WritersMosaic: Mona Arshi, Karen McCarthy Woolf & Roger Robinson

Advance tickets for this event are now available for MLF Get Closer Members to buy. Memberships start at £25 per year - for full details of membership benefits and buying options click HERE. Tickets go on sale to the general public on Thursday 14 August at 10am.

Nature writing has seen a powerful resurgence in recent years, but we must ask - whose voices are being heard? And who is being welcomed into the landscape?

In this thoughtful reading and conversation, John Siddique of WritersMosaic hosts acclaimed poets and co-editors Mona Arshi and Karen McCarthy Woolf and T.S. Eliot Prize-winner Roger Robinson. Together, they reflect on Nature Matters, the new Faber anthology, and explore the deep connections between earth, spirit, and the human experience - from a perspective too often underrepresented in the genre.

This event offers a chance to listen differently, to hear how nature lives in language beyond the usual frames, and to be in conversation with writers who bring a vital, expansive gaze to the page.

Presented by Manchester Literature Festival in partnership with WritersMosaic.

Mona Arshi’s poetry collections include Small Hands, Dear Big Gods and Mouth. She was poet in residence at Cley Marshes, Norfolk in 2020 and is co-editor of Nature Matters: Vital Poems from the Global Majority.

Karen McCarthy Woolf is the author of two poetry collections and editor of numerous anthologies including Mapping the Future and Nature Matters: Vital Poems from the Global Majority. Her verse novel Top Doll was shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot and Jhalak Prizes and she is the winner of the Jerwood Prize for Poetry 2025.

Roger Robinson is a writer and educator who has taught and performed worldwide. He was chosen by Decibel as one of 50 writers who have influenced the Black-British writing canon. He won the T.S. Eliot Prize with A Portable Paradise and collaborated with Johny Pitts on Home Is Not A Place.

Wheelchair Users and those with other access needs requiring a free Essential Carer ticket should contact the Quaytickets Box Office on 0161 876 2015 to purchase tickets.