Andrew McMillan
Andrew McMillan’s first poetry collection Physical won the Guardian First
Book Award and a Somerset Maugham Award, amongst others. He is a senior lecturer at Manchester Writing School, in Manchester Metropolitan University.
What’s your first Yorkshire memory? I was born in Barnsley so I guess all my memories are Yorkshire memories to a certain extent. What I think is my first memory is being on the porch of my grandma’s house and my dad is holding me and I’m looking out into the garden and pointing and asking: “What’s that?” and my dad says: “Snow.”
What’s your favourite part of the county and why? I have to say where
I’m from, right? I think that’s the rule – so I’ll say South Yorkshire, and in particular Barnsley; not just because it’s familiar and homely but because I think it’s really beautiful; the way industry and ex-industry rubs up against places that are beginning to go back to nature and be rewilded.
What’s your idea of a perfect weekend/day out in Yorkshire? It would be December, me and my boyfriend would drive over to The Hepworth and go to the brilliant Christmas markets they have there, before wandering around whatever dazzling exhibition is on at the time. Then we’d go to the theatre, to The Crucible, probably to the studio space, to see some new writing by a brilliant local playwright. We’d stay over. Then on the Sunday we’d go and visit my grandma in Darfield, and eat all of the home-made egg custard that she bakes every week.
Do you have a favourite walk, or view? If I’m back at my parents’ house, and I open the Velux window in the loft, and hang out slightly, you can see the cemetery where three of my grandparents are buried that runs into the back of the garden, and beyond that the undulations of the landscape, of hills and grassedover slag heaps, and now a windfarm and a big warehouse factory. It’s the view of my childhood and it’s a view that’s always changing as the place changes. When the air is cool and the sky is clear, I could hang there for hours, just looking out.
Which Yorkshire stage or screen star (past or present) would you like to take for lunch, and why?
Judi Dench is from York and Sir Ben Kingsley is from Scarborough, so I think I’d take both of them out for dinner and I’d ask them about being in so many films I loved, about how they’d made it, about whether they still felt a connection to where they were born, even though their work had taken them away.
If you had to name your Yorkshire ‘hidden gem’, what or where would it be? I’m not sure if it counts as hidden, but there is a brilliant theatre company in Huddersfield called Proper Job, that I worked with last year on a re-telling of The Portrait of Dorian Gray. Not only do they do brilliant theatre work, experimental and new, but they also do vital community work, helping people with confidence and employability.
What do you think gives Yorkshire its unique identity? The tension between its countryside and its townspaces, often jostling side by side. Also the ability of its people to strike up a conversation with anybody.
How do you immerse yourself in Yorkshire’s cultural life? I think the life of Yorkshire is cultural, its theatres, its galleries, its shops, its chants in the football grounds.
Do you have a favourite restaurant or pub? Thaal, in Darfield, does a brilliant curry, and is a great place to go with the family or with friends to catch up. I remember when it first opened I was sceptical about whether there would be a market for it, whether it might survive. But it’s thrived and it’s a great thing for a small village to have.
Do you have a favourite food shop?
I bet everyone says Bettys. Is that a cliché? I do love it there, for the cake. Actually, I spend most of my time in Yorkshire either on a train passing through, or on cold station platforms, and I’m more and more grateful for the little independent pubs and cafes.