Enjoy a short and friendly ramble, around 3 miles in about 90 minutes, punctuated by pauses for poems which reflect in different ways the environment and scenery through which we are walking.

Food for thought and prompts perhaps for writing of your own.

The morning walks will also provide opportunities for you to buy coffee and refreshments, beforehand or once we’ve returned.

1. East - Siccaridge morning walk, 10.30 am, Wednesday 24th June (Midsummer day), Daneway Inn for coffee afterwards

2. North - Buckholt Wood, early evening walk, 7 pm, Monday 6th July

3. South - Woodchester Park, morning walk, 10.30 am Thursday 23rd July, coffee after at Tinkley Gate cafe

4. West - Eastington morning walk, 10.30am Wednesday 5th August, coffee after at Lazy Goose cafe

Come for one or all walks! Information and maps for meeting up points will be sent via email shortly before the walks take place.

£12 per walk or £40 for all three.

book here!

While you’re here, there are still a couple of spots left on The Long Light this evening, a midsummer writing workshop with JLM Morton - a snip at £20 (£15 concessions). Find out more and book.

Early Bird Tickets for the Dobunni Poetry Festival are now on sale - grab yours while they’re hot. £80 for two days of readings, panel discussions, spoken word, sound installations and more! Reduced price tickets are on sale for a month, then will revert to full price. Check it out here.

That’s all for now! x

More than 15 events will be running over two days, 16 – 17 October at venues across Stroud – our early bird ticket is an absolute steal at £80 for the whole festival. If you like the sound of what we are doing and want to support us, this is your sign! (FYI, that works out at about a fiver per event - and with this line-up, you would, wouldn’t you?!)

From debut collection readings in Borderless Books to showcase events from Broken Sleep, Ambient Receiver and Dialect Press/DIRT to a Friday Night Word Lab special, poetry films, sound installations and a Slight Afterparty on the Saturday, there’s lots going on. Come through!

Tickets can be purchased via our website: www.dobunnipoetryfestival.co.uk

Here’s the full line-up >>>>>>>

PASCALE PETIT – ALISON BRACKENBURY - AMBIENT RECEIVER - ZOE BROOKS - CLAIRE CARROLL - CHAKA - JASON CONWAY - HANNAH COPLEY - KYM DEYN - KAREN DOWNS BARTON - SUYIN DU BOIS - RHIAN ELIZABETH - ANGELA FRANCE - RACHEL GOODMAN - REBECCA GOSS - GEORGIA GRIFFITHS - LUCY HOLME - ADAM HOROVITZ - ALUN HUGHES - ANDREW HYKEL MEARS - AARON KENT - LENZO - LIVING MATTER - JLM MORTON - JOSHUA O’CATHSAIG - PEY OH - ALYCIA PIRMOHAMED - KATE POTTS - ELEANOR REES - ELVIRE ROBERTS - PHILIP RUSH - ANNA SAUNDERS - MARTHA SPRACKLAND - SOLLE - ELLORA SUTTON TSANTANA - MERCE WHITE - JAKE WILD HALL - ALICE WILLITTS - JONNY FLUFFYPUNK & UTA BALDAUF X WORD LAB - SLIGHT AFTERPARTY WITH LOST MYTHOS + SPECIAL GUESTS

Thanks for all your support!

Tickets can be purchased via our website: www.dobunnipoetryfestival.co.uk

“Poetry is not a luxury. It is a vital necessity of our existence. It forms the quality of the light within which we predicate our hopes and dreams toward survival and change, first made into language, then into idea, then into more tangible action. Poetry is the way we help give name to the nameless so it can be thought.”

~ Audre Lorde

We are looking for writers who are curious about place, rooted in their local landscape and open to imagining futures that feel credible and hopeful. You do not need to be a climate expert or an ‘eco writer’. You simply need to be willing to experiment and work alongside others.

Selected writers will:

• join a supportive peer process

• take part in two or three creative workshops

• develop a new piece of writing set in a landscape within the District

• gain experience of a collaborative editorial process

• contribute to a public facing body of work

• keep short journals, field notes and/or photos as part of the work

• record audio for podcast, if possible

• build confidence in near future and place based writing

• receive a paid commission of £250

We welcome writers of all backgrounds and especially those whose voices are under-represented. We are especially interested to hear from writers outside of Stroud Town - see the District map to discover the area this grant covers (including Dursley, Berkeley, Wotton Under Edge, Stonehouse, Minchinhampton etc).

