Creative Manchester

Rising-star Adam O’Riordan joins Manchester Writing School

AWARD-WINNING poet Adam O’Riordan has been appointed Lecturer in Poetry Writing at Manchester Metropolitan University.

Manchester-born Adam read English at Oxford University and in 2008 became the youngest ever Poet-in-Residence at the Wordsworth Trust, the Centre for British Romanticism.

His first poetry collection, In the Flesh, published by Chatto and Windus, won a Somerset Maugham Award in 2011.

Adam’s appointment, alongside high-profile tutors Michael Symmons Roberts, Jean Sprackland and Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, gives the university one of the strongest and most exciting schools for poetry-writing in the UK.

Pride
Adam said: “It's hard for me to express how proud I am to be coming home to Manchester and joining such an exceptional team. I count myself lucky in the extreme to be given the chance to work alongside some of my heroes: the people whose work first drew me to poetry. And to play some small part in encouraging the wealth of talent the Writing School attracts each year.”

Carol Ann – the Manchester Writing School’s Creative Director and Professor of Contemporary Poetry – said: “We are all thrilled at the appointment of a real rising star in poetry and fiction, and Adam’s return to his home city. Our students are very lucky.”

Adam will teach on the university’s ambitious BA English and MA Creative Writing programmes from September 2011.

To find out more about the Manchester Writing School’s public events and activities, and programmes of study go to: www.mmu.ac.uk/writingschool or contact James Draper on +44 (0) 161 247 1787 or j.draper@mmu.ac.uk. Adam’s website: www.adamoriordan.com