Ian McMillan

In Red River Valley, the new collection from one of Britain's most treasured living poets, Ian McMillan makes poems from family life, everyday surrealism, and the effect of austerity on the village near Barnsley where he's lived all his life. Language is the playground and form is the rewritten rule book in work that tries to sit on the page and in the ear at the same time. After all these years, he's still trying to find his voice; maybe it's here in Red River Valley, his dad's favourite song.

Poets have grappled with the vexed question of what constitutes Englishness since time immemorial, and the poetry of the past century has seen perhaps some of the biggest evolutions in national identity. Contraflow takes a completely new approach to the subject of Englishness, and in this stimulating and entertaining anthology two poetic currents flow against each other, so that different decades merge, well-known stanzas brushing shoulders with more neglected verse. What emerges is an extraordinary mosaic of poetic responses to English history, culture and landscape – satirical, visionary, lyrical, comic, political, meditative – yet one which offers a recognisable picture of a land both united and divided through a hundred years. A Guardian and Sunday Times poetry book of the year

My sand life, my pebble life. My life measured out in tides, coming in and going out. My life measured out in games of trying to spot the sea first. My life measured out in the delicious and indulgent sadness that comes from leaving a holiday cottage for the last time and for the first time in several days it isn’t raining, but at least the kids have had a great time and, let’s face it, so have you. Warm and darkly funny, this sublimely crafted book transports you (in a blue Ford Zephyr, with an AA route map, a granny in the back and a bingo hall on the horizon) to the world of childhoods by the sea. Specifically, Ian’s memories of childhood: ones we’ll all identify with – endless sunny days on the beach, done to a turn fish and chips, legendary games of cricket, tea and cakes and family crammed into a tiny caravan, holiday cottages that live forever, buckets of shells, a busted fishing net and enough sand to make a beach, with the tide out, way out… In this nostalgic collection of reminiscences (with the odd poem thrown in) journey with Ian as he walks barefoot to the sea to see the sun rise. He is attacked by seagulls, and midges, and wasps. He eats a lot of fish and chips and it’s always the best yet. He nearly avoids a frisbee. He searches for jazz in Scarborough. He walks. He even tries to run. But mostly he savours the sea and our seaside moments and our seaside dreams. If you want a shot of salty sea air, a tussle with a seagull and the congenial companionship of someone described as ‘relentlessly jolly’ (The Guardian), this will be a joyous and moving read.

Around the Coast in 80 Days is an indispensable guide to the very best of Britain’s diverse coastline. Whether you have just an afternoon, a whole day, a free weekend, or a whole week to explore our wonderful country, this book will guide you to 80 of the most interesting, fun and picturesque seaside spots our coast has to offer. Starting at Liverpool, one of the most fashionable tourist destinations in Europe, the book travels clockwise up to Scotland, down the east coast, across the southern shores, up through Wales and back to the northwest of England. It calls in at exciting seaside towns like Blackpool, Brighton and Newquay, and also invites you to explore the more tranquil coastal stretches, such as Balnakeil, Gower Peninsula and the Lizard. Covering nine coastal regions of Britain, chapters provide insights into the history, culture and key features of each place, how to get to there, where to eat – including the best places for fish and chips, and where to stay. Accompanied by beautiful photography and a handy map, and introduced with an entertaining and evocative Foreword by Ian McMillan, the book will delight families, couples and solo explorers of all ages and with all budgets. We all know there’s so much more to explore and enjoy in our beautiful country – this book will help you do just that.

Join poet and broadcaster Ian McMillan as he looks into the past of his native Barnsley, exploring its history and recalling his own experiences of this particular patch of South Yorkshire. Barnsley – mentioned in the Domesday Book – developed incrementally into an important commercial and cultural centre, home to cinemas, theatres, civic life and Barnsley FC, McMillan’s beloved Tykes. Appropriately, the home of an ancient glass industry was also the site of Britain’s first bottlebank. Real Barnsley also tours the surrounding villages and small towns so important to local identity. Penistone, Hoyland Common, Wombwell, Cawthorne, Royston, Carlton, Cudworth, Grimesthorpe and McMillan’s own Darfield are all on his itinerary. Some were mining villages, products of the seventy collieries within a 15 mile radius of Barnsley (all now closed). Others are rural market towns, on the edge of the Pennines. As McMillan discovers the tide of industry has gone out but the heritage tide has flowed, with the establishment of the Elsecar Heritage Centre at an old ironworks, and ‘The Maurice Dobson Museum and Heritage Centre’, at which the author volunteers. And there are always the moors, to which workers have escaped from factories and pits, where the film Kes was shot. McMillan’s Barnsley is nothing if not an eclectic mix, home to brass bands and the Barnsley Chop but the Arctic Monkeys, Saxon and Kate Rusby. It is also home to Michael Parkinson, Dicky Bird, sculptor Graham Ibbeson, Lord Halifax, Ebenezer Elliott, poet, and the highwayman Swift Nick. And plenty of colourful locals including McMillan himself: Real Barnsley is his shared story.

