What people have said about our past festivals and poet interviews

2022

Fokkina McDonnell for Poetry in Aldeburgh 2022

What is the number of steps that takes someone from a normal life into an act of violence? Arji
Manuelpillai talked briefly about the background to his book, Improvised Explosive Device, published with Penned in the Margins. Arji talked about his family background in Sri Lanka, how in 1982 his auntie’s arms were covered in boils: a physical sign of her fear at a time when the Tamil Tigers were committing acts of violence. His experience as a poetry performer gave enormous clarity and focus to this session. Arji played parts of his interviews with members of extremist groups which seamlessly moved into his reading the poems.

Kathy Pimlott for Poetry in Aldeburgh 2022

Friday and the sun was out and, slowly, familiar faces began to arrive among the dog walkers and amblers taking a break and a coffee on the sea wall. My first task of the day was to go in search of a notebook, having forgotten to pack one – what kind of poet am I? My first session was a workshop run by Fokkina McDonnell, thinking about some of the techniques she learnt and used in her career as a psychotherapist and applying them to the creative process and to performance. There were eight of us in the beautifully refurbished Gallery space...

2021

Maria Isakova Bennett for Poetry in Aldeburgh 2021

Over the weekend in addition to listening to vibrant and urgent Ethiopian poetry— writing coming out of trauma and a love of country, poems of praise and faith directly Zoomed from Addis Ababa, Vienna and New York; and arresting work linked to Human Impact on Nature, Landscape and Climate during which I listened without being able to make a single note, to Dom Bury – his vital poems coming out of reflection and complex complicated decisions, I attended two events linked to the Guillemot and Bad Betty Presses, and an event marking 100 issues of Poetry London.

2020

Christian Wethered reviews PERCEPTION as part of 2020 themes of Place, Perception and Play

This was my first Poetry in Aldeburgh, and though most of us weren’t actually there, it never seemed to matter, the festival being conveyed seamlessly on Zoom

Rachel Donati reviews PLAY as part of 2020 themes of Place, Perception and Play

In lockdown dreaming and play feel even sweeter. We get to escape. Play opens us up to a permeability of thinking, allows porous thoughts in, lets ideas seep & steep, to percolate.

2019

Maria Isakova-Bennett and family on their experiences of Poetry in Aldeburgh 2019

Many thanks again for a wonderful weekend of poetry. I loved each day and evening but especially the close readings and the workshops...

Sarah Doyle gives her account of her first Poetry in Aldeburgh in 2019

I’ve long wanted to attend the poetry festival that takes place in Aldeburgh each year..

2018

2018 Festival review by Kostya Tsolákis

‘Magical’ is not a word I often use to describe an experience, but my first visit to Poetry In Aldeburgh was certainly that

2018 Festival review by Danne Jobin

The town itself fills up with poetry afficionados for the whole weekend, and everyone is approachable.

Kostya Tsolákis talks to poet, tutor and comics editor Chrissy Williams.

Danne Jobin talks to Pascale Petit

Danne Jobin talks to Richard Scott

2016-17 Interviews

Meet Ben Rogers – the Poetry in Aldeburgh / Poetry School Poet in Residence

Ben Rogers, Poet-in-Residence at Poetry in Aldeburgh Festival

You recently had a recce trip to Aldeburgh in advance of your residency. How’s it all looking there at the moment?

Poetry In Aldeburgh: Ben Rogers interviews Paul Stephenson

“In the manner of George Perec’s lipogram novel La Disparition, can you explain, without using the letter E, what you like about poetry in Aldeburgh…?”

Poetry In Aldeburgh: Ben Rogers interviews Rebecca Watts

"A poem should always involve an imaginative act, and pretending to be something other is a good way of triggering one."

Poetry In Aldeburgh: Ben Rogers interviews Chrissy Williams

“Play is fundamental, I think, to anyone interested in artistic expression, and communication.”

Poetry In Aldeburgh: Ben Rogers interviews Ian Duhig

"...childhood is a time of poetry for everybody: we make it just looking around ourselves and thinking, and sometimes later our wonder may find words, if we’re lucky."

Poetry In Aldeburgh: Ben Rogers interviews Blake Morrison

“I have written two memoirs and my poems have become increasingly personal. So yes, I understand the torment.”

Poetry in Aldeburgh Countdown – An Interview with Tamar Yoseloff

“I fell in love with it right from the start, that bleak winter seascape. I’ve been going back ever since.”

More from 2016

Poetry In Aldeburgh: Ben Rogers interviews Dan Burt

"If a piece has nothing to say, why bother saying it?”

Poetry in Aldeburgh Residency: Ben Rogers talks with Holly Corfield Carr

As soon as we talk about ‘chance’ we’ve already stationed part of the writing process outside ourselves.

Poetry in Aldeburgh residency: Ben Rogers interviews… Julia Bird

“What motivates me to produce, promote or write anything is the idea that there will be people around to receive it meaningfully”

Poetry in Aldeburgh Residency: Ben Rogers interviews… Jacqueline Saphra

“Say whatever you want, invent what you like, use your imagination – that’s what writers do, for god’s sake – if it strengthens the poem.”

Poetry In Aldeburgh: Ben Rogers interviews Geraldine Clarkson

How important is the spirit of rebellion or being allowed to break rules when you write poetry?