Welcome to Offa’s Press
Offa’s Press is dedicated to publishing and promoting the best in contemporary West Midland poetry and poets. It will do this through a series of publications and performances where the watchword will be ‘good on the page and good on stage’.
Offa’s Press is eclectic in range. It receives some development funding from Arts Council England and is run as a co-operative by a number of regional writers and poets with Simon Fletcher the Editor / Manager.
For information about current submissions please go to the submissions page for further details. Please browse this website for further news and events and please support Offa’s Press by buying its products and attending events.
Thanks to Cherry Doyle for all her work in compiling this
celebration of 10 years of Offa’s Press!
New Books
Offa’s Press is pleased to announce the publication of 2 new books this summer: ‘A Wonder Woman’ by Kuli Kohli, and ‘In the Sticks’, an anthology of countryside poetry, edited by Simon Fletcher and Cherry Doyle. We are very grateful to Arts Council England for their support over the last 18 months.
You can buy copies of these now from our online shop…
Country Voices
We are also pleased to say that ‘Country Voices’ has returned, as a live event in a marquee, to the ‘Water Rat’, formerly the ‘Meadow Inn’, at Ironbridge, and will be monthly as before.
For details go to the ‘events’ page.
Poet Laureate!
Congratulations to Emma Purshouse on being appointed poet laureate of Wolverhampton for 2019-21. This is great news for Emma, poets in the city of Wolverhampton, and Offa’s Press and we wish her all the very best.
Shortlisted!
Congratulations to Emma Purshouse whose collection “Close” has been short-listed for the Rubery International Book Awards, 2019.
Shortlisted!
Congratulations to Nellie Cole on being short-listed for the Saboteurs’ Award for Best Pamphlet, 2019, for Bella.
Recommended!
The Poetry of the Black Country, Jane Seabourne’s Our Beautiful Scars and The Poetry of Staffordshire have recently been selected as ‘Recommended Reading’ by West Midlands’ librarians under the ‘Poetry on Loan’ scheme. Among other books listed are Wendy Cope’s Anecdotal Evidence and Simon Armitage’s The unaccompanied so this is great news for Offa’s Press.
Poets on Loan
Emma Purshouse, Jane Seabourne and Jeff Phelps have been selected by ‘Poetry on Loan’ (ACE-funded) as ‘postcard poets’ in West Midlands’ libraries for 2019-21.
“This is great news and will be a wonderful show-case for Offa’s Press and the poets themselves,” commented manager Simon Fletcher.
New Titles Available Now
Under Smoky Light
by Michael W. Thomas
Hokusai’s Passion
by John Sewell
Barista
by Nick Pearson
The Wednesbury Mangle Theory
by Marion Cockin
Emma Purshouse talks to the Black Country Arts Foundry about editing The Poetry of the Black Country.
Read the interview here…
Emma Purshouse interviews Win Saha
Read the interview here…
The view from Offa’s Dyke, photo by Dave Finchett.
Why the name Offa’s Press?
Offa was king of the Mercians back in the late 8th century and forged what we call the West Midlands from his power-base at Tamworth. He ruled over much of England and was known as Rex Anglorum or king of the English. Offa’s Dyke he had built as a border with the Welsh. Offa was also an internationalist having friendly ties to the French king Charlemagne.
