Poetry and Faith with Catherine Okoronkwo | GLADFEST 2023
Poetry and Faith with Catherine Okoronkwo
Friday 8th September, 4 to 5pm
Tickets can no longer be purchased via our website. The remaining in-person tickets can be bought from our Reception and will be available at our on-site box office on September 8th and 9th.
Ritual, emotion, faith: all are rooted in the language that we speak, and the words that we reach for when we write. How can we connect with others; how best can we explain to them how we think, feel and act? As both a poet and Anglican priest, Catherine Okoronkwo has more cause than most to ponder how we express ourselves, particularly in the context of faith. As she says, ‘poetry and prose are creative vehicles in which to explore a person’s lived experiences. Words record, bear witness, explore injustices and provoke personal change’.
In what is sure to be a thought-provoking talk, Catherine will explore how poetry in particular has the power to move, express, and connect.
Catherine Okoronkwo, of Nigerian heritage, grew up in the Middle East and studied in the USA and UK. After working as a teacher of English for almost decade, she now works as a Church of England priest. She holds an MA and PhD in Creative Writing (MMU) and writes poetry and prose of all kinds, from micro-fiction, to novels, to memoir. Her current project, Black Pelican, recalls Catherine’s Third Culture upbringing in the Middle East, Nigeria and the West.
Catherine’s recent poetry collection, Blood and Water obara na mmiri (2020) was shortlisted for the Gladstone’s Writer in Residence programme. Her writing is known for its compelling expression; as the Bishop of Dover, Rev Dr Rose Hudson-Wilkin, wrote, ‘it draws you in to confront the subjects that no one wants to talk about and yet it is real and right in our midst’.
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