Quantock Poetry Trail

Tender description

The role of the Quantocks in the Romantic Poet’s development, particularly that of Coleridge and Wordsworth, is an important part of the cultural heritage of the area. Beyond the legacy of the poetry itself, perhaps the most significant contribution of the Romantic Poets was their invention of the idea of “landscape” as something to be appreciated and understood at an emotional and spiritual level rather than thought of only in terms of financial or military value. They were amongst the first and most influential to describe what we now call “sense of place”. This project seeks to explore the varied perceptions of landscape, and the emotions it engenders, through the medium of poetry. The project will embrace the theme of a Quantock – inspired journey. There are three elements, a collection of inclusive curated poetry created ‘en plein air’ in the manner of the Romantic poets, a located audio “poemscape” (Users download an App and ‘go seek’ the poems in the landscape, on finding the location, the poem is automatically triggered (through GPS) on the participant’s phone), the whole tied together with authentically situated re-imagined conversations between the Romantic poets as they invented Romantic poetry in 1798 in the Quantocks. QLPS has other smaller lower key community poetry events in parallel, so although public involvement was important, we did also want to end up with a collection of new poetry that could stand on its own literary merits as part of the QLPS legacy. This project is one of 23 that make up the Quantock Landscape Partnership Scheme, a £2.6m 5-year umbrella project that started in April 2020. It is hosted by the Quantock Hills AONB and supported by the National Heritage Lottery Fund and other funders. The entire LPS, including “Unlocking the Archives”, is fully externally funded. The QLPS was developed with extensive internal and external consultation during 2018 -2019 and the bid was submitted in August 2019 with formal SCC approval. NLHF made their funding offer in December 2019 and the LPS started delivery in April 2020.