A bit of Northern honesty

Poetry From The North: Geoff Hattersley, Allison McVety, Ann Sansom and Peter Sansom, Friday 21st October, 1pm, Becker Room, City Library

Words by Shaaheda Patel.


It’s day 12 of the Manchester Literature Festival, and on a sunny Friday lunchtime, I find myself squeezing into the brimming Becker Room; a charming Victorian room on the first floor of the City Library. Festival director Cathy Bolton points me towards a wooden chair that was resourcefully being used as a doorstop; allowing the final trickle of Northern blood to enter.

Luckily, I now find myself sat in the front row.

Immediately Cathy walks to the front of the crowded room and announces today’s celebration of The Poetry Business’ silver jubilee and 25 years of The North: a magazine capturing Northern poetry, articles, reviews and features.

Editor of The North Peter Sansom springs towards the mosaiced fireplace. While holding his reading glasses in his right hand, Peter begins to read from the latest publication; the first is Stay, a poem by Jeanette Hattersley. The poem takes us to Darlington through the poet’s gentle reminiscences. Peter tells us that this 25th anniversary edition of The North celebrates by reprinting some of the most popular poems in the magazine’s history.

We experience this first hand now through further readings of Simon Armitage’s Zoom and Suddenly by Diana Hendry.

Allison McVety now takes to the stand, dressed in coordinated chocolate brown and a striking red lipstick. She explains that Manchester is her home town; even though she now lives in the South. She recalls her days at Whalley Range High School with its brown uniform and the bus conductor who would get away with unbuttoning school girls’ blouses. She continues by playfully sharing her long-term love with a boy whose name she still does not know. She calls him Boy On The Bus and now reads a poem about him dressed in “air force blue”, “casual cool” and her lonely “17 stops of feeling blue”.

Her next poem paints a picture of post-industrial Manchester in Urmston Brickworks. Here we learn of her frequent escapes from her mother-in-law, who lives in Flixton.

She receives a rapturous applause, disturbing the silent room after each reading. “At home”, she tells us, “I would never get this, the dog will yawn and my husband will tell me he is going out.”

Her next poem was published in The North issue 41. Before she begins reading she asks if there are any psychologists in the room. We look around and shake our heads in unison, intrigued by her question.

She reads from the poem, The Two Times I Saw Your Penis; a matter-of-fact poem about her father. With her audience bewitched by her frank and honest words, she now shares her memories of school, and in particular the times when she would attend school having not read "the right books". Fittingly, this poem is set in a library. She softly summarises how, “everything happens in parenthesis”.

Now Peter Sansom introduces the Northern poet Geoff Hattersley (pictured). He reads from the blurb of his latest collection. “Geoff Hattersley is a welcome subversive and ’the real thing’,” we are told. Geoff, in his baggy shirt and salt and pepper hair, stands up, faces the fireplace and takes a drink of water. He turns around and we hear his uncut Yorkshire twang. He tells us how poems were always from the South and was pleased to find this magazine that allowed poems about things like vests.

His simplicity makes us smile.

He reads from the poem His Fingernails, and plainly tells us, “I never quite knew what this one meant”. He continues reading about a pub in Barnsley and an old couple in the corner who never left, even when the pub was given a facelift to attract the local twentysomethings.

The afternoon now moves from the quirky to the surreal, with Geoff's collection of poems on "hebium", inspired by a dream in which a Dutch lady asked him, “Where’s the hebium?” His quest for the meaning of hebium sparks off lines such as “you have a hebium infection” and “happy hebium honey”. The audience are now in stitches; the applause gets louder and takes longer to subside.

The afternoon has come to an end.

Seamlessly, the table of neatly arranged festival leaflets now becomes a shop, and we crowd around wanting to get our hands on the publications featured in this afternoon’s event.

Leaving the heaving room, my chair a doorstop once again, I begin to understand what Northern poetry actually is. It’s poetry that’s punchy, it’s distinct and it’s downright honest. But paradoxically, Northern poetry still embodies a universality that stems from its need to be ordinary and original.

Shaaheda Patel is a teacher of English Language and Literature at a sixth-form college in Blackburn. She blogged for the Festival in 2010 and has worked on literature development projects with Time To Read.

More than enough love

Not Many Love Poems: A Tribute To Linda Chase, Thursday 20th October, 7.30pm. International Anthony Burgess Foundation

Words by Laura Maley.