I’m going to define the essence of this sprawling place as best I can. I’m going to start here, in this village, and radiate out like a ripple in a pond. I don’t want to go to the obvious places, either; I want to be like a bus driver on my first morning on the job, getting gloriously lost, turning up where I shouldn’t. I’m going to confirm or deny the clichés, holding them up to see where the light gets in. Yorkshire people are tight. Yorkshire people are arrogant. Yorkshire people eat a Yorkshire pudding before every meal. Yorkshire people solder a t’ before every word they use... If there were such a thing as a professional Yorkshireman, Ian McMillan would be it. He’s regularly consulted as a home-grown expert, and southerners comment archly on his ‘fruity Yorkshire brogue’. But he has been keeping a secret. His dad was from Lanarkshire, Scotland, making him, as he puts it, only ‘half tyke’. So Ian is worried; is he Yorkshire enough? To try to understand what this means Ian embarks on a journey around the county, starting in the village has lived in his entire life. With contributions from the Cudworth Probus Club, a kazoo playing train guard, Mad Geoff the barber and four Saddleworth council workers looking for a mattress, Ian tries to discover what lies at the heart of Britain’s most distinct county and its people, as well as finding out whether the Yorkshire Pudding is worthy of becoming a UNESCO Intangible Heritage Site, if Harrogate is really, really, in Yorkshire and, of course, who knocks up the knocker up?

Ian McMillan is among Britain's most treasured living poets. His books of poems, stories and non-fiction have delighted audiences for almost forty years. To Fold the Evening Star gathers work from eight key collections, distilling an essence of McMillan's diversiform poetry and short prose. Hilarity and tenderness, gravity and light, are interwoven into a bountiful poetic fibre. Brought up to date by a series of new and previously unpublished work, To Fold the Evening Star will satisy both the curious newcomer and the familiar reader alike, providing an ample, lively assortment of the work.

In this day-by-day anthology, the 366 of poems and poetic fragments collected in The Poet's Daybook are linked to the day in question in an imaginative variety of ways: by season, by the poet's birth or death date, by the anniversary of an event commemorated in the poem, or by other, more playful, means, including Ian McMillan's own life. The most celebrated poets in the English language are all represented here - from Arnold to Auden, Keats to Kipling, Owen to Eliot, and Whitman to Walcott. A sprinkling of classical and modern European poets completes a world-class line-up. Ted Hughes' 'Wind', Dylan Thomas's 'Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night', William Wordsworth's 'Daffodils', William Carlos Williams's 'The Red Wheelbarrow', and Dickinson's 'A train went through a burial-gate' are just a handful of the much-loved poems on display, alongside fascinating commentary from the author. Juxtaposing the ancient and the modern, the conservative and the radical, the free-form and the structured, the elegiac and the celebratory, The Poet's Daybook breaks free of the shackles of the traditional anthology to create a collection that is, by turns, surprising, comforting, challenging, moving and funny, but always eclectic, stimulating, instructive and wise.

Poetry Book Society Special Commendation for Spring 2012. Welcome to a strange new world in which a poem can be written using only one vowel, processed through computer code, collaged from film trailers, compiled from Facebook updates, hidden inside a Sudoku puzzle, and even painted on sheep. Discover a multitude of new and unusual poetic forms – from tweet to time-splice, and from skinny villanelle to breakbeat sonnet – in this inspiring and inventive anthology. Adventures in Form features over ninety poems by forty-six contributors including Patience Agbabi, Christian Bök, Joe Dunthorne, Inua Ellams, Roddy Lumsden, Ian McMillan, Paul Muldoon, Ruth Padel and Hannah Silva. Editor: Tom Chivers is a writer and literary arts producer. His books include How To Build A City (2009) and The Terrors (2009), which was shortlisted for the Michael Marks Award. He has edited the Penned in the Margins books Generation Txt (2006), City State: New London Poetry (2009) and Stress Fractures: Essays on Poetry (2010). He received an Eric Gregory Award in 2011. He was also co-Director of London Word Festival from its inception in 2008 until 2011, and was a recipient of a Breakthrough Award from the Paul Hamlyn Foundation.

Now in its fourth edition 'Tyldesley and Grieve's Muscles, Nerves and Movement' has established itself as the leading textbook for the study of movement by occupational therapists. The book provides students with a sound understanding of the way in which bones, joints, muscles and nerves allow the body to perform movement during daily activities. Early chapters provide a foundation for the study of movement, with the complexity of detail increasing as the book progresses. Functional anatomy is related to the movements of daily living and is supported by activities for experiencing and observing the way we perform everyday tasks. Later chapters consider the integration of sensory and motor processes for the planning and execution of movement. This fourth edition has been extensively updated and revised. Highly illustrated and now in full colour throughout the book also includes: • Case histories with self assessment exercises • Summary boxes • Key terms • Practice notepads

For a Yorkshireman who has spent half a lifetime in his native pit village, moving south is a mixed blessing and it is where Richard Matthewman's memories begin as he looks back with affection, humour, and no small measure of exasperation at 42 summers - and bitter winters. From boyhood through adolescence to marriage and a family, his stories are filled with a rich gallery of characters. Ian has been Poet in Residence at Barnsley Football Club, Northern Spirit Trains and Humberside Police.

This is a collection of poems and prose pieces that continue the author's exploration of self, place, history and comedy: from columns for BBC Radio 4, to a poetic journal of a Mexican visit; and from poems for "Arts Management Weekly" to poems rejected by editors as too bizarre for children.

A mixture of stories, poems and autobiography: the donkey survives the fire, and the poet survives in a northern world where the sun does not shine equally or often on all and where Postman Pat pens a suicide note, maddened by his theme tune, but keeps on driving all the same. Ian McMillan is a regular radio and television presenter and contributor to "NMW" and other magazines.