Ian McMillan's guests celebrate hedges, with poetry from Alison Brackenbury and Testament, singing from Sam Lee, Michael Symmons Roberts explores a poem with a nightingale at its centre, and hedgelayer Paul Lamb records himself walking a hedgerow that's rich in wildlife. This hedge-themed special features a haunted hedge from poet Alison Brackenbury, part of the anthology 'Lincolnshire Folk Tales Reimagined' (ed, Anna Milon and Rory Waterman). Alison's hedge started off life as a talking hedge i...
Jun 01, 2025•42 min
Ian McMillan's guests are the Scottish Makar Peter Mackay, Jamaican poet Lorna Goodison, as well as Indian dancer and poet Tishani Doshi, and the musician Scanner. Scanner lets us into the baffling and mysterious 'poetry' of album titles by Autechre, Aphex Twin and other electronic music artists. Scanner has worked with Laurie Anderson, and Pauline Oliveros amongst other artists, as well as creating sound design for installations at museums, at an airport and for dancers at the London Olympics. ...
May 25, 2025•42 min
Rebecca Watts has just published her third poetry collection - The Face In The Well. She discusses writing poems that engage with the work of an earlier generation of poets, turning a cherished childhood memory into poetry, and Emily Brontë's love of ironing. Poet and writer Brian Bilston is as much a fan of the American writer, artist, and designer Edward Gorey as The Verb. He accepted our commission to create an updated version of one of Gorey's most celebrated poems - The Gashlycrumb Tinies. ...
Feb 23, 2025•41 min
Flames and poetry - what poetry tell us about the Los Angeles fires, the pleasure the poet John Keats took in reading - a poem-letter to an imaginary estate agent, and magical language. To explore all this McMillan is joined by poetry writers and poetry lovers. Ian's guests: BBC newsreader and journalist Reeta Chakrabarti is a trustee of the Keats-Shelley Memorial Association. She shares her passion for John Keats' poem 'On First Looking into Chapman's Homer' - with its 'realms of gold' and a pl...
Feb 02, 2025•42 min
How does it feel to be adopted? How does naming things affect experience? Why does a mysterious sound make Ian want to get out of the studio in Salford? Is it ever a good idea to pretend to have a particular accent? Poems, questions and much more - on this week's Verb. Ian McMillan is joined by poets Joelle Taylor, Anthony Joseph, Luke Wright, and sociolinguist Rob Drummond. Joelle Taylor brings us a brand new commission inspired by the 50th anniversary of the BBC television series 'The Changes'...
Jan 26, 2025•42 min
Ian McMillan presents highlights from the TS Eliot Prize Readings - extraordinary poetry from 2024. Poetry books featured : Raymond Antrobus 'Signs, Music' (Picador Poetry) Hannah Copley 'Lapwing' (Pavilion Poetry) Helen Farish 'The Penny Dropping' (Bloodaxe Books) Peter Gizzi 'Fierce Elegy' (Penguin Poetry) Gustav Parker Hibbett 'High Jump as Icarus Story' (Banshee Press) Rachel Mann 'Eleanor Among the Saints' (Carcanet Press) Gboyega Odubanjo 'Adam' (Faber & Faber) Carl Phillips 'Scattered...
Jan 19, 2025•41 min
Evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins tells Ian McMillan about the influence of poetry on his writing, and shares poems written by his own mother. Ian also explores the influence of a very competitive mother on the life and poetry of former National Poet of Wales Gwyneth Lewis. And as it's the first Verb of the year, stand-up poet Kate Fox suggests new names for all the calendar months, whilst Stagedoor Johnny brings a new 'eartoon' (which explains why the names of baby animals can be so confus...
Jan 12, 2025•42 min
The Morecambe Poetry festival hosts Ian McMillan and the Verb at the Morecambe Winter Gardens, for a special recording with poets Pam Ayres, Raymond Antrobus and Henry Normal, three performers much- loved by audiences. Pam Ayres takes us back to the beginning of her career with the first poem she ever performed live whilst working for the Royal Air Force. This preceded her memorable winning appearance on the TV talent show Opportunity Knocks. Raymond Antrobus reads from a long sequence of poems ...
Jan 03, 2025•57 min
A special recording of The AdVerb at The Hackney Empire . Ian McMillan introduces six unique collaborations - new commissions between poets composers and musicians in collaboration with BBC Contains Strong Language and the BBC Symphony Orchestra Poets from the East End of London team up with composers to make new pieces that tell stories of this part of the capital city in all its astonishing diversity . 1. Keith Jarrett with his new poem 'E Note' set to music by Iain Farrington 2. Hannah Silva ...
