Date/Time: Wednesday 20th July 2022, 6.30pm to 7.30pm

Venue: Culture Lab, Newcastle University

Join us to hear new poetry from two Bloodaxe poets. The Sri Lankan-born writer, Amali Gunasekera, will be reading from her second collection, The Golden Thread, which blends the sacred with the everyday in a search for grace; and the Pakistani-born Canadian poet, Shazea Quraishi, previews her forthcoming work, The Glimmer, a meditation on the time-span of life illuminated by many voices.

Amali Gunasekera was born and grew up in Sri Lanka. She works in the field of Archetypal Psychology. After living in Mozambique, Kenya and India, she is now based in Cumbria. Her first collection, Lotus Gatherers, was published by Bloodaxe in 2016 (under her former name of Rodrigo). She was selected for Arts Council England's project Breaking Ground: Celebrating the Best British Writers of Colour in 2017. Her second collection, The Golden Thread, was published by Bloodaxe in 2022.

Shazea Quraishi is a Pakistani-born Canadian poet and translator based in London.  A selection of her work was included in the Bloodaxe anthology Ten: new poets from Spread the Word in 2010 and her first pamphlet, The Courtesans Reply, was published by flipped eye in 2012. The Art of Scratching, her first book-length collection, was published by Bloodaxe Books in 2015. Her second, The Glimmer, is published by Bloodaxe in 2022. She received a Brooklease Grant from the Royal Society of Literature in 2015 and an award from the Artists International Development Fund of the British Council and Arts Council England in the same year.
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Curated and hosted by Newcastle Centre for the Literary Arts with GemArts.

GemArts award-winning Masala Festival is a week-long festival celebrating a mix and blend of the finest South Asian Arts and Culture, packed full of performances, exhibitions, events, workshops, pop-ups and demonstrations, presented in venues, places and spaces across the North East. GemArts Masala Festival is from 18th to 24th July 2022, visit www.gemarts.com for full programme.

Free event, and all very welcome.