We are delighted to invite you to literary events taking place within the NAWE Conference at the Park Inn by Radisson York this November.

A Reading by Jean Sprackland
Friday 15 November, 2pm, Henley Suite

Jean Sprackland is one of our leading poets. Her latest collection of poems, Sleeping Keys, is published by Cape this autumn. Tilt was the winner of the Costa Poetry Award in 2008, and Strands: A Year of Discoveries on the Beach (Cape 2012) won the Portico Prize for Non-Fiction. Jean is co-editor with Andrew Motion of the Poetry by Heart anthology, and was on the judging panel at the National Finals in 2013. She is Academic Director of the Writing School at Manchester Metropolitan University.

Jean will be reading from her work and talking about the new Poetry by Heart competition, introducing a performance by this year's winner, Kaiti Soultana.

A Reading by Grace Nichols
Friday 15 November, 8pm, Henley Suite

Grace Nichols was born in Georgetown, Guyana, and emigrated to Britain in 1977. Her first collection, I is a long-memoried woman, was awarded the 1983 Commonwealth Poetry Prize. Her other collections include The Fat Black Woman's Poems, Sunris (which won the Guyana poetry Prize), and Startling the Flying Fish, all from Virago who also published her first novel, Whole of a Morning Sky. She was writer in residence at the Tate in 1999-2000, from which the book Paint Me a Poem was published. Among her popular children's books are The Poet Cat (Bloomsbury), Everybody Got a Gift and Sun Time Snow Time (A&C Black). Her latest adult collections are Picasso, I Want My Face Back and I Have Crossed an Ocean (selected poems), both published by Bloodaxe Books. Cosmic Disco, her new book for young people, has just been published by Frances Lincoln.

You Should’ve Seen Us – Paul Mills
Saturday 16 November, 2pm, Henley Suite

This film, written by poet Paul Mills, is a wonderfully engaging journey through North Yorkshire in poems and film, drawing on extracts from the Yorkshire Film Archive, 1908 to 1958. Some of the poems are read by Paul, some by actors; some are commentaries, others are imagined voices of people in North Yorkshire from before, during and after the Second World War.

Paul Mills has written five books of poems, most recently Voting for Spring, (Smith/Doorstop, 2010). The poems in You Should've Seen Us are now available from Smith/Doorstop in pamphlet form with photographs from the films. He is the Royal Literary Fund Writing Fellow at York University, 2013-14.

“Paul Mills has produced a wonderfully stirring, thoughtful and ultimately celebratory body of work that spins out from specific histories into all our families, all our lives.”  – Ian McMillan

A Reading and Talk by Terry Waite CBE
Saturday 16 November, 8pm, Henley Suite

Terry Waite began his career as Education Adviser to the Anglican Bishop of Bristol, before moving to East Africa in 1969. He witnessed the Amin coup and both he and his wife narrowly escaped death on several occasions. He founded the Southern Sudan Project and was responsible for developing programmes of aid and development for this war-torn region.

After moving to Rome in 1972, he travelled extensively throughout Asia, Africa, North and South America and Europe, advising on programmes concerned with Institutional Change and Development, Inter-Cultural Relations, Group and Inter-group Dynamics and a range of development issues connected with both health and education. In 1980 he was recruited by the Archbishop of Canterbury and moved to Lambeth Palace.

In the early 1980s he successfully negotiated the release of several hostages from Iran and this event brought him to public attention. In 1983 he negotiated with Colonel Gaddafi for the release of British hostages held in Libya and again was successful. In January 1987 while negotiating for the release of Western hostages in Lebanon he himself was taken captive and remained in captivity for 1,763 days, the first four years of which were spent in total solitary confinement. His account of this, Taken on Trust, is published by Coronet. An international best-seller, it was followed by Footfalls in Memory and Travels with a Primate, a humorous account of his journeys with Archbishop Runcie.  

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All readings take place in the Henley Suite at the Park Inn, North Street, York. A number of tickets will be available on the door, priced £5, but to secure a ticket in advance please contact NAWE (National Association of Writers in Education) on 01653 618429 or email info@nawe.co.uk.

The events are part of the NAWE Annual Conference, the full programme for which is available here.