Karen Downs-Barton
Writer, Educator, Poet, and campervan traveler.
About
I am a member of the Society of Authors and my collection, Minx, was published by Penguin in March 2025. I hold a PhD in Creative Writing from King’s College London, a Master’s from Bath Spa University and a first class Ba (hons) in Creative Writing and the History of Art from the Open University. My doctoral thesis examined experimental and multilingual poetics focusing on identity and trauma in marginalised communities and entertainment industries.
Minx is my debut collection and I am the debut author that my editor, Sarah Howe, has brought to Chatto and Windus – a double debut whammy! Minx is available through all good bookshops and can be downloaded as both an ebook and audio book (available for all platforms) where I get to read it in it’s entirety to you.
Didicoy won the 2022 International Book and Pamphlet Competition and was published in March 2023 by Smith|Doorstop, The Poetry Business. It was a Poetry Book Society recommendation for Summer 2023.
I am honoured to be an advisory board member at Creative Future, an organisation that promotes the involvement of underrepresented people in the arts.
Originally from a peripatetic GRT (Gypsy, Roma, Traveller) background, I have studied and worked in London, France, York, Norfolk but am now based in Wiltshire but travel in a converted van where I can indulge my love of foraging.
Conference Speaker, papers delivered, Workshops and Tuition
Transnational Migration in Romani History: Agency, Media, and Policing, Centre for Interdisciplinary Research, Bielefeld University, Methoden 1, 33615 Bielefeld, March 6-7, 2023
Paper: Of Marginalia and Filling the Vampire’s Mirror: re/presenting journeys into creative self-representation against legacies of bordered imaginations.
Shakespeare & Race 2022, Globe Theatre, London.
Workshop leader U.G. poets. I’m delighted to see all the hard work my students put into their creative pieces being delivered at Shakespeares Globe Theatre.
Creative Future Winners Showcase @ Southbank’s London Literature Festival
It was incredible to be reading among such talented and friendly poets and prose writers. It was especially exciting as I was able to listen to Joelle Taylor an amazing writer! Conditions and Terms: Methods and Disciplines of Knowledge, 2022
Paper: Towards a Contemporary Romani Aesthetic: The Emergence of a Gypsy, Romani, and Traveller New Wave in Experimental Poetic Methodologies.
International Romani Day Colloquium, Kings College London
Transhistorical Encounters as Disconnections.
Get in touch
Karen is interested in proposals for collaborations and talks in the UK and worldwide. If you want to chat about poetry, books, the GRT, or text-art hybrid installations and events please contact.
Writing
Do check my extensive list of writing already in the public domain on the Publications page.
Karen Downs-Barton 