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Helen Mort joined the Department of English and Manchester Writing School as Lecturer in Creative Writing in September 2016. Helen is a poet and has published two collections with Chatto & Windus, 'Division Street' (winner of the Fenton Aldeburgh Prize, shortlisted for the Costa Prize and T.S. Eliot Prize) and 'No Map Could Show Them'. Her first novel 'Black Car Burning' is forthcoming in 2018. Her play 'Medusa' is touring with Proper Job Theatre Company in autumn 2017 and her short story collection 'Exire' is forthcoming from Wrecking Ball.
“To know fully even one field or one land is a lifetime's experience. In the world of poetic experience it is depth that counts, not width. A gap in a hedge, a smooth rock surfacing a narrow lane, a view of a woody meadow, the stream at the junction of four small fields - these are as much as a man can fully experience.” - Patrick Kavanagh
PhD in English Literature, University of Sheffield
BA in Social and Political Sciences, Cambridge University
Douglas Caster Cultural Fellow, University of Leeds (2014-2016)
Derbyshire Poet Laureate (2013-2015)
Wordsworth Trust Poet in Residence (2010-2011)
“Why does one begin to write? Because she feels misunderstood, I guess. Because it never comes out clearly enough when she tries to speak. Because she wants to rephrase the world, to take it in and give it back again differently, so that everything is used and nothing is lost. Because it’s something to do to pass the time until she is old enough to experience the things she writes about.” – Nicole Krauss
Language & Technique
Remake / Remodel
Reading Poetry 2
Anna Turner - 'Taking A Reader Into The Woods' (creative / critical PhD thesis)
University of Huddersfield
My research interests include place writing, writing landscapes (especially the post-industrial), writing bodies and the-body-as-landscape. I completed my PhD on the connections between neuroscience and contemporary poetry, focusing on the work of Norman MacCaig, John Burnside and Paul Muldoon.
In progress: the science and poetry of memory with Dr Jason Taylor (Manchester University)
P. Evans, T. Dee, H. Mort, G. Clarke, L. Cracknell (2918). Cornerstones.From Dartmoor to the Arctic Circle. M. Smalley. Toller Fratrum: Little Toller Books.
H. Mort (2022). The Illustrated Woman. Chatto & Windus.
H. Mort (2022). A Line Above the Sky On Mountains and Motherhood. Random House.
P. Evans (2021). Poetry Rebellion Poems and prose to rewild the spirit. P. Evans. Batsford.
H. Mort, S. Maconie (2017). One For The Road: An Anthology of Pubs and Poetry. HR. Mort. Smith/Doorstop Books.
HR. Mort From Summit to Stanza: The Trouble With Mountaineering Poetry. Jasper, Canada, 7/5/2015.
'The Trouble With Mountaineering Poetry' (Thinking Mountains, Canada, 2015)
'Failsafe: Failure in Mountains and Manuscripts' (University of Michigan, April 2017)
'Relief as Reconstruction' (Bristol University, 2016)
'Riley's Light: A Celebration of John Riley', University of Leeds, 2015