Judging by the number of people arriving to join this tribute to Linda Chase, founder of Poets & Players who died in April, I suspect the event could easily have run twice at capacity. Linda had been a keen supporter of tonight’s venue, the International Anthony Burgess Foundation, from its early days and it seems a fitting place to launch her new anthology, for Manchester’s Carcanet, Not Many Love Poems.

The evening begins unforgettably with music. The Mariachoos serenade the audience with a medley including La Bamba, Twist And Shout, Let’s Twist Again, Pretty Woman. It’s brilliantly funny (and good!), complete with huge wobbly moustaches. They follow with a moving version of The Kooks’ Valerie which comes “from the heart”.

Linda’s friends, colleagues and family members read poems from Not Many Love Poems and 2001’s The Wedding Spy. Most introduce their selections with some little nugget of personal memory about Linda.

The evening is introduced by Carcanet editor Michael Schmidt (pictured) who speaks about Linda’s passion for poets to read aloud – an idea to which she eventually brought him round. He even describes Found And Lost, which he reads, as needing to be “in the air”.

Jeffrey Wainwright describes Linda’s work as having many different tones in her voice and the two poems he reads are great examples of Linda’s richness. In Old Jewish Men, she writes in such strong and sure loving tones of “heart keys” and “love looseners”, which contrasts with Lost Souls From Christie Hospital, which is rife with delicate and confused fragility.

I really enjoy John McAuliffe’s reading of two conversational poems; they’re full of brightness and sensitivity. Dare is a reluctant discussion about death which is breathtaking and devastatingly powerful. Asleep And Awake similarly ponders on death, but with a more accepting, final-moments, perspective. Both these poems share a wonderful sense of rhythm.

Poet and writer Grevel Lindop tells the audience he shared a sense of writing about subjects “you’re not supposed to write about” with Linda. He reads the poignant Ticks And Kisses, dealing with mastectomies and the effects they have on people (not just the women who undergo them) which is shot through with humour and a deceptively light tone right up until the stark, final line.

Linda’s daughter Cleo reads Taffeta, a poem about Linda’s mother, Cleo’s grandmother. It’s a great piece of atmospheric, Chanel-drenched nostalgia for a 1950s housewife so perfect, as Cleo tells us, she even had curtains to suit every season.

James McGrath reads poems Linda wrote for her friend Ella, celebrating Ella’s home and friendship. Linda herself extended her home and family to so many that these themes – and the dining table motif, as James points out - come up repeatedly in her work. Gift House is a celebration of home comforts and the rich fruits of friendship.

Paying tribute to the speed with which Linda set up Manchester Poetry School, fellow poet Mimi Khalvati is clearly impressed with Linda’s "just get on with it"attitude (or the Linda-ness of Linda, as Matthew Welton describes it later). She chooses to read Yesterday which finds languid beauty in the Mersey’s flow and familiar changes from summer to autumn with “the reddening leaves, the bright berries splattered against the Wedgwood sky”.

Fellow Carcanet poet Carola Luther (Mimi and Carola both launched new Carcanet poetry collections at this year’s Manchester Literature Festival) says she’s reading First Thought, about the act of writing and of thinking about what you write, because she can hear Linda’s voice in it. The poem has a characteristic freedom and openness in the imagery, ending with, “a true writer is one who never lied”.

The tenderness of Night Vision, selected by Matthew Welton, feels almost too intimate for readers to be allowed in; it’s nearly a peeping Tom of a poem. “I open the duvet and draw you in / as the feathers fill their cases”.

Linda’s celebration of female spirit and independence in One Woman Dancing holds massive appeal for me. It seems to capture Linda’s charisma and inspirational nature, ending as it does: “I don't have to dance if I don't want to dance, / but I do, so I do. One woman dancing. / Look, there's another. And another. / Each of us out there, eyes shut, rocking. Yes!”

What feels abundantly clear, to me, from this glimpse into Linda’s work and her life - and in anecdotes tonight from those who knew her so well - is the importance, for her, of connection; whether as a response to the invasion of cancer, sharing family meals and stories, or giving thanks for a friendship. Linda’s body of work and the new collection Not Many Love Poems is filled with a graceful sense of movement, beauty and a very personal warmth.

Laura Maley lives and works in Manchester and blogs about arts and culture at Cultural Shenanigans. You can follow her on Twitter @elle_c_emm

Survival stories

Words on Asylum & Refuge, Saturday 22nd October 2011, 12.30pm, Cross Street Chapel

Words by Richard Jackson.

