Ralf Webb

Highway Cottage weaves the story of a strange homecoming. A young poet travels to the heart of the English countryside – back to the West Country village where he grew up. Descending into the valley where the small riverside community still resides, he finds himself within a dreamlike landscape, peopled by uncanny figures: drone operators and hunters; half-familiar friends; local historians, and braying councillors trying desperately to oust a community of Travellers. Hovering between reality and folklore, the locale is at once idyllic and in decay; the visitor is both unsettled and soothed by it. Slowly, we start to sense that both villagers and poet might be under threat – not just from the future, but from the past.This book-length sequence of poems represents a ground-breaking artistic achievement by acclaimed poet Ralf Webb. Blending the eerie musicality of children’s rhymes with echoes of traditional balladry and free verse, the collection swells to an extraordinary chorus. With great clarity and affection, but not a trace of sentimentality, Webb conjures a precise vision of a rural community, surfacing the deep and urgent tensions – personal, political, and environmental – that run through Britain today. The result is a unique portrait of contemporary country life, enchanting and unnerving in equal measure.

*SHORTLISTED FOR THE SUNDAY TIMES YOUNG WRITER OF THE YEAR AWARD 2025*''Remarkable... entertaining... deft... moving... refreshing''Daily Telegraph''A richly rewarding account of a resonant cultural moment''Guardian''Textured literary portraits of the masculine mind and body''Raymond Antrobus, author of The PerseveranceIn 1960, James Baldwin decisively diagnosed the troubled state of American society as a ''failure of the masculine sensibility''. Strange Relations explores this mid-century crisis through the lives and works of four bisexual writers: Tennessee Williams, Carson McCullers, John Cheever, and James Baldwin. In a mesmerising blend of biography and cultural criticism, Ralf Webb examines how these writers challenged the damaging restrictions of contemporary gender and sexuality, and how, through both their art and relationships, they sought a transformative new masculinity - one grounded in fluidity, love and intimacy.''Webb''s writing is of a quality rarely seen, and his book returns you to the world slightly changed, equipped with another angle of vision on the quiddity of man''Diarmuid Hester, author of Nothing Ever Just Disappears''Impeccably well researched and hugely enjoyable''Nicole Flattery, author of Nothing Special''Wise, hopeful, and exquisitely written''Will Tosh, author of Straight Acting