Hinterlands – Travels around England’s non-league football grounds, by Christopher Towers, published by Big White Shed, Price: £10
FOOTBALL and poetry don’t often go together, so Christopher Towers’ Hinterlands has already got something different about it.
Towers, a senior lecturer at Nottingham Trent University, explores his love of non-league football as he travels around the ‘hinterlands’, the less than well-known places where the game is played.
His volume of poems captures scenes from high in the hills of Buxton, to the post-industrial surround-ings of Pontefract and the salty air of Cleethorpes.
As Towers explains, the poems are not just about the match. They are about the place and the people, and should be put in a wider context.
He writes: “Non-league football encourages wider reflections away from the games themselves.
“These games have none of the hype of the professional game and capture far more of life beneath the spectacle or the circus.
“The spectators are closer to the pitch and have more time and space to talk, reflect and observe, free of the hassles of being penned in with many thousands of others in restricted spaces.”
Alongside each poem is the scoreline and date as well as a short description of the venue and how to get there. Raphael Achache should also take a bow for some wonderful illustrations that add an extra touch of class to the book.
This collection covers two seasons – from the late summer of 2018 to the January of 2020, just before the global pandemic hit these shores. It will be interesting to see if Towers decides to produce a follow-up effort.
Rating out of 10: 7
● Christopher Towers writes for The Non-League Paper and is poet for Sheffield FC. Hinterlands is available from: https://fiveleavesbookshop. co.uk/product/hinterlands
