In Poetry and Strikes, Michael James outlines, examines, and critiques the cultural legacies of strike action—primarily the miners’ strike of 1984–85—and brings this into dialogue with the historical development of trade unionism and broader society in a post-Thatcher Britain. James’ positionality is refreshingly situated upfront. On page three, he states that “trade unions matter” in upholding and advancing the interests and material conditions of the working-class, and it is the decline in union membership, power, and legitimacy since the 1980s that can explain the concomitant decline in work and living standards. These trends, and their socio-economic impacts, are not the focus of the work, however. James is interested in the ways in which strikes shape artistic expression through poetry, and how narratives of strikes (and the associated aspects of union leaders, political actors, government agencies) are subsequently shaped and reshaped through poetic writing. This is an ambitious piece of work, but one that James asserts is necessary, as poetry represents a form “through which dominant narratives and official histories can be challenged” (5).

In the introductory chapter, we are briefly introduced to the sextet of poets on whose work James focuses. Their writing spans two waves: Barry MacSweeney, Tony Harrison, and Sean O'Brien wrote in the midst of industrial action in the 1970s and 1980s; and Paul Bentley, Helen Mort, and Steve Ely, whose writing post-2010 confronts the legacies of industrial action and the broader context of deindustrializing Britain. I wanted to know much more about the poets themselves beyond the brief introductions given in the text, and feel that an appendix with more biographical detail would have aided in contextualizing the writers and their writing. However, it is their work and its influences/legacies that is of more interest to James and that forms the substance of the subsequent pages.

In chapter 1, James presents a historical overview of the trade union movement in Britain across the twentieth century, in order to contextualize the work of the six poets. I'll return to this chapter later in my review, but it does serve a purpose in providing some historical frames of reference for the literary analysis that follows. In chapter 2, the focus is on three “poetic moments”: the aftermath of the 1974 miners’ strike; poetry in response to the 1984–85 strike; and more recent work shaped and influenced by these periods of dispute. James’ work is strongest when closely analyzing the text, structure, and meanings of these poems, and this is demonstrated throughout this chapter. He identifies and analyzes the tension between the individual union member and the “official organization” throughout the works, clearly illustrating his argument that poetry is a form that is able to challenge hegemonic narratives of class action. I particularly appreciated his discussion of Steve Ely's more recent work, as this illustrates the legacies of the 1984–85 strike, as well as the broader process of deindustrialization, in shaping cultural outputs in deindustrializing regions. This analysis chimes with that of Sherry Lee Linkon in her Half Life of Deindustrialization (2016), highlighting the significance of contested industrial pasts in shaping cultural outputs across geographies. In chapter 3, James discusses the construction of the individual—namely NUM leader Arthur Scargill and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher—within the poems. The relationships between imagery, mythology, reality, and fiction are shown as being interconnected across the pieces in the construction of the person. I struggled with this chapter, but that's not a criticism of James; I felt that this was an area where the book went deeper into linguistic analysis, and beyond the understanding of a more casual reader.

Chapter 4 felt much more comfortable for an industrial historian, with James’ focus on conceptions of place and the significance of the geography of the north-east of England in influencing his more recent poets. As James reminds us, there is no “typical” strike narrative, but there are some shared geographical experiences. The imagery of southern police officers as an occupying force in Bentley's work is fascinating, all the more so given the source material emerged from previously conducted oral history interviews in Thurcroft Village. It is in these analytical areas where the book is strongest, and the subsequent discussion around the popular retelling of the strike in Billy Elliot, Brassed Off, and other “blockbusters” is an important reminder of how these narratives and legacies are constantly negotiated, constructed, and contested.

After an overview of other, more official, poetry related to the 1984–85 strike, James brings us to the conclusion that poetry, and the outputs analyzed in Poetry and Strikes, has the ability to contest the construction and legitimacy of dominant narratives. This conclusion is important and encourages us to expand our analysis of industrial action beyond the social, economic, and political. It is an important book in understanding the relationship between poetic art and expressions of class politics. There are some weaknesses, particularly related to the historic framing set out in chapter 1. James asserts that the “standard” history of trade unions is “generally quiet on the period 1926–72” (24); I'm unsure what standard history he refers to here, but it is a phrase that I couldn't let pass regardless of disciplinary background. Additionally, his argument relating to the invisibility of women within labor history literature (17) feels dated, and there has been extensive scholarship to address this gap—particularly from feminist historians—over the last four decades at least. This slight lack of historiographical awareness is reflected in his description of the 1968 strike by women at Ford Dagenham as a “strike for equal pay,” when it is widely accepted that the strike was over the issue of skill grading and was co-opted into one of equal pay by union officials and political actors. It is not a book that adds to the historiography of industrial action, and does not grasp the historical complexities therein, but that's not the intention of the author.

These critiques aside, Poetry and Strikes is a timely reminder that activism, action, and industrial dispute have many representations and cultural afterlives. By centralizing poetry and the miners’ strikes of the later twentieth century, Michael James illustrates how these are shaped through the positionality of the authors and, more importantly, the passage of time.