Festival in a Book

This week has seen the launch of the anthology Festival in a Book, which celebrates the Wenlock Poetry Festival, which ran from 2010-2016. There are two kinds of anthology. One throws the poems into a heap, and sorts them out into alphabetical order of surnames. The other thinks very carefully about what goes where, how the poems are grouped, and in what order they should come. This collection fits very snugly into the latter category, of carefully considered work.

For anyone who was involved in WPF there’s a ton of memories here, reminders of details which are very much treasured, landmarks in a poetic journey which for a lot of us are of lasting significance: particular performers at the Edge, the Poetree, the Emergency Poet, tea and cake and at Priory Hall.

But there’s also the poetry, and that means poems from an astonishing range of contributors. I count at least sixty nationally known poets in the index, writing about a wide variety of subjects. I doubt there’ll be a more substantial anthology of any kind published this year, which makes this collection the perfect Christmas present. Whether or not you know Wenlock, whether or not you read a lot of poetry, this is the ideal way to get a taste of either or both.