Musician, rapper, playwright, performance poet, novelist – it’s hard to know which title comes first when referring to English artist, Kate Tempest.
In 2013 Tempest won the prestigious Ted Hughes Award for her epic poem, Brand New Ancient. In 2014, her debut album Everybody Down was nominated for the Mercury Prize. Now comes her debut novel, The Bricks that Built the Houses. Each chapter of the book relates to a track from Everybody Down, and takes us into the homes of ordinary Londoners, revealing their motivations, failures and hopes. Tempest’s subject – rich with history, community and character – is South London, the place she grew up.
Join us for a lively discussion with one of the most exciting new voices emerging from Britain today and Maxine Beneba Clarke.
Featuring

Kate Tempest
Poet, rapper, playwright and novelist Kate Tempest’s epic poem Brand New Ancients won the Ted Hughes Prize for poetry in 2013. The following year she was named by the Poetry Society as a Next Generation Poet. In the same week her debut solo album, Everybody Down, a narrative-driven hip hop record, was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize 2014. Her most recent poetry collection is the acclaimed Hold Your Own. The Bricks that Built the Houses, which involves the same characters as Everybody Down, is her first novel.

Maxine Beneba Clarke
Maxine Beneba Clarke is the author of the acclaimed memoir The Hate Race, the award-winning short fiction collection Foreign Soil, the poetry collections Carrying The World and How Decent Folk Behave, and many other books ...