Prof Zoë Skoulding
Professor of Poetry and Creative Writing / Director of Research, Impact and Engagement
Overview
I am Professor in Poetry and Creative Writing in the School of Literatures, Languages and Linguistics and Undergraduate Course Director in Creative Writing. I co-direct ContemPo, the Centre for Contemporary Poetry http://contempo.bangor.ac.uk/index.php.en.
In my research I bring together my practice as a poet with a critical interest in place, sonic environments, ecopoetics and various forms of translation.
I am a Fellow of the English Association.
Additional Contact Information
Position: Professor of Poetry and Creative Writing
Email: z.skoulding@bangor.ac.uk
Phone: +44 (0) 1248 382106
Location: Room 311 New Arts
Teaching and Supervision
I teach creative writing, with a focus on poetry, the short story, creative translation and experimental writing. I also teach contemporary literature, with an emphasis on poetry, Welsh writing in English, and ecopoetics.
I am happy to consider PhD proposals relating to any of these areas.
Research Interests
The core of my research is my practice as a poet. I am interested in exploring relationships between language and environments, whether urban or rural. Recent projects exploring lost rivers in Bangor and Paris investigate the interweaving of human and non-human lives. I translate from French, and my work also draws on a close connection between translation and creative practice, particularly in experimental contexts. I often collaborate with artists and musicians, and have performed my work across Europe, India and Latin America.
My critical work has focused on contemporary women poets and urban space, the Welsh modernist poet Lynette Roberts, and the role of listening in poetry, which is the focus of my forthcoming monograph.
From 2017 to 2018 I directed the AHRC-funded research network Poetry in Expanded Translation, which brought together an international grouping of poets, translators, critics, choreographers and musicians for a series of conferences.
Postgraduate Project Opportunities
Publications
2023
- Accepted/In pressIn Conversation. Poetry and Community in Transatlantic Translation: Zoë Skoulding Speaks to Erín Moure The Translator
Skoulding, Z., 11 Aug 2023, (Accepted/In press) In: The Translator.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review - Accepted/In pressOn Immersion: A Note on Elizabeth-Jane Burnett's Of Sea
Skoulding, Z., 10 Jan 2023, (Accepted/In press) In: Paideuma. 51
Research output: Contribution to journal › Special issue - PublishedThe Taste of Revolution
Skoulding, Z., 27 Jul 2023, Literature and the Senses. Kern-Stähler, A. & Robertson, E. (eds.). Oxford: OUP, p. 339-354 (Oxford Twenty-First Century Approaches to Literature).
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - Published“All the birds had called a conference”: Songs of the Emergency
Skoulding, Z., 10 Jul 2023, "Places that the map can’t contain" Poetics in the Anthropocene. Fiedorczuk, J. & Piszczatowski, P. (eds.). V&R Unipress
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review
2022
- PublishedA Marginal Sea
Skoulding, Z., 27 Oct 2022, Manchester: Carcanet Press Ltd. 84 p.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedAnniversary Above Penmaenmawr
Skoulding, Z., 15 Oct 2022
Research output: Other contribution - PublishedPoetry's Geographies: A Transatlantic Anthology of Translations
Skoulding, Z. (ed.) & Hedeen, K. M. (ed.), 30 Nov 2022, Bristol: Shearsman Books. 204 p.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - Accepted/In press“Who was ever only themselves?” Cross-border Ecologies of Translation
Skoulding, Z., 2022, (Accepted/In press) The Routledge Companion to Ecopoetics. Fiedorczuk, J., Newell, M., Quetchenbach, B. & Tierney, O. (eds.).
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review
2021
- PublishedAgainst English: Conceptual Writing and the Multilingual Poem
Skoulding, Z. & Robinson, R. (Translator), 29 Dec 2021, In: Tenso Diagonal. 12, p. 155-174 19 p.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review - PublishedIn Meshes: A poetry and photography collaboration
Skoulding, Z. & Avasilichioaei, O., 15 Aug 2021, Montreal : Vallum Society for Education in Arts & Letters.
