2023 Ceremony

A Prize Ceremony and day of poetry readings and workshops will be a part of this year’s BBC Contains Strong Language festival in Leeds at 3.30pm (BST) Friday 22 September 2023 in the Howard Assembly Room. For this year’s ceremony, expect words of power, beauty, sadness, hope and activism, with Poet Laureate Simon Armitage, and judges Pascale Petit, Nick Laird and broadcaster Reeta Chakrabarti. This unique prize is the world’s foremost in engaging the power of poetry to affect the future of our world. Find out more and sign up here.

The Laurel Prize workshop will take place during the festival. Run by our 2023 Chair of Judges Pascale Petit, see the workshop here, it’s happening on Friday 22 September at 10am, in the Leeds Central Library. The winner will be recorded live with The Verb (Radio 3’s cabaret of the word, featuring the best poetry, new writing, and performance) on Friday 22 September at 10pm after the festival, see here.