Private Passions

Maurice Riordan is a poet much preoccupied with time - how time suddenly stands still, or speeds up, or loops you back in dreams to childhood - in his case, to the countryside of County Cork where he grew up. It's a theme he's explored in four prize-winning collections of verse, alongside translations and a series of anthologies - including an anthology of very early Irish poetry, scribbled by Irish monks in the margins of Latin texts. In his day job, he's professor of poetry at Sheffield Hallam University and was until recently editor of Poetry Review. In Private Passions, Maurice Riordan talks to Michael Berkeley about his childhood in the "horse-drawn, candle-lit" Irish countryside and the music which inspires him, beginning with the Gregorian Chant he heard as a young altar boy. We hear the haunting unaccompanied voice of the traditional Irish singer Darach Ó Cathain, and of the Traveller and banjo player Margaret Barry. Other choices include Debussy, Piazzola and Samuel Barber. Ian Bostridge sings an ari