Poetry on Prescription goes on tour

Poetry comes firmly off the bookshelf, heading straight to the centre of communities and everyday life with a mission to uplift and inspire when William Sieghart, National Poetry Day founder and the brains behind Poetry on Prescription, stars in a mini-series of special library events brokered by The Reading Agency and publishers Faber and Faber.

William, (right), who also founded the Forward prizes for poetry, firmly believes in poetry’s ability to see readers through the most difficult moments of life, by providing a sense of complicity and understanding. The idea of Poetry on Prescription was born at the Port Eliot festival last summer, where William found people queuing round the block asking him to suggest poems to cure everything from a blue day to a broken heart.

Now his Faber-published poetry anthology, Winning Words: Inspiring Poems for Everyday Life – poems ancient and modern especially chosen to inspire and help the reader through the tribulations of daily existence – will be central to his library tour events, during which he will explain to audiences of local readers why poetry can be better than therapy; read from his anthology and then prescribe a poem for any problem that is presented to him, with attendees invited to book ‘appointments’.

The Poetry on Prescription library tour will be at:

• Sevenoaks Library in Kent on Wednesday 15 May

• Staplehurst Library in Kent on Thursday 16 May

• St John’s Wood Library, Westminster on Tuesday 18 June.

 “In our increasingly alienated modern lives, an appropriate poem can be more helpful than many forms of therapy. We love our poetry but are often intimidated by it. Yet we consume more greetings cards than any other nation, enjoy our chants on the football terraces and have contributed significantly to the canon of rap music,” says William Sieghart.

• Poetry on Prescription tour information:

• Sevenoaks Library, Kent (Buckhurst Lane, Sevenoaks, TN13 1LQ), Wednesday 15 May. Starts 1430. Tickets: £3 and must be booked in advance. Contact Sevenoaks Library on 08458 247200 or email Jenny.Carter2@kent.gov.uk

• Staplehurst Library, Kent (The Parade, Staplehurst, Tonbridge, Kent, TN12 0LA), Thursday 16 May. Starts 1000. Tickets: free but booking essential, with a donation for refreshments. Contact Staplehurst Library on 01580 891929 or email staplehurstlibrary@kent.gov.uk

• St John’s Wood Library, Westminster (20 Circus Road NW8 6PD), Tuesday 18 June. Starts 1800. Tickets: free but please sign up. Email stjohnswoodlibrary@westminster.gov.uk or call 020 7641 1300.