Research output: Other contribution - PublishedSong of Gulls and Hummingbirds: A poetry collaboration
Skoulding, Z. & Lema Otavalo, Y. L., 19 Mar 2021, Poetry and Covid-19: An Anthology of Contemporary International and Collaborative Poetry. Caleshu, A. & Waterman, R. (eds.). Bristol: Shearsman Books, p. 79-82 4 p.
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - Publishedfrom Môn_Tréal (1): A poetry collaboration
Skoulding, Z. & Avasilichioaei, O., 2021, 3 p. Bridgend : Poetry Wales Press.
Research output: Other contribution - Publishedfrom Môn_Tréal (2): A poetry collaboration
Oana Avasilichioaei & Skoulding, Z., 31 Aug 2021, Toronto : The Puritan.
Research output: Other contribution
2020
- PublishedA Revolutionary Calendar
Skoulding, Z., 31 Aug 2020, Bristol: Shearsman Books. 130 p.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedPoetry & Listening: The Noise of Lyric
Skoulding, Z., 4 Nov 2020, Liverpool: Liverpool University Press. (Poetry &...; vol. 10)
Research output: Book/Report › Book › peer-review - PublishedPoetry in Expanded Translation: Special Issue
Skoulding, Z. (ed.) & Hilson, J. (ed.), Dec 2020, In: English. 69, 267
Research output: Contribution to journal › Special issue › peer-review - PublishedThe Celestial Set-Up
Skoulding, Z., 1 Jul 2020, Bethesda: Oystercatcher Press. 24 p.
Research output: Book/Report › Book
2019
- PublishedFootnotes to Water
Skoulding, Z., 21 Oct 2019, Bridgend: Seren Books. 68 p.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedListening and location in the poetry of Lynette Roberts
Skoulding, Z., Apr 2019, Locating Lynette Roberts: ‘Always Observant and Slightly Obscure'. McAvoy, S. (ed.). University of Wales Press, p. 177-196
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review - PublishedLynette Roberts: Welsh poet who fused touch and sight into sound
Skoulding, Z., 2 Jan 2019, The Conversation.
Research output: Contribution to specialist publication › Article
2017
- PublishedCaroline Bergvall’s Drift: Subtitles and Sounded Text
Skoulding, Z., 2017, Poetry/Translation/Film. Serban, A. & Dussol, V. (eds.). Presses Universitaires du Septentrion ed. Lille, Vol. Arts du spectacle. (Arts du Spectacle).
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review - PublishedFilm, Gramophones and the Noise of Landscape in Dylan Thomas and Lynette Roberts
Skoulding, Z., Oct 2017, Reading Dylan Thomas. Allen, E. (ed.). University of Edinburgh Press
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review - PublishedUnderground Rivers: Notes Towards a Zoepoetics
Skoulding, Z., Aug 2017, Atlantic Drift: An Anthology of Poetry and Poetics. Byrne, J. & Sheppard, R. (eds.). Edge Hill University Press and Arc Publications
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
2016
- PublishedDisappearing sounds: poetry, noise and narrative
Skoulding, Z. C., Kinzel, T. (ed.) & Mildorf, J. (ed.), 25 Apr 2016, Audionarratology: Interfaces of Sound and Narrative. 2016 ed. Walter De Gruyter, (Narratologia; vol. 52).
