Readings
- 2017
9 June, Friday – Institute of Psychoanalysis, Maida Vale, London7 May, Sunday – Cheltenham Poetry Festival (https://cheltenhampoetryfestival.wordpress.com/festival-2017/)28 March, Tuesday – Cambridge, CB1 monthly reading series (http://www.cb1poetry.org.uk/)2 March, Thursday – StAnza International Poetry Festival, St. Andrews, Scotland (http://www.stanzapoetry.org/festival/poets-artists/stephenson-0)13 February, Monday – Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, Carol Ann Duffy and Friends (https://www.royalexchange.co.uk/whats-on-and-tickets/carol-ann-duffy-friends-2017)15 January, Waterstones, Brussels
- 2016
November – launch of my second pamphlet at the Poetry in Aldeburgh festival; October – Torbay Poetry Festival; July – Magma issue launch at the London Review of Books bookshop, London; January – Magma reading at the Torriano, London and at the Poetry Cafe, Covent Garden, London.
- 2015
November – reading from my pamphlet at the Troubadour, London; May – Grasmere launch of my first pamphlet ‘Those People’ (Smith/Doorstop 2015).
- 2014
May 22 – I read 2 x 20 minutes slots as guest reader at Paris Lit Up’s Thursday night reading series in Belleville. Poems inspired by airports, European travel and living statues.
- 2013
October 17 – I read 4 poems at the Paris Lit Up night at Culture Rapide in Belleville, the great Thursday night weekly poetry outing, full of poems, songs, novel extracts and always the unexpected. Really open and supportive atmosphere.
October 13 – I read ‘live’ from Paris alongside Izzy Galleymore, Chris McCabe and Andrew Philip as part of Robert Peake’s Transatlantic Poetry reading series, Silk Road British Poetry Part 1, which can be watched at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2nSkpX9Qck
June 3 – I was lucky to have the opportunity to read alongside the poets Simon Armitage, Frieda Hughes and Stuart Silver, with pianist Huw Warren at Coffee House-Poetry at the Troubadour, Earl’s Court in June for ‘what we should have said’ – “an entertaining, enlightening, innovative & unpredictable spoken-word shindig”. An amazing experience, and the time just flew! Below with regular fortnightly reading series organiser Anne-Marie Fyfe, and Frieda Hughes after the reading.
May 23 – Not a reading as such, more of an exhibition. The launch night of the 15 poets x 15 artists collaboration project organised by poet Katrina Naomi. I was teamed up with the painter Tony Hull. What resulted: two almost-classical portraits with unexpected voices.
May 4 – At the Dugdale Centre, Enfield with the Highgate Poets, having rushed there from Brighton and the issue launch of the fantastic new format Modern Poetry in Translation.
It is a really good, well-equipped venue. The Enfield Poets recently relocated there from Salisbury House, and are a very friendly and supportive crowd. Post-reading photo.
April 28 – Torriano Meeting House, Kentish Town, London with the Highgate Poets. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rK04-RUw3kI
February 23 – ‘Alter Ego’ event organised by Roddy Lumsden, upstairs at the Betsey Trotwood pub, Farringdon, London. I read a poem about actress Gwyneth Paltrow composed of 20 intentionally bad haiku.
February 18 – Magma Poetry Competition Awards, RADA, Chenies Street, London. A great evening of readings and a chance to say hello again to prize winner Amali Rodrigo who I had met on an Arvon course at Lumb Bank, Yorkshire, in 2011.
I read short poems of under 10 lines by Jacob Polley and Michael Egan, before my own poem ‘The Pull’, which appears in issue 55 of Magma, entitled ‘Soul and the Machine’. By complete coincidence – after sending poems issue after issue, to no avail – I had a poem taken in the same issue, called ‘cautious means reduce’, derived from C++ code.
- 2012
14 Magazine, issue launch, Poetry Cafe, Covent Garden, London
The Shuffle, monthly reading series, Poetry Cafe, Covent Garden, London
Adventures in Form, anthology launch, Aldgate, London
- 2011
Ledbury Poetry Festival, Ledbury, Herefordshire
- 2010
Coffee-House Poetry at the Troubadour, Earl’s Court, London