To apply, complete our online form OR send a short audio or video message responding to the questions below to dialectsubmissions@gmail.com by the deadline.

The questions on are as follows:

1. tell us a little about yourself (100 words)

2. tell us about the landscape you feel most connected to (50 words)

3. tell us why you want to take part (100)

4. send us a 500-word sample of your writing.

If you need to talk through the call out before applying, email us to arrange a short chat and/ or if you simply have some queries, please feel free to contact juliette.morton@dialect.org.uk.

The deadline for submissions is midnight 12th July 2026.

Weight of Light is sponsored by the Nature & Climate Fund at Stroud District Council.

Let’s imagine a future we can move through together.

There’s lots going on at Dialect and we have news to share, so please… read on!

Nottingham Poetry Festival this weekend

We are very excited to be bringing Dialect Press and our DIRT imprint up to Nottingham *this Saturday* for readings from Elvire Roberts & Rachel Goodman, JLM Morton and Charlie Sanderson with conversation about the art of collaboration. How do you begin a shared piece? What do you do when your approaches diverge and how do you navigate this? What can you learn about your own practice through collaboration? Perhaps you'd like to hear more about our DIRT ecopoetry competition that's currently open to submissions. These questions and more are all up for discussion. Come along, get involved - we'd love to see you there. Nottingham Central Library, 11am - 12.30pm. At £5, tickets are an absolute bargain! Available via this button »>

Tickets

Page to Performance

Are you a writer who wants to take your readings and performances to the next level? Or are you someone who hates talking in public, but needs to deliver a speech or presentation? Also at Nottingham this weekend, Charlie Sanderson will be sharing a range of professional tips and exercises, carefully tailored for anyone who wants to take to the stage and read to an audience. In 90 minutes, she’ll give you the tools to bring your words alive, and help you to discover the joy of performing!

Nottingham Central Library 1pm - 230pm.

Page to Performance

The Long Light: a summer solstice writing workshop

High summer is a season rich with possibility. It is a time of abundant growth and harvest, the peak of nature’s bounty. Fields are full, the warm woodland floor darkens with the leaf cover in the canopy above, fruits and vegetables are ripening – everyone, it seems, is out and about enjoying the fullness of the year. The sun itself – and the solstice - is a powerful symbol of vitality and sustenance. In this seasonal online workshop, which is becoming a tradition in itself, JLM Morton will guide you to create new work and check in with your creative practice.

Tuesday 16th June, 6pm - 8pm online.

The Long Light

Michael Marks Award

We are thrilled to have been shortlisted by the Michael Marks Awards for Pamphlet Publisher in recognition of our DIRT ecopoetry imprint. The awards ceremony is taking place at the British Library next Tuesday - whatever the outcome we feel like winners already to have our work platformed in this way. The judges had this to say:

“DIRT, the ecologically focussed imprint of Dialect Press, makes plantable pamphlets that treat publishing as something living rather than fixed and forces us to confront the realities of our environment and the impact of consumption on the planet. We loved how the publisher brings this into practice, in a genuine, actionable and collaborative way, while still pushing at the boundaries of what poetry means and what is has the potential to be.”

DIRT Competition

Submissions to our DIRT ecopoetry competition are now OPEN! We’re inviting poets who care deeply about our living planet and want to experience writing in collaboration with another poet to submit work for our first DIRT plantable poetry competition pamphlet. DIRT commissions pairs of poets to write collaborative poems in response to climate science. Our project models Earth-positive publishing. Previous commissions include poets Clare Pollard paired with Anglia Ruskin student Freya Sacksen, and Alycia Pirmohamed paired with Hannah Copley. The deadline for entries is midnight on 14th June.

“ The whole collaboration experience was so lovely that we carried on writing and talking about it afterwards. Honestly, DIRT’s one of the most magical things to be a part of, just do it! Being involved in a DIRT collaboration and getting to work with Alycia and Alice really has changed how I think about writing and my creative practice.” ~ Hannah Copley

DIRT - find out more

Weight of Light

We were very pleased to be acknowledged by our local district council for the work we’ve been doing building an artist-led model for climate storytelling through our project Weight of Light.

You can find out more about the project on our website, listen to the stories on our podcast and we now have all of the stories available as a digital download for a small donation of £2, which goes towards supporting our writer network. Click the button below to purchase.

