An Evening with Warsan Shire

Manchester Literature Festival is thrilled to present an evening with Somali-British poet and writer Warsan Shire. Born in Nairobi and raised in London, Warsan was awarded the Brunel International African Poetry Prize and served as the first Young Poet Laureate of London. She has written two chapbooks, Teaching My Mother How To Give Birth and Her Blue Body, and wrote the poetry for the award-winning visual album Lemonade and the Disney film Black is King in collaboration with Beyoncé Knowles-Carter.

One of the most exciting poets of her generation, Warsan builds on the power of individual poems like Home and For Women Who Are Difficult to Love with her first full-length collection, Bless the Daughter Raised by A Voice in Her Head. Beautifully crafted and profoundly moving, it’s a collection that explores home and exile, migration and assimilation, faith and family alongside love, desire, trauma and womanhood. Join us to see Warsan discuss her work and perform some of her fierce and tender poems.

Hosted by Malika Booker. The founder of Malika’s Poetry Kitchen, Malika is a British poet and theatre-maker of Guyanese and Grenadian parentage. Her poetry collection Pepper Seed was shortlisted for the OCM Botas Prize and her poem The Little Miracles won the 2020 Forward Prize for Best Single Poem.

Presented in partnership with Centre for New Writing, Creative Manchester and Waterstones Deansgate.

‘Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head is full of ferocious love and truth. It is not an overstatement to say Warsan Shire writes the way Nina Simone sang.’ Terrance Hayes

Copies of Bless the Daughter Raised by a Voice in Her Head will be available to collect before the event.