The border town of Presteigne on the Welsh Marches plays host to a fine selection of award winning poets, novelists and a children’s writer on Sunday, July 9 and Monday, July 10 at The Radnorshire Arms Hotel with the return of Charlie Wilkinson’s popular Red Parrot performances and another top-line reading from the Poetry in Presteigne , organised by Lynden Rees-Roberts.

This mini feast of words gets under way at 5pm on Sunday with a set of Red Parrot Prose featuring Paul Binding, Sarah Burton and Jem Poster followed at 6.30pm with Red Parrot Poetry and the launch of Gestures and Counterpoints by John Mole together with more readings from Paul Binding and Jem Poster.

Novelist, poet and journalist Paul Binding has written for the Independent and TLS and his last major book explored the life and work of Hans Christian Anderson, winning the Hans Christian Anderson Prize. Sarah Burton is the author of critically acclaimed biographies and children’s books, most recently, the humorous Complete and Utter History of the World By Samuel Stewart, Aged 9.

Jem Poster has written two novels including ‘Rifling Paradise’ (Spectre 2006) and an extensive exploration of the prose writing of Edward Thomas ( Oxford University Press) plus a collection of poetry, ‘Brought to Light’ ( Bloodaxe ). He is a winner of the Cardiff International Poetry Competition and other poetry prizes.

The evening continues with radio poet John Mole, who is well known for his work on ‘Time for Verse’ and ‘Poetry Please’. He has been poet in residence at Magdalene College, Cambridge and for the Poet in the City project. He is the author of many collections of poetry, and is the recipient of the Gregory, Cholmondley and Signal Awards for his work. The Red Parrot is pleased to be launching his latest collection, ‘Gestures and Counterpoints’ (Shoestring Press).

The fourth reading in the Poetry in Presteigne season is on Monday, July 10 and features award-winning poets Dave Costello and Sheila Templeton who are on a Red Squirrel Press tour in south Wales. Sheila Templeton from Glasgow writes in both English and Scots. She has been the Makar of the Federation of Writers in Scotland and has twice been awarded the McCash Scots Language Poetry Prize as well as many other prizes. Her work has been published in numerous anthologies, magazines and newspapers and read on Radio Scotland. Her latest publication is ‘Gaitherin’, which brings together a well received collection of poems in Scots and English. Dave Costello from Wallasey is a previous winner (2011) and runner up (2015) of the Welsh International Poetry Competition. He was also a prize-winner in the Troubadour International Poetry Prize (2015). His publishing credits include Prole, Orbis, Shooter, Magma, Zoomorphic and Envoi. His most recent pamphlet ‘No need for candles’ (Red Squirrel Press 2016) will be followed by a full collection in 2019.

Poetry in Presteigne is supported by Literature Wales. For further details, visit poetryinpresteigne.org