Event Description

Join Spork! Poetry for an evening of fun, fabulous and fiery spoken-word poetry at Exeter Library, as we celebrate and elevate LGBTQ+ voices. Featuring the incredible poet, performer and T.S Eliot Prize Winner Joelle Taylor, with support from Bristol based slam winning poet Aish Humphries. All hosted by silly stand-up poet Chris White.

Joelle Taylor
is the author of 4 collections of poetry. Her most recent collection C+NTO & Othered Poems won the 2021 T.S Eliot Prize, and the 2022 Polari Book Prize for LGBT authors.

C+NTO is currently being adapted for theatre with a view to touring. She is a co-curator and host of Out-Spoken Live at the Southbank Centre, and tours her work nationally and internationally in a diverse range of venues, from Australia to Brazil.

She is also a Poetry Fellow of University of East Anglia and the curator of the Koestler Awards 2023. Her novel of interconnecting stories The Night Alphabet was published by Riverrun in Spring of 2024 and was named Guardian Book of the Month. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and the 2022 Saboteur Spoken Word Artist of the Year. She was recently honoured with a DIVA Award for Excellence and was also included in the Independent’s 2024 Pride Power list.

Aish Humphreys
is a poet, performer and workshop facilitator from Cornwall, living in Bristol. He has performed all over the UK and last year worked in Romania with Tongue Fu exploring the relationship between music and spoken word. Poet in residence for the SS Great Britain in 2022, their first poetry pamphlet, “Saints of Golden Hour” was released in February 2023, treading soberness, girlhood, queer relationships and the gods we create for ourselves.

Chris White
is a performer, poet and the founder of Spork! Poetry. A slam winning poet who frequently performs his work at nights and festivals from Shambala to Tongue Fu. He was the first Riddler in Residence at Exeter Cathedral, has performed on buses and boats, and likes writing silly words about love, ducks & other wet things.