On the penultimate afternoon, as well as being one of the busiest days of this year’s Manchester Literature Festival, the doors to the Unitarian Chapel - on Cross Street - open to a crowd of festival-goers, all eagerly taking advantage of the book sale that coincides with today’s event. In support of Amnesty International, with 2011 being the 40th anniversary of the Manchester Amnesty group, all the proceeds from this event go to the work of the organisation.

The book sale is just one of the reasons why this afternoon’s gathering is unique amongst others held by the festival. Firstly, it is the surroundings: the circular seating arrangement, in which everyone is facing one another, creates an intimacy that is entirely appropriate for the theme of the afternoon. This, as well as the 30 minutes or so everyone spent buying books beforehand, allowing for conversations to spark – between the audience and today’s speakers alike – produces a comfortable and warm setting, one suitable for an event that stirs as much emotion as this.

After words from the representatives of Amnesty International, we are introduced to those appearing today: Mende Nazer and Caroline Clegg, Segun Lee-French, as well as Aslee and Zofia, representatives of the Manchester-based Women Asylum Seekers Together (WAST).

Beginning with Mende Nazer, author of the harrowing memoir Slave and a notable human rights activist, we are introduced to her through Caroline Clegg. Caroline, director of Feelgood Theatre, adapted Mende’s book for the stage. The play premiered at the Lowry theatre, in Salford, late last year. There is clearly great affection between the two ladies, with Caroline expressing how moved she was moved by Mende’s story, “before I finished reading it - through tears, rage and often most of joy and laughter in celebration of Mende’s culture - I just knew I had to do something about what I had read”.

Mende sets the scene and starts with a description of her happy childhood. Growing up within the Nuba Mountains of Sudan, she notes “My childhood was absolutely wonderful. It was just free of responsibility, and it was an amazing childhood - like every child deserves. Everyone who lives in the Nuba Mountains are farmers, and they look after their own animals. Life is very simple and safe, and it’s just amazing.” This though, is a prelude to Mende’s difficult story. One day, in 1994, Mende’s village was attacked and raided, under the Scorched Earth policy by the Arab North Sudanese government. During the destruction of her village, she was caught and taken to Khartoum with a group of other captured children. In the capital, she was sold into slavery, spending the next years of her life in servitude to families in Sudan and London, during which, as Caroline describes: “Mende cooked, cleaned, no day off, no pay, she was beaten, abused, and completely dehumanised. Forced to speak Arabic, she wasn’t allowed to speak her own cultural language. If she was found singing or anything, she was beaten. This became her daily life, still not knowing what happened to her family, not knowing if they survived the raids, what had happened to her friends or anyone.”

Visit the Mende Nazer Foundation.

Such was the emotional weight of Mende’s testimony, and Caroline’s words, the latter half of the event continued with Segun Lee-French uttering: “It’s not often that such people can make you feel like crying, but that really did move me, so I feel a little bit inadequate to follow” - though he shouldn’t. Working for the Manchester group Speakeasy People, Segun is a writer, singer and poet that puts on events that concern human-rights causes. Though only a short performance, he uplifts the audience through interactive poetry readings, as well as singing songs about “championing the underdog” and “the need for equal opportunities for everyone”. Intelligent and well spoken, I would recommend catching a performance of his to all.

Ending the event, are Aslee and Zofia from WAST. WAST, formed in 2005, works for women to have a “safe, mutually understanding and supporting environment, in which to talk about their experiences and trauma in fleeing their home countries, and the issues they are facing under the immigration system in Britain”. Having over 100 members, we learn from Aslee how the women help each other, most still waiting to learn the outcome of their asylum petitions. Following this, a reading is given by Zofia – herself an asylum seeker, currently receiving help from WAST – from their publication Am I Safe Yet. The book contains a selection of experiences from WAST members, and is available to buy now. Please visit the WAST website: it contains important information about WAST, as well as how one can involve themselves and offer help. In particular, it offers information of how to contact Nick Clegg and Theresa May, in regards to ongoing petitions of asylum.

Richard Jackson is a PhD student interested in Central and Eastern European history, literature and culture. His blog, Lemberik, concerns the issues of minority populations in this region and he can be followed on Twitter via @lemberik.

The PEN is mightier than the sword

Writing Freedom: The Story Of English PEN, Saturday 22nd October, 3.30pm, International Anthony Burgess Foundation

Words by Elinor Taylor. Photograph by Jon Atkin.


