award. Gráinne also holds a PhD in eighteenth-century studies from Newcastle University. Join Gráinne for a discussion of what poetry means to her as a novelist, and what kinds of poems sustain her own writing practice.

16.00-16.30pm | Free

Open Mic

If you have not yet published a pamphlet or a poetry collection, and would like to take part in this open mic event, please contact the Festival Organising Committee (team@newcastlepoetryfestival.org.uk) with a copy of the poem you wish to read (no more than 30 lines) by Sept 21st (5PM). There are ten available spaces so contact us early. New and unpublished poets are also encouraged to apply for the mentoring session and the discussion with poetry publishers on the following day.

16.30-17.00pm | Free

John Challis, Imtiaz Dharker & Theresa Muñoz

John Challis was born in London in 1984. His pamphlet, The Black Cab (2017), was a 2019 New Writing North Read Regional title. His second full-length collection, The Green Parcel, was published by Bloodaxe in 2026 and was longlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Collection 2026. He holds a PhD in Creative Writing from Newcastle University.

Imtiaz Dharker is a poet, artist and video film-maker. She was awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry in 2014, is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and in 2020 became Chancellor of Newcastle University. Her latest collection is Shadow Reader (2024).

Theresa Muñoz is a Canadian-born poet living in Edinburgh. Her second collection Archivum was published by Pavilion Poetry in 2025. Her work has been nominated in the Saltire Book Awards, Kavya Prize and the Royal Society of Literature prizes. She was recently Writer-in-Residence at Green College, University of British Columbia. She works at Manchester Met University. 

John, Imtiaz and Theresa will talk about the process of writing for a commission or a project, and read some poems they have written in this way.

18.00-19.00pm | £7/£3

Charlie Hardwick, Kay Hepplewhite,  Fiona MacPherson & Ellen Phethean

The Poetry Virgins are back; older, certainly, and wiser, perhaps! Join them for a reading of poems plucked from the history of women poets' work. With some perennial favourites from their past, they also bring new poems: naming, exploring, and celebrating women's experiences – and our shared lives in common.

19.15-20.15pm | £7/£3

Martina Evans & Jackie Kay

Martina Evans was born in Cork and lives in London. She is the author of thirteen books of poetry and prose. American Mules (2021) won the Pigott Poetry Prize. She is poetry critic for the Irish Times and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Her latest collection, Drunken Driving (2026), is a Poetry Book Society Choice for Summer 2026.

Jackie Kay was born in Edinburgh. Her novel Trumpet (1998) won the Guardian Fiction Prize. Between 2016 and 2021 she was the third modern Makar, National Poet for Scotland. She lives in Manchester and is Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Salford. Her latest collection, May Day (2024) was a Poetry Book Society recommendation for Summer 2024. Her Selected Poems is published by Picador this October and is a Poetry Book Society special commendation for Winter 2026.

10.30-11.30am | Free

If you have not yet published either a pamphlet or a poetry collection, and would like to take part in this mentoring opportunity, please contact the Festival Organisers (team@newcastlepoetryfestival.org.uk) by Sept 21st (5PM). There are limited places, so please apply early with a short (200 words max) account of your creative practice. New and unpublished poets are also encouraged to apply for the Open Mic session on the previous day.

11.45am-12.45pm | Free

Neil Astley, Sarah Howe, Jo Colley & Julie Hogg

Join us for a discussion between Neil Astley (Bloodaxe), Sarah Howe (Chatto), Jo Colley and Julie Hogg (Blueprint Pamphlets) about their experiences of publishing and editing poetry.

14.00-15.00pm | £7/£3

Kym Deyn, Olivia McCannon & Anita Pati

Kym Deyn is a writer and editor. Their debut collection folkish was published by Nine Arches in 2026 and was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. They run The Braag CIC, a poetry and speculative fiction press.

Olivia McCannon's first poetry collection, Exactly My Own Length (2011), won the Fenton Aldeburgh Prize. Her latest poetry books are Beauty and Beast (2023) and The Lives of Z (2025), which emerged from a PhD at Newcastle University.

 Anita Pati's debut poetry collection, Hiding to Nothing, was published in April 2022 by Pavilion Poetry and shortlisted for the Jhalak Prize. Anita is now researching the 1866 Great Odisha Famine for a PhD in Creative Writing Practice (poetry).

15.15-16.15pm | £7/£3

Clementine Ewokolo Burnley, Nadine El-Enany & Roshni Gallagher – “James Berry Competition Winners”

Clementine Ewokolo Burnley grew up in Cameroon and has lived between Scotland, Italy and Germany. She is a joint winner of the 2024 James Berry Prize. Her collection Belling the Leopard (2026) is a Poetry Book Society Recommendation.

Nadine El-Enany was joint winner of the James Berry Poetry Prize in 2024, when she also won the Newcastle University Chancellor's Poetry Prize. Her first collection of poems, Pelican Daughter, was published by Bloodaxe Books in 2026.

Roshni Gallagher is a poet from Leeds living in Edinburgh. Her debut collection Even the Trees is published by Bloodaxe Books and is shortlisted for the Forward Jerwood Prize for Best First Collection 2026.

16.30-17.00pm | Free

Carl Kears & Clare Lees

Carl Kears is Senior Lecturer in Medieval Literature at King's College London. His research and writing have focused on the earliest English poetry and on the creative practices, archives and activism of twentieth- and twenty-first century small presses in London and the North East.

 Clare Lees is Director of the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London, where she is also Professor of Medieval Literature.

Carl and Clare respond to Cædmon's “Hymn”, the earliest English poem, using examples from seventh-century Northumbria and modern Northumberland to explore the poem's many voices, versions, and translations.

18.00-20.30pm | £9/£5

Rachael Boast, Carolyn Forché, Sarah Howe, Roger Reeves & Aleš Šteger

Rachael Boast is a poet, editor and disability advocate. Her fifth poetry collection, Volvelle, was published by Picador in July 2026. She won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection in 2011 and has been shortlisted for the Griffin Prize (2014) and the T.S. Eliot Prize (2016).

 Carolyn Forché was born in Detroit in 1950. Her second book, The Country Between Us (1981), drew on her experiences in El Salvador. Her anthology, Against Forgetting: Twentieth-Century Poetry of Witness (1993), remains a classic text. Otherwhere: New and Selected Poems, 1976-2026 is published by Bloodaxe in September.

Sarah Howe is a Hong Kong-born poet and editor. Her first book, Loop of Jade (2015), won the T.S. Eliot Prize and The Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award. Her second collection, Foretokens, was shortlisted for both the T.S.Eliot and Forward prizes. She is Poetry Editor at Chatto & Windus.

Roger Reeves is the author of the award-winning Dark Days: Fugitive Essays (2023) and the poetry collection Best Barbarian (2022), which received the 2023 Griffin Poetry Prize and the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award.

Aleš Šteger is a poet and prose writer from Ljubljana, Slovenia, whose books have been translated into over 20 languages. His latest publication in English is Burning Tongues: New and Selected Poems, published by Bloodaxe in 2023.