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BBC Radio 4 Extra

Poetry Extra

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Weekly opportunity for listeners to revisit the riches of the BBC radio poetry archive

A brand new poetry slot on Radio 4 Extra gives listeners a weekly opportunity to revisit the riches of the BBC radio poetry archive

Poetry Extra: Lost Voices: Robert Service

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28/01/2018

Lost Voices: Robert Service

BBC Radio 4 Extra - Poetry Extra, Lost Voices: Robert Service

Poet Daljit Nagra selects Lost Voices featuring Robert Service.

4 Extra Debut. Poet Daljit Nagra selects Lost Voices featuring Robert Service, a favourite poet of presenter Brian Patten. From May 2011.

Poet Daljit Nagra revisits the BBC's radio poetry archive with 'Lost Voices' featuring Robert Service. 

As a young man, Brian Patten was fascinated by the life and work of Robert Service, who in the early years of the 20th century left a banking job in Glasgow for the excitement of the goldrush in the Yukon. He almost immediately found himself working in a bank again, but he was now in a romantic wilderness. In the bars of Whitehorse he heard wonderful stories of life in the Gold Rush which he transmuted into Kipling-inspired verse, and he was soon the best-paid poet in the western world. Yet despite his huge popularity, he remained the self-described 'man who wouldn't fit in'. 

Now, though honoured in Canada, Robert Service's work is almost forgotten.

Poems read by James Cosmo.

Producer Christine Hall

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2011.

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