Nobody's Subject

'From John Frost to Richey Edwards, the Welsh Valleys have a proud tradition of eloquent and passionate dissent and, in Nobody's Subject, Mike Jenkins again proves himself a worthy inheritor of this tradition. This collection of political poems has an impressive range of moods, from the protest song sincerity of 'No Boom, Just Bust' and 'Fairwood Drive, ' through the brilliant satire of 'Abandon the Valleys' and the broader comedy of poems about UKIP candidates' experiences with animals, to 'Of Possibilities, ' a touching poem of fatherhood and the way political activism can be passed through the generations. In a world in which poetry can sometimes be dismissed as the plaything of the middle classes or a bubble-wrapped academic elite, here are important poems to shelve next to Tony Harrison, Alan Sillitoe and Robert Tressell, a collection for all of us, about what really matters now. ' - Jonathan Edwards, winner of Costa Prize for poetry, 2015.