Campaign in Poetry: The Emma Press Anthology of Political Poems

By Rachel Piercey and Emma Dai'an Wright

Campaign in Poetry is a powerful collection of poems about political and social issues in the UK. The poems have been written by contemporary poets in the months leading up to the UK General Election, reflecting current concerns and developing events in this country as well as more global trends. Some of the sharpest minds writing today offer up shrewd, provocative thoughts on nationalism, climate change, immigration, political apathy amongst voters, arts funding and feminism in the digital age. This anthology is a statement against disaffection, providing an alternative perspective on the political landscape of the UK.

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Emma Press
• Release date: Aug 10, 2014
• ISBN: 9781910139226

Emma Dai'an Wright

Emma Dai'an Wright (1986) is a British-Chinese-Vietnamese publisher and illustrator. She worked in ebook production at Orion Publishing Group before leaving in 2012 to set up The Emma Press with the support of the Prince's Trust. She has since published over 500 writers across more than 70 books, including poetry anthologies for adults and children, short stories, and translations. In 2016 The Emma Press won the Michael Marks Award for Poetry Pamphlet Publishers. She lives in Birmingham.

Book preview

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Campaign in Poetry

The Emma Press Anthology of Political Poems

Edited by Rachel Piercey and Emma Wright

With poems from Mona Arshi, Stephanie Arsoska, Elizabeth Barrett, Kayo Chingonyi, Ellie Danak, Dai George, Jan Heritage, Holly Hopkins, Luke Kennard, Anna Kisby, Rachel Long, Rosie Miles, Richard O’Brien, Clare Pollard, Ewan Stevenson, Jon Stone, James Trevelyan and Kate Wise.

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The Emma Press

Copyright

First published in Great Britain in 2015

by the Emma Press Ltd

Poems copyright © individual copyright holders 2015

Selection copyright © Rachel Piercey and Emma Wright 2015

Illustrations and introduction copyright © Emma Wright 2015

All rights reserved.

The right of Rachel Piercey and Emma Wright to be identified as the editors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

eISBN 978-1-910139-22-6

Print ISBN 978-1-910139-17-2

A CIP catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library.

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Introduction

Rachel (Piercey, my co-editor) and I decided to make Campaign in Poetry last year because we wanted to challenge voter apathy and engage with the state of democracy in the UK. The amazingly high turnout for the referendum on Scottish independence contrasted miserably with the low turnout for recent local and general elections in the UK, and the momentum built by the ‘Yes’ campaign was an instructive example of how people who think they can actually make a difference are far more likely to go out and vote. We wanted to make an anthology which would capture and inspire momentum for change.

Many of the submissions we received were about the suffragettes, and I began to muse on what I had learned at school: the hunger-striking, window-smashing suffragettes made their mark, but the more moderate suffragists and indefatigable female workers in the First World War also had