This year the National Centre for Writing has put together a series of literary journeys that will guide you through our exciting City of Literature weekend at Norfolk & Norwich Festival 2019.

With a programme of fresh and original literary voices, along with award-winning writers and publishers, we invite you to celebrate Norwich as a UNESCO City of Literature and a home to writers, thinkers, storytellers and readers. Browse the curated journeys we’ve suggested and book four or more events together to get a £1.50 discount per ticket.

Our fifth journey celebrates the power of poetry in all of its forms: from epic poems of myth and magic to personal expressions of psychic survival.

Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me
– with Kate Clanchy

4pm, Friday 24 May, National Centre for Writing, Dragon Hall, £8

Kate Clanchy, a prize-winning poet, wants to change the world and thinks school is an excellent place to do it. In this interactive event based on her candid, funny and moving new book, she invites you to meet some of the kids she has taught in her 30-year career, and to celebrate this most creative, passionate and practically useful of jobs.

Dragon Hall After Dark
– Adelaide Ivánova and Rachel Long

7.30pm, Friday 24 May, National Centre for Writing, Dragon Hall, £8

Join us for an hour of empowering conversation and beautiful poetry from Brazilian poet, activist and artist Adelaide Ivánova and her translator Rachel Long. Ivánova’s award-winning collection, The Hammer, explores the slippery, politically fraught concepts of rape, adultery, trauma and power, ultimately tracing a path of psychic survival through verse. Presented in partnership with the Poetry Translation Centre.

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Epic Continent
– with Nicholas Jubber

10am, Saturday 25 May, The Adnams Spiegeltent, Chapelfield Gardens, £8

Our greatest works of literature are often inspired by moments of seismic change. Journeying from Turkey to Iceland, award-winning travel writer Nicholas Jubber takes us on a fascinating adventure through our continent’s most enduring epic poems – from the Odyssey to Beowulf – to learn how they were shaped by their times, and how they have since shaped us.

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Fire & Rain
– with Jan Carson and Inua Ellams

6pm, Saturday 25 May, National Centre for Writing, Dragon Hall, £8

Two spectacular new voices in literature transport us into wildly magical settings. The Fire Starters by Jan Carson is a tale of fierce familial love and sacrifice that fizzes with wonder. The Half-God of Rainfall by Inua Ellams is an epic story and lyrical exploration of pride, power and female revenge across mythologies.

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Explore the rest of the City of Literature programme >>

Tickets are available from the Norfolk & Norwich Festival website. A discount of £1.50 per ticket will be automatically applied to your basket when you book four or more events together.