The winners of the 2018 Poets & Players Competition judged by Pascale Petit

The Judge’s report on the competition and the winning poems:

When Poets & Players asked me to judge their competition I happily agreed. It’s an organisation I have long admired, from its earliest days with the inspiring founder Linda Chase, to today’s impressive incarnation in the splendid Whitworth Gallery. Being based in the hub of Manchester, I knew there would be a high standard and was not disappointed, though the competition drew entries from all over.

Trawling through the anonymous entries was like a treasure hunt, many adventures with words had along the way, through various and enthralling worlds. Thank you to all who entered and entrusted your work into my hands. It’s hard to define what I was looking for, as I wanted to be surprised by something unexpected. But I do know that I wanted poems full of life, with a pulse and heartbeat. I also hoped for poems that demanded to be reread, yielding deeper layers. Above all, I searched for a feeling that they had had to be written, had a sense of urgency. I wasn’t so keen on work that told me what it was about, leaving nothing to my imagination. Happily, there were many candidates on my longlist that fulfilled my expectations.

The finalists include five commended poems, and three winners, though it might be useful to consider that when I get to the final eight, this is the slowest and hardest part of the judging. Each poem in the shortlist gave me a thrill as I reread it a second time, then continued to yield more pleasure as I compared and contrasted, but had to decide on the winner. One did stand out for me and rose to the top of the pile.

Competition Winners

First Prize: ‘Familiars’ by Sarah Westcott

Second Prize: ‘Fayum Portraits’  by James Friedman

Third Prize: ‘Alerion’ by Andrew Rudd

Commended Poets (in alphabetical order)

’The Cat’s Tail’ by Ken Evans

‘An early swim’ by Mark Fiddes

‘The Boy Who Kept Bees’ by Michael Greavy

“…you are no better than an animal;                                                                                                nothing but a common whore…” by Cathy Grindrod

‘Lee’ by Joanna Lowry

THE WINNING POEMS

FIRST PRIZE: SARAH WESTCOTT

Familiars

I will roll into cream, harden to talon and furl to the wedged tail and he will be bent, digging the earth and I will watch sinew, fine yellow hairs, and he will know he is being watched for he is also watchful

and he will straighten and lift his eyes to the hills and something pale will catch the corner of his thoughts, a handkerchief, a school shirt, and he will glance into the scratchy light and see me there, black eyes staring through his clothes, his earth-suit, and I shall go to him

moving myself down that thought so the thought becomes a presence, carries the wave of itself, like letting go a long ravelling bolt of blue or green or blowing onto a dusty book and following a single mote, its path on the breath or updraft of a limb

and when I reach the soft boy bones, the utter heart of him, he will cradle me in his ribs
then I shall lift and glide down the hollowed lane, up into the stand of darkening oak and out again, unmade

and I will go into a hare, I will come to the fleetlands when the fields are low and brown
and I will run and run as she drives and the music will make her think of me – something
on the radio waves –

and she will glance from her window and see me running parallel, haunches sprung, un-sprung and I will remember what it is to run and my eye will hold hers long enough for her to blink and slow the car and I will go

into a daw and I will have a black apron, shining grey cap and pink maw and I will go to her door one afternoon when she is at her papers and I will peck the glass door, I will come up past her fig and tap deliberately
……………………………………………………..Just like that
until she looks up and I will hop onto her palm and we shall meet like that and she will say how brave I am and remember how frail I was, the light shining between my bones and I will preen to show comfort and she will think how much I would have loved to hold a daw like that – not knowing she is the daw herself and it is love she holds in her hand, its liberties.

Note – ‘I shall go into a hare’ forms part of a testimony from Isobel Gowdie, who is said to have confessed to witchcraft in 1662.

SECOND PRIZE: JAMES FRIEDMAN

Fayum portraits*

The dead keep on surprising us,
all dressed up in the dark
like party guests waiting for their host.

From coffin-boards and mummy-cloths,
looking out to see who’s there,
they stare at us, full-face.