Dec 27, 2024•1 hr 2 min
Ian McMillan is joined by four guests for more poetry and performance . After a year characterised by wet weather, Alan Connor constructs a poem from 188 Words for Rain collected on travels around the country for his new book with that title. Comedian and writer Isy Suttie treats us to a new song written with the approaching Bonfire Night in mind, but the fireworks in the studio don't only come from her guitar. The other guests get a chance to join in too. Poet Pascale Petit opens up her first n...
Nov 03, 2024•42 min
On this week's edition of The Verb, Ian McMillan gathers together - Wendy Cope - the poet whose 1986 debut collection "Making Cocoa For Kingsley Amis" became that rare thing - a poetry best seller. As her first collected poems are published she reflects on poetry forms and why some of her old poems are making their first public appearance in her new book. Ira Lightman, poet and artist, reflects on the nature of the epic. A marathon endeavour for poets and readers, it's usually seen as an ancient...
Oct 27, 2024•42 min
This week on The Verb Ian McMillan is joined by Paul Farley, author of the bird-centred 2019 poetry collection 'The Mizzy'. Especially for The Verb he's written us a brand new poem that considers birds on our workplace, inspired by new 'Nature Postive' building regulations. Malika Booker is tackling this week's 'Neon Line' poem. Booker won the Forward Prize for 'Best Single Poem' in 2023 and she takes us through the 2024 winners, who have recently been announced. Linguist and author of 'You're A...
Oct 20, 2024•42 min
Ian McMillan talks to Margaret Atwood and Alice Oswald about how we write poetry, and their own process, the natural world, time, and the possibilities of myth.
Oct 13, 2024•42 min
BBC Contains Strong Language 2024 took place in Sydney Australia in partnership with Red Room Poetry and ABC Australia . This special edition of The Verb was recorded in State Library of New South Wales n front of a audience as part of the festival. With guests Eileen Chong the first Asian Australian poet to be on the school syllabus, who came to Australia from Singapore in 2007. Singer songwriter Paul Kelly - described as the Laureate of Australia - whose latest project sets the work of poets a...
Oct 06, 2024•52 min
Gardens, balloons, parties and whales feature in this week's cabaret of the word. Ian's guests include Toby Litt, Roger Robinson, Hannah Silva and Caleb Femi. Novelist, poet and librettist Toby Litt has wrestled Ian, written stories backwards, and been limited to a single verb, in previous Verb commissions. This week he has to write something surreal for us, and then write something even more surreal by the end of the show - whilst blowing up two balloons. Toby is also mine of writing advice and...
Sep 29, 2024•42 min
Ian McMillan presents a cabaret of the word - the best poetry and performance - with guests Daljit Nagra, Karen McCarthy Woolf, Brian Bilston and the voice of Stagedoor Johnny. Brian Bilston, internet poetry sensation - and the poet behind 'Days like there' and 'Alexa, what is there to know about love?' shares poems in both human and animal languages from his new book 'Let Sleeping Cats Lie'. Karen McCarthy Woolf writes us a brand new poem in response to AA Milne's classic book - now reaching it...
Sep 22, 2024•42 min
Bringing you the best in Australian spoken word poetry . A special edition of Adverb, recorded at the Riverside Theatres in Parramatta the creative edgy hub of West Sydney. Featuring the founder of the exciting Bankstown series of poetry slams Sara Mansour along with many of the poets who have performed there in slams that attract huge audiences to poetry . The Dharug people are the traditional custodians of the land upon which this performance was recorded in front of an audience. Here 7 of the...
Sep 06, 2024•57 min
Inspiring words that connect us in difficult times; three outstanding poets take to the stage at Outspoken, one of the most exciting and innovative poetry nights in the world. Imtiaz Dharker, poet, film-maker and national treasure is on first. She is a recipient of the Queen's Gold Medal and reads new poems from her collection 'Shadow Reader' - some of which explore the uncanny experience of having her 'shadow' read in order to predict her life-span. Rachael Allen is a legendary poetry editor as...
Aug 30, 2024•57 min
Ian McMillan presents poets in performance from the Hay Festival for The Verb's performance wing - The Adverb. This week's guests include the Poet Laureate Simon Armitage, the National Poet of Wales Hanan Issa, former Children’s Poet Laureate Joseph Coelho, Professor of Creativity Owen Sheers - and Jazz Money, an Australian poet of Wiradjuri heritage. They share poetry of nail varnish, snow, rivers, labyrinths and the heart.
Aug 23, 2024•56 min
Recorded live at the sunny Latitude Festival Ian McMillan has gathered three top poets for The Adverb - The Verb's showcase of the best live poetry and readings. Dr John Cooper Clarke is a legend of the punk poetry scene and gets us into gear with a poem about the thrilling allure of the hire car. The best art can come out of limitations and Luke Wright shows his amazing lyrical dexterity with a poem entirely based on the assonance of the letter A. And TS Eliot prize winner Joelle Taylor spellbi...
