Zaffar Kunial, winner of the National Poetry Competition, and Helen Mort, five-time winner of the Foyle Young Poets Award, take to the centre stage to present a bold and imaginative exploration of language. These two poets have been bringing their visions of the North of England to the page for many years, and it is a delight to be bringing them to StAnza’s main stage. Both poets’ work orbit around ideas of belonging – Kunial as the son of a Kashmiri father, and Mort in her research into ground-breaking women in mountaineering – and their explorations of the boundaries of ‘civilisation’ and the natural world will make for a spellbinding main event.

Zaffar Kunial is the author of two collections, Us and England’s Green, both published by Faber. Helen Mort is an award-winning author based in Sheffield. She has published three poetry collections (Division Street, No Map Could Show Them, and The Illustrated Woman), a debut novel (Black Car Burning), a short story collection (Exire), drama and creative non-fiction.