About

Ellen McAteer, a poet and songwriter, is the founder of tell it slant poetry bookshop in Glasgow, and Publishing Manager of the Poetry Translation Centre in London. Their poetry pamphlet Honesty Mirror won First Prize in the New Writer annual prizes, judged by Helen Mort, and is published by Red Squirrel Press. Their first full collection, My Deep and Gorgeous Thirst, was  published by Verve Poetry Press in October 2024. They were one of the London Library Emerging Writers cohort for 2023-24. They are also on the Editorial Board of Gutter magazine, and work with the Poetry Society. They were General Manager of Poetry London magazine, and Director of the Poetry Trust in Suffolk, which ran the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival, and continued to be involved with Poetry in Aldeburgh. They are a former promoter with Martello music, and a visiting lecturer on poetry at the Glasgow School of Art MA in Research and Creative Practice for seven years. They won the 2016 Waterstones Refugee Week Poetry Competition, and has been shortlisted for the Baker Prize and the Bridport Prize, and longlisted for the National Poetry Competition. They have performed at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, Latitude Festival, and Poetry in Aldeburgh, completed a commission for Stanza Poetry Festival, and has been a featured poet at the Doune the Rabbithole festival and Truck Festival, among others. They won an Arts Council grant to develop her creative practice, and completed a full-length poetry manuscript titled Psychogeography as a result, under the mentorship of Rachel Long. They have had poetry and prose published in magazines and anthologies, and a play at the Edinburgh Fringe, later recorded for local radio.  Their song Blue Valentine won a BBC radio competition, and has been used in a  TV advert. They have been a visiting lecturer the University of Oxford Creative Writing MSt, a mentee of the Clydebuilt Verse Apprenticeship Scheme, under Alexander Hutchison, and a singer with the band Stone Tape. They were previously a member of Donny O’Rourke‘s poetry group, and worked with Louise Welsh in her time as Writer-in-Residence at the Art School. They have been a director of the Scottish Writers’ Centre, and a member of the core group of performers at the Hammer & Tongue spoken word collective in Oxford.