Why Edinburgh's Push the Boat Out poetry festival is going big on punk
Emma Collins, director of Edinburgh’s international poetry festival Push the Boat Out, explains why this year’s event will be infused with punk spirit
As a longtime fan of punk and alternative music, I was really keen to bring some punk spirit to this year’s Push the Boat Out. Poets across history have challenged us to look at the world differently, helping us to connect with raw emotion or express dissent, while often not conforming to the societal expectations of their times. It’s hardly surprising they have been involved in the punk scene since its roots in the 70s.
The pioneers of punk poetry are now household names. New York’s Patti Smith, known as the punk poet laureate, is an award-winning writer of several poetry collections as well as being a prolific and frankly legendary musician. Her seminal 1975 album Horses fused poetry and punk music together in a blend that would define the genre. In the UK, poet John Cooper Clarke is as iconic a figure in the punk scene as the Sex Pistols, one of the many bands he’s shared a bill with.
The 1980s brought us the Ranting Poets, with figures such as Linton Kwesi Johnson, Attila the Stockbroker, Phil Jupitus - performing as “Porky the Poet” - and Tim Wells (who you can see alongside Jay Mitra at this year’s Push the Boat Out) coming to the fore. Their style embodied punk's anger, rebelliousness and social commentary, often with a humorous edge. In many ways they paved the way for today’s vibrant spoken word scene.
Early punk poetry helped bridge the gap between spoken word and music, linking the two art forms - yet another incentive to reflect the punk scene within our programming. PTBO’s objective has always been to push poetry far beyond the page with a programme that offers varied, cross-art form billing and many inclusive entry points to poetry far beyond the traditional written word. For 2025, we’re viewing the concept of punk through a much wider lens, embracing the way that it blends art forms and approaches together and causes a commotion. We’re thinking about punk in its broadest sense: as a movement that embodies subversion, rebellious creative expression and activism.
For me, one of the most important aspects is the idea that punk, expressed in whatever art form, can be raw and unpolished. In prioritising genuine emotion and experience over artistic perfection, it aims to be honest, provocative, and deeply personal. At PTBO, we have a key goal of making poetry more accessible to different people, especially people who haven’t experienced or enjoyed it outside a classroom. Punk embodies the spirit of DIY art: anyone can pick up a pen (or record a TikTok in their room) and start working on their own poetry or spoken word, and that’s really freeing, inclusive and democratic.
By the same token, these new ways of sharing poetry mean that established poets can speak directly to their audiences about the things they care about in an unfiltered way, calling attention to causes and building a sense of community. New artists don’t necessarily have to wait for a traditional publishing deal before they can start sharing their work and building their following. Young people have a poetic platform to express the things that really matter to them and their peers.
This democratisation calls into question which voices we listen to, something we really want to focus on at PTBO. While punk music has often highlighted predominantly white artists, punk poetry today is much more inclusive. And in a world where research is consistently showing us how much more likely an artist is to succeed if they come from a well-off background, punk in all its forms still embraces working class voices and perspectives.
At its heart, punk poetry can offer a call to arms. Poets are still seething about the state of the world - and rightly so. Their work cuts to the heart of what they believe we should be fighting for, while also giving us space to imagine a better, more hopeful future.
Push the Boat Out is at The Pleasance, Edinburgh, from 20-23 November, bringing together over 120 Scottish and international artists for a weekend of poetry, performance, music and art, see https://pushtheboatout.org/
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