The Ballad of the Blade
Seriously...
BBC
4.1 • 885 Ratings
🗓️ 25 September 2018
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The story of knife crime, told in verse by the weapon itself. Why do teenagers carry knives? How does it feel to live in a world where that's normal? How should we respond to the moral panic generated by the current wave of youth crime? Momtaza Mehri, Young People's Poet Laureate for London, presents a verse-journey into the thoughts and feelings of those for whom knife crime is an everyday reality. Perpetrator or victim, armed or defenceless, all the lines blur in "Ballad of the Blade" - a poem told in the voice of the knife as it travels on a chilling arc out of a child's bedroom, through fear, a yearning to belong and succeed, ruin and - sometimes - redemption. First-person voices from London and Sheffield splinter through the poem, reflecting the mosaic of lives affected by youth violence - bereaved youngsters and determined parents, criminals and youth workers. "Ballad of the Blade" is scored by Jon Nicholls. The programme was devised by Andrew Efah of BBC II! Producer Monica Whitlock.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box. |
| 0:05.0 | The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from. |
| 0:09.0 | And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape. |
| 0:12.0 | The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape. |
| 0:12.5 | The IRA inmates who found a way. |
| 0:14.5 | I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path |
| 0:19.5 | through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history. |
| 0:25.0 | The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them. |
| 0:28.5 | Escape from the maze, listen first on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:34.0 | This is the BBC. |
| 0:37.0 | Hello, I'm Philip Sans, and before you get to your expected podcast, |
| 0:41.0 | I want to tell you about a brand new podcast series from BBC Radio 4. |
| 0:45.0 | It's called The Rat Line and it's a story of a senior Nazi who escaped in |
| 0:49.6 | 1945, went into hiding and four years later came down from the mountains to make his way to Argentina via the Vatican. |
| 0:57.0 | It's a story of life and love, a curious death, Nazis, fascists, and spies, and a genial old man who lives alone in a castle steeped in |
| 1:08.0 | secrets. To subscribe, just search for intrigue, the Ratline, wherever you get your podcasts. |
| 1:15.0 | Hi, I'm Riana Dillon and this is seriously. |
| 1:22.0 | I think with most kids the first night they get is from their mom's kitchen. I think with most kids the first knife to get is from their mom's kitchen. |
| 1:25.0 | You just go in your kitchen and you get, you won't get the biggest knife, |
| 1:28.0 | just get a small knife and conceal it and you feel like, oh, I've got a weapon. |
| 1:33.7 | This poem begins where someone ends, |
| 1:37.2 | at the precise moment where the angle of your desperation |
... |
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