In Conversation: Naomi Shihab Nye

Naomi Shihab Nye is coming to The Pleasance on Sunday 15 November, for a session presented by Push the Boat Out. It's the final day of their festival, which runs from 31 October to 15 November, so this is the closing act of the whole run.

Nye is a Palestinian-American poet whose work is often described as 'international in scope and internal in focus'. She's known for homing in on the small, everyday things — the people and objects we usually walk past without thinking — and treating them as something worth celebrating. It's that kind of poetry: grounded in the ordinary, but with a wide lens. She was the former Young People's Poet Laureate for the USA, and her readings are known for being humorous, immediate, and urgently political, often shifting between the two in the same breath.

On the day, she'll be in conversation with Alycia Pirmohamed. The session is a mix of readings and discussion, so you'll hear her read her own work and then hear her talk through it with Pirmohamed. It's a good way to get a sense of how she works and the things that drive her poetry, rather than just listening to the poems on their own.

It's on Sunday afternoon, 3:00pm to 3:55pm, at The Pleasance (Upper Hall, Pleasance Courtyard), 60 Pleasance, Edinburgh EH8 9TJ. General admission is £16.32 (£15.00 plus a £1.32 booking fee), and there's a concession of £13.67 (£12.50 plus a £1.17 booking fee) for students, registered unemployed, disabled customers, senior citizens, and children and young people under 18. Companion tickets are free for anyone requiring personal assistance.