The Multicultural Midlands

The multicultural Midlands is a unique, interdisciplinary study of the literature, music and food that shape the region’s irrepressible, though often overlooked, cultural identity. It is the first of its kind to give serious critical attention to a part of the world which is frequently ignored by readers, critics and the culture industries. This book makes a claim for the importance of the Midlands and evidences this with nuanced close reading of a multitude of diverse texts spanning so-called ‘high’ to ‘low’ culture; from the Black Country’s ‘Desi Pubs’, to Leicester’s ‘McIndians’ Peri Peri (‘you’ve tried the cowboys, now try the Indians!’); Handsworth’s reggae roots to Adrian Mole’s diaries. Front matter Contents Introduction: ‘a so what? sort of place’ Nottingham: writing the ‘rebel’ city Nottingham: introduction Performance poetry, COVID-19 and the new ‘public sphere’ #rebelnotts: literary tourism in Alan Sillitoe’s Nottingham Coda: ‘ode to a Raleigh Burner’ Leicester: the ‘model’ multicultural city Leicester: introduction Piri piri chicken: ‘demotic cosmopolitanism’ in contemporary Leicester #WeNeedDiverseBooks: diversity in Leicester’s Young Adult fiction ‘Leicester, Leicester/ Fester, fester’: at home with Adrian Mole Coda: brimful of Leicester Birmingham: (re)building the second city Birmingham: introduction Is Birmingham a ‘non-place’? ‘Double vision’ in Handsworth art Coda: ‘our new layered city’ The West Midlands: from Shakespeare to Syal The West Midlands: introduction ‘Pathos, politics and paratha’: re-reading West Midlands, South Asian literature The great ‘talent drain’ of the West Midlands: Lenny Henry, Caitlin Moran and Sathnam Sanghera Coda: desi pubs of the Black Country The self-deprecating conclusion Bibliography Index