LAST year American poet Linda Chase set up the Manchester satellite of The Poetry School, the original established in London in 1997.

Mixing term-long courses with one-day workshops and events and welcoming students of all backgrounds and levels of experience, the school added something valuable to Manchester’s literary scene and, this autumn, looks set to build on its success with an expanded and appealing programme.

Chase grew up in New York City, studied in Vermont and became a costume designer in San Francisco before moving to the UK, eventually settling in Manchester to establish her own Tai Chi school.

A graduate of the Manchester Creative Writing MA, her poems have been published in the pamphlets Young Men Dancing (Smith/Doorstep) and These Goodbyes (Fatchance). Her own collection, The Wedding Spy, was published by Carcanet in 2001.

New students

She is also a part time lecturer at the MMU Writing School and at the Poetry School in London, so new students will be in very capable hands.

The first course of the new term is called Telling Things, and Chase will be examining the ‘complex patterns of truth’ in poems.

October also brings a day-long workshop, The Poem of Fact & The Poem of Fable, with Alfred Corn (8 Oct), followed by a reading with Mimi Khalvati in the evening, whilst the School’s spring and summer terms promise 20th Century Poets with Michael Schmidt, Freedom and Form with Sophie Hannah and a Poetry Garden Party with strawberries and wine. Going back to school has never been so pleasant.

Poetry School Autumn Term is on at The Village Hall, Palatine Road, Didsbury from Thursday, October 6 until Thursday, December 8. Telling Things, Oct 6 - Dec 8, Thurs 7.30pm-9.30pm, £88 (£76) per ten-week term. The Poem of Fact & The Poem of Fable with Alfred Corn, Oct 8, 10.30am-5.30pm, £56 (£37). Followed by a reading with Mimi Khalvati, 7.30pm, £6 (£4). Call 0845 223 5274 for more information.