The Verb

BBC Radio 4

Ian McMillan hosts Radio 4's cabaret of the word, featuring the best poetry, new writing and performance.

  1. 6 天前

    Michael Laskey, Michael Schmidt, Michelle Penn, Rachel Douglas-Jones

    Michael Laskey has produced six collections of poetry since his first pamphlet in 1988. That was also the year he co-founded the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival. His career in poetry which has seen him teach, edit, and publish and has resulted in him becoming this year's recipient of the King's Gold Medal for Poetry. As his Collected Poems is published, he looks back on charting his life in poetry. When Michael Schmidt met Elizabeth Jennings, he was a student and she was a celebrated poet. As managing director of Carcanet Press he become her publisher. A relationship that endured until her final collection in 2001. In her centenary year, he talk about her distinctive qualities as a poet and shares his favourite poem of hers. Michelle Penn takes inspiration from the Latin American iteration of the retablos art form for her new book - Retablo for a door. The poetry collection in part explores the female experience, but also turns its attention to subjects as varied as the first atomic bomb test, and Leonardo da Vinci's drawing, Vitruvian Man. She discusses why she found retablos such a useful creative aid for her poetry. In Redacted: Writing in the Negative Space of the State, academic Rachel Douglas-Jones reflected on the poetic power of redaction to interrogate and understand the General Data Protection Regulations. She explains why redaction, currently in the news for its power to obscure, can also lead to revelation. Presenter: Ian McMillan Producer: Ekene Akalawu

    42 分鐘

  2. 3月1日

    Sibling relationships with Blake Morrison, Natalie Shapero, Tara Bergin, and the word 'literally'

    Ian McMillan is joined by Blake Morrison with the poetry of sibling relationships, Natalie Shapero - who reports poetically from the world of cinema in L.A., and Tara Bergin, who looks at how to escape from a poem, as well as sharing a 'Neon Line' with us. We also have our cartoon for the ear - an 'eartoon' exploring the origins of confusing words in the English language - written and performed by Stagedoor Johnny (Richard Poynton). Blake Morrison's new poetry collection is 'Afterburn' (Chatto and Windus) - his new book on writing memoir 'On Memoir' is published in April. Natalie Shapero's collection 'Stay Dead' is published by Outspoken Press. Tara Bergin's 'Savage Tales' is published by Carcanet Produced by Faith Lawrence

    42 分鐘

  3. 2月22日

    George Szirtes, Iryna Starovoyt, Zain Rishi, Katie Clarke

    George Szirtes, winner of the T. S. Eliot Prize and the King’s Gold Medal for Poetry, is the most recent poet to join the small selection panel for arguably the UK's most public celebration of poetry - Poems on the Underground. As the London Tube initiative reaches its 40th birthday, George discusses how poems are chosen and shares some poetry that he feels speaks to the strength of the scheme. Depending on how you count it, this month marks the 4th or the 12th anniversary of the conflict between Ukraine and Russia - a conflict in which poetry has become a player. Iryna Starovoyt is a poet and critic from Ukraine. She reflects on the 19th century poet and artist Taras Shevchenko - regarded as a totemic figure in Ukrainian literature, and whose name is on the country's highest award for Arts and Culture, the Taras Shevchenko National Prize. Katie Clarke, Director of Literature at The Reader organisation, shares her experiences of reading poetry with people who have dementia and the surprising power of poetry to make fresh connections at the individual and group level. Zain Rishi's debut poetry pamphlet, Noon, is published this month. He becomes the latest poet to choose a Neon Line for The Verb's regular feature in which poets reflect on poetry lines that they feel shine out. Presenter: Ian McMillan Producer: Ekene Akalawu

    42 分鐘

  4. 2月15日

    Richard Dawson, Jacob Polley, Sarah Howe, Frank Cottrell Boyce on John Carey

    Ian McMillan's guests this week are the singer and songwriter Richard Dawson, T.S. Eliot prize winning poets Jacob Polley and Sarah Howe and Children's Laureate Frank Cottrell Boyce - who celebrates Professor John Carey and the art of poetry criticism. Richard Dawson and Jacob Polley light up the past and make the future of energy and community life seem more real - by bringing their different sensibilities to 'Ancestral Reverb' - an album created by north east organisation 'Threads in the Ground' (directed by Adam Cooper). 'Ancestral Reverb' contains music spanning over 100 years, and the words of those connected to coal. DJ and producer Bert Verso sampled historic music for this album, and wove it through with his own new compositions. The records are embedded with fragments of coal. Richard Dawson's latest album is 'End of the Middle' and Jacob Polley's 'Hymn to Water' can be heard on BBC Sounds (www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m002mw7t) Sarah Howe's new book is 'Loop of Jade' which beautifully takes on threads from her T.S. Eliot prize winning collection 'Loop of Jade'. Sarah explores a 'Neon Line' for us from the work of the American 20th century poet Elizabeth Bishop - a stand-out line that lets us into a poem. Sarah tells us about the power of the messy first draft, and where it can lead a poet. Children's Laureate, novelist and writer of the 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremony - Frank Cottrell Boyce celebrates the wit, generosity, and pithy opening sentences of Professor John Carey, whose distinctive voice as teacher, critic and broadcaster led so many into a deep engagement with poetry. Presented by Ian McMillan Produced by Faith Lawrence

