How to be Held: A Writing Workshop on Queer Tenderness with Annie Hayter

A workshop for LGBTQIA+ people, delving into the possibilities of queer tenderness; through discussion, reading, writing and longing.

The title Deptford Literature Festival in chunky black lettering outlined in bright yellow, sits on a background in blue and pale blue. It’s an illustration that includes an image of a hand with a pen, a closed fist, and the words ‘whose stories are told?’, ‘resistance’, ‘community’, and ‘history’.

Free to attend. BOOK VIA EVENTBRITE HERE. 

With writer and poet Annie Hayter, this workshop will be a place to write amid queer community; to explore what it means to hold and to be held. We will read texts that unfurl the many possibilities of queer tenderness and consider what this means for our collective liberation – delving between the surreal, the everyday, and the imagined. Together, we will dream, holding space for rage and resistance, as it is entwined with longing and gentleness.

This will be a supportive environment, and we will use both personal and imagined material to encourage our work together, exploring a range of artistic exercises. Extracts from writers such as: Danez Smith, Mary Jean Chan, Jay Bernard, Helen Oyeyemi, Kaveh Akbar, Kei Miller, Jackie Kay, Anthony V. Capildeo, Tanya Tagaq, and many more beloved creatives will be included in an anthology of texts that you can take away with you after the workshop for further inspiration.

This workshop is a space for LGBTQIA+ people and those who are questioning. Whether you are new to writing, or whether you are a seasoned poet, there is a place for you here.

Access information:

  • All of our in-person events Friday-Sunday, including this one, will be BSL Interpreted for audiences that require it. For workshops, you will be asked when booking your free ticket if you require the services of a BSL interpreter. For all workshops where one or more attendees require BSL interpretation, we will arrange for an interpreter to be there.
  • This event is wheelchair accessible, with accessible toilets.
  • Deptford Lounge has Changing Place facilities, an induction loop and assistance dogs are welcome. For more information: deptfordlounge.org.uk/access
  • A quiet space is available during the day at Deptford Lounge, in the Music Room, on the first floor.
  • If you require additional access provision in order to attend or take part in the Festival, for example, larger print handouts at workshops, or a scribe, please get in touch before the Festival day at: [email protected]
  • If you require assistance on the Festival day itself, please come to the Festival Hub in the foyer of Deptford Lounge where we will be happy to help you.

For more information about the access provision available, please visit: spreadtheword.org.uk/access-at-deptford-literature-festival

MORE INFORMATION AND BOOK TICKETS VIA EVENTBRITE

Annie Hayter

Festival Artist


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Annie Hayter was born in a paddling-pool in Deptford, beneath a waning Cancer moon. They delight in writing about queer transformations, flatulent saints and sloughed skins – coming third in the Cúirt New Writing Prize for Poetry, and shortlisted for The White Review’s Poet’s Prize, Young People’s Laureate for London, and Desperate Literature Prize. They’ve had writing published in The Big Issue, the Rialto, MAGMA, The London Magazine, TimeOut, and have performed poetry on Radio 3.