The Verb

Ian McMillan explores the skill of collaboration - joined by guests Nicci Gerrard and Sean French, who write best-selling thrillers under the pseudonym Nicci French, and by Britain's finest, if only, comedy-jazz-rap duo 'Harry and Chris' (poet Harry Baker is a Poetry Slam Champion, and Chris Read is an award winning songwriter); they talk - and sing - about the ups and downs of creative collaboration. Nicci French's latest book is 'The House of Correction'. 'Harry and Chris' are performing with a socially distanced audience in May and June.https://www.harryandchris.com/

What kind of writing keeps us thinking about technology and social media platforms, and their place in our lives - especially when they're seamlessly woven into our days? Ian McMillan is joined by comedian and actress Isy Suttie, political analyst Nanjala Nyabola, the poet Jack Underwood, and communications lecturer Dr Paul Taylor.Isy Suttie writes and performs a brand new song for The Verb about disappearing into the wormhole of the smartphone, and considers throwing her devices into the sea. But will that just encourage sharks to tweet, she wonders? Isy won a Sony Award for her radio series 'Pearl and Dave'; her novel 'Jane is Trying' is published later this year.Political Analyst and essayist Nanjala Nyabola tells us about the satisfaction of finding Kiswahili words for technological terms conceived in English, and how important the right language is for shaping our political futures. Nanjala shares her love of the work of Botswanan writer Bessie Head and discusses her collection of essays 'Travelling While Black'.Poet Jack Underwood's new book is a lyric essay, combining poetry and prose; it's called 'Not Even This: Poetry, parenthood and living' and is a tender exploration of time, uncertainty and fatherhood. Jack argues for poetry as a respite from the risks of generalisation and certainty that much of today's technology seems to encourage.Dr Paul Taylor is a senior lecturer in communications theory at the University of Leeds, and he avoids social media completely. Paul explains why he looks for insights into how technology may be influencing not just how we use our time - but what we think we are here for - in the work of Italian novelist Italo Calvino and in the novels of French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre.

Ian McMillan celebrates pauses and punctuation with guests Kei Miller, Eley Williams, Kate Fox and Angela Leighton. They explore the different emotions, listening and reading experiences prompted by brackets, full stops, em dashes, blank spaces, and other writerly ways of building obstacles, time and listening into poetry and prose.Eley Williams reads a brand new commission for The Verb, a very short story, which delights in the longest dash of all - the em dash, putting it at the heart of a romance. Eley is the author of the novel 'The Liar's Dictionary' and a BBC National Short Story Finalist.Verb regular and stand-up poet Kate Fox offers a very personal review of various forms of punctuation - imagining them as rest stops. Is a full stop like 'bunking in a hostel on a Scottish island and rolling over on to a pocket full of Kendal Mint Cake in the middle of the night'? Kate thinks so.Poet and essayist Kei Miller discusses the way he uses space on the page, particularly in his new book of essays 'Things I have Withheld', to explore what is buried or repressed in silences. He also reads from his poetry collection 'In Nearby Bushes'.Angela Leighton, poet, critic and translator, opens brackets up for us - showing how they let us listen, especially in a poem, in a remarkable variety of ways. Angela also reads from her collection 'One, Two', evoking the soundscape and listening of the first lockdown of 2020.

How determined do you have to be to become a writer? How do you return to the page every day when inspiration runs dry, or you receive a rejection? And how do you know when to step away in case your writing becomes over-determined. To answer these questions Ian McMillan is joined by guests including Paula Byrne who has just written a new biography of the British novelist Barbara Pym, who wrote for many years before being published, and was unceremoniously dropped by her publisher when her work become unfashionable.Monique Roffey's novel 'The Mermaid of Black Conch' won the Costa Book of the Year Award 2020 - but its path to publication wasn't straightforward. Here Monique discusses keeping faith in your work when it doesn't appear to fit in any boxes.And we have brand new poetry from Marvin Thompson, winner of the National Poetry Competition award for his poem '‘The Fruit of the Spirit is Love (Galatians 5:22)’ and from Iona Lee who has written us a new poem on 'Determination'.Presenter: Ian McMillan Producer: Jessica Treen

Ian McMillan and guests delight in the writing and naming of planets (Ian loves Neptune best), exploring how we as writers influence the perception of them, and how our perception may influence how humans treat them.Bettany Hughes is a historian, author and broadcaster. She shares her passion for Venus (planet and goddess) and looks at the first poem where the moon is depicted as 'silvery'. Bettany is exploring the big questions of the universe in films called 'Tea with B', and in her interview with author Ben Okri describes poetry as 'The Mothership'.Two of the earth's most exciting sound poets - Hannah Silva and Tomomi Adachi tell Ian how they created sound poetry for Pluto, and explored its ambiguous status (it is not officially a planet any more). They also perform a spontaneous sound poem, especially for The Verb, celebrating the vast number of icy bodies with fascinating names in the Kuiper Belt.JO Morgan's collection 'The Martian's Regress' is a remarkable thought experiment - imagining humans leaving Earth for Mars, and then returning here in thousands of years’ time, only to be disappointed by our solitary moon. In poems which explore what it means to 'subjugate' a planet to make it support life, Morgan also considers the role of myth and story in building our relationship with a planet.Kate Greene almost lived on Mars. She was one of a team selected by Nasa to take part in an experiment in Hawaii, where she lived in a geodesic dome for four months in order to simulate what it would be like on Mars. A journalist, author and poet, Kate found herself thinking differently, and considering the relationship of the body to the Earth. Her account of the experience can be found in her book 'Once Upon a Time I Lived on Mars'.