Their portraits show them young again,
their finery and coiffured hair,
with eyes wide-open, olive-dark;

almost confrontational,
as if they would look us up and down,
astonished to find us in their way.

Some eyes betray a tenderness
as though recalling distant violence.
A child frowns as if puzzled by death.

They seem brimful, about to spill
confidences, what their lives tasted like,
but keep their distance as they stare

like passengers, looking out of windows
on a train halted here.
I think they are pitying us

and saddened we’re still weathered by the air,
its heat and winds they have done with.
They can’t remember what it’s like

to change, although they are wrapped up
pupae-snug and already changed.
They smell of dust and interrupted dreams.

*(Mummy portraits dating from 1st century BC, found in the Fayum basin near
Cairo)

THIRD PRIZE: ANDREW RUDD

———————————————–………………………………….alerion, n.
———————————————–A bird believed to have no feet. Obs.

Alerion

How does she refuel in the sky?
Over the river, dipping into gleam,

a brief glitter in and out of branches,
the footless bird, all go, all fly.

These she knows well, the Parliament
of Impaired Fowl:

…the headless bird,
…the silent bird;
…the stumpy bird without a tail;
…the wingless bird, who pecks the ground;
…the bird with no feathers;
…the bird that sings but cannot hear its song;
…the eyeless bird migrating home in darkness;
…the bird that is invisible,
…only articulated air.

Alerion cannot slip the stream
or cling to anything solid.

What is so beautiful and sad is this verb
that can never become a noun.

But she has learned to set her course
where the skies are empty, where she can match

her speed to the rotation of the earth, creating
an illusion of rest, of blessed sleep.

OUR 2018 COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED. THANKS TO ALL WHO ENTERED.  WINNERS WILL BE INFORMED BY 12 APRIL 2018

We are pleased to announce the 6th poetry competition run by Poets & Players, one of Manchester’s leading organisers of poetry and music events.

OUR JUDGE FOR 2018 WILL BE PASCALE PETIT

Photo credit: Derek Adams

What previous judges have said about the Poets & Players Competition:

Poets & Players is one of the most significant and impressive poetry organisations in the country: the quality of the readings it puts on, its presence in the city is remarkable, so I’m delighted to be part of it in judging this competition.  (Michael Symmons Roberts, 2017)

What was electrifying about this year’s entries … was not just the wide and eclectic range of subject matters … but also the range of forms and tones, the many tongues and registers that together created a resonating and distinct entry of poetry.                  (Jackie Kay, 2016)

What a fabulously organised competition… One tries to dissuade people from the idea of competitions but if you’re going to have one have it like this. (Paul Muldoon, 2015)

It was actually really fun judging the competition because you get the sense of what is happening in poetry right now … it was fascinating to take the temperature, as it were, of contemporary poetry. I’d like to thank Poets and Players organisation for running the competition, for wanting to run the competition, but also in general for the work that they do in promoting poetry in Manchester and the broader area, it’s a commendable organisation and I’m delighted to be associated with it. (Vona Groarke, 2014)

This competition was scrupulously organised, and I loved the fact that the anonymity of the entries allowed each poem to speak for itself. (Jacob Polley, 2013)

POETS & PLAYERS PRIZE

Pascale Petit will read ALL poems. All poems will be judged anonymously.

1st Prize: £600
2nd Prize: £200
3rd Prize: £100

Commended poets at the judge’s discretion.

Closing Date: Wednesday 28th February 2018

Winners will be informed by 12 April 2018 and will be invited to read alongside Pascale Petit at the prize awarding ceremony on the afternoon of Saturday 12 May 2018 at the Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester. If you have not been notified by 12 April, we are afraid you have not been successful.

