'Instead of a card' poetry pamphlets | UK based independent publisher

Candlestick Press

Biographies

Here you can find out more about the huge range of poets we feature in our pamphlets and the artists whose work appears on our beautiful covers.

We’ve now published poems by almost 700 historical and contemporary poets. In our pages you’ll find old favourites alongside twenty-first century voices – everyone from WH Auden to Benjamin Zephaniah. Although our emphasis is on British poetry, you’ll also find Irish, American and Australian writers.

We hope these pages will encourage you to explore further the work of a poet you’ve enjoyed in one of our pamphlets.

  • Sarah Young

    Sarah Young is a printmaker, designer, painter, maker and illustrator whose first creative venture was a travelling puppet theatre with her husband. She now works from her studio on the south coast of England and her work is widely exhibited in galleries across the UK and in the US.  She has recently illustrated a collection of Greek Myths for children, published by Walker Books.

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  • Holly Yuille

    Holly Yuille is a poet and fiction writer, who often uses magic realism in her work. As well as holding a Creative Writing Degree from Swansea University, Holly regularly performs at spoken word events in Worcester where she now lives. She was the winner of the 2019 Worcestershire Litfest Flash Fiction Slam.

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  • Benjamin Zephaniah

    Benjamin Zephaniah (1958 – 2023) was a poet, novelist and playwright who grew up in Jamaica and Birmingham. He is the author of several poetry collections, including Talking Turkeys (1994); Too Black, Too Strong (2001); and We Are Britain! (2002). He also wrote plays and teenage novels, and produced many music recordings.

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  • Belinda Zhawi

    Belinda Zhawi is a Zimbabwean-born writer and educator based in London. She is a former London Laureate and ICA Associate Poet whose work explores the effects of colonialism on southern Africa. Her pamphlet Small Inheritances was published by Ignition Press in 2019.  She has run the London poetry platform Born::Free for five years.

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  • Sarah Ziman

    Sarah Ziman is a poet who was born and brought up in the South Wales valleys, and currently lives in Hertfordshire. She won the YorkMix Poems for Children Competition in 2021, and has had poems for young people published in anthologies and magazines worldwide. Her debut children’s collection will be published in 2024, by Troika Books.

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