The International Women’s Day Poetry Showcase was one of the first events kicking off the York Literature Festival 2025, and it was a great way to welcome both the festival and York’s International Women’s Week! Taking place in the slightly hidden-away Theatre@41 on the outskirts of the city centre, it was a relatively small and intimate venue – perfect for a poetry reading.
The event started strong with Chloe Hanks’ welcoming and quippy hosting as she implored us to laugh, cry, and of course make lots of noise for the performing poets and their poems. All three of these things did indeed happen over the course of the evening. Hanks read out her own poem about relationships, sex, and female self-realisation – wonderfully setting the tone for the evening – and then it was over to Lillian Akampurira Aujo to perform.
I had never encountered Aujo’s poetry before this event, but I will definitely be following her work closely after hearing her read. She is a Ugandan-born poet local to Yorkshire, and the only performer of the evening who has not yet published a full collection. She read three long poems centred around absent fathers, familial relationships, and colonial influence. These were all incredibly moving, and the way she performed them really added to this. As Hanks noted on the night, Aujo’s poetry and the way she reads is transporting. Throughout her entire reading, I was entranced by the world and language of her work. In one striking moment, she sang a few long, undulating notes as part of her first poem, and it felt like the whole room held its breath. Her work was vivid, raw, and emotionally resonant, and I can’t wait to see what she writes next.
Next up was Isabel Galleymore, a celebrated ecopoet with four collections under her belt. She read from her latest book Baby Schema – titled after the term for the set of infantile physical characteristics which make up ‘cuteness’. Her work was fittingly playful, often turning concepts on their head – she explored wildlife through plushies and cat videos, and motherhood through a plastic doll which she enjoyed throwing on her roof as a child. Her poetry was bright, funny, and quirky, but also powerfully subversive in its depictions of nature and womanhood. Galleymore’s reading brought some well-timed fun to the evening, which led perfectly into the next poet, Kim Moore.
Moore read from her third and latest collection, All the Men I Never Married, which won the Forward Prize for Best Collection in 2022. The work in this collection, which centres around her experiences with men ranging from ex-boyfriends to taxi drivers, was at once strikingly honest and sardonically funny. Her poems spoke perfectly to the female experience – as was seen from the frequent murmurs of understanding and laughter from the audience – and her unapologetically feminist voice made her a perfect fit to perform for International Women’s Day. After this, she read two poems not featured in this collection. One was an unpublished piece from the collection she is currently working on, and one was a piece she wrote for National Poetry Day. Both focused on motherhood and familial love, and both left me more than a little weepy. Judging from these pieces, Moore’s next collection is absolutely one to look forward to.
Mary Jean Chan, the headlining poet, performed after a twenty-minute break, reading from their latest collection Bright Fear. I have been a fan of Chan’s work for a long time, and as excited as I was for this part of the evening, I will admit that out of the four poets, Chan’s poetry was perhaps the least changed through out-loud reading. This is not to say that Chan’s reading was anything less than skilful; they are a seasoned poet and performer, and it shows. However, their work is intricate and layered, with form often playing a large role in their meaning. I get the most from their poetry when I read it slowly and repeatedly, and this becomes slightly lost when pieces are performed. Nonetheless, Chan’s reading was still very enjoyable. They described their process of writing Bright Fear, at a time when the Covid pandemic was at the forefront of their mind, and they began losing faith in the power of poetry. Their reading, and the collection itself, centred around the book’s middle section ‘Ars Poetica’, which beautifully details the ways poetry has influenced and improved their life. Chan’s work is incisive, emotionally resonant, and tentatively hopefully, and it is always a joy to read or hear performed.
A short Q&A with the poets followed Chan’s reading. The audience asked questions regarding writing rituals, inspirations, and gender, which the poets answered insightfully and, of course, very eloquently. This made for a lovely end to the night and really provided an extra layer of understanding to each poet’s work. Overall, this was a smoothly organised event with great choice of poets and beautiful performances – a brilliant way to begin this year’s lit fest.
The York Literature Festival runs until March 29th, excluding one final event on April 29th. More poetry readings in the lit fest include the Beyond the Walls Student Showcase on March 17th, which will include various writing forms including poetry, Ukrainian Poetry in the North on March 18th, and the Say Owt poetry slam on March 19th. Other events to look forward to with tickets still available include a conversation with Susie Dent about her novel Guilty by Definition on March 15th, and a conversation with Emma Morgan on March 22nd about her experience with Penguin’s WriteNow programme for underrepresented communities. Click here for the full line-up!