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - PublishedTeint: For the Bièvre/Pour la Bièvre
Skoulding, Z. & Portante, J. (Translator), 18 Feb 2016, Swansea: Hafan Books. 48 p. (Boiled String Poetry Chapbooks)
Research output: Book/Report › Book
2015
- PublishedAll that one night
Skoulding, Z. C. & Dunthorne, J., 1 Dec 2015, In: Poetry Wales. 51, 2, p. 43-44
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review - PublishedCaroline Bergvall's Drift: subtitles and sounded text
Skoulding, Z. C., 18 Jun 2015.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedExtract from ‘The Rooms’
Skoulding, Z., 2015, Out of Everywhere 2: Linguistically Innovative Poetry by Women in North America and the UK. Critchley, E. (ed.). Reality Street, p. 293-300
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - PublishedTranslating Sound and Resonance in Experimental Poetry from the UK : a Cross-Channel Perspective
Skoulding, Z. C. & Birkan-Berz, C., 17 Oct 2015, In: Palimpsestes. 28, p. 97-116
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review - PublishedTranslation and destruction [in Spanish translation]
Skoulding, Z. & Fondebrider, J. (ed.), 5 Oct 2015, Poetas que traducen poesía. 2015 ed. LOM ediciones
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter
2014
- PublishedFilm, gramophones and the noise of landscape in Dylan Thomas and Lynette Roberts
Skoulding, Z. C., 11 Oct 2014.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedPoetry, Noise and Erasure
Skoulding, Z. C., 11 Sep 2014.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedSundogs and Roses: Synaesthesia in the poetry of Carol Watts and Mei-mei Berssenbrugge
Skoulding, Z., 25 Jun 2014.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedTranslating Sound and Resonance in Experimental Poetry from the UK: a Cross-Channel Perspective
Skoulding, Z. C. & Birkan-Berz, C., 17 Oct 2014.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedWomen's Experimental Poetry in Britain 1970-2010: Body, Time and Locale
Skoulding, Z., 8 Sep 2014, In: Contemporary Womens Writing. 9, 1, p. 159-160
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
2013
- Published'"& in ongoingness" "of voices"': speech, song and citation in the poetry of Alice Notley and Pierre Joris',
Skoulding, Z. C. & Skoulding, Z., 7 Nov 2013.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedContemporary Women's Poetry and Urban Space
Skoulding, Z. C., 18 Oct 2013, Palgrave Macmillan.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedIn Reality: Selected Poems trans.
Portante, J. & Skoulding, Z. (ed.), 20 Sep 2013, 2013 ed. Seren.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedLisa Samuels: Unknown Cities
Skoulding, Z. C., Skoulding, Z. & Davidson, I. (ed.), 1 Jan 2013, Placing poetry. 2013 ed. Rodopi, p. 93-113
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - PublishedMetropoetica
Skoulding, Z. C., Balode, A., Fiedorczuk, J., Karlstrom, S. & Pepelnik, A., 30 May 2013, Seren.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedMisremembered Lyric and Orphaned Music
Skoulding, Z. C. & Robinson, P. (ed.), 26 Sep 2013, The Oxford Handbook of Contemporary British and Irish Poetry. Oxford University Press
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - PublishedPlacing Poetry (Spatial Practices)
Skoulding, Z. C. (ed.), Davidson, I. (ed.) & Skoulding, Z. (ed.), 1 Jan 2013, 2013 ed. Rodopi.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedPologne/1931
Rothenberg, J., Skoulding, Z. C. (ed.) & Portante, J. (ed.), May 2013, Éditions Caractères.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedSound and Ecopoetics
Skoulding, Z. C. & Skoulding, Z., 1 May 2013.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedThe Museum of Disappearing Sounds
Skoulding, Z. C., 7 Oct 2013, Seren.
Research output: Book/Report › Book
2012
- PublishedCathedrals of Sand: textual cities
Skoulding, Z. C., 1 Apr 2012, Nutopia: A Critical View of Future Cities. Miles, M. & Savage, J. (eds.). 2012 ed. University of Plymouth Press, p. 116-129
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - PublishedIrruptive Citizenship in the Poetry of Erin Moure
Skoulding, Z., 25 May 2012.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedMisremembered Lyric and Orphaned Music
Skoulding, Z. C., 7 Jul 2012.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper
2011
- PublishedAbsent cities: texts and heterotopias
Skoulding, Z. C., 22 Jul 2011, Performing Poetry: Body: Place and Rhythm in the Poetry Performance.. Graebner, C. & Casas, A. (eds.). 2011 ed. Rodopi, p. 247-262
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - PublishedAgainst background: Reframings of the City by Redell Olsen, Jena Osman and Frances Presley.