RULES AND OTHER INFORMATION

• The competition is open to anyone over the age of 16, except for members of the Poets & Players committee.
• Poems must be in English, typewritten in single space, font size 12. Please begin each poem on a new page but multiple online entries should be contained in a single document.
• Poems can be on any subject, in any style or form, but must be the author’s own original work. They should not have appeared anywhere before, online or in print. Please do not submit poems that are currently under consideration elsewhere.
• Maximum line length for individual poems is 40 lines (excluding title). Please do not include photographs or illustrations.
• No changes can be made to poems once submitted and we regret that we are unable to provide feedback or make any refunds.
• You may submit as many poems as you wish, accompanied by the appropriate payment and application form.
• Please note that all competition entries must reach us by Wednesday 28 February 2018, (online entries may be submitted up to 12 midnight on this date (GMT); postal entries must be received in our mailbox no later than Wednesday 28 February 2018). Entries arriving after this date will not be considered.

HOW TO ENTER

ENTER BY POST

ALL entries must be accompanied by a completed application form (see the link below):

Competition Application Form 2018

• Please post the completed Competition Application form and poems to: Poets & Players Poetry Competition, Poetry Dene, 16 Clifton Street, Bury, Lancashire, BL9 5DY.
• If you wish to receive confirmation of your entry please enclose a prepaid envelope.
• Poems must be printed on separate, numbered sheets, word processed (or typed) and clearly legible (single spaced and font size 12).
• Please do not include your name or other identifying information on the same page as the poem/s. All poems will be judged anonymously.
• You may enter as many poems as you wish but please ensure you add all poem titles to the application form.
• Entry fee is £4 per poem or 3 for £10. Please do not send cash. Postal entries must be paid by cheque or postal order (only email entries may use PayPal). Please make payable to ‘Poets & Players’ and send together with your poem/s and Competition Application form to the address above.

ENTER BY EMAIL

ALL entries must be accompanied by a completed application form (see the link below):

Competition Application Form 2018

Please email the completed Competition Application form and poems to
P-Pcomp@mail.com      All email entries will be acknowledged.

• Please ensure that all poems are sent as a single attachment and not in the body of the email. Please use your name as the title of the document (poems and application form can be in the same document but must be on separate pages). If you are submitting more than one poem you should include them all in the same attachment but please ensure pages are numbered and start each poem on a new page. Single spaced and font size 12. Please save documents as doc, docx or PDF.
• You may enter as many poems as you wish but please ensure you add all poem titles to the application form.
• Please do not include your name or other identifying information on the same page as the poem/s. All poems will be judged anonymously.
• Entry fee is £4 per poem or 3 for £10. Email entries must be paid by PayPal. IMPORTANT please include the PayPal reference number on the application form.
• • • Single poem £4
    • Three poems £10

CHECKLIST: Completed Application Form; poems on separate sheets (with no identifying information); cheque or postal order made payable to ‘Poets & Players’ (if submitting by post); PayPal reference (if submitting by email).

COPYRIGHT

Entrants retain copyright of their poem, however, we would hope to receive permission to make a video recording of the winners reading at the awards ceremony for our website, and to publish the winning poems on our website and/or in the Whitworth Art Gallery for one year after the competition.

Thanks to Alex at Jam Jar Productions for putting together this fab video of our last event at the Whitworth:

Jam Jar Productions kindly attended our last event at the Halle and filmed this lovely video for us, they’ll be joining us at the Whitworth in November too. Check it out, and thanks very much JJP!

The workshop is on Saturday 18 November at 10.30-12.30 at the Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester. The fee is £20. Please email davidborrott@btinternet.com to reserve a place and for details of how to pay.

James Sheard

James Sheard was born in Cyprus in 1962, and spent his childhood abroad, mainly in Singapore and Germany. As an adult, he spent periods living in Hamburg and Helsinki. He is the author of two full collections of poetry: Scattering Eva (Jonathan Cape, 2005), shortlisted for both the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Glenn Dimplex Award for Poetry, and Dammtor (Jonathan Cape, 2010), as well as a pamphlet of poems, Hotel Mastbosch (Mews Press, 2003), which was awarded the Ictus Prize. His third collection – The Abandoned Settlements – deals with the literal and metaphorical abandoned places of one’s life, and was a Poetry Book Society Choice. He currently lives in Powys and is Lecturer in Creative Writing at Keele University

Free reading at the Whitworth Art Gallery on Saturday 18 November at 2.30-4.00.

