Open Call: Poet-in-Residence at Summit Festival

Poetry School invites applications for an early or mid-career poet to be our first Poet-in-Residence at Summit Festival, on 19 & 20 October 2024.

Summit: A Poetry School Festival is an ecopoetry, nature, and climate writing festival, with its inaugural edition being a collaboration between Poetry School, University of Leeds Poetry Centre, the Laurel Prize, the National Poetry Centre, Yorkshire Sculpture Park, and National Landscapes Association.

Summit’s ethos is centred around poetry, community, and action. It provides a vital space to consider how words, and worlds, are deeply connected, and what role poetry plays as we face up to immense biodiversity losses, habitat destruction, rising carbon emissions, and warming temperatures. The festival brings together some of the UK’s most celebrated writers and ecological thinkers for two days of performances, workshops, surgeries, and panel discussions. Summit takes place on 19 October at Yorkshire Sculpture Park and 20 October at the University of Leeds Poetry Centre.

Our Summit Festival Poet-in-Residence will spend time absorbing the atmosphere of the Festival, attending, in-person, the workshops, panel discussions, and reading events, and reflecting on the urgency of the Festival’s themes and ethos. They will write a new poem for Poetry School to publish, using any aspect of the experience that has been of inspiration, alongside a reflective blog.

Key Benefits and Remuneration

The Poet-in-Residence will receive:

– Two nights’ accommodation in Leeds on Friday 18 October and Saturday 19 October.
– Travel from home to Leeds and Yorkshire Sculpture Park.
– A free pass to attend workshops at Yorkshire Sculpture Park on Saturday 19 October.
– An invitation to the Laurel Prize-giving Ceremony and Dinner on Saturday evening.
– A free pass to attend workshops and panel discussions in Leeds on Sunday 20 October.
– Payment of £250 to create 40–80 lines of poetry, responding to the Festival’s experiences, themes, values, and ethos, together with a reflective blog.
– A place on our Autumn Term Online Fortnightly Feedback course with Natalie Whittaker (worth £95); n.b. one of the draft poems submitted for feedback on this course should be the commissioned Summit Festival poem-in-progress.

Key Outputs

– 40–80 lines of poetry responding to the Festival’s experiences, themes, values, and ethos.
– A creative-reflective blog of c. 1,000 words encompassing the Festival weekend.

Eligibility

– This residency is for an early or mid-career poet. You may have published a pamphlet and/or have had a record of magazine publication and competition success. You must not have published a full collection of poetry.
– Based in the UK and available to travel to Leeds on weekend of 19 and 20 October 2024.
– A past or current Poetry School student.
– Current Poetry School or Leeds University staff may not apply.

To Apply

To apply, please send to the following to [email protected]. This could either be as a Word Doc or in video form, sent via WeTransfer. Please entitle your document ‘Application for Summit Festival Poet-in-Residence’:

– 3 poems, at least 1 of which should be on an environmental, climate, or nature theme.
– A c. 300-word statement explaining why you would be ideal for this residency and how the experience will help develop your creative practice.
– A 250-word biography.

Summit Festival Residency Timeline

– Deadline for applications: Tuesday 1 October, 11.59pm.
– Artist Confirmed: Friday 4 October.
– 4 October – 17 December – Enrol on Autumn Term Fortnightly Feedback course with Natalie Whittaker (draft Summit Festival poem to be submitted after the festival).
– Saturday 19 October & Sunday 20 October – Attend Summit Festival in-person, including workshops, readings, and panel discussions.
– Monday 2 December 2024 – Draft poem and reflective blog submitted to Poetry School for feedback and editorial. First payment (50% of fee) released.
– Monday 6 January 2025 – Final drafts of poem and reflective blog submitted to Poetry School. Final payment released.