Angela France

Welcome to my website.

Here, you will find details about my books, sample poems, and updates on forthcoming events.

About me
I wrote poetry through childhood, teens and twenties as a means of self-expression. While I had a break from writing, I never stopped reading poetry and started writing again in my early forties with a determination to learn about the craft of poetry, and to deepen my understanding of how poetry works and what it can do. Poetry very quickly became central to everything for me.

For the last 20 years, I have been studying, reading, writing, and teaching poetry. For me, poetry is a means of examining and understanding the human condition and I am always fascinated and excited about its power to communicate what is unsayable; by how ‘something that is not in the poem can creep, crawl, flash, or thunder in’ (Dylan Thomas). Initially, I worked at poetry on my own and had some success with a few journal publications but reached a stage where I needed more input from others more skilled than I, so did an MA, then a PhD. I did not do either for the qualification but because I wanted to be in an environment, and among people, where it would be understood that the choice of a word, or the placement of a line break, really matter.

I am inspired by poets who never stop exploring and developing such as Claire Crowther, M.R. Peacocke, Kei Miller. I am also inspired by the writing of my students, and by people I meet in the community. Whether it is someone reading on the open mic at ‘Buzzwords’ (the reading series I run), or a woman in prison who has never written before and didn’t think she could, I am always inspired by the human drive to communicate and make sense of our lives.

Please contact me with any queries.