Simon Armitage returns to Hexham for an afternoon poetry event to open this year’s Hexham Abbey Festival. Using film clips, Simon will talk about the challenges of writing poetry for his First World War project Still, which features historic aerial photographs of the Somme and Simon’s TV commission The Not Dead and The Great War: An Elegy. Cogito will have a book stall with a selection of Simon’s books which he’ll be happy to sign after the event. Tickets are £12 (£10 concessions) available from the Queen’s Hall.