The Poetry Bath
The Poetry Bath has now moved from Wildhart Radio to Buzzsprout. Follow the links below to tune in.
Episode 3/54. Clare Best joins me to talk about her feeling for water and to read spring-fed, sea-washed poems.
Episode 53/2. The second part of my interview with Sussex-based writer Joanna Nissel whose debut poetry pamphlet Guerrilla Brightenings was published by Against the Grain Press in 2022. In this episode, Joanna reads further poems from her pamphlet along with some new work and tells me about her PhD research into mentoring within higher education and the wider culture of poetry.
Episode 52/1. Joanna Nissel (Part 1). I meet Sussex-based writer Joanna Nissel whose debut poetry pamphlet Guerrilla Brightenings was published by Against the Grain Press in 2022. Joanna reads from the pamphlet and tells me about her love of the chalk paths and landscape of the Sussex Downs and how the Covid pandemic inspired in her the unexpected outburst of creativity that became Guerrilla Brightenings.
Episode 51. Kevin Scully returns for the final episode of the Poetry Bath on Wildhart Radio. Kevin reads from his new pamphlet For The Journey, which he wrote during his residency on the Cuckmere Pilgrim Path at Cuckmere Haven, East Sussex. Kevin & I talk about walking, mysticism and the joys and challenges of being a poet in residence.
Episode 50. New York poet Suzanne Cleary joins me to read from her work and talk about the central role of play in her creative practice and the importance of letting things break.
Episode 49. Martyn Hudson joins me to read from and talk about the work of his late wife, the multidisciplinary artist Emily Hesse, whose rooted life in and deep love of the North Yorkshire Moors formed the foundation of her work.
Episode 48. Rebecca Hurst returns to the show to read from her pamphlet The Fox's Wedding, celebrate the joys of creative friendship and talk about the difficulty of balancing the demands of the writing life.
Episode 47. The second part of a two-part interview in which I chat to Robert Hamberger about his book A Length of Road, in which Robert retraces John Clare's Journey Out of Essex. In this second part Robert reads the poetry in the book, partly inspired by Clare, partly by Robert's own experiences.
Episode 46. In this special two-part interview, I chat to Robert Hamberger about his book A Length of Road, in which Robert retraces John Clare's Journey Out of Essex, walking from Epping Forest to Northamptonshire and sleeping rough along the way. Robert's journey mirrors Clare's in other ways too: Robert was suffering his own crisis of identity at the time as well as coming to terms with the death of his best friend, artist Clifford Haseldine.
Episode 45. Janet Sutherland returns to the Poetry Bath to read from her new hybrid collection, The Messenger House, and talk to me about her great-great grandfather's journeys to Serbia in the mid-nineteenth century and her own trip there in 2018. The book interweaves journal entries, letters, poems and other testimony, both real and imaginary, by both Janet and her great-great grandfather, and asks questions about the nature of messages.
Episode 44. Rosie Johnston joins me to read from her work and talk about her childhood in Northern Ireland, her love of the sea and how it’s been integral to her healing from complex PTSD. We also discuss her experimental 17 syllable form (her ‘Wee Seventeens’) and much more.
Episode 43. Sheereen Khan reads from her memoir Belonging, Biryani and Bacon, which won second place in the Bridport Memoir Prize 2023. Sheereen talks to me about how food both united and divided her Irish Catholic mother and Indian Muslim father.
Episode 42. Benjamin Cusden reads from his collection Cut the Black Rabbit and tells me about his experience of homelessness and healing.
Episode 41. Lawrence Wilson returns to the Poetry Bath to read from his latest collection, Brick, a book-length sequence of poems from the first year of the Covid pandemic. Lawrence talks to me about friendship, love, walking, worrying and cooking in the weird year of 2020.
Episode 40. Mara Bergman reads from her work and chats to me about her childhood in New York, how she first came to London and fell in love with Britain, and how her twin careers as a poet and a children's writer interweave.
Episode 39. Maria Jastrzebska reads from her latest collection, Small Odysseys, and talks to me about her early childhood in Warsaw and later life in London and Brighton, and what it means to move between two cultures.
Episode 38. S J Fowler talks about the serious business of messing around. I hear how Steve has fun with writing and performance and cultivates a sense of joy and playfulness in his work.
Episode 37. Susie Campbell reads from her work and chats with me about the importance of textures, margins and liminality in her writing.
Episode 36. Alex Josephy tells me about her two lives in England and Italy and the meaning of home.
Episode 35. Janet Sutherland joins me to read from her latest collection, Home Farm, and talk about water meadows, eels and growing up on a dairy farm in Wiltshire.
Episode 34. Writer, actor and kindly man of the cloth Kevin Scully joins me to read from his work and talk about his life in Australia, East London and now in the leafy Weald.
Episode 33. I meet David Caddy to listen to David's work and chat about his interest in literary sociology and the ecology of poetry, and his love of the landscape and people of Dorset where he's lived for most of his life.
Episode 31. Vilde Bjerke Torset tells me about asemic and visual poetry, frogs, horses and the meaninglessness of everything.
Episode 30. Rhyming translator-poet Timothy Adès reads from his work and shares his love of music and singing.