Weight of Light

Summer Poetry Walks

Poetry walks with Philip Rush are back! Enjoy a short and friendly ramble, around 3 miles in about 90 minutes, punctuated by pauses for poems which reflect in different ways the environment and scenery through which we are walking. Food for thought and prompts perhaps for writing of your own. The morning walks will also provide opportunities for you to buy coffee and refreshments, beforehand or once we’ve returned. Come for one or all four - starting 24th June at 10.30am.

Poetry Walks

Dialect Membership

Are you looking to join a community of like-minded writers for encouragement, support and feedback? Joining the Dialect community through our membership scheme is a great way for you to connect with other rural writers, gain confidence and carve out regular space and development time for getting your words into the world. Prices start at £10 per month, with free access to the scheme for those who are carers or on a small income.

Membership - find out more!

Midlife Magic!

From 24th - 29th June 2026 Juliette is leading a holistic writing retreat in southern France for women at midlife - we'll have daily writing workshops, a morning yoga practice with Netty Chapman, a ceramics and ritual workshop with our host, sculptor Nathalie Edwards, and a Q&A on functional menopause meds with Sandra Ishkanes. With wild swimming and access to miles of walks in the extraordinary landscape of the Gorges du Tarn, right on the doorstep, it's going to be a transformative few days. The Mill are offering a 50% discount to two friends who would like to come along and share the 2 bedroom canal apartment - essentially two places for the price of one! The cost covers full board (home cooked meals, all dietary requirements catered for) - travel / flights and airport transfers are the only thing not covered. If this sounds like something you'd be interested in, please hit reply to this email for more info. We hope to see you there!

All for now folks! x

24th - 29th June at The Mill, Saint-Georges-de-Luzençon, Aveyron, France.

Taking our cue from the metamorphosis of the moth, this holistic retreat celebrates wisdom, maturity and growth, embracing our midlife transitions. There are just three spots left and we’d love it if you could join us - and we’re offering a discount that’s exclusive to our newsletter subscribers to entice the last few folks over the threshold!

Enjoy daily writing workshops with JLM Morton, yoga with Netty Chapman, ritual and ceramic-making with Nathalie Edwards, wild swimming and walks in extraordinary countryside (yes there are dinosaur footprints in the hills!). Plus a bonus myth busting session on functional menopause medication with Sandra Ishkanes.

Our venue, The Mill, stands on the banks of the River Cernon. In recent years it has become a haven for writers, artists and creatives from all over the world with many of them returning regularly to participate in residencies. The Mill's restoration provides a variety of rooms from French rustic charm to qirky industrial comfort. There are shared and single occupancy options. Plenty of communal areas, including the peaceful cobalt blue library, the laid-back salon and quiet areas along the river bank. The nearest town is Millau.

This retreat is full board, with delicious home cooked meals served from The Mill’s kitchen - all dietary requirements can be catered for, just let us know on booking. Everything is included except flights and transfers.

If this sounds like your tasse du thé, we would love to see you there - use discount code MOTH26 at the checkout for a wopping 15% off (expires Friday 5th June).

FIND OUT MORE

For comprehensive information about The Mill, please see this link. Visit The Mill’s website here.

Stroud is a town rich in creativity, but it doesn’t have a poetry festival of its own. In a place known for its independent spirit, its artistic communities across disciplines, and its deep connection to landscape and radical thought, this absence is striking. The Dobunni Poetry Festival 2026 aims to change that, establishing a dedicated poetry festival for Stroud and creating a cultural home for writers, readers, and audiences of all ages, supported by our festival bookseller Borderless Books.

By naming the festival after the Dobunni, we’re honouring a lineage of creativity and connection to place. It signals that this is a festival grown from the ground up - shaped by the people who live and work here, attentive to the rural territory that has always held stories, and committed to celebrating the voices that rise from it today.

The festival will run across two days, 16–17 October 2026, bringing together headline poets of national standing with the exceptional talent already thriving in the region, platforming poets and publishers based in the west / south west.

For now, kindly save the date in your diaries – tickets will be on sale very soon. We hope to see you in October!

We are grateful to Stroud Arts Festival and the Laura Kinsella Foundation for some seed funding to help us to get this off the ground.

