26/03/2026
Writing Hope on the Threshold
A Remember Oluwale & Chapel FM Creative Writing Workshop + Live Radio Broadcast with Emily Zobel Marshall and Abdullah Adekola. Supported by Leeds Beckett University.
Bookings now open https://bit.ly/oluwalethresholds
We invite you to join us on a unique writing journey. Bring your ideas, pens and an open heart to a poetry workshop facilitated by the Remember Oluwale anti-racist charity and Chapel FM community radio and arts centre and supported by Leeds Beckett University.
The theme for the Chapel FM Writing on Air festival this year was thresholds. David Oluwale, a Nigerian migrant who was hounded to his death by two Leeds police officers in 1969, lived his life on the threshold.
A stowaway who crossed the ocean to live in Leeds, David was rejected by the city’s gatekeepers. He slept in doorways, existing both inside and outside society, until his tragic end.
In this dynamic poetry workshop, we focus on writing about lives and moments on thresholds – between continents, states of being and belonging, the uncanny (unheimlich), doors, portals, liminal spaces, the in-between and passing places.
We unpick and respond to moments of change and transition, for it is also in the liminal, in the betwixt and between, that great transformation can occur. A stunning 10-meter sculpture of a ‘Hibiscus Rising’ was erected in Leeds in 2023, challenging the narrative of despair often associated with Oluwale’s life and pointing us towards a more hopeful future. We ask how much room there is for hope in our contemporary Northern cities – how much do we dare to dream?
As part of this event, participants will cross another threshold: from page to airwaves. The workshop will culminate in a live broadcast from Chapel FM’s beautiful radio theatre, where writers can join the studio audience or share work created during the session, alongside other pieces that respond to the theme. In carrying words from private reflection into collective listening, we open a space where stories of transition, resistance and hope can be heard across the city.
📅 Saturday 25th April 2026
📍 Chapel FM, Old Seacroft Chapel, 1081 York Road, Leeds, LS14 6JB
2.00: creative writing workshop
5.15: share a light meal with us
6.30-7.30: live studio broadcast
🎟️Booking essential – https://bit.ly/oluwalethresholds