Skoulding, Z., 1 Sep 2011, In: Journal of British and Irish Innovative Poetry. 3, 2, p. 123-139
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review - PublishedLisa Samuels: Unknown Cities
Skoulding, Z. C., 2 Nov 2011.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedTranslating Cities: Walking and Poetry
Skoulding, Z. C. & Turley, R. M. (ed.), 20 Oct 2011, The Writer in the Academy: Creative Interfrictions (Essays and Studies). 2011 ed. D.S. Brewer
Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter - PublishedTranslation, rewriting and the marginal city in Geraldine Monk's Escafeld Hangings
Skoulding, Z. C., 11 Apr 2011, In: Translation Studies. 4, 2, p. 183-196
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
2010
- PublishedAgainst Background
Skoulding, Z. C., 14 Jul 2010.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedAlice Notley's disobedient cities
Skoulding, Z. C., 1 Oct 2010, In: Feminist Review. 96, p. 89-105
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review - PublishedMetropoetica
Skoulding, Z. C. & Fiedorczuk, J., 2 Sep 2010.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedMetropoetica: poetry translation and walking in the city
Skoulding, Z., 28 Jun 2010.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedReading Denise Riley’s “The Castalian Spring”
Skoulding, Z. C., 13 Nov 2010.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper
2009
- PublishedCathedrals of Sand.
Skoulding, Z. C. & Skoulding, Z., 2 Apr 2009.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedColliding Cities: Collaborative practices in poetry.
Skoulding, Z. C., 1 Jan 2009.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedHistory and rewriting in the poetry of Urban Spaces: Frances Presley and Redell Olsen.
Skoulding, Z. C. & Skoulding, Z., 7 Mar 2009.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper
2008
- PublishedFrom Here
Skoulding, Z. C., 1 Jan 2008, Ypolita Press.
Research output: Book/Report › Book - PublishedGeraldine Monk's Escafeld/Sheffield: City in Translation.
Skoulding, Z. C., 1 Jan 2008.
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper - PublishedRemains of a Future City
Skoulding, Z., 1 Jan 2008, Seren.
Research output: Book/Report › Book
2004
- PublishedThe Mirror Trade
Skoulding, Z., 1 Jan 2004, Seren.
Research output: Book/Report › Book
Activities
2023
- Resounding Bodies: Ecopoetics, Listening and Translation
The challenge for humans in a time of crises for the climate and biological diversity is to change our thinking, to decentre ourselves and understand our place in continuity with the world and what’s in it. How can experimental practices of poetry and translation enable different kinds of listening – and therefore new kinds of community – across the boundaries of languages, species, and forms of knowledge? Professor Zoë Skoulding will draw on examples from her own writing and translation to explore poetry’s acoustic context and what this means for ecological relationships.
15 May 2023
Links:
Activity: Invited talk (Speaker)
2022
- Placing Experiment: Losing, Gaining and Shifting Ground.
Co-organising conference and presenting paper.
3 Dec 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic conference (Speaker) - Being Human / Revolutionary Senses Botanical Poetry Walkshop
A creative writing walk and workshop exploring the French Revolutionary Calendar.
13 Nov 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic workshop, seminar, course (Speaker) - Being Human / Human and Beyond: Writing With Birds
12 Nov 2022
Links:
Activity: Participation in Academic workshop, seminar, course (Speaker) - Being Human / Human and Beyond: Trees and Their Languages
After exploring a range of poetry in translation, Year 9 students from Ysgol Friars were invited to write poems in French, Welsh and English that responded to trees in their area.
