Congratulations on being shortlisted for the East Midlands Book Awards 2014!
I’m really honoured to be part of the shortlist. The first ‘big’ event I ever took part in as a writer was an East Midlands project called ‘24:8’ many years ago and I met some fantastic people from across the region as part of it – it was the first time I really felt part of an artistic community. So being considered for the prize makes me feel even more part of an East Midlands creative network.
You grew up in Chesterfield before studying at Cambridge University. What brought you back to Derbyshire?
Even when I wasn’t living in Derbyshire I found myself writing about it time and again. It was as if my poems had a kind of homing instinct. When I saw that there were PhD places available to study at Sheffield University, I jumped at the chance to move back. I’ve spent the past 3 years looking at some of the links between science and art, questioning whether poets and neuroscientists are interested in the same mysteries about human consciousness. It’s been a real privilege and I’ve learned a lot.
What are the main themes in your writing and how has living in the East Midlands affected your poetry and your career?
Gritstone edges, pubs and the things that happen in them, people-watching, ex-industrial landscapes, myths and legends.....in no particular order! I’ve always been very inspired by Ian McMillan and the way he recognises that real life can be stranger (and more interesting) than fiction. So I’ve often been drawn to write about familiar places and people although some things get dramatised and fictionalised along the way, of course. The East Midlands is an incredibly diverse place – Nottingham is a world away from Chesterfield, for example, but they also have loads in common – and I grew up with fantastic East Midlands writers like Alan Sillitoe as creative role models. I also write quite a bit about doomed relationships, but I don’t think the East Midlands are to blame for that!
You’ve enjoyed a huge amount of success at a relatively young age. What have been the high points and more challenging moments for you so far?
I feel incredibly lucky to be able to devote so much time to my passion, the thing that defines me, the only thing I’ve ever been any good at. When you try and make writing the centre of your life, every day is different. Just in the past few months as Derbyshire Poet Laureate I’ve relished the opportunity to work with different groups, from primary school children to elderly patients with dementia. I’ve written poems for Chesterfield FC (which meant going to my first football match) and poems for the Tour de France. The biggest challenge in recent years has been keeping poetry itself at the centre of my life and making time to write – poems come from silence, you have to listen to hear them properly.
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And what has surprised you most?
How positively people have responded to my first collection – it’s been almost overwhelming. I worked on the book for about 6 years and I can still hardly believe it’s really in print and in bookshops. I almost faint if I see it on a shelf somewhere
Division Street is your debut collection. Do you have a favourite poem from the book?
The long poem at the heart of the book, ‘Scab’ – it isn’t my favourite as such (your own poems are like your own children, you can’t have favourites!), but it’s the poem I worked hardest on and spent longest revising. Every time I thought it was finished, there was a bit more to write. I was trying to put into words how I felt about the legacy of the miners’ strike – even though I wasn’t born when the strike was at it’s height – and whether or not I succeeded, I’m glad I tried to write about something so challenging. I worked with a few great editors: Parisa Ebrahimi at Random House and a good friend and fellow poet Alan Buckley. They could see more clearly than I could which poems belonged in the book and which could be left out. I think you need real distance from the work to do that. Editors have the patience of saints!
How do you relax and unwind when you aren't working and writing?The cover photograph on Division Street is 'Miners' Strike Orgreave, 1984' by Don McPhee. Did you choose it and why?
I’ve always been incredibly taken by that striking photograph (no pun intended!). It captures a whole world. Don McPhee was a remarkable photographer. Most of the collection isn’t as overtly political as that image might suggest, but it is preoccupied with division – the gaps between people, the everyday distances we open up – and I thought that photo suggested division nicely.
I like to drive up to Burbage Edge, put my climbing shoes on and go soloing (climbing without ropes). There’s nothing better than looking back and seeing the whole valley spread out below you. Teetering on gritstone might not be everyone’s idea of relaxation, but I find being outdoors lets me listen to my own thoughts. I love to write poems in my head when I’m out walking or running too, something about the rhythm of my steps helps me write.
What is the best piece of writing advice anyone has ever given you?
When I was a teenager I went on an Arvon course at Lumb Bank and our tutors encouraged us to read as widely as possible. I don’t think you can do much better than that. Writers should read more than they write. Read anything. If you think a book isn’t useful, it’ll turn out to be crucial.
Who do you most enjoy reading and what are you reading at the moment?
I always love John Burnside’s poetry and prose and at the moment I’m reading his recent memoir ‘I Put a Spell on You’. He makes me feel as if the world is mysterious and full of possibilities, that there are still secrets left to find. I’m also an avid short story reader and always go back to Raymond Carver and Lorrie Moore. Short fiction is so hard to write, I admire anyone who can master the form.
What's next?
I’ll be reading at Buxton Fringe in May, Latitude festival and then at Southwell Poetry Festival on July 20th. Every first Wednesday of the month I host ‘Spire Writers’, an open mic night with featured guest readers at The White Swan in Chesterfield. Anyone is welcome, it’s free and events start at 7.45pm.
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