The International Anthony Burgess Foundation played host to a stimulating and original exploration of the history of English PEN as it celebrates its 90th birthday. The original format of the event entailed readings from two novelists, Edward Docx and Catherine O’Flynn, and two poets, Shamshad Khan and John McAuliffe. Between them, these authors read scripted scenes from the early days of English PEN, extracts from the letters and diaries of writers imprisoned around the world, and contributions to landmark debates hosted by PEN. The presence of these four distinguished writers, and their feeling for the words they read, brought to life vividly the history of this organisation, the profile of which is perhaps lower than it ought to be among ordinary readers.

English PEN (standing for Poets, Essayists and Novelists) was founded in 1921 by Amy Dawson Scott to promote literature as an aid to understanding among nations, and to campaign for the freedom to write and the freedom to read. This celebratory event began with a reading of its founding charter, including the memorable assertion that, “Literature knows no frontiers, and should remain a common currency between nations in spite of political or international upheavals”. Its members pledge to “champion the ideal of one humanity living in peace in one world”. Over the course of the afternoon, the importance of defending these clear and inspiring principles was eloquently affirmed, while the difficulties of defending them through the ensuing 90 years, in a world in which such motifs of mutual understanding have become unfashionable, were not glossed over.

It is through readings of the words of imprisoned writers that the reality of persecution and oppression is brought home – the diary of a Turkish socialist journalist, the letters of a South Korean writer, and the harrowing account of a persecuted Iranian writer. These performances were gripping, leaving no doubt of the indispensability of PEN’s work. The event then gave the audience a taste of some of the debates on free speech hosted by PEN, most notably the strikingly divided contributions to the debate that followed the fatwah on Salman Rushdie. Some made for uncomfortable listening, but in so doing they testified to PEN’s necessary role as an organisation within which delicate issues of freedom can be seriously debated. The idealism of its founding charter may seem problematic now, and the principle of freedom of speech less than transparent, but this only makes it more vital that the conversation continues. Increasingly, PEN has been involved in debates about how to respond to threatening and inciting speech, and the balance between protection and censorship; the evolution of its role was the subject of a lively question and answer session.

This was a well-structured event that left the audience persuaded that the struggle for the freedom to read and write is vital, and is far from won. The IABF, named for a writer who was himself no stranger to the controversies of censorship, was a fitting venue, and proves itself once more to be key part of Manchester’s cultural landscape.

Elinor Taylor researches 1930s literary Communism at Salford University, where she also teaches. She writes fiction and the odd poem.

Science and nature

The Devil's Garden: Edward Docx and Johan Oldekop, Saturday 22nd October, 1pm, The Manchester Museum

Words by Nija Dalal. Photograph by Jon Atkin.


In a quiet room on the topmost floor of the Manchester Museum, Johan Oldekop, a biologist, begins a discussion of his research in the Amazon. He stands in front of about 30 people, and illuminates the complexities of environmentalism and conservation when placed against indigenous peoples' concerns. “The environment,” he says, “is like a plastic cup. You can squeeze a plastic cup, and it will change its shape, but it can re-form and it will still hold water. But if you squeeze it too hard, it’ll break, and it won’t be able to hold water any more, and importantly, it won’t be a cup.” Why squeeze the cup? Development.

He put it most starkly by telling us about how one village is currently six hours away from the nearest hospital by boat... but if those villagers had a road, they would only be one hour away. They want a road, but conservationists want to maintain the rainforest, and in the heart of the Amazon, Oldekop argues, is where issues of science, progress, humanity and the environment come together. Where do human rights, such as access to medical care, trump environmental concerns, and who should be the beneficiaries?

Oldekop's research focused on the role of rural communities in conservation initiatives and environmental impacts, so his work fits neatly in with today's other speaker, Edward Docx.

The Devil's Garden, by Docx, is about a scientist named Dr Forle, who is based on a river station deep in the South American jungle. Docx begins by telling us that he’s happy to be in Manchester promoting his new novel, because Manchester is his home town.

First, Docx discusses his inspirations that led him to write this book, including Coetzee and Conrad. He describes casting his characters in such a way to maintain conflict. “Conflict is drama,” he says. For example, if there’s a scientist, then there should be a religious person to conflict with the scientist. He tries to imagine his characters as a whole cast, in the round, so that there’s always drama. In The Devil’s Garden, he says, there’s drama because it’s about the conflict between corporations, environmentalists, scientists, missionaries and indigenous people.

But the real issue that his novel is about (and, he says, that every novel is really about) is how we should try to live.

