The Sylvia Plath Literary Festival
Friday 21st - Sunday 23rd October 2022
Tickets available through the website
The Festival will mark the 90th birthday of the legendary poet, and coincide with the publication of After Sylvia, an inspiring anthology of new poems and essays in celebration of her life and work. The weekend festival will feature talks, readings, workshops, and events at venues across Hebden Bridge and Heptonstall.
Festival Director Sarah Corbett says:
“We’re excited that the festival will bring together leading and emerging poets and writers from across the UK, Ireland and the US to celebrate Sylvia Plath’s legacy, her importance for 20th and 21st Century literary arts, and her continued influence on contemporary writers.”
“Events will include a poetry brunch, a poetry séance and open mic night, writing workshops and close readings, cocktail hour at Nelson’s Wine Bar with Gail Crowther, author of Three Martini Afternoons at the Ritz: The Rebellion of Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton, and will offer a range of digital and live-streamed events. Among speakers at the festival are Sylvia Plath biographer Heather Clark (Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath), poets Mona Arshi (winner of the Forward Poetry Prize 2015, for Small Hands), Victoria Kennefick (shortlisted for the Costa and T.S. Eliot poetry prizes for Eat and We Both Starve) and Rosie Garland (What Girls Do in the Dark).”
Events at the Town Hall during the festival:
My Little Flicker by Sarah Hesketh: The Town Hall Reception
Friday 21st October – Sunday 23rd October
Poet and artist, Sarah Hesketh’s artwork responds to Sylvia Plath, motherhood and menstruation.
Poetry Brunch with Amanda Dalton, Eleanor Rees & Judith Willson
Friday 21st October 11am – 12.30pm
Join Festival Director Sarah Corbett to open the festival with three superb poets. A magical and intimate reading in an informal setting where you can listen to poems and chat with the poets over tea and cakes.
Headline Event: Launch of After Sylvia with Sally Baker, Jane Commane, Rosie Garland, Carola Luther and Eileen Wright
Friday 21st October 7pm - 9pm, disco 9.30pm - midnight
Doors open at 6pm
Festival Director Sarah Corbett and co-editor Ian Humphreys will introduce this ground-breaking anthology of newly commissioned poems and essays, featuring work from a diverse range of leading writers and emerging talent.
Short Story Workshop: Reading and Writing Mary Ventura with Anna Chilvers
Saturday 22nd October 10:30am - 12:30pm
This reading and writing workshop will be based on Plath’s short story, ‘Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom’. Participants will be asked to read this short story before the workshop. The workshop will include a discussion of the story, and writing exercises that spring from it. Suitable for writers of all levels.
Close Reading: Sylvia Plath and Medicine with Tracy Brain
Saturday 22nd October 2pm - 3pm
Join novelist and Plath scholar Tracy Brain for a Close Reading Workshop with Optional Writing Exercises. In this workshop, we will look together at a selection of poems where Plath overtly addresses a variety of medical conditions from plastic surgery to reproductive medicine. Our workshop will be informed by a rich array of contextual materials, drawing on short passages from her letters, journals, fiction, scrapbooks, and other archival resources.
Poetry Workshop: Magic and Poetry with Eleanor Rees
Saturday 22nd October 2pm - 4pm
Join poet and theorist Eleanor Rees to explore how poetry is a kind of magic. Eleanor will discuss ideas to enable practicing poets to experience their creative process as metamorphosis and transformation. Participants will take part in carefully guided writing rituals that encourage playful improvisation, enabling new visions to emerge, and a poetic voice to become audible. Suitable for experienced writers.
Talk: New Generation Thinkers with Julie Irigaray, Iona Murphy and Doka Tamás
Saturday 22nd October 3pm - 4pm
Three research students discuss their work on Sylvia Plath, in conversation with Kitty Shaw from the Sylvia Plath Society. Building on her essay in After Sylvia, Dr Dorka Tamás will speak about Plath’s engagement with the early modern witch-hunt and supernatural figures in the early modern plays, such as the witches in Macbeth and the magician in The Tempest. Julie Irigaray will discuss Plath’s perception of English, drawing on her current PhD research into Plath’s identity as an American living in England, and Iona Murphy will explore representations of disability and disability prejudice in The Bell Jar. Hosted by Sylvia Plath Society.
Please be aware that this talk will be filmed for use by the Open University.
Headline Reading with Heather Clark and Ruth Fainlight
Saturday 22nd October 7pm - 9pm
Doors open at 6pm
Plath Biographer and Professor of Poetry Heather Clark will read from and discuss her new biography of Sylvia Plath, Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and a New York Times Top 10 Notable Book of 2021. She will be joined by iconic poet Ruth Fainlight, whose New & Collected Poems, was published by Bloodaxe Books in 2010. Hosted by Helen Meller.
Talk: Loving Sylvia Plath with Emily Van Duyne
Sunday 23rd October 2pm - 3pm
This talk dissects the literary afterlife of Sylvia Plath, and how writers in the 1970s, like Harriet Rosenstein and Robin Morgan worked hard to speak openly about Plath’s experience of domestic violence but were silenced. We’ll look at the ways these two women’s early writing on Plath was linked in surprising ways, and what that mysterious silence tells us about the continuing challenges of writing on Plath in the feminist tradition. Hosted By Gail Crowther.
Please be aware that this talk will be filmed for use by the Open University.
Headline Poetry Reading: Disruptive Voices with Victoria Kennefick and Shivanee Ramlochan
Sunday 23rd October 7pm - 9pm
Doors open at 6pm
Victoria Kennefick is one of the boldest, most exciting poets to emerge in recent years. A major poet in the making, Kennefick’s debut, Eat or We Both Starve (Carcanet 2021) was shortlisted for the 2021 Costa and T.S. Eliot poetry prizes, and won the 2022 Seamus Heaney Prize for Poetry. Writer, activist and editor Shivanee Ramlochan’s debut collection, Everyone Knows I am a Haunting (Peepal Tree, 2019) was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection. Hailed by Olive Senior as, ‘a challenging, unforgettable and courageous new voice.’ Ramlochan is an electrifying performer of her work. Sylvia Plath Literary Festival is proud to bring you two of the most dynamic and essential poetic voices of our times. Hosted by John McAuliffe.