Aug 16, 2024•56 min
Why does 'mean' have so many meanings? Why do poets take metaphor so seriously? Why do objects like pink ghetto blasters make poems live? And why are the filaments of our eyes in the edges of the snow? To answer these surreal, and not so surreal questions - Ian McMillan is joined by Alistair McGowan, Caroline Bird, and Toria Garbutt, and presents an 'eartoon' - a cartoon for the ear, from Richard Poynton (otherwise known as Stagedoor Johnny). Alistair McGowan is an impressionist, actor, writer, ...
Jul 28, 2024•42 min
Crocodile-like men, fireflies, a soul hitching a ride on a bee, the coolness of Switzerland, anagrams, and a mysterious rhyming poem - all this and more from Ian McMillan's guests this week - as they explore the way a poetic image can change the way we see things, Arji Manuelpillai is a poet and creative facilitator. His poetry collection 'Improvised Explosive Device' (Penned in the Margins) emerged through research and interviews with academics, sociologists, and former members of extremist gro...
Jul 21, 2024•42 min
Frogs who love rain, the poem that came from a magpie, the poetry of the peleton, and the everyday language of dating apps. Ian McMillan's guests this week (Hollie McNish, Testament, Ira Lightman and Liz Berry) bring all of this to the studio table and much, much more. Hollie McNish's latest book is 'Lobster and other things I'm learning to love' - she shares a pluviophile poem that shows how much joy there can be in realistic love. Ira Lightman is an innovative poet and artist and this week, es...
Jul 14, 2024•42 min
Ian McMillan is joined by poets and poetry lovers for this celebration of language recorded at this year's Hay Festival. The actor, Harry Potter star, Dickens virtuoso and national treasure Miriam Margolyes shares one of her favourite poems, the 19th century poet Robert Browning's 'My Last Duchess'. Miriam invites listeners to imagine the Duke, who is the speaker in the poem, as being like 'Hannibal Lecter' from 'The Silence of the Lambs' - a good planner, who has killed his wife. Irish novelist...
Jul 07, 2024•42 min
The appeal of 'the road less travelled by', Emily Brontë as self-help guru, a new way to look at Little Red Riding Hood and the 'little miracles' we might notice when we care for the elderly; Ian McMillan celebrates poems that explore all of these ideas with his guests, the poets Len Pennie, Malika Booker, Kate Fox, and Michael Symmons Roberts. Michael Symmons Roberts' poetry collections include 'Drysalter', 'Mancunia' and 'Ransom'. This week Michael explores Robert Frost's poem 'The Road not Ta...
Jun 30, 2024•41 min
What's it like being awake at 4am? How do we feel about toads? Where does the word chortle come from, and when is an anthem truly personal? Ian McMillan gets to the heart of these questions through brand new poetry commissions, exploring the poems and poets we love, and through celebrating language's delights and quirks - all in the company of his guests: the poets Jackie Kay and Helen Mort, the actor Paterson Joseph, and the singer, songwriter and song 'treasurer' Sam Lee. Guests: Helen Mort's ...
Jun 23, 2024•40 min
The Verb, which for the past 22 years has been bringing linguistic delights to the Radio 3 audience, will be leaving to make its new home on Radio 4. But in a mood of celebration Ian McMillan and his guests put the number 3 in the spotlight as they explore the magic and the power of three in poetry, storytelling and writing; with poet and memoirist Don Paterson to guide us around those poetic forms based on the number three, by long-time Verb favourite Ira Lightman with a brand new commission, s...
Mar 29, 2024•44 min
Ian McMillan is leaning into unease this week as he discusses writing and Claustrophobia. His guests are Holly Pester, whose new novel 'The Lodgers' examines the psychological disturbances of precarious housing situations; we meet a woman renting a flat that is more like a sandwich packet than a house, and another who must make her own life extremely small as she lodges with a family. Catherine Coldsteam’s new memoir is ‘Cloistered’, a book about the twelve years she spent in a Carmelite monaste...
Mar 22, 2024•44 min
This week The Verb offers you another chance to hear a special extended interview with Zadie Smith. Her audacious first book 'White Teeth', written when she was just 24, was one of the most talked about debut novels of all time. Most of Smith's novels take place in north west London, where she grew up, and which she has described as the location of her imagination, and her heart. In her latest novel 'The Fraud', also set in the area, Smith moves into historical fiction with a story inspired by a...
Mar 15, 2024•44 min
On International Women's Day Ian McMillan is joined by poets Joelle Taylor, Rommi Smith, Kim Moore and Shirley May to explore how women poets are using poetry and writing to explore and challenge sexism and to empower women through words. There's also music from soul singer, Sarah-Jane Morris, and musician, Tony Remy, from their new album 'Sisterhood'. Rommi Smith reads a poem specially written for The Verb celebrating the colour purple; in 'The Night Alphabet', Joelle Taylor's first novel, one ...
Mar 09, 2024•44 min
