Harry Josephine Giles
Harry Josephine Giles is a writer and performer from Orkney, who now lives in Leith. They co-founded the Edinburgh spoken word events series Inky Fingers and co-directs the live art platform Anatomy. They hold an MA in Theatre Directing from East 15 Acting School, and are studying for a PhD at Stirling University.
Their early work includes the pamphlets Visa Wedding (2012) and Oam (2013), which were published by Stewed Rhubarb, and they have also produced visual poetry objects and digital texts including Farmform (2014), We Are Rain (2014), and Casual Games for Casual Hikers (2015). 2015 saw the publication of the narrative verse sequence Drone in Our Real Red Selves (Vagabond Voices).
Their full collection publications, Tonguit (Freight Books 2015) and The Games (Out-Spoken Press 2018) were shortlisted for the Edwin Morgan Poetry Award, with Tonguit also shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection. They have released four Zines with Easter Road Press, including Stim (2019), Moon, Sun and All Things (2019), Some Defintions (2019) and Scenes (2020). Not Going Back to Normal and the art print Out of Existence (both 2021) are their most recent publications.
Every week during 2019, Giles published a poem on Twitter, each of them titled ‘Abolish the Police’, and all of them, from often surreal, tenuous or uncomfortable angles, argued, imagined or agitated for just that. They have written about the process on their website.
Giles spent a number of years developing their poetic sci-fi novel, Deep Wheel Orcadia (Picador, 2021) written in the Orkney Dialect with a ‘playful’ English translation. It was given a Poetry Book Society choice and Times SF book of the month.
Giles has been a writer in residence for 3rd Ring Out, Govanhill Baths Community Trust, the Crichton Carbon Centre and the Nevis Land Partnership, and in 2015-16 was Reader in Residence for West Lothian Libraries. They has been featured in the SPILL National Platform, Verb Festival (Aotearoa) and Teszt (Romania). Their one-to-one show What We Owe was listed in the Guardian’s “Best of the Edinburgh Fringe” round-up – in the “But is it art?” section. Their multimedia poetry show Drone debuted in the Made in Scotland Showcase at the 2019 Edinburgh Fringe.
They were BBC Scotland Slam Champion in 2009, and won the IdeasTap National Poetry Competition in 2012. They are a founder member of the Shift Collective of spoken word artists. Their theatre productions, often combining spoken word with interaction, sound and projection, have toured the UK and Europe, including festivals such as Forest Fringe, Sprint, SPILL and CrisisART. They have featured at the Edinburgh International Book Festival, the StAnza Poetry Festival and New York’s legendary Bowery Poetry Club. Their one-to-one show What We Owe was listed in the Guardian’s “Best of the Edinburgh Fringe” round-up in the “But is it art?” section. They toured the multimedia poetry show Drone, which featured at the Edinburgh Fringe 2019 and were shortlisted for the Saltire Prize the same year.
