Poetry Extra: Murmur

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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

Murmur

BBC Radio 4 Extra - Poetry Extra, Murmur

Daljit Nagra chooses the very best programmes from the BBC's poetry archive.

Poet Daljit Nagra introduces 'Murmur' in which author Julia Blackburn expresses the loss of her husband through poetry. From 2016.

Poet Daljit Nagra revisits the BBC's radio poetry archive selecting 'Murmur'  in which Julia Blackburn reads her poem about the death of her husband and flocks of winter starlings.   

Not long after her husband died she found herself drawn to write a series of poems about his last years and his life.  At the same time near their Suffolk home Julia watched the great seething and pulsing of winter starling murmurations.  Without expecting it she also found that the starlings flew into her poem and began to help her make sense of her husband's death.  

Her book of poems is called: Murmurations of Love, Grief and Starlings.  She reads it, talks about her husband and tries to hear the sound of ten thousand starlings wheeling through the dusk of a winter's day.  

Producer:  Tim Dee

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 2016.

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