James Sheard

James Sheard was born in Cyprus in 1962, and spent his childhood abroad, mainly in Singapore and Germany. As an adult, he spent periods living in Hamburg and Helsinki. He is the author of two full collections of poetry: Scattering Eva (Jonathan Cape, 2005), shortlisted for both the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Glenn Dimplex Award for Poetry, and Dammtor (Jonathan Cape, 2010), as well as a pamphlet of poems, Hotel Mastbosch (Mews Press, 2003), which was awarded the Ictus Prize. His third collection – The Abandoned Settlements – deals with the literal and metaphorical abandoned places of one’s life, and was a Poetry Book Society Choice. He currently lives in Powys and is Lecturer in Creative Writing at Keele University

Kayo Chingonyi

Kayo Chingonyi (pronounced kai-o chin-gone-yee) is a fellow of the Complete Works programme for diversity and quality in British Poetry and the author of two pamphlets, Some Bright Elegance (Salt, 2012) and The Colour of James Brown’s Scream (Akashic, 2016). His first full-length collection, Kumukanda, was published in June 2017 by Chatto & Windus. As well as being widely published in journals and anthologies, Kayo has been invited to read from his work at venues and events across the UK and internationally. In 2012 he represented Zambia at Poetry Parnassus, a festival of world poets staged by The Southbank Centre as part of the London 2012 Festival.

Photo credit: Naomi Woddis

Rebecca Hurst

Rebecca Hurst is a doctoral student at the University of Manchester where she writes poetry and researches Soviet fairy tales. Her work has appeared in various magazines including Agenda, Aesthetica, The Clearing, and Magma Poetry. Her opera, After the Fall, written with composer Helgi Rafn Ingvarsson, premiered in May 2017. She is a member of the Voicings Collective; an ensemble that creates exploratory new music theatre.

Music from Chetham’s

Van Heek Quartet: Quintijn van Heek, Charlie Howells, Aidan Hutson-Hill, Cubby Howard

Marley-Clarke Quartet: Macie Wallis, Mitzi Marley-Clarke, Neil Dixon, Iona Russell

Chetham’s is the UK’s largest specialist music school, offering a world-class music education to 300 outstanding young musicians in the heart of Manchester. Funding through the Department for Education ensures that entry is based on musical potential alone, and never on background or ability to pay. Chetham’s students perform regularly in solo recitals and orchestral concerts, alongside a vibrant chamber music programme, with every student from the age of 8 upwards performing in a chamber group. Today, four of the school’s superb young players form part of the Poets and Players events.

This is our annual collaborative event with the Manchester Literature Festival. The event takes place Saturday 14 October at 2.30-4.00 at:

Free reading at the Whitworth Art Gallery on Saturday 16 September at 2.30-4.00.

Hilda Sheehan

Hilda Sheehan’s debut collection is, The Night my Sister Went to Hollywood (Cultured Llama Press, 2013) She has also published a chapbook of prose poems, Frances and Martine (Dancing Girl, 2014) ‘Joyously funny … comic writing with a bite’ David Caddy, Tears in the Fence. The God Baby is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press in September 2017. Hilda is the director of Poetry Swindon.

Malika Booker

Photograph by Siro Micheroli

Malika Booker is a British poet and multi-disciplinary artist of Guyanese and Grenadian Parentage. Breadfruit (pamphlet), (flippedeye, 2007) was recommended by the Poetry Society and her poetry collection Pepper Seed (Peepal Tree Press, 2013) was longlisted for the OCM Bocas prize and shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney Centre prize for first full collection (2014). She is published with the Poets Sharon Olds and Warsan Shire in The Penguin Modern Poet Series 3:Your Family: Your Body (2017). Malika has been the recipient of residencies from Millay Colony, Cove Park, The India International Centre and Kocevje through The Centre for Slovenian Literature.  She is a Fellow of both The Complete Works and Cave Canem and was inaugural Poet in Residence at the Royal Shakespeare Company. Malika has an MA in Creative and Life Writing from Goldsmiths University, was the Douglas Caster Cultural Fellow in Creative Writing at University of Leeds and is now an LHRI Fellow at that same university