#poetryfestival #dobunnipoetryfestival #stroud #cotswolds #gloucestershire

LINE UP

Pascale Petit
Alison Brackenbury
Ambient Receiver
Zoe Brooks
Claire Carroll
Chaka
Jason Conway
Hannah Copley
Nick Degg
Kym Deyn
Karen Downs-Barton
Suyin du Bois
Angela France
Lucy Holme
Adam Horovitz
Alun Hughes
Andrew Hykel Mears
Aaron Kent
Living Matter
JLM Morton
Pey Oh
Alycia Pirmohamed
Kate Potts
Philip Rush
Martha Sprackland
Ellora Sutton
Alice Willitts
Jonny Fluffypunk & Uta Balduf x Art Lab
Slight afterparty with Lost Mythos + special guests

Whether you’re sitting on a messy stack of drafts or an almost-there manuscript, this is a day for clarity, momentum, and that clicking-into-place sound you hear when the work suddenly makes sense together.

Best words. Best order - as Coleridge (almost) said.

We’ve got a great venue for this one at the deconsecrated Chapels of Rest on Bisley Road in Stroud ,Gloucestershire. Bring your own lunch and enjoy panoramic views across the valleys and over towards the Severn vale!

The workshop takes place on Friday 15th May, 10am – 4pm.

Your tutor for the day is JLM Morton, an award-winning poet and emerging publisher whose commissions and projects have recently been selected for the Poetry Book Society Summer Pamphlet Choice and shortlisted for the Michael Marks Awards. Author of two pamphlets, three micro pamphlets, one poetry collection and another forthcoming, JLM has a PhD and an MA in Literature and an MA in Creative and Life Writing - if you’d have thought she’s got an inkling of sound approaches to putting together longer works, you’d be right. Safe pair of hands, we reckon.

As we may have been (ahem) a little slow to advertise this one, we’re offering £5 discount code to newsletter subscribers to help get it off the ground - use GIT26 at the checkout and cash it in!

Book here!

Book here!

Level Up! Elevate your poetic craft in this dynamic mentoring workshop tailored for poets eager to strengthen their work. Close reading and feedback from critical friends. Monthly, online, starts 8th May 9am - 12pm. With JLM Morton. One spot left.

From Fragments to Form - advanced life writing with Kate Potts. A small, advanced group (maximum 8) for writers ready to turn existing material and ideas into a structured manuscript opening and outline in 10 weeks. Starts 8th May.

Get it Together - have you got a poetry pamphlet in you? If you’re looking to get your poems together and make ready to send out a pamphlet to publishers, this day long workshop will be right up your street. Friday 15th May, Chapels of Rest, Stroud - with JLM Morton.

Words in the Woods is an afternoon of focused, structured writing time at the Into Nature roundhouse, in the beautiful surroundings of Hailey Wood, nr Cirencester, Gloucestershire. Saturday 16th May with Emma Kernahan.

Looking towards June, we’re excited to be heading up to NOTTINGHAM for a Page to Performance masterclass in performing your work with confidence, hosted by voice actor and storyteller Charlie Sanderson. We’re also hosting The Long Light, an online writing workshop for the summer solstice. There’s also the super special Moth Magic retreat in France. Enjoy writing workshops with JLM Morton, yoga with Netty Chapman, ritual and ceramics with Nathalie Edwards, wild swimming and walks in extraordinary countryside (yes there are dinosaur footprints in the hills!). Plus a bonus myth busting session on functional menopause medication with Sandra Ishkanes. Three spots left and that’s happening 24th - 29th June.

Thanks to all who have supported us in recent weeks, come and said hello at Free Verse Book Fair in London and joined us for a very magical evening of readings at our Indie Press Network Poetry Salon at Museum in the Park in Stroud last Thursday. Our cup runneth over!

A final note to say We’ll Meet You There is now back in stock. Check out our bookshop for all our publications.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Juliette & Emma x

Working in a small, committed group (maximum 8), you’ll develop your existing material into a structured opening and a clear plan for a full-length project. Whether you’re writing memoir, autofiction, essays, or hybrid work, this course offers space, rigour, and detailed feedback to help you progress.

What you’ll leave with:
– A strong, polished opening chapter (or equivalent)
– A clear structure for your manuscript
– Up to 9,000 words of developed or revised writing
– A deeper understanding of your project’s voice, shape, and direction

Each weekly 2.5-hour session combines close reading, craft discussion, in-session writing, and focused feedback. You’ll also receive weekly written feedback, detailed editorial comments on your opening chapter, and a one-to-one mentoring session at the end of the course.

You’ll explore advanced topics including voice and distance, structure and momentum, ethics and vulnerability, and revision as re-envisioning — drawing on the work of writers such as Mary Karr, Ocean Vuong, and Maggie Nelson.

