C+nto: & Othered Poems

By Joelle Taylor

WINNER OF THE T S ELIOT PRIZE 2021

WINNER OF THE POLARI PRIZE 2022

‘Visionary and powerful. I loved it.’ Hollie McNish

The female body is a political space.

C+nto enters the private lives of women from the butch counterculture, telling the inside story of the protests they led in the ‘90s to reclaim their bodies as their own – their difficult balance between survival and self-expression. History, magic, rebellion, party and sermon vibrate through Joelle Taylor’s cantos to uncover these underground communities forged by women.

Part-memoir and part-conjecture, Taylor explores sexuality and gender in poetry that is lyrical, expansive, imagistic, epic and intimate. C+nto is a love poem, a riot, a late night, and an honouring.

minds. Here is poetry that defends our right to walk without fear, wear what we choose, be who we uniquely are." - - Diana Souhami

• Language: English
• Publisher: The Westbourne Press
• Release date: Jun 7, 2021
• ISBN: 9781908906496

Joelle Taylor

Joelle Taylor is a spoken word artist, poet, playwright, author and cultural terrorist. She has performed across the UK as well as internationally for the British Council (Zimbabwe, Brazil, Botswana) taking in a diverse range of venues from Dingwalls, the 100 Club, the 02 Arena, the Royal Festival Hall and Ronnie Scott’s to the Royal Court, the Globe, the ICA, Buckingham Palace and both Pentonville and Holloway prisons. She curates and hosts Mother Foucault, an evening of intellectual uprising, powerful poetry and furious dance – with guests including Will Self, Sabrina Mahfouz, Salena Godden and Vanessa Kisuule. She was awarded a Fellowship of the Royal Society Arts in 2015 as well as being named as one of Southbank Centre’s Nelson Mandela Change Makers for positively affecting cultural Britain. Her latest collection The Woman Who Was Not There was published by Burning Eye in 2014.