A new chapter begins: Manchester named Unesco City of Literature

Thriving festivals, flourishing publishers and now Unesco status … Manchester’s literary scene only gets stronger

When the announcement was made that Manchester had been awarded Unesco City of Literature status my social media feeds filled up with photographs of victorious colleagues and acquaintances who had worked fantastically hard across different institutions to make it happen. They looked happy and tired in equal measure.

Manchester is home to two thriving creative writing MA programmes – at the Manchester Writing School at Manchester Metropolitan University (where I teach) and the Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester. Staff and students from both regularly intermingle at live-literature nights such as Verbose, Bad Language, The Other Room and many more. The Manchester international festival, which takes place every two years, transformed the city in the summer. The annual Manchester literature festival wrapped up a couple of weeks ago. And, on 3 November, the national creative writing graduate fair, run by Comma Press with the Manchester Writing School, will bring agents, publishers and writers together in a frenzy of literary speed dating.

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