So proud to get Gail McConnell into the studio today. She's the writer of two pamphlets and one amazing book. The Sun Is Open was brought out on Penned a few years back and it really is a groundbreaking book and well worth a read.

It won the The John Pollard Foundation International Poetry Award and The Christopher Ewart-Biggs Memorial Prize  and was shortlisted for the Michael Murphy Memorial Prize. It was a Poetry Book of the Month in the Guardian and in The Observer, a book of the year in the TLS and The White Review, and a poetry book of the year in The Telegraph and The Irish Times. The Sun is Open was warmly reviewed in the Dublin Review of Books, Some Flowers Soon and Blackbox Manifold. I wrote about the book in The Irish Times and further coverage appeared in The Telegraph and the Belfast Telegraph. I discuss the book in conversation with Emily Berry for the Poetry Society podcast, with Pádraig Ó Tuama for the Corrymeela podcast and on Sunday with Steven Rainey on Radio Ulster. With Conor Garrett I made 'The Open Box', an arts feature based on the book for BBC Radio 4. 

Today we talk extended metaphors, animals and descriptive language in this homage to the American poet Kay Ryan. The poem is called Spiderweb.

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Very happy to be back with Ellen Cranitch in the Pickle Jar.

She is a poet and lecturer. Her first collection, The Immortalist, was shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney Award for Best First Collection. Her new collection, Crystal, was published by Bloodaxe, named “Dignified, moving and sure…" by The Observer where it was named book of the month, it was also recommended by Stephen Fry and Ian McMillan.

Today she brings a Prynne Poem into the Pickle Jar and we speak of line breaks, intensity and the importance of syntax.

With two books on the horizon, I'm extremely excited to bring Salena Godden into the Pickle Jar.

Salena Godden is an English poet, author, activist, broadcaster, memoirist and essayist. Born in Hastings, UK, of Jamaican-Irish heritage, Godden based in London. Widely anthologised, she has published several books. She has also written for BBC TV and radio and has released four studio albums to date.

Today we crack open a Nikita Gill poem to see what we can find.

Very excited to bring Bryony Littlefair into the Pickle Jar. Partly because her debut poetry collection Escape Room (Seren, 2022) was excellent. Also because her pamphlet Giraffe won the Mslexia Pamphlet Prize in 2017. But mostly because we both LOVE Tony Hoagland.

So here's us geeking out over Tony Hoagland for 20 minutes!

Immensely proud and thankful to PBS for bringing Paul Muldoon into the studio.

Paul Muldoon is so big he's off the charts. I don't think there's many awards he hasn't won in his huge career. Today we celebrate his 14th book 'With Joy in Service on Rue Tagore'.

I learnt alot in this episode and so will you.

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We're finally back.

This week I'm joined by Golnoosh Nour. A Tehran born poet who has two fantastic collections. The most recent was Rocksong on Verve and it blew my face off. So I invited her in to talk about a poet and poem she really loves. Amongst Darkness by Forough-farrokhzad.

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This week we are taking a trip to Birmingham to celebrate with the crew from Uni_Slam.

Uni_Slam is a huge event that takes place yearly in The Birmingham Hippodrome. Each year University students come together to share their poems in a competition that celebrates the diversity of poetry in this country.

On the same weekend the Uni_Slam team invites to the festival some of the Poetry Collectives that hold some of the best emerging poets of the scene.

I am honoured to give a podcast stage to some of those collectives.

In this episode we listen to poets from

Roundhouse Poetry Collective

The Poetry Society’s Young Poets Network Collective

Barbican Young Poets 

Nottingham's Speak Easy

South Yorkshire's : Hive Young Poets

Manchester's Young Identity

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Happy to be back here to present another special speaking with the wonderful Victoria Kennefick 

Victoria grew up in Cork and lives in Kerry. Her debut collection, Eat or We Both Starve (Carcanet Press, 2021), won the Seamus Heaney First Collection Poetry Prize and the Dalkey Book Festival Emerging Writer of the Year Award. It was shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize, the Costa Poetry Book Award, Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry,

Today she talks about her new book 'Egg/Shell' and reads her favourite poem from it.

I am so massively excited to bring Kwame Dawes into the Pickle Jar.

He is the author of twenty books of poetry and numerous other books of fiction, criticism, and essays. In 2016 his book, Speak from Here to There, a co-written collection of verse with Australian poet John Kinsella appeared.  He is Glenna Luschei Editor of Prairie Schooner and teaches at the University of Nebraska and the Pacific MFA Program.  He is Director of the African Poetry Book Fund and Artistic Director of the Calabash International Literary Festival.

Often called 'the busiest man in literature', Today he joins us to talk about his new book Sturge Town.

This episode is brought to you with Poetry Book Society.

The Poetry Book Society is a unique poetry book club, founded by TS Eliot to share the joy of poetry. Every quarter their expert poet-selectors choose the very best new poetry books to deliver to members across the globe, alongside a lively quarterly poetry magazine. Annual Poetry Book Society Membership is the perfect way to keep up to date with all the latest poetry releases, discover new voices and inspirational world-class poetry. Join the Poetry Book Society today