Blah! Blah!! Blah!!! Writers For Café Blah – poetry and prose for the people – takes place Saturday 23 November, 5-7pm, at Withington Public Hall Institute. Featuring 16 performers from the city’s writing and spoken word scene, all proceeds (except Eventbrite fees) will be donated to the #SaveCafeBlah Just Giving campaign, to help save this vital creative hub.

Reading are: flash fiction writer and workshop facilitator David Gaffney, Professor of Poetry at the Centre for New Writing John McAuliffe, Tom Jenks, of The Other Room avant-garde reading series, Jazmine Linklater of No Matter, Peter Barlow’s Cigarette organisers Joey Francis and Tim Allen, Speakeasy host Steve Smythe, Anna Percy of Beatification, creative writing lecturer Alicia Rouverol, Manchester Critics Collective member Lydia Unsworth, Lenni Sanders of The Writing Squad, Broken Sleep Books poet Nóra Blascsók, Confingo contributor Nathan Bailey, and Manchester poets Steven Waling and Pam Galloway.

Blah! Blah!! Blah!!! will be compèred by Sarah-Clare Conlon, who ran award-winning Verbose at Fallow for three years from 2015.