Xanadu

These poems were written for a poem-film by Simon Armitage in the BBC 2 series Words on Film. The film is set on the Ashfield Valley Estate in Rochdale, Lancashire, which consisted of 26 alphabetically named flats. Ashfield Valley was in the process of being demolished as the poems were written and the film was being made. Simon Armitage was then working as a probation officer, and his first posting as a raw recruit was to Rochdale, where his patch included Ashfield Valley. Xanadu is his personal and imaginative response to the ill-starred estate, using highly innovative and strangely unsettling poetry and film techniques, assisted by contributions from the last surviving Ashfield tenants. Dogs, snow and Hungarian dancers add further zest to Armitage's Xanadu. The book is illustrated with stills from the film.