This course is for writers ready to commit to a book-length project, with generous but rigorous support and guidance, and was developed as a response to requests from participants in Dialect’s Writing Our Lives workshop.

Course details:
Fridays, 8 May – 10 July
10:00–12:30 (Zoom)
£445 / £395 reduced rate (limited spaces)

A free taster session — Beyond Chronology: Finding the Right Form for Your Life Writing — will run on Wednesday 29 April.

Places are limited, and the group is intentionally kept small to allow for in-depth feedback and discussion.

Book your place via the Dialect website.

Booking

—
Dr Kate Potts is the author of three poetry collections and an experienced teacher of creative writing. She has taught widely in universities and for organisations including The Poetry School and Arvon. Her teaching combines close attention to craft with a supportive, exploratory approach that helps writers to build confidence in their voice and work.

Our very next Dialect retreat is happening on Saturday May 16th, 10am-3pm, at the Into Nature site at Hailey Woods near Cirencester.

We’ll be hosting structured writing time by the fire in a brand new roundhouse, along with drinks and snacks and plenty of discussion time - or just a chance to breathe and soak up some woodland magic.

Hailey Woods are especially beautiful at this time of year, with plenty of walks and even some Roman history nearby.

Our tickets are on a sliding scale, from just £12.50 for Dialect Meadow members and friends, to £20 for a regular ticket. And we have a special pay it forward rate of £30 for anyone who would like to support Dialect Writers CIC and the brilliant Into Nature CIC in making the arts and nature accessible to everyone.

There is parking and a toilet on site, and the roundhouse is a short walk from the car park along a level woodland track.

Writers of all levels and genres are very welcome.

You can book your spot here

(if cost remains a barrier, please feel free to email us at dialectwriters@gmail.com to secure your spot)

Tell us what you need - the Rural Writers Survey

And secondly, a very quick ask! Writers ‘on the edge’ of large towns and cities are often overlooked when it comes to cultural events, networking and support for their craft. We think that needs to change, so at the moment Dialect are surveying rural writers across the UK to find out more about what would really help their work to get to the next level. If you have a spare 5 minutes, we’d love to hear your views! Any feedback you can give us will help us to shape our courses, workshops and membership offerings both in person and online - and help us secure funding to support all writers in rural and edgeland places, whatever their background.

You can find the rural writers’ survey here

And speaking of brilliant writers in rural places…

Grab your seat at the Indie Press Network Poetry Salon

Hosted by Dialect Writers, this evening of live poetry readings returns to the Museum in the Park in Stroud, Gloucestershire on 30 April from 7pm to 9pm.

Our featured readers for April are:

Jeremy Dixon

Suzannah V. Evans

Adam Horovitz

Vanessa Napolitano

Philip Rush

Kathryn Southworth

Writers, editors and poetry lovers are invited to gather in the Pavilion of the walled garden, a warm, informal setting to celebrate small press publishing and the creative communities it sustains. Expect fresh, exciting voices and a chance to connect with people shaping the contemporary poetry landscape.

An open, welcoming space for anyone curious about the vitality of indie presses today.

Book your spot here

That’s it from us for now - we hope you have fun in the sun, and looking forward to hearing from you soon.

In the mean time, all power to your writing elbow:)

The Dialect Team

Count me in!

We’re in for a treat! Our featured readers for April are: Jeremy Dixon, Suzannah V. Evans, Adam Horovitz, Vanessa Napolitano, Philip Rush, Kathryn Southworth.

Find out more about each of these brilliant poets below.

We will gather in the pavillion of the walled garden, a warm, informal setting, to celebrate small press publishing and the creative communities it sustains. Expect fresh, exciting work and a chance to connect with people shaping the contemporary poetry landscape.

An open, welcoming evening for anyone curious about the vitality of indie presses today.

The event is FREE and books will be for sale - there is an option to buy a token on checkout to exchange for a book on the night. Please book your ticket below so that we can keep an eye on numbers.

Book Here!

Featured Poets

Suzannah V. Evans is a poet, researcher, and educator. Her debut poetry collection Under the Blue is shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize, and her work has received the Ivan Juritz Prize and a Northern Writers’ Award. Her poetry pamphlets are Brightwork and Marine Objects / Some Language. Suzannah teaches poetry in adult education and works with Poetry By Heart.