Edward Docx then reads out some short sections of his novel before the floor is opened to the audience for a Q&A. The discussion ranges from eco-tourism to ethics, but most interestingly, one audience member challenges both Oldekop and Docx’s work. By explaining how all the complications and complexity of decisions around environmentalism are so interrelated, they’re essentially saying there’s nothing we can do that would be both fair to everyone and still save the earth. It’s despairing, and shouldn’t we just stop even trying to save this planet? Shouldn’t we just work on finding a new one to colonise, if this is all so complicated that, in the end, we simply can’t figure out what the best route might be?

In response, Oldekop and Docx both recognise the despair in their works, but Docx tempers this sentiment by saying that humans have always been inventive and creative. Art, he thinks, is humanity’s redemption. While his book is dark, he feels it is full of light. If people will re-read the book (which, he says, “is the only way of really reading”!), he thinks they’ll find it suggests there is a future.

And Oldekop agrees, saying that nihilism is dangerous, because if we really begin to believe there’s nothing we can do, then it will stop us doing anything to protect our planet or take care of people.

Nija Dalal is a writer, radio producer, and a second-generation Indian-American. She's radio obsessive, cooks and crafts and sews, and keeps a blog about it when she remembers. Currently in Manchester, she's lived in Sydney and Atlanta, and she's looking for a job in radio.

All Wells and good

David Lodge: A Man Of Parts, Friday 21st October, 7.30pm, Whitworth Art Gallery

Words by Benjamin Judge.


I had always thought that HG Wells was just this bloke who wrote some books and once said something a tad unfortunate about eugenics. But it appears there was more to him than just War Of The Worlds and The Time Machine (the film version of which featured Samantha Mumba. Remember her? I’ve just Wikipedia-ed her and she had more hits than you think. And she once dated Sisqo. Who did Thong Song. Remember? No? What? I’m getting distracted? HG Wells? Oh, yes. Right. HG Wells. Sorry.).

It turns out that apart from being a writer and thinker, ol’ HG was something of a card as well (or "player", to use the modern vernacular). In fact, so long was the list of his love affairs and casual conquests that David Lodge gave as examples of Wells’ behaviour that I was surprised he had the energy to even pick up a pen, let alone write over a hundred books.

Wells was, I suppose, the Sisqo of his day. Both masters of the written word (compare Wells’ “Yet so vain is man and so blinded by his vanity...” to Sisqo’s “I like it when the beat goes da na da na”), both most happy when “dat dress so scandalous”. It is in no way hyperbole to suggest that if your family was based in South London between 1866 and 1946, chances are you are related to HG Wells. That man really did love “that thong th-thong thong thong”.

David Lodge, in his new biographical novel, A Man Of Parts, uses Wells’ love life as a framing mechanism to tell his story. He explained how while writing a biographical novel has the advantages for the author of relieving him of the duty of making up a story, and giving him the readers' belief (which, he points out, is particularly useful with someone like Wells, whose life was so unusual), it presents him with one major problem: that of finding a “novel-shaped story” within somebody’s life. Wells’ women provide this novel-shaped story because there are so many repeating motifs (two sexless marriages, two affairs with brilliant undergraduates, two lovers with young suitors that they would eventually marry, many affairs with women novelists and essayists), which allowed Lodge to create patterns within the text, and create fact in the guise of fiction.

Lodge’s talk was, perhaps unsurprisingly given his background in education, effectively a lecture on the genre of biographical fiction interspersed with readings from his new novel. Put simply, it was rather brilliant; a highlight of what has been a vintage year for the Manchester Literature Festival. It is not often one gets such an insightful look into how a writer approaches his work, or what a respected critic thinks a genre, such as the biographical novel, should and should not strive for.

Lodge is an engaging and generous host, giving long and thoughtful answers to questions posed by the crowd. Asked how he felt about the possibility that in the future his own life might become the material for a novel, he laughed, and admitted that he would hate it, and that Wells would probably hate his own book. “A contradictory answer,” he smiles, “but then, novelists are contradictory.”

Benjamin Judge's blog, Who The Fudge Is Benjamin Judge?, was joint winner in the Manchester Blog Awards 2011 in the Best Writing On A Blog category, and he is also one of the five winners of The Real Story competition.

Super troopers

Superheroes Of Slam Final, Thursday 20th October, 8pm, Yard Theatre

Words by Kevin Danson. Photograph by Jon Atkin.