Ian McMillan on how 'writing at home' inspires, constrains and infuses language and storytelling - with guests Maggie O'Farrell, whose award-winning novel 'Hamnet' takes us inside Shakespeare's home, the unofficial Poet Laureate of Twitter Brian Bilston, Berlin-based writer and football pundit Musa Okwonga, and poet Holly Peste, who has written a specially commissioned piece inspired by the sound of writing at home.Producer: Ruth Thomson

This year, F Scott Fitzgerald's classic The Great Gatsby enters the public domain. What will this mean for one of America's best loved novels?Ian McMillan is joined by the academic and writer Sarah Churchwell, author of 'Careless People: Murder, Mayhem and the invention of The Great Gatsby', to discuss why the language of the book is still so resonant to us today.And poet and playwright Inua Ellams considers the quality of 'emptiness' in the text and how Fitzgerald's writing made this glittering world of parties feel so hollow.Jonathan Bate's new book is 'Bright Star, Green Light: The Beautiful and Damned Lives of John Keats and F. Scott Fitzgerald'. Bate joins us to take us on a 'Keatsian' reading of The Great GatsbyAnd to examine the idea of the public domain, we'll also be looking at what it means to remix and play around with a text with musician, broadcaster and technologist LJ Rich. LJ is a synesthete - how does she Fitzgerald's book, famously drenched in colour from green lights to yellow cocktail music?Presenter: Ian McMillan Producer: Jessica Treen

In a world of daily pleases and thank yous, obligatory thank-you notes, and polite appreciation how can we express authentic gratitude with sincerity? Has lockdown made us more grateful? Can the expectation of gratitude be a burden?Poet Kate Fox assesses the etiquette of writers’ acknowledgements – who to thank? How much is too much? Is there such a thing as oversharing? Comedy writer Jack Bernhardt imagines how grateful you’d have to be – forever - if Superman saved your life. Sound artist Leafcutter John makes gratitude reverberate through a sheet of steel, and poet Michael Symmons Roberts reflects on the complexity of expressing gratitude in praise poetry, in a post-secular world.Producer: Ruth Thomson

Guilty pleasure. Airport novel. Holiday reading.The language used to describe crime fiction often suggests that there's something throwaway in the ability to craft a gripping story that keeps the reader guessing. There's a suggestion that creating "a page-turner" is something of a lesser skill when it comes to writing. Creeping up on that idea from behind and leaving its body in the library, we have three women who know a thing or two about the literature of crime. Val McDermid is a powerhouse of popular fiction, with works translated into 40 languages and more than 16 million books sold. She tells us about the narrative techniques she uses to keep us up late reading "just one more chapter" of novels like "Still Life".Sophie Hannah has been trusted with one of the crown jewels of detective fiction - Hercule Poirot. She tells us about the responsibility of taking on Agatha Christie's beloved character, and about how she switches modes for nail biters like "Haven't they Grown". Katherine Stansfield writes the historical crime series The Cornish Mysteries - and tells us about one of the initial efforts to make the crime genre "respectable" - formalised techniques and rules drawn up by a collection of some of the greatest popular fiction writers in the world - The Detection Club. Presented by Ian McMillan Produced by Kevin Core

You can talk the talk but can you walk the walk? At The Verb, we do both, as Ian McMillan is joined by guests who consider the deep connection between writing and walking. From the strut to the swagger, the amble to the lope, English has many words to get from A to B - all conveying a slightly different meaning. So where does writing and the physical journey meet?Jini Reddy talks about the quest for magic in the great outdoors, which is the subject of her Wainwright shortlisted book Wanderland. Theatre maker Testament tells us about his work "Black Men Walking" and proves that the inspirations and insights of a walk don't have to be based in the countryside, with a performance of his work City Song, a rap which sees us float through an urban landscape almost in a sleepwalk. Ira Lightman has recorded a special reaction to Wordsworth - surely the poet who is most often associated with the restorative powers of a walk - but the relationship with walking and feeling good is more nuanced for Ira. And Stuart Maconie gives us his insights into the ramble, stressing that walking should be all about inclusion. He asks us to be wary of language that suggests anyone is not welcome in the outdoors, and considers stepping out as a spur to creativity. Presented by Ian McMillan Produced by Kevin Core