6th May 2014

As part of the city’s Spring Festival of Markets, Literature Northwest are pleased to announce the return of the popular Manchester Independent Book Market on Saturday 7th and Sunday 8th June 2014 in St Ann’s Square, with emerging literary star Jess Green as the headlining poet.

Born in Leicester, the 24-year-old spoken word poet who studied Creative Writing at Liverpool John Moores University, sparked debate earlier this month when a performance of her poem ‘Dear Mr Gove’ was posted to YouTube. The video, in which Green lambasts the education secretary Michael Gove over his proposed reforms, has already been viewed more than 260,000 times.

Green will be opening the market on the Saturday at 12pm with a 30-minute performance, followed by back-to-back performances and readings throughout the weekend from some of the region’s finest slam and spoken word poets, short story writers, and authors. The line-up includes Ben Mellor (winner of the 2009 BBC Radio 4 National Poetry Slam), Tony Walsh (Glastonbury Poet in Residence 2011), and Lauren Bolger (winner of The Roy Fisher Prize for poetry 2012). More acts are yet to be confirmed.

Now in its 6th year, the Manchester Book Market plays host to the most innovative and prolific independent presses and artists in the North West. Over the course of two days, the public will have the chance to be introduced to, and sample some of the work from a variety of independent publishers selling high-quality fiction, ranging from poetry, novels, short stories, graphic novels and magazines, not to mention the opportunity to hear from the writers themselves over in the performance area. Stallholders this year include short story specialists Comma Press, experimental poetry publisher FlapJack Press, Peepal Tree Press (publishers of Caribbean and Black British fiction, non-fiction and poetry), Manchester's Writing Development Agency Commonword, Rough Cut Comics, and many others.

The market will run from 10am to 5.30pm Saturday and Sunday, with performances from 12pm to 5pm both days, and will be located in the Orangery in St Ann’s Square, a covered marquee that forms the hub of the Spring markets alongside a number of food traders and a bar area.

For more information contact [email protected] or [email protected], and see here for updates
http://commapress.co.uk/events/manchester-book-market-2014/