    42 分鐘

  5. 2月8日

    The Love Verb

    Ian MacMillan has love in mind as he is joined by a swoon of poets all interested in the subject of love in lyric form. Kim Moore’s poetry collections include The Art of Falling and All The Men I Never Married. She's chosen this week's Neon Line, The Verb's feature on lines that shine out from their poems, from a love poem that has long moved her. She also shares a new love poem from her forthcoming collection, The House of Broken Things, Deborah Alma, poet, editor, and co-founder of The Poetry Pharmacy is a fan of love poetry anthologies She discusses the approach she took in her own love poetry anthology - Words For Love, and why she finds The Emma Press Anthology of Love edited by Rachel Piercey and Emma Wright, and Something New: Alternative Poems for Alternative Weddings edited by Caroline Bird and Rachel Long, such appealing collections. In Rob Macaisa Colgate's debut poetry book, Hardly Creatures, he models his collection of poems on the experience of a fully accessible art gallery, inspired by his work in disability arts gallery in Toronto called Tangled. Hardly Creatures features a series of love poems which Rob calls Benches to reflect the fact that he sees them as places of rest in a collection often concerned with the practicalities, the pain, and the politics of disability. Mark Connors, co-founder and editor of Yaffle Press, on the love song inspired poetry in their latest publication - Poems Inspired By the Best Songs of All Time. Presented by Ian MacMillan Produced by Ekene Akalawu

    42 分鐘

  6. 2月1日

    Rilke's life-changing poems and Paul Farley, Kate Fox, Griot Gabriel

    Ian McMillan explores Rainer Maria Rilke's life advice, and is joined by Paul Farley, Griot Gabriel, Kate Fox and Ulrich Baer Paul Farley brings us the sound of planes, and the world of the usher - as well as a life-long connection to Robert Louis Stevenson's 'A Child's Garden of Verses'. Paul's latest collection 'When it Rained for a Million Years' was shortlisted for this year's T.S.Eliot Prize. 'Can poetry change your life'? - poet and Verb regular Kate Fox - and writer and scholar Ulrich Baer explore a 'neon line' (an outstanding line of poetry' ) by the German language poet Rainer Maria Rilke; an enigmatic line that has left the page and entered popular culture. So why is Rilke's poetry so popular in 2026 - a hundred years after his death? Kate's latest book is 'On Sycamore Gap' - Ulrich's writing on Rilke includes 'Dark Interval: Rilke's Letters on Grief, Loss and Transformation'. Griot Gabriel is from Manchester, and founded The Poetry Place. In 2025 he won the Forward Prize for 'Best Single Poem – Performed' for ‘Where I’m From’. Here he shares extracts of new work and explores the resonance of the word 'hand-me-down'.

    42 分鐘

  7. 1月25日

    T.S. Eliot Prize Poets

    Join Ian McMillan for a celebration of remarkable poets and poetry as he presents highlights of the annual T.S. Eliot Prize readings, recorded in front of an audience at London's Southbank. Ian was the host for the TS Eliot Prize readings at the Royal Festival Hall - where shortlisted poets read from their shortlisted collections in front of a packed audience. For this edition of The Verb Ian has selected poems featuring infinity pools, slush, shopping malls, family inheritances, the beaver, and lost keys - and tells us which collection scooped the prize of £25,000, awarded by the T.S.Eliot Foundation. The poets featured this year are: Gillian Allnutt, Isabelle Baafi, Catherine-Esther Cowie, Paul Farley, Vona Groarke, Sarah Howe, Nick Makoha, Tom Paulin, Natalie Shapero, and Karen Solie.

    41 分鐘

  8. 2025/12/19

    The Christmas Adverb

    Testament, beatboxer, rapper and writer - presents a festive Adverb (complete with a yuletide salad battle), with his guests the former Scottish Makar Jackie Kay, poetic legend John Hegley, Mercury prize nominated folk singer Sam Lee, as well as satirical supremo Brian Bilston. They bring iconic robins, soul stirring music, poetic Christmas questions, and quirky Yule traditions to an audience in the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra Hall in Salford. Brian Bilston's very funny books include 'You Took the Last Bus Home', and 'Alexa, what is there to know about love'? His latest book is called ‘A Poem for Every Question’. He shares new poems and poems from his book ‘And so this is Christmas’: John Hegley brings surreal festive interaction and poignantly playful poems to the Adverb. He also celebrates a playful December celery battle recorded in the letters of Romantic poet John Keats. Sam Lee's album is ‘Songdreaming’ – he's joined by pianist James Keay to perform songs that sing us deep into this time of year. Sam organises 'Singing with Nightingale' events, so we find out where nightingales go for Christmas. Jackie Kay's latest book is 'May Day' - she shares a poem by one of her favourite poets Norman McCaig - which stars a robin - and tender winter poems from her collections.

    57 分鐘
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簡介

Ian McMillan hosts Radio 4's cabaret of the word, featuring the best poetry, new writing and performance.

資訊

  • 創作者
    BBC Radio 4
  • 活躍年代
    2012年 - 2026年
  • 集數
    274
  • 年齡分級
    兒少適宜
  • 版權
    © (C) BBC 2026
  • 節目網站
    The Verb

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