Pavilion Poetry Launch
In April 2015, Liverpool University Press launched a new series of poetry books that celebrate risk-taking, named Pavilion Poetry. The series, edited by our own Deryn Rees-Jones, aims to seek out and publish all that is daring and relevant in contemporary poetry. Further details can be found here.
Pavilion Poetry debuted with three books from a trio of poets from the UK: Mona Arshi, winner of the 2014 Manchester Poetry Prize; Sarah Corbett, a T.S. Eliot Prize shortlistee; and Eleanor Rees, shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection.
All three were invited to give a reading at the launch event, clips of which are below.
Mona Arshi
Mona Arshi was born to Punjabi Sikh parents in West London where she still lives. She initally trained as a lawyer and worked for Liberty, the UK human rights organisation. She received a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of East Anglia and won the inaugural Magma Poetry Competition in 2011. Mona was joint winner of the Manchester Creative Writing Poetry Prize in 2014. More recently, the collection released with Pavilion Poetry, Small Hands, won the Forward Arts Foundation's Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection.
Sarah Corbett
And She Was, Sarah Corbett's publication with Pavilion Poetry and her fourth book of poetry, is a verse-novel. The book was written as part of a PhD in Creative Writing at the University of Manchester's Centre for New Writing, under the supervision of John McAuliffe. She has published three previous collections with Seren Books: Other Beasts (2008), The Witch Bag (2002) and The Red Wardrobe (1998), which won an Eric Gregory Award and was shortlisted for both the Forward First Collection Prize and the T S Eliot Prize. Sarah's poetry has been widely anthologised and translated, and she collaborates reguarly with other artists, filmmakers and writers.
Eleanor Rees
Eleanor Rees is the author of Andraste's Hair (Salt, 2007) which was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection and the Glen Dimplex New Writers Awards, Eliza and the Bear (Salt, 2009) and Blood Child (Pavilion, 2015). Eleanor has worked extensively as a poet in the community and holds a practice-based PhD in the work of the local poet. She often collaborates with musicians, artists, performers and works to commision. She lives in Liverpool.
