About

Who is Barbara?

Barbara is our African milk tree. She enjoys spending her days gazing out of the window and across the river.

Barbara is someone on the edges of society. In ancient Rome, Barbara was a colloquial term used to refer to foreign, immigrant or lower status, women. This could be women from Celtic, Germanic, African or Eastern tribes. (A non-Roman wife was known in legal texts as uxor barbara.) It could be women whose speech, dress or manners were judged ‘barbarous’. In other words, the outsiders. The feral women. These women were known as Barbaras.

Barbara is our broadside. An A3 page of short poems (and sometimes prose), showcasing a variety of voices. It is primarily a physical, paper publication—we seek to challenge the increasing digitalisation of life and of writing. There is something more tangible, more delicious, about poetry that can be touched, held, and experienced in three dimensions. You will find our publication out in the wild, on the streets and in coffee shops. It is designed to be held in your hands, folded up in your back pocket, read while waiting for the bus. These are wild words, waiting to be discovered and enjoyed.

In the spirit of ancient Rome, barbara champions the voices of outsiders—however this is defined. You may be an immigrant, with your feet planted in two cultures. You may be neurodivergent or disabled. You may be a witch. You may be a post-menopausal woman who has suddenly found she has become invisible—but is not ok with being silenced just yet. Are you a cat lover in a community of dog people? A Tory in a hippie commune? Maybe you’re just a little bit feral.

We are, as a publication, outside the mainstream publishing world. Our broadsides are free to read. Our aim is to get the names and words of our poets out in the world and seen—especially if they are the voices that usually go unheard.

We bring old school techniques to contemporary writing. Each poem is written up on a typewriter, assembled by hand, copied at our local library, and distributed by us, in person. But barbara also includes QR codes, web addresses and social media handles. We want our poets to have the widest possible reach, to be found both on the street and on the net.

What is a Broadside?

In the 17^th–19^th centuries, before the mechanisation of the printing industry, broadside publishing was popular across the UK and USA. A broadside was a single side of cheap paper, printed on one side, and designed to be disposable. They were cheap to purchase (often a penny or halfpenny per copy), making them affordable to the working classes, and were sold on street corners by pedlars and hawkers, or pinned to the walls of ale houses.

While the early broadsides shared official notices, they later became a publication of the people, influencing popular culture and encouraging political agitation. A broadside might share ballads, entice the reader with scandalous and salacious news stories, or feature woodcut illustrations.

What is the Barbaraverse?

The barbaraverse is the wider world of barbara. This includes our whole community of writers and readers, and everyone who has enjoyed, been involved in, or featured in an edition of barbara. It includes all of the places barbara finds herself—the places she is pasted in cities and villages across Scotland and the wider world, the places she is read, and everywhere she is shared on social media. The voices who write for her, and the voices who read her.

We’d love to hear from you! Any comments, questions, or photos of barbara out in the wild, can be sent to connect@barbara.pub