Clare Shaw

Described by the Arvon Foundation as “one of the country’s most dynamic young poets”, Clare Shaw has two collections from Bloodaxe: Straight Ahead (2006), which attracted a Forward Prize Highly Commended for Best Single Poem; and Head On (2012), which is, according to the Times Literary Supplement: “fierce … memorable and visceral”. Clare was born in Burnley in 1972, and her poetry finds its roots in place and an uncompromising voice. Often addressing political and personal conflict, it is fuelled by a strong conviction in the transformative and redemptive power of language.

Clare is Royal Literary Fellow at Huddersfield University, and a regular tutor for the Poetry School, the Wordsworth Trust, The National Writer’s Centre of Wales, and the Arvon Foundation. She is also a mental health trainer, activist and author: recent publications include “Otis Doesn’t Scratch: talking to young children about self-injury” (PCCS Books, 2015); and “Our Encounters with Self-Harm” (2013).

Olivia Moore

The workshop is on Saturday 16 September at 10.30-12.30 at the Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester. The fee is £20. Please email davidborrott@btinternet.com to reserve a place and for details of how to pay.

Clare Shaw

Described by the Arvon Foundation as “one of the country’s most dynamic young poets”, Clare Shaw has two collections from Bloodaxe: Straight Ahead (2006), which attracted a Forward Prize Highly Commended for Best Single Poem; and Head On (2012), which is, according to the Times Literary Supplement: “fierce … memorable and visceral”. Clare was born in Burnley in 1972, and her poetry finds its roots in place and an uncompromising voice. Often addressing political and personal conflict, it is fuelled by a strong conviction in the transformative and redemptive power of language.

Clare is Royal Literary Fellow at Huddersfield University, and a regular tutor for the Poetry School, the Wordsworth Trust, The National Writer’s Centre of Wales, and the Arvon Foundation. She is also a mental health trainer, activist and author: recent publications include “Otis Doesn’t Scratch: talking to young children about self-injury” (PCCS Books, 2015); and “Our Encounters with Self-Harm” (2013).

The results are now in and we would like to take this opportunity to thank Michael Symmons Roberts for his excellent contribution to the success of the competition. We would also like to thank all those who entered.

The winning poems chosen by Michael Symmons Roberts*

*All poems entered into the competition, were delivered with no identifying details to Michael Symmons Roberts, who read every poem before making his decision.

Michael Symmons Roberts with Pam Thompson (3rd place), Sharon Black (1st place) and Ian McEwen (2nd place)

1st Prize:   ‘Post Op’ by Sharon Black
2nd Prize:  ‘Poem with this cow in it’ by Ian McEwen
3rd Prize:   ‘My Life As A Bat’ by Pam Thompson

Commended poems:

‘By the Statue of John Betjeman at St Pancras’ by Rory Brennan
‘Absences’ by Sharon Black
‘Mega-Death Calculator’ by David Wilson
‘The Slow Amble’ by Pat Borthwick
‘Literacy’ by Sam Burns

Michael Symmons Roberts’ comments about the competition

Poets & Players is one of the most significant and impressive poetry organisations in the country, the quality of the readings it puts on, its presence in the city is remarkable, so I’m delighted to be part of it in judging this competition. The standard was very high, I know judges always say this, but I’ve judged quite a few of these, there’s always a first sift where you move things out of the way and you think you can quickly establish these aren’t going to win, but the first sift really didn’t do much in terms of the fact that the quality was so high I was still left with a lot that were commanding serious attention.

