Katrina Naomi is a poet based in south London and is originally from Margate. Katrina's first full collection 'The Girl with the Cactus Handshake' was shortlisted for the inaugural London New Poetry Award 2010. The book (which received an Arts Council England writer's award) was published in 2009 by Templar Poetry, priced at £9.99 and is available now.

'Naomi’s poems often establish surprising contexts from which to explore the intimate codes of relationships. The farmer’s boy is up and away or a woman recollects lying on the floor of a pub with a man while her partner watches. Allusions and an acute psychological interrogation make the poems incisive and unpredictable and keep us on our toes for the possible mischief ahead. This arresting and vivid first collection is full of dark humour and affectionate address to dark circumstances.' (The judges of the 2010 London New Poetry Award - Daljit Nagra, Tamar Yoseloff, Adam O'Riordan - on 'The Girl with the Cactus Handshake'.)

You can read more about the book, see comments from the poets Roddy Lumsden, Todd Swift and Anne-Marie Fyfe, among others, and find out where to purchase a copy in the Publications section of this site - simply click on the link below. One of Katrina's poems 'The Longing of Cranes', from the collection, was chosen by The Festival of London - you can read it on London's South Bank GPS website. Several other poems from her first collection have been anthologised.

During 2009-10, Katrina was the first Writer in Residence at the Bronte Parsonage Museum in Haworth, Yorkshire. In April 2010, the Bronte Society published a pamphlet of Katrina's poems, 'Charlotte Bronte's Corset', which has been very well received. This new pamphlet is available directly from Katrina get in touch as well as from the Bronte Parsonage Museum (www.bronte.info or tel 01535 640188) and costs £4.99.

Her pamphlet 'Lunch at the Elephant & Castle' is also available (£4). This won the 2008 Templar Poetry Competition. Read comments from the poets James Byrne, Michael Laskey and Julia Bird (the latter in 'Poetry London') on this book, and see its availability in the Publications section of this site - simply click on the link below.  

In 2010 Katrina was Writer in Residence at Hartlepool Art Gallery, working with local groups, and an installation of her poems was displayed in the town. Her poetry has also been performed as part of an operatic song cycle at London's Festival Hall, and she has collaborated with a sound artist to produce a collaborative art/poetry event about Brixton.

She received an Arts Council England writer's award for 2008-9 and a Hawthornden Fellowship in 2009. Katrina was shortlisted in the 2009 Bridport Prize, runner-up in the 2009 Stanza Competition, commended in the 2010 Ware Poetry Competition, the 2010 Slipstream Competition and the 2009 Poetry on the Lake Competition. In 2008 she won the Templar Poetry Competition and the Ledbury Poetry Festival Text Poem Contest. Katrina has an MA in Creative and Life Writing from Goldsmiths. Katrina recently started a PhD on Creative Writing, her research is on violence in poetry (looking at the work of Sharon Olds, Pascale Petit, Peter Redgrove and Robin Robertson).  

 
News, Readings and Events:

In September, Katrina is recording an interview with Resonance FM's 'Literature Lounge', reading at Ramsgate and Deal in Kent, and performing with the artist Tim Ridley at Streatham's Peace Day in London. And in October, Katrina is at the Jazz Verse Jukebox, at Ronnie Scotts. See the Events section of this website for full details and for further information on forthcoming readings in London and elsewhere.

She is running two workshops for the Poetry School 'Going Public' in Brighton and Bristol - see their latest brochure or website for full details.

Katrina's work is included in a new poetry anthology 'KJV: Old Text, New Poetry' which has just been launched. The anthology features poetry by Penelope Shuttle, Ian Duhig, Clare Pollard and Katrina Porteus among others. Katrina also has a poem in the poetry anthology 'Soul Feathers', which is raising money for Macmillan Cancer Support. It's available now and includes poetry by Carol Ann Duffy, Seamus Heaney, Maya Angelou, Sharon Olds and Benjamin Zephaniah. Katrina's poems are also featured in the new Goldsmiths anthology 'Goldfish 3', which was published in March 2011.

Katrina's first play 'The Water Skiing Diaries' was given a rehearsed reading in London as part of the Goldsmiths Plays season in February 2011, and she recently had a poem performed by the Iris Theatre Company in Covent Garden as part of a night of Dramatic Verse.

Oxfam recently issued 'Asking a Shadow to Dance: 35 Young British Poets for Oxfam', which features Katrina's poetry along with the work of many great poets. The DVD is available on ebay and from Oxfam Bookshops, priced at £12.99.

Katrina has recently performed her work at the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival, Arvon's Lumb Bank, the Bronte Festival of Women's Writing, the Derwent Poetry Festival, the Essex Poetry Festival, Scotland's StAnza International Poetry Festival, the Oxfam BookFest, and at London's Poetry Cafe and Troubadour Cafe, among other venues.

Get in touch if you'd like to book Katrina to read or run a workshop.

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