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Jonathan Coe’s new novel ‘Middle England’ (Viking)  has been called ‘a delightful skewering of British nostalgia’, and a ‘state of the nation’ novel. But for The Verb, he explores its Midlands settings as ‘places to think with’. Jonathan also explores the way the fictional landscapes of one of the most famous myth-makers of all, J.R.R Tolkien,  seemed strangely familiar to him when ‘The Hobbit’ was read out at school. It was only later he realised they were based on the woods where he walked as a child.  Jonathan reads a passage from the new novel which gets to the heart of English identity in 2018 – in which he delineates and celebrates the diverse wonders in (that most middle of ‘Middle England’ settings), the super-sized garden centre. 

The language of the Black Country is integral to Liz Berry’s poetry. She reads from her latest collection ‘The Republic of Motherhood’ (Chatto), full of dialect words such as ‘bobowler’; which Liz says allow us to conjure, in our mouths, the voices of people no longer with us. Liz feels there is a lack of knowledge about the Black Country in the wider culture, which is something she likes to turn to her advantage, leaving her free to invent her own myths. 

When Steven Camden was growing up, he navigated complex rules regarding his West Midlands accent – when it was and wasn’t ok to talk as he would at home, and discusses just how different language can sound in the Midlands, a mere bus ride away. Even now, people assume he is younger than he is because of the way he speaks. Steven says he is always writing in celebration of his Jamaican grandparents (particularly his nan) and tries to capture the music of their speech. His new book of poetry for teenagers is ‘Everything All At Once’ (Macmillan).

The Verb brought the Â鶹Éç Folk award-winning musician Ben Walker together with Dr Bethany Whalley (a researcher in early medieval literature, water and the arts) to collaborate on a piece of sound art inspired by ‘Penda’s Fen’. ‘Penda’s Fen’ is a cult 1974 TV film written by David Rudkin and directed by Alan Clarke – it’s the story of a teenager called Stephen, struggling with his sense of identity, who has a series of strange visions in the Worcestershire landscape. Bethany and Ben recorded the piece in Pinvin, where the film was set, to create a piece that celebrates the fen as a space for imagination and preservation, and which asks ‘What’s in a name’? The piece includes the voices of local children, and stage directions from the screenplay. Bethany has contributed an essay to a new book on the film called ‘Of Mud and Flame’ (MIT press) to be published in Spring 2019.