Past Events
Saturday 30 July 2022
15:00 Nudawn, London
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12 writing workshops, 12 amazing hosts and a whole load of super talented writers later, it was time to celebrate!
For our end of project wrap party, we concluded Word by Word Presents 2021-2022. There was music, spoken word performance, open mic and lots of lovely folk.
Sunday 12 June 2022,
13:00 Bush Theatre
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Nikesh will use over a decade's worth of teaching and his experience as a published author to help you edit your own work. The hard work in writing is in editing, refining, rewriting and redefining your work.
Nikesh will help you to do this, through tips on practically setting up an edit, how to read your own work, how to keep yourself motivated, how to move between big picture edits and smaller sentence by sentence rewrites.
Sunday 10 April 2022,
14:30 - 16:30
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Using experimental methods, this writing workshop encouraged participants to write back to the conditions in which they live.
With a specific focus on the relationship between imagining, political organising and temporality, it used the archival prompts as basis for assessing the value and utility of political writing. This was a writing workshop about the things we want and what we will have to do to get them.
Sunday 13 March 2022,
14:30 - 16:30
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From Inua: A lot of needless mysticism surrounds the work of poets and the work of poetry. Central to my work as a writer and facilitator is an attempt, always, to simplify, clarify and show the building books beyond poetic ideologies and approaches to writing.
This workshop was for those starting to write as well as those well established in writing poetry. It is always important to go back to basics - and in these two hours, we read and discussed poems that lay bare the mysticism, that we might make better thinkers and in that, writers.
Sunday 13 February 2022,
11:45 – 14:00
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We were beyond excited to welcome actor, writer & director John Rwothomack to our Word by Word Presents series for the month of February.
From training as an actor, to then tackling theatre directing and finally grappling with playwriting, John Rwothomack, in this writing workshop drew from his experiences not just as a playwright but also what he learned from the other disciplines of theatre and how best they can be used to help a writer formulate a story.
Sunday 13 February 2022,
15:15 – 16:30
We couldn't wait to welcome alternative hip-hop and spoken word artist, and Sheffield's former Poet Laureate, Otis Mensah.
The session explored creative philosophy and influence, as Otis delved into his artistic journey and demonstrated how Hip-Hop poetry has acted as a vehicle to vulnerable expression...
Sunday 16th January
We were very excited to welcome storyteller and performer Jan Blake to kick off our 2022 Word by Word Presents series.
Through various immersive exercises, Jan Blake showed us how to take your narrative or poetry off the page, and into the world of storytelling, and help build confidence delivering our writings verbally, weaving a story...
Thursday 20th May 2021
Word by Word Collective has landed, and we are thrilled to launch ourselves into the world.
In May 2021, we invite you to the launch for our workshop series, Word by Word Presents. As our very first public event, this will be an online evening in several parts, open to anyone, available from anywhere. We'll also be sharing our very first zine, Issue 1: Rebirth...
Sunday 13th June
Join us at at the Bush Theatre (Shepherd's Bush) for our very first workshop of our 12-month series, Word by Word Presents. Led by award-winning contemporary vocalist, lyricist and composer Lauren Kinsella, this workshop will explore the relationship between music and words.
The workshop will consist of a mixture of talking about where she finds inspiration, showing examples of her own work through performance and audio, as well as guided writing exercises with the group.
Sunday 11th July
In the second workshop of the Word by Word Presents series, Diyora will guide participants through various writing exercises exploring how to tap into our emotions and how best to write about them.
Why is it important to write about yourself? How do sensory experiences reflect our inner emotions? Is there a way to add colour to language to express ourselves? Separated into several parts, the workshop will explore these questions and many more.
Sunday 15th August
Join us for a stimulating writing workshop that explores how to write, read and think about science fiction as activism.
With a focus on worldbuilding we will take sci-fi as a point of departure and consider the politics and potentials of centring protagonists, storylines and realities that remain both oppressed and marginalised by Western patriarchal societies...
Sunday 12th September
In the fourth workshop of the series, Belinda Zhawi held a space for us to reflect with poetry, reconnect with our surroundings and listen a little deeper.
This past year has forced many of us into spaces of listening to ourselves and those around us more than before. There are numerous ways to listen when we engage with our surroundings and poems. We create a space for listening when we read and hear poems; they have the ability to hold us still in a moment and really consider what just happened...
Sunday 10th October
If history is a cycle, how can we use the past to build convincing futures? ​
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Fiction has the power to manipulate linear time. In 1949, George Orwell predicted the hyper surveillance of our modern world. Star Trek predicted the ubiquitous nature of video calling. In this workshop, we will tap into these writers clairvoyant abilities and use history to predict the future...
Sunday 14th November
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How we can dismantle and disrupt what we traditionally consider to be theatre? Pulling in references from Brecht and Boal, the workshop explored the roles of the writer, performer, and audience as Liv talked through their various working manifestos...
