Author appearances, poetry and spoken word events in London this week
Thursday 24 October
Tony White shows people round the Science Museum exhibition of Shackleton’s Man Goes South, for his novel of the same name, at – obviously – the Science Museum. £15 (includes book), 2pm
There’s a shared audience reading of Alice Oswald’s A Sleepwalk on the Severn at the Southbank Centre. £5, 8pm
One of our favourite poets and perfomers, Liz Bentley does her show AAA Rating at the Deptford Albany. There’s support from Jonny Fluffypunk. £8 / £6, 7.30pm
Karen McCarthy Woolf joins Cicely Herbert, Piers Plowright and the Apollo Chamber Players at Keats House to celebrate Poems on the Underground. £5, prebook, 7pm
Daniel Cockrill and Sabrina Mahfouz take the floor at Bang Said the Gun. £7 / £5, 8pm
Patsy Antoine, Steve Pope, Sesay and Becky Nana Ayebia Clarke discuss the state of black British publishing at the CLR James library in Dalston. Free, 6.30pm
Susan Cooper joins Marcus Sedgwick at Waterstones Piccadilly to talk about her new novel Ghost Hawk. £5 / £3, 6.30pm
David Edmonds asks Would You Kill The Fat Man? at West End Lane Books. Free, prebook on 020 7431 3770 or info at welbooks.co.uk, 7.30pm
Roger McGough, Julie Mullen and LiTTLe MACHiNe are at the Landmark Arts Centre in Teddington. £14, 7.30pm
The week’s reading at the Wapping Project comes from Andrew Motion. £6, 7pm
Friday 25 October
SJ Fowler launches Enemies, a collection of collaborations with with over 30 artists, photographers and writers, at Toynbee Studies with Penned in the Margins. Free, 7pm
Bernadine Evaristo introduces the tale of Mr Loverman at Deptford Lounge. Free, 7pm
Paul Morley debates the North and (almost) everything in it at Foyles. Free, prebook,6pm
Head to Housmans for the launch of Queer Haunts edited by G Abel-Watters and The Carrier Bag by John Dixon. Free, 7pm
Elizabeth Gilbert talks about her novel The Signature of All Things at the Southbank Centre. £12 / £10, 7.30pm
Gaiutra Bahadur talks about her ‘Coolie Woman’ ancestor at the South Asian Literature Festival. £5, 6.30pm
Words Over Waltham Forest launches with the This Is Me exhibition and performance from Joelle Taylor, at Walthamstow Library. Free, 5pm
Kate Foley and Donald Gardner join Hylda Sims at the Poetry Cafe for Fourth Friday. £7 / £5, 8pm
Saturday 26 October
100 poets read in 50 pairs at a mammoth event at Rich Mix from the Camarade poetry project. Featuring Ross Sutherland, Tom Chivers, Kirsty Irving, Sam Riviere, George Szirtes, Julia Bird and 94 others. Free, from 2pm
Lucy Caldwell, Bill Broady, Ros Barber and graphic novelist Karrie Fransman are the guests at Word Factory #15 in Soho. £12 / £8, 6pm
Forest Poets perform poems inspired by artworks in the Writing on the Wall exhibition in Walthamstow. The reading’s free, at 39 Orford Road, from 7pm
Jonathan Coe and Ali Smith have retold Gulliver and Antigone for children. Hear them talk about it at Daunt Books Marylebone. Free, prebook, 10.30am
Join creative classes in Waltham Forest, or tweet @HerbieHerb who’s writing micropoems throughout the day.
The Travelling Talesman brings his stories to the Big Green Bookshop in Wood Green. £5, 7pm
Poetry from Lemn Sissay and Ben Okri is set to music for a celebration of Martin Luther King at the Southbank Centre. £22.50 / £17.50, 7.30pm
Grab a day ticket for the South Asian Literature Festival and choose from events with Sarwat Chadda, Kamila Shamsie, Declan Walsh, Arun Ghosh and more. £15, from 11.30am
Sunday 27 October
Linda Rose Parkes and Nicky Mesch are the guests at Torriano Poets in Kentish Town. £5 / £3, 7.30pm
Monday 28 October
Malcolm Gladwell will attempt to change the way you see the world, at the Lyceum Theatre. £8-£60, 6.15pm and 8.30pm
Joe Sacco talks to David Boyd Haycock about WWI and trench warfare, at the London Review Bookshop. £10, 7pm
Martina Cole is at North Chingford Library (free, 7pm) as part of Words Over Waltham Forest. Or head to Leytonstone Library to hear John Rogers talking about This Other London (free, 7.30pm)
Tuesday 29 October
Celebrate the Poetry Library’s 60th birthday at the Southbank Centre with Ian McMillan, Emily Berry, Fleur Adcock, John Agard, Daljit Nagra and many more. £15 / £12, 7.30pm
Daljit Nagra, storyteller Vayu Naidu and musician Ranjana Ghatak re-imagine the Ramayana at the British Library for the South Asian Literature Festival. £7.50 / £5, 6.30pm
Crime queen Martina Cole is in conversation at the Big Green Bookshop. £5, 7pm
Storyteller and image-maker Dave McKean talks about his work and latest project Nine Lives at Foyles. £6, 6.30pm
Niall O’Sullivan hosts the weekly open mic night at the Poetry Cafe. £5 / £4, 7.30pm
Wednesday 30 October
The fantastic Homework team (Ross Sutherland, Joe Dunthorne, Luke Wright, Tim Clare, John Osborne) take up the theme of transport at Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club. £5, 7.30pm
Another chance to catch Liz Bentley, this time with Rob Auton at the Clissold Leisure Centre in Stoke Newington. £5 / £3, 8pm
VG Lee, David McGrath, David Mildon and Cherry Potts tell haunting tales at The Ivy House in Nunhead, plus flash fiction from the floor. Free, 8pm
Forward Prize winning poet Emily Berry is at Lutyens & Rubinstein. £8, 7pm
Neil Spring gives an illustrated talk about his debut novel, The Ghost Hunters, at Waterstones Gower Street. £5 / £3, 6.30pm
AC Grayling is at Waterstones Hampstead talking friendship (and his new book, Friendship). £6 / £4, 7pm
Two Daunt Books events: Philip Kerr is in Hampstead talking about the latest in the Bernie Gunther series Prayer (£5, 7pm) while in Marylebone, Monocle founder Tyler Brûle offers a guide to better living (£8, 7pm)
Guy Adams talks about his novel The Clown Service with James Barclay at the Big Green Bookshop. Free, 7pm
David Lyall reads from his new collection A Million Acts of Resistance for Words Over Waltham Forest. Free, 5.30pm
Follow @LondonistLit for our pick of that day’s literary events.