大象传媒

Two of the most striking and original first poetry collections in the last few years have been Division Street by Helen Mort and Black Country by Liz Berry. Both books are steeped in the places they were made in: West Yorkshire and the West Midlands. With Paul Farley for The Echo Chamber both poets have travelled towards one another and taken some poems back to their source. Helen Mort in the Peaks, on Sheffield streets, and then the memorably twisted spire of the church in Chesterfield. Liz Berry in a Black Country pigeon loft, an echoing canal tunnel and an ancient geological treasure trove. The heart of England is remade in these new poems. The poets end up half way between one anothers' places in a hotel that W. H. Auden (great poet of the unloved world) said served the best martinis in the land. Producer: Tim Dee.