Biblio/Poetry Therapy conference baton passed to Turkey for 2027 

Organisers of the third annual European Biblio/Poetry Therapy conference have declared the event a resounding success following its conclusion in Canterbury, Kent, UK.

The two-day ‘Pilgrims of the Page’ conference on 1^st and 2^nd October was produced by The Poetry Practice in association with Lapidus International and brought together 110 participants from 25 countries spanning Europe and the rest of the world. 

Delegates travelled to Canterbury from an array of countries including the UK, Hungary, Finland, Israel, Sweden, Italy, Lithuania, US, Norway, Belgium, Germany, Greece, Netherlands, Romania, Türkiye, Austria, Croatia, France, Denmark, India, Ireland, Japan, Liberia, Taiwan and Zambia. They gathered in the Lodge next to Canterbury Cathedral in the autumn sunshine to explore how words can heal, transform and illuminate human lives. 

The organising team comprising Victoria Field, Eduard Heyning, Marianna Casale, Jon Sayers and Anne Taylor and Lapidus chair Mel Perry were inspired by Geoffrey Chaucer’s 14th century Canterbury Tales in their choice of guiding themes for the event – The Tavern, The Road and The Shrine. 

‘We envisioned the conference becoming a Tavern—a designated place of welcome, conversation, and shared humanity; a Road—an unfolding journey of practice dialogue and discovery through a rich array of workshops and presentations; and a Shrine—where we invited curated moments of reflection, insight, and integration,’ said Jon Sayers who first proposed these metaphors.

‘We are delighted by the way participants engaged with the themes of the conference and by the positive feedback we received on the warm, welcoming and inspirational nature of the event,’ commented Eduard Heyning.

Keynote speaker Neil Astley, editor of Bloodaxe books and publisher of the ground-breaking Staying Alive life-affirming anthologies opened the conference with poems for inspiration as well as video interviews with poets Jane Hirschfield, Chase Twichell, Jane Clarke and Arundhathi Subramaniam who reflected on how poems can act as a tavern, road and shrine. 

In her keynote on day two, Lapidus International chair, facilitator and poet Mel Perry gave a moving portrayal of her journey into the field of therapeutic writing and poetry, using islands and travel as ways of opening reflections on the ‘troughs and rainbows’ that make up the weather of our lives.

As well as presentations and workshops as spaces for inspiration and connection, participants at the main conference were offered a quiet corner for reflection complete with a poetry tombola by John Prebble and Alex McIntyre of the Poetry Exchange . 

Delegates also enjoyed at Pilgrim’s Feast with entertainment at St Paul’s Church and the opportunity to attend Evensong in the Cathedral and experience the historic city of Canterbury on a walking tour on the morning following the conference. 

Victoria Field, co-director of the Poetry Practice said: ‘What a joy it was to be face-to-face and connecting through poetry. This is how we re-weave the social fabric of the world! 

Mel Perry, chair of Lapidus International said: ‘We were hoping that the conference would become a metaphorical shelter, somewhere for Pilgrims to huddle in a storm, The event surpassed all our expectations.’

The main conference was preceded by a successful ‘Building a Field Together’ Research-Focused Day led by Marianna Casale and Jurgen Pieters from Ghent University and CHARM, a network of global partners working in the field of medical and health humanities, which was also well received by participants.

At the end of the conference a baton was passed symbolically from Judit Béres, who organised the first conference in Budapest to Karoliina Maanmieli and Juhani Ihanus, who hosted the second in Jyväskylä via the Canterbury conference team to Güssün Güneş, who revealed that the 4th Conference will take place in the Rami Library in İstanbul in September 2027. Full information and calls for abstracts will be available in December.