“I want the very act of creation to haul me so far outside my comfort zone I’m left gasping at the sheer audacity of it all.
I want the writing of books & creation of performances to be alchemical, metamorphic processes wherein I could not possibly remain the same person who began such wild & reckless tasks.” – Sophie McKeand
Sophie McKeand is an award-winning poet, writer, & sound artist, creating at the intersection of humanity, technology, & nature. She is the current culture editor at anarchist newspaper Freedom News, the former Young People’s Laureate Wales, and TEDx speaker. She won the OUTspoken London Award for Innovation in Poetry, was longlisted for the Poetry Society’s National Poetry Competition, and was the recipient of a Creative Wales Award. She is the author of three poetry pamphlets: Prophecy: conversations with my Self (2010), Hanes (2016), and The Slow-Time Traveller (2018), and a full-length hard-back poetry collection, Rebel Sun (2017); she collaborated on an album of poetry & noise, inc. fronting live performances, DRKMTR (2012); devised & performed in two shows, Metaforestry (2013), & CRØWOMAN (2018); and has just completed feminist cli-fi series The MthR Trilogy: The Madness of Sara Mansfield (1/5/2021), Prophets of The Red Night (1/5/2022), and Rematriation (1/5/2023). For The MthR Trilogy book tour Sophie created a fluid show of spoken word extracts from the novels performed with looped field recordings & improvised soundscapes, which she then took to Focus Wales Festival, as well as a special recording for Unpsychology Magazine, and then multiple performances at Stockholm & Gothenburg fringe festivals.
Sophie’s work has been published widely including Poetry Wales, Planet magazine, Dark Mountain & more. She has performed extensively including at Hay Festival, Uncivilisation, Caught by the River, the Kolkata Literature Festival, & more. Her public commission on a Woodland Trust legacy pole resides in Bute Park, Cardiff, her commission to commemorate the Aberfan disaster was performed on the Wales Millennium Centre’s stage by Michael Sheen, and her commission to mark the 70th anniversary of the founding of the NHS is installed in the Grange University Hospital, Cwmbran. She has also conducted live on-stage interviews with live on-stage interview with: Andrew Motion, Sarah Howe, Victoria Coren, Jack Monroe, Jon Ronson, Viv Albertine, and John Robb.
Sophie’s most recently published work is sci-fi novella, Future Sphere (1/12/2023)
