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The editor of Bloodaxe Books, Neil Astley, writes about the Newcastle Literary Festival, of which he is the co-organiser.

Newcastle Literary Festival is one of the country's most successful literature festivals. It features a wide and imaginative range of writers and literary events — some of which cut across literature into other arts. It also attracts capacity audiences — from 300 to 600 during the past few years for the biggest draws (Kurt Vonnegut , Allen Ginsberg, William Burroughs, and John Fowles). Other events are staged outside the literary fortnight in October by the Newcastle Literary Supplement.

Smaller, less successful festivals tend to receive more coverage in the national press, mainly because they are within journalist-distance of London. Journalists might note that Newcastle is only three hours by train from Kings Cross, and that what the Festival is doing is part of a renaissance of the arts in the North which — unlike the Royal Shakespeare Company, who have played a six-week season here for eight years —they are yet to discover.

This year's major poetry events were 'Irish Accents' and a performance by the Liverpool poets. 'Irish Accents' was an evening of poetry, dance and music. Paul Muldoon teased the audience with some tantalisingly short lyrics from his new book Quoof. He is so relaxed that his poems seem to float off independently. If we like them he is quietly pleased. Nothing will ruffle him, and it is not so much his comments that provide insights into the poetry as this benevolent but inscrutable demeanour. It is the proper stance of the poet, and perhaps also a protection. Medbh McGuckian was more openly mischievous, pouring scorn on some very fine poems, and on some of the hapless people featured in them, who became stock characters in her anecdotes. don't know why I wrote this,' she'd say of a poem which still seemed capable of surprising her as she read it. There are few poets with her rare kind of unschooled genius, and few as genuine as Michael Longley, whose reading had such an air of civilised authority that the audience knew they were hearing a truly classical poet. Longley is a masterly technician, and the great strength of his craft lies in its unobtrusiveness, in the quiet power with which it focuses and heightens passion, compassion and indignation. Posterity may judge poems like 'The Linen Industry', 'Wreaths', 'Wounds' and his Tibullus version 'Peace' as among the finest of our time.

There were interludes of Irish music from the Knights of Wallsend and dancing by members of Clann Na Gael, three Wallsend lasses whose glorious performance was said by Michael Longley to be as good as anything he'd seen in Ireland. The musicians, poets and dancers complemented one another on their respective contributions, and the high quality of all three was acknowledged by the audience of 150.

At school in the sixties English lessons meant Rudyard Kipling's Kim, made to last a whole year by the English teacher, who would interrupt our readings from the book with long reminiscences of his time in India and his flying days with the Camel Corps. When he'd finished his digression, one of us would read until he dropped off to sleep, whereupon we'd start up a frog chorus of belching. Poetry was Walter de la Mare, Longfellow and Masefield. Then came 1967. We got a new English teacher who read us the Liverpool Poets. After that there was no looking back. I remain grateful to the Liverpool Poets for showing me the way to Ted Hughes.

After their Newcastle reading, the Famous Three signed dog-eared copies of The Mersey Sound for fans of all ages, including eager school kids for whom poems like Brian Patten's 'Angel Wings' expressed something more real to them than the current school prescription of War Poets and Richard Adams. The reading itself (to an audience of over 400) was polished and entertaining, with Adrian Henri's cloying sentimentality the only real disappointment for me. Roger McGough always impresses with his professionalism, and his fine sense of timing. Similarly, Patten's parables are self-contained and do not overreach themselves. I remembered Larkin's comment that Patten's poems were very simple and undervalued: 'When I read them I think, "Yes, that's a perfectly good emotion, it's quite well expressed".' Afterwards the three praised a more respectable poet from Merseyside, Matt Simpson. 'Matt's a good poet,' they said, firmly.