“An emotional journey into the individual lives and testimonies that make up the whole picture of a history so integral to the area in which we live and work”
Coal was the fuel to the Industrial Revolution, and in the years following this it was the central industry for many of the towns (or ‘pit villages’) in Sheffield and the surrounding area. So much so, that it became the livelihood of these populations. In areas where the coal industry was booming (primarily in the North of England and in Wales), 1 in 20 were employed by it. Indeed, if like me you come from an ex-mining town yourself, you’ll be all too familiar with the assertion that ‘every male member of my family went down the pit…until it came to me’, as stated by poet and one of the contributors to this piece of work, Ian Parks; or, as my grandad would say, ‘there were only two jobs for lads when they left school – soldier or miner’…
You’ll also be all too familiar with the catastrophic impact that pit closures had (and arguably continue to have) on the places whose economies relied on them. Not to mention the contentious period of striking – of violent clashes between police and community at picket lines, and of poverty, hunger and destitution at home – that feature so strongly in our collective memory (try mentioning the name Thatcher around here and you’ll cause quite a stir!)
All in all, the history of the miners’ strikes and of life in coal mining communities has shaped the identity of the area in which we study, work and live, and of the people who we share it with. Coal is an attempt to bring together the individual histories of people connected to this heritage, into a larger history of our roots as working-class people in this region.
Coal is an anthology of poetry, prose and photographs to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the miners’ strikes, which took place from March 1984 to March 1985. It is a collaborative effort that saw publishers The Poetry Business working alongside the National Coal Mining Museum for England, with the help of poet Sarah Wimbush, who already has an extensive collection of poems about the miners’ strikes. The anthology includes the works of established poets, the likes of Ian McMillan, Liz Berry, and Gillian Clarke, but also includes contributions by younger poets, and members of the public from North England and Wales (historic coal mining communities) who attended writing workshops hosted by The Poetry Business earlier in the year.
Many of the poems and fragments that were spoken at the Off The Shelf event were vulnerable snapshots of people’s lives and reminiscences of coal before, during, and after the strikes, and the effect of hearing these read by the authors themselves was highly emotive. 40 years on from the strikes, the slagheaps have turned to hills and the old pit wheels have become nothing but curious landmarks, but the emotional traces of this lost identity are still present.
I hope that this anthology is the beginning of a wider appreciation of coal mining as a significant part of contemporary British history, and that these stories can be rediscovered by the first generation with no first-hand experience of this period. After all, the themes of counter-culture, communities coming together, and celebrating working-class people and history, are still applicable 40 years later.
Rating: ★★★★★
Coal was published in November 2024. Other Off the Shelf Festival events can be found here
