Magnetic Field: The Marsden Poems

Magnetic Field: The Marsden Poems is a 2020 collection of poems by the English poet Simon Armitage. All 50 of the poems, written throughout his career, relate to places in his home village of Marsden, West Yorkshire. The book contains maps of the village, showing where each poem is situated.

Magnetic Field:
The Marsden Poems
Cover of first edition
AuthorSimon Armitage
Cover artistDesign by Faber, photograph by Simon Armitage
GenrePoetry
Set inMarsden, West Yorkshire
PublisherFaber and Faber
Publication date
15 March 2020
Media typeHardback
Pages89
ISBN978-0-571-36144-1
OCLC1153334504
Preceded bySandettie Light Vessel Automatic 
Websitehttps://www.simonarmitage.com/magnetic-field-the-marsden-poems/

The book has been welcomed by critics, who have noted Armitage's skill and accessibility, and the way he has brought Marsden to life on the page.

Context

Author

Simon Armitage is an English poet, playwright and novelist. He was appointed as Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom in 2019.[1] He is professor of poetry at the University of Leeds and became Oxford Professor of Poetry when he was elected to the four-year part-time appointment from 2015 to 2019. He was born and raised in Marsden, West Yorkshire, and still lives nearby.[2][3]

Motivation

Armitage explains in the book's introduction that when he returned to Marsden with a geography degree, "I started looking out of [my bedroom] window again, and out of the large picture window in the living room with its wide-angle view of Marsden – and I was ready to write... the village became the drawing board or board game on which I could practise my poetics and play out my perspectives."[4] He considers his motivations at that time, such as fabricating an identity, stating that whatever they were, they were "at a subconscious level".[5] He notes that a different account would be needed to explain why he continued to write Marsden poems "on and off – for another three decades".[6] He writes that he found he had been using Marsden to chart "the effects of the recession [from 2008], and the austerity that followed, and a growing sense of marginalisation in what was supposed to be an age of increased communication and connectedness."[7]

Book

It's a doll's house end terrace
with all the trimmings: hanging baskets,
a double garage,
a rambling garden with
a fairy-tale ending and geese

on the river. Inside
it's odd, dovetailed into next door
with the bedrooms
back-to-back, wallpaper walls
so their phone calls ring out

loud and clear ...

Simon Armitage, from "Wintering Out", in
Magnetic Field: The Marsden Poems

Publication history

Magnetic Field: The Marsden Poems was published in hardback on 15 March 2020 by Faber and Faber in London.[8] They brought out a paperback edition in 2021.[9]

Synopsis

The book contains 50 poems about Armitage's home village of Marsden, written at different times throughout his career. The poems are arranged roughly chronologically, not by date of writing but by the date to which each poem applies, something Armitage states could not be precise, as some apply to a range of dates. The endpapers are maps of parts of Marsden at differing scales, keyed to the poems by page numbers in red attached to each poem's location, such as a house, a garden, a reservoir, or a railway bridge.[10]

Recordings

A BBC producer invited Armitage to read some of the poems in situ in their exact Marsden locations. They made recordings including of "Emergency" in the boarded-up fire station; "Harmonium" in St Bartholomew's Church; "Leaves on the Line" at the railway station; and "On Marsden Moor" on the moor around the village.[11]

Reception
The poems are each situated geographically around the village, keyed with red lettering to their page numbers. The provision of maps (small detail shown) has been noted as a convenient feature of the book.[12] The marked outline denotes an inset map of the area around the poet's childhood home.

The poet Jonathan Humble, in The Yorkshire Times, calls the book "a love letter to a muse that was there for the poet at the beginning and has continued to be a source of inspiration through to the present day."[12] He notes that Armitage calls Marsden "genuinely unique … as a liminal, transcendent and transgressive location", and agrees it is an interesting place with a thriving cultural scene. He admires the book's production as "a lovely thing to behold", with its "handy maps", should the reader wish to walk what he predicts will become the "Armitage Trail", and the cover photograph of Marsden including the author's terrace house, and a shiny central band "illustrating (I believe) the magnetic attraction he feels towards the village."[12] He writes that "The Marsden Poet" remains as Samuel Laycock, commemorated in stone in the village's park, noting that "this seems to rankle the Poet Laureate (and with some justification", as Laycock left Marsden when he was 11 years old. Humble concludes that Armitage "surely deserves some physical recognition in the village as, with understated skill and marvellous accessibility, [he] continues to put Marsden on the map."[12]

The critic and editor Kate Simpson, in Poetry School, describes Magnetic Field as "a complex and alluring interpretation of our connection to both interior and exterior spaces: the grass is near touchable; the evening breeze tangible; the 'horizon ablaze' ("Emergency"). The fields await our return."[13] In her view, the Marsden poems "are like cardinal directions, pointing back to the landscape and inviting readers to gather in a geographical amphitheatre."[13]

References
  1. "Simon Armitage: 'Witty and profound' writer to be next Poet Laureate". BBC News. 10 May 2019. Retrieved 10 May 2019.
  2. Flood, Alison (19 June 2015). "Simon Armitage wins Oxford professor of poetry election". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 22 February 2022.
  3. "Biography » Simon Armitage – The Official Website". www.simonarmitage.com. Retrieved 22 February 2022.
  4. Armitage 2020, pp. viii–ix.
  5. Armitage 2020, p. ix.
  6. Armitage 2020, pp. ix–x.
  7. Armitage 2020, p. x.
  8. Armitage 2020, p. iv.
  9. Armitage, Simon (2021). Magnetic field: the Marsden poems (Paperback). London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 978-0-571-36145-8. OCLC 1182515254.
  10. Armitage 2020, pp. vii–xiv.
  11. Armitage 2020, pp. xiii–xiv.
  12. Humble, Jonathan (25 October 2020). "Review: Magnetic Field: The Marsden Poems by Simon Armitage". The Yorkshire Times. Retrieved 22 February 2022.
  13. Simpson, Kate (2021). "Review: Magnetic Field by Simon Armitage". Poetry School. Retrieved 22 February 2022.

Bibliography
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