2. Charlotte Mew on the Threshold

Through five fluctuating reputations, Ian Sansom explores very different variations of what we might call near-fame: the once-fashionable and now forgotten; the critically admired but never widely read; the artists overshadowed by big names or big movements; the careers derailed by circumstance; the work that doesn’t fit what the culture is looking for. He suggests that obscurity tells us what a culture values, and just as importantly, what it overlooks. In exploring the careers of the almost-famous, Sansom charts a map of shifting tastes, attention, fashion, politics and technology.

In this second essay, Ian Sansom considers poet Charlotte Mew. Although admired by major writers like Hardy, Auden and Virginia Woolf, Mew never gained the recognition her supporters expected. Her career becomes a way of thinking about poetry that resists simple categorisation, about queerness, class and personal reticence as forces shaping reception.

Presenter: Ian Sansom
Producer: Sara Davies
Sound Designer: Matt Bainbridge