Adam Horovitz is a poet, performer and editor. He has published three collections of poetry, Turning, The Soil Never Sleeps and Love and Other Fairy Tales, a memoir, A Thousand Laurie Lees, and an album of poetry and music with Josef Reeve, Little Metropolis. His latest book, Slow Migrations, is out with Indigo Dreams (2025). His most recent collaboration is Rock, Paper, Scissors, a poetry pamphlet with Ella Duffy, out now with Dialect Press.

Vanessa Napolitano is a Yorkshire-based writer who has published four pamphlets including Various Magics (Black Cat Press) and the lives we had before (forthcoming with Stanchion in May 2027). Her first full collection is due out with Black Cat Press in 2027. She writes on themes of grief, nature, nostalgia and love.

Philip Rush is a retired English teacher who lives in Stroud. He oversees ‘Yew Tree Press of Stroud’ which publishes small-run pamphlets from local and not-so-local poets. His own poetry has been published most recently by The Garlic Press in his book, Camera Obscura. His latest pamphlet is Dusk Code. He plays the fiddle enthusiastically.

Kathryn Southworth has spent most of her life as an academic at a number of universities in the West Midlands. Kathryn’s first collection, Someone was here was published by Indigo Dreams in 2018 and was a Poetry Kit book of the month. She has four further books of poetry with Paekakariki and Vole. Tonight she represents Yew Tree Press and will be reading (with some assistance) from her new pamphlet How I Became a Witch.

Yes Please!

In ‘If Everyone Holds Up the Sky,’ Roma Robinson reconfigures and finds new meaning in old myths, while Charlotte Levene’s story ‘The Swap’ is set in Stroud’s near future where her characters reflect on the ways climate crisis has changed their lives. In E.M. Potts’s short story ‘Yarn,’ Vi returns to her hometown by maglev and sees it with fresh eyes.

We gathered last week in the walled garden of the Museum in the Park to celebrate these stories and the co-creative process that brought these writers together.

We were joined by the wonderful Ilse Pedler who read from We’ll Meet You There, written with Alice Willitts and Hilary Watson. We’re so grateful to all of our supporters who’ve ensured the pamphlet has sold out in quick time - it’s clearly struck a chord - keep your eyes peeled for a restock soon! If you’d like a sneak peak, why not check out the launch of We’ll Meet You There on our YouTube channel?!

You can now find out all about the Weight of Light project via our website where you can also read and listen to all of the stories.

Thanks to funding from Stroud District Council, you can now hear these stories wherever you get your podcasts on our relaunched Dialect Writers Collective Podcast! Do give us a like and subscribe.

Listen to the podcast

All for now! Juliette & Emma x

What do previous participants say about Mel’s course?

Melanie’s Developing your Fiction writing workshop helped me break a ten-year writing block - and finally put pen to paper of a novel a decade in the making. I’m now five chapters and 5000 words in to my first draft. The feedback from Mel and the group she facilitated was invaluable for shaping my novel’s direction. Highly recommend! ~ Participant on Developing Your Fiction

I’ve found both Mel’s workshops to be so informative, well-structured and helpful in me becoming more confident in my writing. She ensures that the workshop format of giving and receiving feedback for your work is done in such a way that each person receives useful, specific guidance and suggestions on how to develop their work, in a positive format. I have been inspired by what I’ve learnt from both courses and would recommend them to anyone wanting to write. ~ Participant on Beginning to Write Fiction and Developing Your Fiction

Across six weeks, you’ll work with an expert tutor and a small cohort of committed writers to refine voice, structure, character, and the emotional architecture of your work. This course is very practical, rigorous, and generous.

If you’re ready to push your fiction further, steady your craft, and finally give that story the attention it deserves, join us.

Course details + booking below »>

All the details are here

Join JLM Morton for this immersive online workshop exploring how poetry can chart the landscapes of memory, emotion, and environment.

Blending creative cartography with lyrical writing, participants will create personal or collective ‘maps’ – of neighbourhoods, childhood places, imagined futures, or inner worlds – using poetry as the compass.

Inspired by work from poets such as Bhanu Kapil, Kei Miller and Natalie Diaz, and drawing on sensory prompts, spatial memory, and visual tools, this workshop invites participants to think about place not just as location, but as experience that is layered and shifting.

This workshop is a rerun of a sold out workshop we did for the Poetry Society in January 2026. Get it while you can!

More info here!

Ilse Pedler will also be joining us all the way from Cumbria to read from her collaborative pamphlet, We’ll Meet You There.

Roma, from the Radical Youth Space for Education in Stroud, will be running a mini zine workshop.