Episode 29. Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana reads from her collection Sing me down from the dark and tells me about the ten years she spent living and teaching in Japan and her return to Britain.
Episode 28. Robert Hamberger joins me to read from his work and talk about walking, his love of John Clare and how he found a home in Sussex.
Episode 27. Lydia Harris reads from her recent work and tells me about her life on the Orkney island of Westray.
Episode 26. Raine Geoghegan joins me to read from her work and talk about her Romany heritage and her love of music and dance.
Episode 25. Jessica Mookherjee and I meet at the lovely Gallipot Inn in Upper Hartfield, East Sussex to talk about rock'n'roll, female desire and Jessica's collection Play Lists.
Episode 24. Di Slaney tells me about her life rescuing, nurturing and writing about wonky animals.
Episode 23, in which I meet Alison Sanders, Helen Bardsley, Lucy Horswill and Robert Nagle on Ashdown Forest to walk, write and talk about our shared loved of the Forest.
Episode 22, in which Terri Mullholland reads her flash fiction and talks to me about the influence of her childhood and parents on her writing.
Episode 21, Sarah Salway reads from her playful collection Not Sorry and tells me about the joys of hybrid writing.
Episode 20. Josephine Balmer and I discuss the role of translation in her work and what it means to live with ghosts.
Episode 19. Stephen Plaice joins me to read from and discuss his Sussex-based novel The Hardham Divine.
Episode 18. Lawrence Wilson returns to read from There is so much I could say, an anthology of poems written by Wilson and Martha Gould with members of the Rare Dementia Support Research Project.
Episode 17, in which JC Niala and I talk about her work recreating a 1918 allotment and our shared love of languages and gardening.
Episode 16, in which I talk to Phil Vernon about his work in peace-building and about the power and powerlessness of poetry.
Episode 15, in which Katrina Rideout tells me about her love of Ashdown Forest, liminal spaces and manga novels.
Episode 14, in which Lawrence Wilson and I share our love of spring and read spring-themed poems by ourselves and others.
Episode 13, in which Patricia Robson and I talk about poetry, storytelling and the wearing of masks.
Episode 12, in which I walk on Ashdown Forest with James Adler and talk about how we can care for our endangered heathlands.
Episode 11, in which Mark Chambers tells me about his career in the police force and the joys and disappointments of being a police-officer poet.
Episode 10, in which Sarah Miles tells me about her work teaching poetry to children, running Paper Swans Press and about her love of Eric Satie.
Episode 9, in which Susan Castillo Street talks about the impact of her early life in the American Deep South upon her writing and her subsequent academic and poetic career in Europe.
Episode 3/54. Clare Best joins me to talk about her feeling for water and to read spring-fed, sea-washed poems.
Episode 53/2. The second part of my interview with Sussex-based writer Joanna Nissel whose debut poetry pamphlet Guerrilla Brightenings was published by Against the Grain Press in 2022. In this episode, Joanna reads further poems from her pamphlet along with some new work and tells me about her PhD research into mentoring within higher education and the wider culture of poetry.
Episode 52/1. Joanna Nissel (Part 1). I meet Sussex-based writer Joanna Nissel whose debut poetry pamphlet Guerrilla Brightenings was published by Against the Grain Press in 2022. Joanna reads from the pamphlet and tells me about her love of the chalk paths and landscape of the Sussex Downs and how the Covid pandemic inspired in her the unexpected outburst of creativity that became Guerrilla Brightenings.
Episode 51. Kevin Scully returns for the final episode of the Poetry Bath on Wildhart Radio. Kevin reads from his new pamphlet For The Journey, which he wrote during his residency on the Cuckmere Pilgrim Path at Cuckmere Haven, East Sussex. Kevin & I talk about walking, mysticism and the joys and challenges of being a poet in residence.
Episode 50. New York poet Suzanne Cleary joins me to read from her work and talk about the central role of play in her creative practice and the importance of letting things break.
Episode 49. Martyn Hudson joins me to read from and talk about the work of his late wife, the multidisciplinary artist Emily Hesse, whose rooted life in and deep love of the North Yorkshire Moors formed the foundation of her work.
Episode 48. Rebecca Hurst returns to the show to read from her pamphlet The Fox's Wedding, celebrate the joys of creative friendship and talk about the difficulty of balancing the demands of the writing life.
Episode 47. The second part of a two-part interview in which I chat to Robert Hamberger about his book A Length of Road, in which Robert retraces John Clare's Journey Out of Essex. In this second part Robert reads the poetry in the book, partly inspired by Clare, partly by Robert's own experiences.
Episode 46. In this special two-part interview, I chat to Robert Hamberger about his book A Length of Road, in which Robert retraces John Clare's Journey Out of Essex, walking from Epping Forest to Northamptonshire and sleeping rough along the way. Robert's journey mirrors Clare's in other ways too: Robert was suffering his own crisis of identity at the time as well as coming to terms with the death of his best friend, artist Clifford Haseldine.