The Poems

First Prize: ‘Post Op’ by Sharon Black

Post Op
(for Elizabeth)

I spotted you this morning
near Columba’s Bay – before the climb
towards the slate grey loch, just past
that split in machair where beach pushes through,
past the lambs going mental as they
race us to the fence posts, player numbers
painted on their backs, past fat pellets
of goose droppings and strewn button-top shells,
those smooth white spirals no bigger than tears
with gently wound mysteries –
in a hollow to the right, a sheep,
shaggy and wise, with high Finnish cheekbones
and an aquiline nose just like yours –
standing, staring straight at me
with two lambs suckling, one on either side like wings,
tails frantic as propellers: a light aircraft
flown in from the recovery ward
to watch our pilgrimage,
blessing each of us in turn as we
made our way to the pebbled bay
at the south of the island, the Atlantic
winking like a waggish aunt,
the mad scrabble for green serpentines
of which you are the queen.
I didn’t find a big one, not like yours, but a handful
of smaller, speckled stones like eggs
that I tucked inside my clothing
and carried back across the peaty scars
and the new wood bridge
to the sill of my hotel window with its perfect
view across the Sound.

Comments from judge Michael Symmons Roberts
1st Prize: ‘Post Op’ by Sharon Black

This is a quiet, tender poem that impressed me more with each re-reading. The title and dedication suggest what TS Eliot called ‘private words addressed to you in public’ – in this case a poem as charm or prayer for recovery and healing. It is deceptively simple – an account of a walk through a landscape – but the details are telling and wonderfully, intricately drawn.

Biographical note:

Sharon Black is originally from Glasgow but now lives in the Cévennes mountains of southern France. She is widely published and in 2016 won the Silver Wyvern Prize (Poetry on the Lake), the Prole Laureate Competition, was highly commended in Wigtown Poetry Competition and shortlisted in The London Magazine Poetry Prize. Her first collection, To Know Bedrock, was published by Pindrop Press in 2011. Her second, The Art of Egg, appeared with Two Ravens Press in 2015. www.sharonblack.co.uk

Second Prize: Ian McEwen

Poem with this cow in it

You know as well as I do the poor
cow’s a pretext, not the object
of attention. Sad, to lumber
unaware the uses you’ve been
put to. She tests one foot

patiently before another:
the wobble of a zen
balloon, a gas and shit
dirigible. The udder tide
migrates – to the parlour-

from the parlour- to the parlour –
soft as polyps, timed by the trickle
of a liquid clock. The cows
produce themselves along
the slurry path. In heaviness

that calls them to the artificial
suckle of relief they go –
blotchily, calmly, all together.
If she looks like the leader
it’s the flow behind her, she

was at the back when
the turn came. At this gate she
ponderously ponders as our host
the empty, forgone envelope.
We know who the loser is,

announced in backwards order.
The cows have voted with
their feet and left their
monuments around us.

Comments from judge Michael Symmons Roberts
2nd Prize: ‘Poem with this Cow in it’ by Ian McEwen

This poem caught my attention and held it from first reading. It begins with a playful title and a sleight of hand opening, but becomes surprisingly poignant. I was very struck by its linguistic inventiveness and wit.

Biographical note:

Ian McEwen’s poems have appeared widely in magazines including Poetry Wales, Shearsman, Long Poem Magazine, Rialto and Poetry Review. The Stammering Man was a winner in the Templar pamphlet competition 2010 and his collection Intermittent beings was published by Cinnamon in 2013. ‘Father lost lost’ was highly commended by the Forward Prize judges in the single poem category 2014. He is a board member of NAWE and a former board member of Magma. Ian has four children and lives in Bedford where he promotes the Ouse Muse open mic.