We can’t wait!

Museum in the Park, Stratford Park, Stroud, Gloucestershire, 7pm - 9pm.

Refreshments and materials will be provided. The event is free but booking is encouraged via the link below!

https://www.dialect.org.uk/events/weight-of-light

Join us for a celebratory evening shining a light on our new project, Weight of Light, and the four brilliant local writers at its heart. We will also be joined by the wonderful poet Ilse Pedler, whose collaborative pamphlet We’ll Meet You There is published by Dialect Press.

Charlotte Levene, E. M. Potts, Roma Robinson and Philip Rush have been on a co‑creative journey to craft thrutopian stories that imagine hopeful, practical ways of living through climate change toward a more liveable future.

At this event, you’ll get a glimpse into their process, hear what’s inspired them and discover how the work has unfolded through written pieces and a new podcast series.

The night also includes a hands‑on mini zine workshop for anyone curious about the kind of small scale, radical distribution that can inspire creative communities.

Ilse Pedler will be reading from We’ll Meet You There, a thrutopian pamphlet written with poets Alice Willitts & Hilary Weston which reinvents, repurposes and retrofits poetic forms to uncover expressions for new ways of looking at the world.

What do we need literary writing to be in our time of era-defining shifts in world-order? Can we fall in love with the future again and how could an attitude of positive futurism translate into writing?

Details

Pavillion in the walled garden, Museum in the Park, Stratford Park, GL5 4AF.

7pm - 9pm

Tickets to this evening are free, but please book below so that we can keep track of numbers.

TICKETS!

The Weight of Light is supported by Stroud District Council.

This collaborative pamphlet is playful and attentive as it circles around the well‑known childhood game, and has clearly struck a chord with the PBS selectors. It’s a joy to see Ella and Adam’s work recognised in this way, and we couldn’t be more thrilled for them both.

Jackie Kay has already called it “a beautifully conceived wee gem of a chapbook,” and we couldn’t agree more. The pamphlet brings together two distinctive poetic voices in a conversation that is tender, sharp, and full of imaginative leaps.

If you’d like to get your hands on a copy, it’s available now through our Bookshop: www.dialect.org.uk/bookshop

Huge congratulations to Ella and Adam on this well‑deserved honour. It’s a wonderful moment for the poets, and for everyone who loves to see collaborative, risk‑taking poetry celebrated.

If you’d like to hear Adam and Ella in conversation, you can read their collaborative interview here.

They hope to be coming to read in a venue near you soon, and in the meantime, you can sign up to hear Adam read from the pamphlet - with a host of other great poets - at our next Poetry Salon at Museum in the Park, Stroud. This is taking place on Beltane eve, Thursday 30th April 7pm - 9pm. Tickets are free but please book here.

milk and honey,
nourishment to my bones
sweet on my lips

milk and honey,
the in between of growing pains
and the celebration of it

~ from 'Milk & Honey' by Mercedes White

Something special happened in Stroud last December. A group of local poets braved the winter chill with notebooks in hand, writing outdoors at the market before heading to The Ale House to share their brand new work with an audience of Dialect community folk. It was a simple idea that turned into a day full of warmth, creativity and genuine connection.

Our partnership with the Gloucestershire Poetry Society was central to making this micro project happen, for which we’re very grateful. Shouts to Jason Conway who helped coordinate the project, identifying poets to commission, spreading the word and co organising the evening event. The back room of the Ale House that Saturday evening was packed to the gunnels with good cheer and camaraderie, with the open mic encouraging anyone to share something of their own, reminding us how much joy there is in offering space for creativity to surface.

Pop Up Poetry proved that even a modest project can create a spark. Stroud showed up with enthusiasm, generosity and a true love of language that carried the whole day.

We are already thinking about what comes next and we’re delighted to be able to publish the poems that emerged from Nourish! on our website. Read the poems via the link below.

Poems!

Some people might call these retreats, and often we do too. It’s true that they are most definitely a time to hide away from the busyness of the world, to focus fully on the quiet, subversive voices within us that need an outlet.

The word ‘retreat’ can be a tricksy one however, simultaneously indulgent and monastic - somehow both too much and too little for those who deserve the luxury of time, but rarely feel entitled to it.

And so, we often talk about them in more prosaic terms. Gatherings. Get togethers. Shin digs. Celebrations.