Episode 45. Janet Sutherland returns to the Poetry Bath to read from her new hybrid collection, The Messenger House, and talk to me about her great-great grandfather's journeys to Serbia in the mid-nineteenth century and her own trip there in 2018. The book interweaves journal entries, letters, poems and other testimony, both real and imaginary, by both Janet and her great-great grandfather, and asks questions about the nature of messages.
Episode 44. Rosie Johnston joins me to read from her work and talk about her childhood in Northern Ireland, her love of the sea and how it’s been integral to her healing from complex PTSD. We also discuss her experimental 17 syllable form (her ‘Wee Seventeens’) and much more.
Episode 43. Sheereen Khan reads from her memoir Belonging, Biryani and Bacon, which won second place in the Bridport Memoir Prize 2023. Sheereen talks to me about how food both united and divided her Irish Catholic mother and Indian Muslim father.
Episode 42. Benjamin Cusden reads from his collection Cut the Black Rabbit and tells me about his experience of homelessness and healing.
Episode 41. Lawrence Wilson returns to the Poetry Bath to read from his latest collection, Brick, a book-length sequence of poems from the first year of the Covid pandemic. Lawrence talks to me about friendship, love, walking, worrying and cooking in the weird year of 2020.
Episode 40. Mara Bergman reads from her work and chats to me about her childhood in New York, how she first came to London and fell in love with Britain, and how her twin careers as a poet and a children's writer interweave.
Episode 39. Maria Jastrzebska reads from her latest collection, Small Odysseys, and talks to me about her early childhood in Warsaw and later life in London and Brighton, and what it means to move between two cultures.
Episode 38. S J Fowler talks about the serious business of messing around. I hear how Steve has fun with writing and performance and cultivates a sense of joy and playfulness in his work.
Episode 37. Susie Campbell reads from her work and chats with me about the importance of textures, margins and liminality in her writing.
Episode 36. Alex Josephy tells me about her two lives in England and Italy and the meaning of home.
Episode 35. Janet Sutherland joins me to read from her latest collection, Home Farm, and talk about water meadows, eels and growing up on a dairy farm in Wiltshire.
Episode 34. Writer, actor and kindly man of the cloth Kevin Scully joins me to read from his work and talk about his life in Australia, East London and now in the leafy Weald.
Episode 33. I meet David Caddy to listen to David's work and chat about his interest in literary sociology and the ecology of poetry, and his love of the landscape and people of Dorset where he's lived for most of his life.
Episode 31. Vilde Bjerke Torset tells me about asemic and visual poetry, frogs, horses and the meaninglessness of everything.
Episode 30. Rhyming translator-poet Timothy Adès reads from his work and shares his love of music and singing.
Episode 29. Alexandra Corrin-Tachibana reads from her collection Sing me down from the dark and tells me about the ten years she spent living and teaching in Japan and her return to Britain.
Episode 28. Robert Hamberger joins me to read from his work and talk about walking, his love of John Clare and how he found a home in Sussex.
Episode 27. Lydia Harris reads from her recent work and tells me about her life on the Orkney island of Westray.
Episode 26. Raine Geoghegan joins me to read from her work and talk about her Romany heritage and her love of music and dance.
Episode 25. Jessica Mookherjee and I meet at the lovely Gallipot Inn in Upper Hartfield, East Sussex to talk about rock'n'roll, female desire and Jessica's collection Play Lists.
Episode 24. Di Slaney tells me about her life rescuing, nurturing and writing about wonky animals.
Episode 23, in which I meet Alison Sanders, Helen Bardsley, Lucy Horswill and Robert Nagle on Ashdown Forest to walk, write and talk about our shared loved of the Forest.
Episode 22, in which Terri Mullholland reads her flash fiction and talks to me about the influence of her childhood and parents on her writing.
Episode 21, Sarah Salway reads from her playful collection Not Sorry and tells me about the joys of hybrid writing.
Episode 20. Josephine Balmer and I discuss the role of translation in her work and what it means to live with ghosts.
Episode 19. Stephen Plaice joins me to read from and discuss his Sussex-based novel The Hardham Divine.
Episode 18. Lawrence Wilson returns to read from There is so much I could say, an anthology of poems written by Wilson and Martha Gould with members of the Rare Dementia Support Research Project.
Episode 17, in which JC Niala and I talk about her work recreating a 1918 allotment and our shared love of languages and gardening.
Episode 16, in which I talk to Phil Vernon about his work in peace-building and about the power and powerlessness of poetry.
Episode 15, in which Katrina Rideout tells me about her love of Ashdown Forest, liminal spaces and manga novels.
Episode 14, in which Lawrence Wilson and I share our love of spring and read spring-themed poems by ourselves and others.
Episode 13, in which Patricia Robson and I talk about poetry, storytelling and the wearing of masks.
Episode 12, in which I walk on Ashdown Forest with James Adler and talk about how we can care for our endangered heathlands.
Episode 11, in which Mark Chambers tells me about his career in the police force and the joys and disappointments of being a police-officer poet.
Episode 10, in which Sarah Miles tells me about her work teaching poetry to children, running Paper Swans Press and about her love of Eric Satie.
Episode 9, in which Susan Castillo Street talks about the impact of her early life in the American Deep South upon her writing and her subsequent academic and poetic career in Europe.