This year’s Superheroes Of Slam Final, hosted by Manchester Literature Festival and Commonword, opens its doors to an eager crowd waiting to cram the Yard Theatre’s stalls to bask in two hours of the best local poetry from around the North. Competing to win a £250 cash prize and the Dike Omeje Slam Champion Trophy are the finalists from Manchester, Gift Nyoni; Liverpool, Rael James; Leeds, Zodwa Nyoni; Wigan, Louise Fazackerley; Oldham, Mark Mace Smith; Newcastle, Aidan Clarke, and Crewe, Emma Purshouse.

Bouncing onto the stage is the excitingly spontaneous Dominic Berry, writer/poetic performance artist and winner of the previous Slam Final. Appearing to never suffer from a pout or frown, Dominic introduces us to the judges of this stirring competition: Baba Israel, Artistic Director at Contact Theatre, writer/poet and Commonword’s very own Yvonne McCalla, and one of Arts Council England’s Alison Boyle. In addition to these "celebrity" judges, two members of the audience are chosen to award points for the public. Points are awarded for both performance and content. Poets have three minutes to Slam! their poems before they are interrupted by a gruelling noise made by Segun Lee-French. A founding member of Manchester’s Speakeasy People poetry and music collective, Mr Lee-French tests the judges with a theatrical performance of one of his own works which describes a typical Mancunian Friday night down Deansgate.

The first round is astounding. If I had known I would be in the vicinity of such talent I may have brought an autograph book. There is a huge variety of material; accidental muses, cigarette nubs, slavery, wars, modern love, pigeon-loving smack heads. I felt like I had boarded the Pepsi Max of poetry. Aidan throws us a quickie on young lovers before he begins his competing poem: "Oh how romantic / now they’re alone / she’s checking Facebook / he’s on his phone".

Despite each contestant’s pieces being worthy of the rapturous applause received, there are three which I should mention; Emma Purshouse’s poem on cigarette nubs, Zodwa Nyoni’s intense piece on global wars (first whopping 10 for content) and Rael James’ skill with rhyme and meter - together with his expressive words, this gets him awarded the second sparkling 10 for content.

Welcoming back the increased gathering, Dominic covers us with one of his own poems called Time Travels, recently written and with an admirable annunciation to Manchester Literature Festival 2011 (hooray!). While the poets reel off their craftworks in the second round, the air feels somewhat tenser. Legs twitch, contenders rub their hands as they look on at their opponents. Even I can feel my heartbeat picking up its pace. Themes seem to have subdued in this heat; lost love, riots, a passionate voice about passionate voices, yet up we go again with Emma's entertaining Mexican fruit machine song. Mark takes control of the stage with a heartfelt performance and Rael stitches my memory with the words "I want to do cartwheels to show you how my heart feels". What a rolling sea of verbal waves. In accordance with Dominic, I have to say Rael really is a Ninja of rhythm and rhyme.

The air is heavier than ever. We crane our necks to see how far the judges are with their tallying to reveal the final two who will go head-to-head in the ultimate word-off. It's Rael James and Mark Mace Smith.

So Low, So High is Mark’s final poem of the competition. And what a poem. Not only does it possess beautiful imagery of nature in conjunction with oneself, he provides it with incredible delivery, both vocal and physical, captivating the audience with a blending assonance and onomatopoeia. His final syllable collides with the sudden "out of time" noise. Phew.

Up next is Rael "Ninja" James. We sit and we listen to Rael’s meaningful words of a growing relationship, one that blossomed and grew, drawing tears, attracting envy. Everyone is paying attention to these sincere words uttered in his usual melodic, urban tone. He tells us he wants to share the object of his poem and so we sit, transfixed, waiting for him to produce… a pair of bloomin' trainers! This guy knows his art like a painter knows his paints.

Although very tight between the two finalists, Mark Mace Smith is declared winner of this year’s Superheroes Of Slam Final. In his modest demeanour he finishes his final performance with a homemade turntable-scratching political, satirical verse.

I speak to Mark briefly after his win. He explains he first began writing poetry to woo a girl in his teens. He sent her letters and poetry until he finally won her over. Seeing he had a gift, or something that would help him win further females, he became further inspired by some of the greatest lyrics surrounding him at the time. He loves to perform and after tonight we can see why.

Congratulations to Mark Mace Smith, Rael James and the other six grand finalists.

Kevin Danson is an English Literature student at MMU. Read his blog Pebbleddash and follow him on Twitter @pebbleddash.