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The City Poets will work across our partnership network, acting as an ambassador for Manchester’s residents, communities, and literature organisations. The City Poet roles carry a civic responsibility, much like conventional Poet Laureate designations. The appointees will be commissioned to produce new writing, as well as contribute to the development of poetry in education through workshop facilitation with partner organisations/schools. There will also be opportunities for funded international travel for both poets.
Commissioned work will respond to themes relevant to the poets via key dates in the 2025 calendar year (past poems include Ali Al-Jamri, Crisis of Humanity for United Nations World Arabic Language Day 2023 and Jova Bagioli Reyes, Unbelonging for World Poetry Day) and/or respond to other exciting public events, projects and community outreach programmes coordinated by Manchester City of Literature and its partnership network (e.g. Anjum Malik, We are Butterflies Forever in Flight short film with Manchester Indian Film Festival). The poets will also translate each other’s writing into their mother tongue.
Manchester has a rich literary tradition, as home to some exceptional and high-profile poets, a thriving poetry and spoken word scene, awarding-winning publishers and writing development agencies and libraries which place writing and community outreach at the heart of their work. This heritage is represented in Manchester’s designation as a UNESCO City of Literature in 2017.
The two newly appointed City Poets will occupy the role for a period of one year and will each be paid a total fee of £3,250 for a number of key deliverables that make up each City Poet position, including poetry commissions, poetry translations, international travel and a piece of community engagement work (full details can be found in the info pack).
Key dates: Midnight on Sunday 1 December 2024: Closing date for applications Wednesday 4th December 2024: Notification of shortlisted applicants Monday 9th December 2024: Interviews
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