A.F. Harrold is an English poet and performance poet who has performed at most of the Literary and Poetry Festivals, beside several Comedy Festivals and the Edinburgh Fringe.

He has won numerous poetry slams (live performance poetry competitions) including the Cheltenham Festival UK All-Stars title and was the Hammer and Tongue UK Champion two years running.

He has performed in Denmark, Canada, France and the USA, and his work is widely published in UK poetry magazines (Poetry London, Smiths Knoll, Iota etc.).

A.F. Harrold is due to participate in the Queensland (Australia) Poetry Festival in August.

School Visits

A typical school visit will start with a whole school assembly for a half hour or so, in which he performs his own work and engages the kids in the immediacy and excitement of poetry. Following that he’ll usually run individual workshops for classes throughout the day — getting the kids to create individual and group poems and answering any questions they have. But this is entirely flexible.

The preferred age range encompasses Years 3-6, although he can work well with older or younger children as well.

“The yak-poet is Spike Milligan and Peter Cook rolled into one, but with the non-PC stuff taken out so the jokes are environmentally and culturally friendly..”
Daljit Nagra, teacher, JFS, North London

“A.F. Harrold left our school assembly hall dripping with poetry! His wit and wisdom cannot fail to inspire a love for poetry in children.”
Donna Pocock-Bell, librarian, St Helen & St Katharine School, Abingdon, Oxon

“It was great to have a ‘real, live’ poet in the school. The children were enthralled and very attentive throughout the visit, very entertaining! This was a perfect opportunity for the children to experience poetry first hand and really start to appreciate a ‘love for words’ which will hopefully stay with them for a very long time.”
Paula Davis, teacher, Brambletye Junior School, Earlswood, Surrey

“What an inspirational man! Ashley had the girls hanging on his every word – some amazing language was created – the girls were absolutely animated and still buzzing today.”
Helen Holland, teacher, Rye St Antony School, Oxford

His most recent collection is I Eat Squirrels (2009) a book of poetry for children (Also available on a spoken CD). Previous works for adults include the collection of love poems, Logic & The Heart (2004), and two books of comic verse, prose and pictures, Postcards From The Hedgehog (2007) and The Man Who Spent Years In The Bath (2008).