Graeme Farnell: Bayble: Capital of Poetry

We’re 50 miles off the west coast of Scotland. On the Isle of Lewis, a two-and-a-half hour ferry journey from the mainland. And we’ve come to one of 94 small townships and villages on the island. It’s called Bayble. Fewer than 400 people live here.

But this settlement is different. It has reared an unprecedented number of poets, three of them internationally acclaimed. Despite their poetry not being written in English. The area has been called the “poetry capital of the world”, and the emergence of Bayble poets in such numbers into the European mainstream, “unparalleled”.

This book, in stark, simple images, explores the environment which helped produce this phenomenon – its architecture, coast and landscape. At times beautiful, at others in decay, the setting – and the poetry it has inspired – are both powerful and unique.