Longbarrow Press is delighted to announce the publication of Matthew Clegg‘s second full collection, The Navigators.
The poems draw on the dynamic physical geography of Cumbria and the East Yorkshire coast, and on the life (and afterlife) of the canals of Leeds and Mexborough. Versions of Apollonius, Aristophanes and Homer introduce an extra-temporal dimension, most apparent in the closing sequence of the collection, where these mythical, personal and historical threads are finally woven into one fugue-like movement. The Navigators is an affirmation of the reflection and regeneration that we find where waters meet and mingle; these literal and metaphorical thresholds offer both expedition and epiphany.

A beautifully produced 128-page hardback,​ ​The Navigators​ ​is now available from Longbarrow Press for just £12.99​ ​(inc UK P&P​).​ A limited edition CD comprising Clegg’s reading of his sequence ‘Cave Time and Sea Changes’ (recorded in a sea cave in Flamborough, East Yorkshire) is also included with initial orders. You can order the book via The Navigators microsite (which also has poems, recordings and essays relating to the book), or by clicking on the PayPal link below (major debit cards accepted – no PayPal account required):

£12.99 (inc UK P&P)

£16 (inc Europe P&P)

£18 (inc Rest of World P&P)


The Navigators will be launched at the Shakespeare pub, Gibraltar Street, Sheffield S3 8UB at 7.30pm on Thursday 25 June, with a specially devised collaborative reading featuring Matthew Clegg, Ray Hearne and Fay Musselwhite, and musical contributions from guitarist Simon Heywood. Ahead of the Sheffield launch, A Navigation with Matthew Clegg and Ray Hearne on Sunday 24 May is a canal walk that explores the South Yorkshire Navigation for several miles east of Mexborough, with Clegg reading poems that move between the past and present of the waterways, and Hearne performing songs that branch off along tangents suggested by the theme of navigation. Click here for more details (and to reserve places, which must be booked in advance). Here’s a short film of Clegg and Hearne’s rehearsals on the Mexborough Canal:

Ray Hearne also appears with Rob Hindle for a rare performance of Hindle’s acclaimed sequence The Purging of Spence Broughton at Boston Castle, Rotherham, on Wednesday 20 May. Spence Broughton was executed in 1792 for his part in robbing the Sheffield and Rotherham mail; his body was gibbeted at the scene of the crime on Attercliffe Common (between Sheffield and Rotherham), where it hung for 36 years. Click here to read ‘Spence Broughton, Rotherham and the Rights of Man’, a new blog post in which Hindle locates the tale(s) of Broughton within the wider political and historical context of the period. Further details of the Boston Castle event are available here.

Finally, a series of exhibitions at Sheffield’s Bank Street Arts (coinciding with the South Yorkshire Poetry Festival) focus on collaborations between artists and poets, including
Fairytale no. 9, a new work by Angelina Ayers and Beverley Green, and The Frome Primer, a reworking of the 2006 sequence by Andrew Hirst and Brian Lewis that led to the founding of Longbarrow Press. The exhibitions run from 20 May to 30 May; click here for further details.