Over the last two and half years, the ‘pay as you wish’ Dialect community has grown full to the gills with talented, skilled and very funny people, a huge number of whom squeeze writing in around the edges of work, or illness, or care-giving, or all of the above. Our ‘Meadow’ members’ collective was designed with these writers in mind, not because it was a ‘nice to have’ but because that’s us too.

Thanks to input from our brilliant collective, our writing gatherings were crafted to reflect our own needs - quick and easy to access, gentle, nurturing and above all - fun.

Month long musings in tasteful, remote locations have their place, but those flat out on the frontline of parenting and/or juggling several jobs need creative hits that are a lot more double espresso than latte toned interior decor.

So, in addition to our workshops and craft development, Dialect have offered up much needed hours of gathering and connection in accessible pieces - three times a week, we have written online together, grabbing just a single hour of words and creative spark amid the demands of ordinary life. We’ve gathered together to write in the woods, in museums, in gardens, in cafes, in mills, in market places, in the home of an eighteenth century scientist. Sometimes, with childcare provided. Sometimes, in the back of pubs in small towns. Once (unplanned) in the back of a van.

Over two and a half years, we have made friends and started new projects, had imaginary dinners, won prizes and published books that otherwise would not have come to be. The discussions we’ve had have nudged our work in new directions and made new things seem worthwhile. Through the rejections and the triumphs and the bumpy ride that is making art in a hostile environment, it is gathering that has kept us going.

And this month, Dialect are reaching a 500 hour milestone. We have now, by our calculation, spent five hundred hours officially just hanging out with rural and edgeland writers of all backgrounds, right across the UK.

We think that deserves a little moment.

If you’d like to mark it with us, feel free to hop in and join in over in the ‘Meadow’ - our thriving ‘pay as you wish’ writing community that’s open to anyone who writes in rural and edgeland places (including suburbs and rural cities).

https://www.dialect.org.uk/

Want new kinds of gatherings and writing support? You can help us by letting us know what works for you! Our latest survey takes 5 minutes, and is for rural writers everywhere - we would love to have your insights:

https://www.dialect.org.uk/writers-survey

And if you’re in Gloucestershire or nearby, you can also join us for our latest set of in-person gatherings, in the magical new roundhouse at Hailey Woods near Cirencester. These are taking place this Friday March 27th and on Saturday May 16th, running 10am-3pm.

These are hosted by our partners Into Nature CIC, and have a sliding payment scale: £30/£20/£12.50 for members. Our pay it forward tickets support our work in making the countryside and the arts accessible to everyone.

Bookings can be made here:

https://www.dialect.org.uk/coursesworkshops/wordsinthewoodsmarch

https://www.dialect.org.uk/coursesworkshops/wordsinwoodsmay

Whatever your preference, online or in person, in the wild or in the warm - we’re looking forward to writing with you. Here’s to 500 more hours of good old fashioned getting together :)

Emma and Juliette x

We’ll Meet You There brings together three exceptional poets who have immersed themselves in an exploration of thrutopia – the radical, hopeful imagining of paths through our current crises towards a liveable thriving future.

Through tangible visions of change and bold re-thinking of how we live, this collection invites readers to imagine what is possible and desirable when we dare to think differently, act differently, and believe that better futures can still be made.

Please support us by buying the book and joining the launch online tonight for the launch 6.30pm - 7.30pm , when the poets will read from their work and discuss the alchemy of their collaboration.

Launch Tickets

“Poetry redolent with questions, hopes, fears and the possibility of redress, and lit throughout with hope. I leave the pamphlet with my soul a little less sore, nourished and inspired by its three-way conversation.” - Jane Burn

“In We’ll Meet You There, thrutopoets Alice Willitts, Ilse Pedler and Hilary Watson are three distinct and powerful voices who ‘re-fable’ the future and fill us with longing. Inventive, radical, full of hope and heart.” - Elizabeth Lewis Williams

“These poets have been to the future and they’re back to tell us just how abundant and thriving the world will be, if we do everything we possibly can now to change direction.” - Katherine Stansfield

I don’t say, but how will I get there now… I say, I believe you
I don’t say, but the leaders won’t change… I say, we are the change
I don’t say, will you forgive me when I get there, is it too late…
I say, I’m coming, wait for me, I’m on my way

The Call - Alice Willitts

Let me tell you what’s possible
how to drench a city in green
ride an urban flood of possibility
how to light a green fuse

 How To Retrofit a City - Ilse Pedler

There’s a place for you here and
in that thriving future. Open yourself 
to its manifest. 

 Heron Time- Hilary Watson