An Evening With Jackie Kay

Jackie Kay, one of the UK’s best loved poets, celebrates the publication of May Day, her much anticipated new poetry collection. 

As the title suggests, these poems cast an eye over decades of political activism, from the international solidarity of the Glasgow of Jackie’s childhood, her parents’ Socialist campaigns, through the feminist, LGBT+ and anti-racist movements of the 80s and 90s and up to the intersection of a global pandemic and the urgency of Black Lives Matter.

Jackie will bring to life a cast of influential figures and delve beneath the surfaces of received narratives: the Jamaican model Fanny Eaton, for example, muse of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in England; Paul Robeson, Angela Davis and the poet Audre Lorde. 

Jackie Kay was born in Edinburgh. A poet, novelist and writer of short stories, she has enjoyed great acclaim for her work for both adults and children. Her novel, Trumpet, won the Guardian Fiction Prize. 

She has published three collections of stories with Picador, Why Don’t You Stop Talking, Wish I Was Here, and Reality, Reality; two poetry collections, Fiere and Bantam; and her memoir, Red Dust Road.

From 2016 to 2021 she was the third modern Makar, the poet laureate of Scotland.

She lives in Manchester and is Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Salford.