Exclusive: Poet Donna Ashworth on finally finding ‘freedom’ in her 40s – and why failure is vital
Best-selling poet Donna Ashworth has always had a way with words – even if she had forgotten all about it.
The Sunday Times bestseller, whose most recent book To the Women has just spent another week at the top of the book charts, is feted by more than 430,000 followers on Instagram and has won celebrity fans such as Davina McCall and Fearne Cotton.
But she never set out to make poetry her career. Before 2020, she’d worked as a journalist and run a children’s play centre with her husband, Robert, a former producer on Coronation Street, as well as sung on cruise ships. But poetry had always been in the background, ever since Donna was a teenager.
“I wasn’t aware of it until I found my own diaries – and they’re full of them,” the 49-year-old exclusively tells HELLO! from her new home just outside Stirling in Scotland. “They’re not that different from what I’m doing now, except they’re very much teenager heartache and angst.
“I can’t bear to read them, to be honest with you,” she says. “It’s like when you read your Facebook posts from five years ago, it is hideous.
“Looking back, writing has always been there, but it didn’t come out again or in with any intent until my mid-40s,” she says. “The imposter syndrome was high, but I had a feeling that it would be worth it and something might be on the other side of it.”
With more than 300,000 copies of her seven books sold, Donna has become the face of modern poetry. Her works – which touch on the joy of ageing, the pain of loss and the euphoria of falling in love – are said to be responsible for the huge rise in sales of poetry books in the UK.
Her poems took off in 2020 when a video of her lockdown-inspired poem ‘History Will Remember When the World Stopped’ went viral, with celebrities including actors Michael Sheen and Vicky McClure each reading a line.
Despite her success, Donna has received criticism for being what has been described as an “Instagram poet”. But she sees the way she shares her beautifully composed words as a way that makes poetry accessible.
“The way we consume poetry has changed,” she says. “We may not always have time to sit down with a book but if my Instagram post can cut through the layers and make people feel something, even just for a minute, then it’s working. Poems don’t have to be in a big book to be powerful.”
As well as her latest bestseller, Donna is also celebrating her beautiful “forever home” which she moved into four months ago with husband Robert and their sons Felix and Brodie.
The family, who moved back to Donna’s native Scotland from Manchester at the start of the Covid lockdown, fell in love with the breathtaking scenery surrounding their new home.
It’s this scenery that powers her poetry: as well as a stylish navy-blue office for admin, Donna’s writing desk faces a bay window that looks out on to mountain views, where she can watch the sunrise as she writes.
“Our last house was a new property which we purchased after only viewing it online in lockdown,” she says of the building they left last year.
“This house is totally different. Our last purchase was about surviving, but this one is for thriving. It’s 150 years old and has the best energy; it’s old and fabulous and there are stories in all of the walls,” Donna enthuses. “We immediately knew it was the one.”
The property has great old-world charm, with a huge key and servant bells from yesteryear still in place, yet Donna and her husband have put their own spin on the interiors, with splashes of colour throughout the property.
Donna employs the same attitude when choosing her outfits for public speaking appearances. “I want to wear something bright and beautiful to make people smile,” she says of her rainbow wardrobe. “I love to dress up, do my hair and make-up and wear beautiful things, but I know that isn’t where my worth lies.
“I used to really struggle with ageing, and fret about grey hairs and sagging eyelids, but my sister gave me the solid advice to simply not focus on that – nobody else does, so why should I?”
With her 50th birthday in April, Donna says she plans to “celebrate the life” out of her new decade. “I’ve been dying to turn 50,” she says. “I’ve had to stop myself wishing the years away.
“I have so much planned for my birthday. My friends and I have hired a treehouse and I’m going to Mexico, too.
“I was so hard on myself in the first half of my life, but turning 40 helped me uncover myself. I boxed myself in during my 20s and 30s, but hitting midlife unravelled that. I found a sense of freedom I never had before.
“As I got older, I accepted that failure is an integral part of success. If you fail it means you’ve tried, so I make sure to congratulate myself for my failures as much as my wins.
“I’m not seeking approval any more and my worth doesn’t lie within other people.”
To The Women by Donna Ashworth is published by Bonnier
To read the full exclusive interview, pick up the latest issue of HELLO! on sale in the UK on Monday. You can subscribe to HELLO! to get the magazine delivered free to your door every week or purchase the digital edition online via our Apple or Google apps.
Photographer: Robert Ormerod @robert_ormerod
Styling: Daria Run @colours agency @daria_run
HMU: Rhomani Maloney-Drummond @colours agency @pompomyah
