Lyra – Bristol Poetry Festival announces lineup for 2024

The sixth successive edition of Lyra – Bristol Poetry Festival, themed around ‘Poetic Futures’, will be taking place from April 12-21 across 10 venues around the city.

Delving into the power of poetry and language, poets and speakers will be reimagining new worlds; exploring the ways in which technology might shape our future.

Headliners will include a multitude of contemporary poets including Alice Oswald, Raymond Antrobus, Safiya Kamaria Kinshasa, Nikita Gill, Simon Armitage and Salena Godden, as well as three winners of the prestigious Forward Prize for Poetry: Momtaza Mehri, Malika Booker and Bohdan Piasecki.

Co-directed and curated once again by Professor Lucy English and Danny Carlo Pandolfi, the eclectic programme will include performances, workshops, exhibitions, walking tours, family activities, film screenings, poetry slams, open mics, wellbeing activities, multilingual and BSL interpreted events, a number of free activities, as well as more online, live-streamed events than ever before.

Alice Oswald, T. S. Eliot Prize winning poet

Festival highlights include a number of technologically ambitious installations, from the Bonds audiovisual poetry exhibition at Bristol Beacon to the Cancer Alley poetry film hologram exhibition at Watershed, and Deanna Rodger’s Poetic Fortune Teller.

There will be a panel and performance on AI and poetry (part of Lyra’s new Page Against the Machine project), an AI and poetry writing workshop, a poetry and technology film screening, and other expansive, genre-pushing activities.

‘Poetic Futures’ will be explored through a Queer Futures event, a workshop and new show from Joelle Taylor, a multimedia Hot Poets talk on poetry, climate and saving the world, and activities which contrast the past and future such as a Caribbean Nights film screening, poetry and archives workshop, a Beyond Poetry panel discussion (with Vanessa Kisuule, Travis Alabanza and Cecilia Knapp), and historical walking tours.

Gabriel Awuah Mainoo will be travelling from Ghana to headline Lyra

On the centenary of American writer James Baldwin, a workshop led by US writer Danez Smith and panel led by Bristol-based Edson Burton will reflect on his legacy and Baldwinian futures. The closing event, City of Words, will be a celebration of Bristol in its many perspectives and histories, and a collaboration with the inimitable Bristol Ideas as part of their closing activity.

Many community groups commissioned by Lyra in 2024 will also showcase their work, as well as newly commissioned Bristol poets Asmaa Jama, Stephen Lightbown, Deborah Harvey, Lawrence Hoo and Sukina Noor.

Thanks to funding from Bath Spa University, the festival organisers are delighted to be welcoming four poets from Ghana for an exclusive performance of East and West African poetry, including the much-vaunted Gabriel Awuah Mainoo.

shakara, Lyra’s 2024 Festival Poet

Finally, Lyra’s chosen 2024 Festival Poet is Jamaican-born artist shakara, whose work embodies a fusion of technology and creativity, blending poetry, spoken word, filmmaking and AI to pave the way for technologies rooted in human-based ethics.

As well as running a workshop and performing new work, they will be taking part in a discussion panel and running community outreach activities across March and April.

Amongst their many key partners and collaborators for the 2024 festival, Lyra is grateful for the support of Arts Council England, Bristol University’s Poetry Institute, Bath Spa University, Bristol Ideas, Apples and Snakes, Super Culture, Renaissance One, Poetry Translation Centre, Hot Poets and Speaking Volumes.

Lyra – Bristol Poetry Festival is at multiple venues across Bristol from April 12-21; event times vary. For the full programme, information about outreach activities, ticket links to all events and festival passes, follow @lyrafest or go to www.lyrafest.com.

Specific information about each venue’s accessibility can be found on the Lyra homepage; here you can also find an Access Form through which you can contact the organisers in advance about any specific access needs.

All photos: Lyra Fest

Read more: Lyra – Bristol Poetry Festival announces lineup for 2023

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