| Ian McMillan | |
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| Born | 21 January 1956 Darfield, Barnsley, Yorkshire |
| Occupation | poet, journalist, playwright, broadcaster |
| Nationality | British |
| Period | 1980–present |
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www.uktouring.org.uk/ian-mcmillan/ |
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Literature portal |
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Ian McMillan (born 21 January 1956 in Darfield, South Yorkshire[1]) is a British poet, journalist, playwright and broadcaster who has continued to live in Darfield.[2]
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McMillan graduated from North Staffordshire Polytechnic in 1978. He started performing on the live poetry circuit in the 1970s. He has had several volumes of poetry published for both adults and children. He is an enthusiastic advocate of poetry. In addition he has had journalism published in Q magazine and Mojo magazine, and writes a weekly column in his home town's local newspaper, The Barnsley Chronicle. He has the unique honour of being the first poet in residence to a football club, his hometown Barnsley FC. His play Sister Josephine Kicks the Habit, based on the work of fellow Yorkshireman Jake Thackray premiered in 2005. In June 2010 McMillan was appointed poet-in-residence at English National Opera.[3]
McMillan hosts the weekly show The Verb and Proms variation Adverb on BBC Radio 3, "dedicated to investigating spoken words around the globe". According to the Radio Times, he is the 22nd Most Powerful Person in Radio. He is also a regular roving contributor to BBC Radio 4 Today Programme where he was Election Laureate. During January 2007, he presented a BBC Radio 3 series on the art of writing, Ian McMillan's Writing Lab, talking to a range of writers including Julian Barnes, Mark Ravenhill, Howard Jacobson and Michael Rosen. He has appeared on BBC Radio 4's long-running panel game Just A Minute.
He is a regular guest on Newsnight Review, The Mark Radcliffe Show, The Today Programme, You & Yours, The Culture Show, Never Mind The Full Stops and Have I Got News For You?. He narrates The Museum on BBC 2 on Thursdays and has also been the voice behind adverts for Persil and Oats so simple.
McMillan is a regular judge of poetry competitions. In December 2006, McMillan judged the "Central Trains Poetry Competition" and the winners, from the Royal Grammar School Worcester, were awarded with a signed copy of his poem "Take me on a Christmas Trip on Central Trains" at Birmingham Snow Hill Station.[4][5][6] He was also a judge in the Foyle Young Poets Awards 2008, and went as a teacher with the winners for a week to The Hurst, an Arvon centre based in Shropshire, as part of their prize.[7] He judged the 2009 Cardiff International Poetry Competition for the award ceremony in June.
In 2005, as Poet Laureate for the Three Cities (Nottingham, Leicester and Derby), he was involved in the Three Cities Create and Connect scheme, which included a regional writing competition. The project resulted in a now-scarce publication, A Tale of 3 Cities : New Writing from Derby, Leicester and Nottingham. McMillan contributed a foreword and two original pieces, "Here.Now.Then" and "The Laureate Reflects" as well as co-authoring (with six regional writers) "Three Cities Chain Poem".[8]
In 2007, McMillan published a book named Collins Chelp and Chunter: a Guide to the Tyke Tongue. This was a compilation of words that are used in the Yorkshire dialect as well as a few pieces of Yorkshire humour and illustrations. Many words are pinned down to specific areas of Yorkshire or specific towns or villages; one word, lenerky, that means "soft or floppy", is even ascribed to Grange Moor, a very small village in Kirklees, West Yorkshire near Wakefield between the towns of Barnsley and Huddersfield.[9]