Lifesaving Poems: Roger McGough’s ‘I always wanted to go on the stage’

I count myself lucky to have been taught by a team of English teachers who I have no doubt … More

Lifesaving Poems: Mary Oliver’s ‘The Journey’

The Journey One day you finally knewwhat you had to do, and began,though the voices around youkept shoutingtheir bad advice–though … More

It was the best of times. Jean Sprackland and I were tutoring the dream group at Totleigh Barton for a … More

It was the best of times. Jean Sprackland and I were tutoring a poetry course at Totleigh Barton, the Arvon … More

I once saw Michael Rosen teach a theatre full of tearfully happy children and adults these wonderful nonsense word games … More

I think my first bout of Poetry Exhaustion occurred sometime after my A levels. Our English paper was quite advanced for its … More

To safe and almost universal silence I published How Far From Here is Home? (Stride) a few days before Christmas in … More

I was lucky. I was taught English in one of those classrooms with complete sets of A Taste of Honey, … More

It was summer. I found myself on the top floor of the library, on the recommendation of a friend: … More

One year I decided that I would decorate one of my teaching rooms with my collection of Poems on the … More

I came across Hubert Moore’s fantastic book of poems The Hearing Room (Shoetstring, 2006) via my friend and neighbour Lawrence Sail. In … More

Readers who have followed my Lifesaving Poems series will know by now that there isn’t and wasn’t a plan about … More

For the last nine years at the end of the first week in July I have been saying goodbye to … More

I wrote here recently about losing my ambition as a writer. In case readers are in any doubt, the stuff … More

The Bath Festivals‘ Write Team was a creative writing project designed to develop pupil confidence and engagement in their learning. The … More

In 2007 Sue Dymoke, Andrew Lambirth and I got together and decided we were going to apply to the ESRC … More

I want to live – Sharon Olds The most intense reading group I ever belonged to wasn’t really a reading … More

Sometimes you do not get a poem, or what a poet is up to, straight away. In the case of … More