Telling Tales

SHORTLISTED FOR THE TED HUGHES PRIZE 2015

Tabard Inn to Canterb''ry Cathedral,
Poet pilgrims competing for free picks,
Chaucer Tales, track by track, it''s the remix
From below-the-belt base to the topnotch;
I won''t stop all the clocks with a stopwatch
when the tales overrun, run offensive,
or run clean out of steam, they''re authentic
and we''re keeping it real, reminisce this:
Chaucer Tales were an unfinished business.

In Telling Tales award-winning poet Patience Agbabi presents an inspired 21st-century remix of Chaucer''s Canterbury Tales retelling all of the stories, from the Miller''s Tale to the Wife of Bath''s in her own critically acclaimed poetic style.

Celebrating Chaucer''s Middle-English masterwork for its performance element as well as its poetry and pilgrims, Agbabi''s newest collection is utterly unique. Boisterous, funky, foul-mouthed, sublimely lyrical and bursting at the seams, Telling Tales takes one of Britain''s most significant works of literature and gives it thrilling new life.