11 Nov 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic workshop, seminar, course (Speaker) - Môn_Mesh_Tréal: A Sonopoetic Duo Performance
Sound and poetry performance at Oroboro New Media Lab, Montréal
10 Oct 2022
Activity: Types of Public engagement and outreach - Media article or participation (Contributor) - Participation in Trois-Rivières International Poetry Festival
4 Oct 2022 – 10 Oct 2022
Activity: Invited talk (Speaker) - Poetry Reading at Kenyon College Ohio USA
Reading in Kenyon College, Ohio
8 Sep 2022
Links:
- https://www.kenyon.edu/events/poetry-reading-with-zoe-skoulding/2022-09-08/
- https://kenyoncollegian.com/arts/2022/09/poet-zoe-skoulding-reads-from-new-collection-a-marginal-sea/
- North American Poetry 2000-2020/2
North American Poetry 2000-2020/2
29 Jun 2022 – 2 Jul 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic conference (Speaker) - Les migrations des plantes : modalités, ambivalences, enjeux
24 Jun 2022 – 25 Jun 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic conference (Speaker) - Poetry in Transatlantic Translation: Encounters Across Languages
14 Jun 2022 – 18 Jun 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic conference (Organiser) - What's the Matter in Translation?
8 Jun 2022 – 11 Jun 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic conference (Speaker)
2021
- THE AMERICAN LITERARY TRANSLATORS ASSOCIATION 2021
15 Oct 2021 – 17 Oct 2021
Activity: Participation in Academic conference (Speaker) - Traduction – relation
4 Oct 2021 – 8 Oct 2021
Activity: Participation in Academic conference (Speaker) - Creating Across Languages Video Workshop Series
As part of Professor Zoë Skoulding’s AHRC Leadership Fellowship 2020-22, she developed a project to encourage new approaches to creative writing in the new Curriculum for Wales. Meeting regularly with a team of education advisors from the GwE Gogledd Schools Improvement Service, she led development of a pilot unit of work for Year 8/9 pupils. Working with invited Welsh and international poets, she designed and co-delivered a series of twelve video workshops for use in teaching Welsh, English and French, modelling techniques for teaching poetry as a creative multilingual practice. These now form the basis for discussions with teachers in selected north Wales schools, who will collaborate on developing their own schemes of work structured around these materials but adapted to their specific contexts. These will be trialled with pupils in 2022-23 and used as a model to encourage further responses to the Curriculum for Wales.
3 May 2021 – 1 Sep 2022
Activity: Participation in Academic workshop, seminar, course (Speaker)
Projects
-
Migrating knowledges: Science, subjectivity and landscape
01/02/2022 – 01/08/2022 (Finished)
-
Poetry in Transatlantic Translation: Circulation and Practice
01/09/2020 – 01/08/2022 (Finished)
-
Poetry in Expanded Translation
01/01/2017 – 01/08/2019 (Finished)
Description
Translation may seem like a simple matter of transposition between languages, but the translation of poetry in particular reveals the fascinating complexity and richness that comes from the interface of different languages and cultures. Language itself is constantly changing, and experimental forms of poetry have embraced the complex relations between words, meanings and the spaces they inhabit. As twenty-first century poetry expands into the possibilities of different media through international readings, performances and festivals, it also expands possibilities for translation. Poetry has always circulated internationally. The network will challenge the widespread view of autonomously monolingual poetic traditions while discovering how exchange between languages works in artistic terms, and how it brings cultural particularities into view.
Links:
Other Grants and Projects
I led the AHRC network Poetry in Expanded Translation 2017-2018.
http://expanded-translation.bangor.ac.uk/
This network brought together practitioners and critics of poetry and translation with visual and sound artists to discover new ways of creating and interpreting language across art forms and cultures. In the context of a changing Europe, it analysed the impact of experimental traditions that continue to forge links between different languages, and discovered new ways of presenting poetry to multilingual audiences. Through its link with the National Poetry Library in London's Southbank Centre, it invited active involvement from readers and practitioners of poetry beyond academic contexts. At a time when technologies such as machine translation are enabling communication, the apparent untranslatability of poetry makes it a crucial site for the creative exploration and understanding of intercultural difference.
A collaboration with the artist Ben Stammers was supported by the Arts Council of Wales and the ESRC Bangor Impact Acceleration Award.
http://www.bangoradda.org/
rAdda is a collaborative art project that involves observing and thinking about the river and its relationship with the city. Through walks, performances, visual art and text, we are exploring the Adda as a connection between a disappearing past and a yet to be imagined future.