Third Prize: Pam Thompson

My Life As A Bat

…A wish, to
……be a bat—ricocheting in a
………..cave, all caricature,
…..daring, some might say, devil, whose
………echolocation leads me to my prey.
….fierce, fiercer in flight,
………….ghost of an old world, gorging on twilight,
….haunting houses, yours,
………….infiltrating your study to spawn
….jelly-eyed babies on your laptop. My
………….kind laugh, cry and scream—
….listen. You pad to the window.
………….may even open it. There’s a
….new smell in the bedroom, not unfamiliar.
………….Ouch! We go for veins
………….plumped by sleep. I have very small teeth.
….remember. A wish some might think
………….strange but it’s not so silly,
….truth is, it would be fun to flit
………….under your half-open blind on a hot night, land,
….victorious in bed between the two of you like a
…………..weird forgotten child with waxen wings.
….X-ray vision I won’t have as a bat but I can smell
…………..your fear, see how guilty you look when, without
….Zopiclone she wakes, to a bizarre petting-zoo.

Comments from judge Michael Symmons Roberts
3rd Prize: ‘My Life As A Bat’ by Pam Thompson

This is a smart, witty poem with a real edge and a sting in the tail. It is formally ambitious and adept, built around an abecedarian structure, but manages to maintain its fluency and energy throughout.

Biographical note:

Pam Thompson lives in Leicester. Her publications include Show Date and Time, 2006, (Smith/Doorstop) and The Japan Quiz, (2008), Redbeck Press. Pam is one of the organisers of Word!, a spoken-word night at The Y theatre in Leicester. She has a PhD in creative writing which links the science of holography and writing poetry.

Information about the Competition

A total number of 341 poets took part in the competition submitting a total of 813 poems. 291 poets (152 women and 118 men, 21 indeterminate, eg just initials) submitted a total of 665 online poems. We offered both postal and online entry options, 50  poets chose to submit  a total of 148 poems by post from all over the UK and also a couple of entries from overseas. This was an excellent and encouraging number and the overall standard was very pleasing. 

We were delighted to welcome Michael Symmons Roberts as our judge, and offer our thanks and appreciation for his enthusiasm, professionalism and attention to detail. We received entries from all over the United Kingdom, also many from The Republic of Ireland. Overseas entries included: Spain, Italy, France, Netherlands,  USA , Denmark, Austria, Canada and Australia: a truly international event. 

All entries were clearly addressed and, without exception, appropriate payments included. Thank you to all our entrants for your help in this and for your interest in our competition.

Thank you to everyone involved in the organisation, promotion and success of the fifth Poets and Players Competition. Please look out for future announcements about the 2018 competition.

Videos of the winners performing their poems will be available shortly on our Youtube Channel.

Any feedback relating to any aspect of the competition is most welcome.

Our next event will feature poets Greta Stoddart, A B Jackson, and Cheryl Pearson with music from Liam Byrne and Andy Hulme. The venue is the Whitworth Art Gallery, Oxford Rd, Manchester M15 6ER, time 2.30-4.00.

This is a free event open to all and there’s no need to book.

Greta Stoddart

Greta Stoddart was born in Oxfordshire. Her first collection At Home in the Dark (Anvil) was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and won the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize in 2002.Her second book, Salvation Jane, was shortlisted for the Costa Book Award 2008. She was also shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Individual Poem in 2012. Her third book, Alive Alive O (Bloodaxe, 2015), was shortlisted for the Roehampton Poetry Prize 2016. She lives in Devon and teaches for the Poetry School and the Arvon Foundation

A B Jackson

A.B. Jackson’s first book, ‘Fire Stations’, won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection 2003. His latest collection is ‘The Wilderness Party’ (Bloodaxe Books, 2015), a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. He has a PhD in Creative Writing from Sheffield Hallam University, and currently works at Cambridge University Library.

Cheryl Pearson

Cheryl Pearson lives and writes in Manchester. Her poems have appeared in publications including The Guardian, Envoi, Crannog, High Window, and Southword. In 2016, she won the High Sheriff’s Cheshire Prize for Literature, and won third prize in Bare Fiction Magazine’s national poetry competition. She was nominated for a 2017 Pushcart Prize. Her first full collection, “Oysterlight”, was published in March 2017 by Pindrop Press.

Liam Byrne and Andy Hulme