Situated within a UNESCO City of Literature and part of the School of English at Manchester Met, our founding mission is to support co-creational spaces where everyone is welcome to engage with poets, poetry and each other and to explore collaborative ways of thinking, communicating and finding meaning in the world, enriching both local and national culture. 

Led by a core team of world-leading, award-winning poets, critics and the Manchester Poetry Library, we are a global leader in poetry, fostering diverse research and programming that is driven by creative practice and a commitment to social and community impact. 

We see poems as artistic expressions, creative acts and as crafted works that serve as sites of exploration for the writer and the reader. Through poetry, we experiment with language, meaning, emotions, and ideas to delve into the human experience. Poetry is a tool for discovery, where we explore everything from personal identity to urgent social issues, from the nature of creativity to the complexities of human thought and action. Poetry is deeply interdisciplinary, bringing together perspectives from literature, art, psychology, philosophy, science, health and beyond. By collaborating across these different fields and more, we create opportunities for diverse stakeholders and disciplines to intersect, generating new ideas and fresh insights, while always advancing poetry’s role as a bridge connecting diverse ways of knowing. 

With the School of English and the Manchester Writing School, we offer a variety of degrees and short courses, a series of public reading events, a programme of outreach activities, a major international writing competition and an annual festival of children’s literature. 

“Our stunning programme of events features writers who believe in the power of poetry and language to make transformational social change.” 

Kim Moore

We support the study and practice of poetry from undergraduate and postgraduate levels to PhD studies and beyond. This includes the highly ranked BA Creative Writing programme and poetry pathway in Manchester Writing School’s MA/MFA in Creative Writing. We are also home to many doctoral students working on critical and creative writing PhDs.

The university is home to both established and emerging writers working together, producing new poetry that interrogates the world we live in.”

Helen Mort — Professor of Poetry

What We Do