Warm Heart Poetry Festival set for July
Organisers of the Warm Heart Poetry Festival, which debuted last year in December, have announced that the festival will be held on July 29.
One of the organisers, poet Sylvester Kalizang’oma, said yesterday that the festival would be held at Robin’s Park in Blantyre.
“Last year we had the festival at Blantyre Cultural Centre but we decided to shift to Robin’s Park and I can say it here that we have already booked the venue,” Kalizang’oma said.
He said this would be a one-day event and that at the moment they were still working on the line-up.
“We will be releasing the line-up very soon. We are also still discussing on the guest artist for the festival and we will also be honouring another artist,” he said.
The ‘Unkalindanji Moyo’ creator also said they were still working on the theme for the festival.
He said they have reviewed last year’s event and that, this being the second time they would want to do it better with more additions to give poetry lovers the best.
“Last year it was just a launch but now we have started the journey and we have made several consultations to bring out the best. All we want is for people to appreciate poetry to the fullest and this is also part of giving poets a platform to perform and share ideas,” Kalizang’oma said.
The past years has seen Land of Poets, spearheaded by Poetry Association of Malawi (Pam), happening in July every year.
But last year it failed to take place due to funding before Warm Heart Poetry Festival came out.
Pam President, Nyamalikiti Nthiwatiwa, said last time that they had tried their best by sending proposals to get funding for the festival but things did not work out.
He, however, said, despite the festival failing to take place last year, they were hopeful that they would come back.
Warm Heart Poetry Festival last year received support from, among others, Bayete Naturals which promised to continue with its support this year.
The festival through Bayete Naturals, honoured veteran poet and writer Alfred Msadala with the Lifetime Achiever Award.
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