This week, Ian McMillan is joined from a distance by his guests, who are all in their own homes. Together they discuss the changing language we are all using as we try to keep friendships alive whilst isolating. There's a brand new poem from Kate Fox, advice from someone used to working alone from A.L Kennedy, John Carey takes us through some poetry that might hold solace for us, Caroline Bird reads a poem that is helping her, and Boo Hewerdine performs a song commissioned especially for The Verb

Presenter: Ian McMillan

Ian McMillan explores African writing with Maaza Mengiste, Ekow Eshun, Jennifer Makumbi and Ellah Wakatama.

Presenter: Ian McMillan

This week, the late-night language lock-in is feeling uncertain with Shaun Usher, Jo Neary and Jude Rogers.

When the world changes suddenly - how do we know what to abandon and what to keep? William Gibson, Don Paterson, Caro C, and Kọ́lá Túbọ̀sún explore the writing of obsolescence with Ian McMillan.

The iconic 1960s television series 'The Twilight Zone' is replete with sudden ruptures to daily life -Don Paterson explains how he used the series to write poems that explore our relationship with obsolescence. Sound artist and composer Caro C shares a new commission for The Verb, the novelist famed for conceiving 'cyberspace', William Gibson, considers the disappearance of the future, and Kọ́lá Túbọ̀sún explains why he strives to give Nigerian English and the Yoruba language a technological presence.

Presenter: Ian McMillan

Ian McMillan asks where poetry and philosophy meet - with guests Raymond Antrobus and Helen Mort.

Ian McMillan explores the language of leaving, resettling and exile with songwriter Ana Silvera and poets John McAuliffe, Igor Klikovac, Mina Gorji, and André Naffis-Sahely.

Welcome to Hotel Verb. Checking in with Ian McMillan this week are novelist Eimear McBride. Eimear won the Goldsmiths Prize and the Bailey's Women's Prize for Fiction for her debut novel 'A Girl is A Half-Formed Thing'. Since then, she's spent a lot of time in hotels, inspiring her new novel 'Strange Hotel' (Faber), in which the hotel becomes a metaphor for middle age.

Joining Eimear is Andy Miller, author of 'The Year of Reading Dangerously' and presenter of the Backlisted Podcast. Andy Miller celebrates his favourite author, Anita Brookner, and her Booker Prize-winning classic novel, 'Hotel du Lac'

And Roger Luckhurst is the author of 'Corridors: Passages of Modernity', on corridors, 'Monster hotels', and the fictional hotel corridors that populate our imaginations.

Presenter: Ian McMillan

Poets Layli Long Soldier who is Oglala Lakota, and Natalie Diaz who is Mojave, join Ian McMillan for a programme in which they explore the power of pleasure, the effect of recurring images - and the way language can fall short in conveying apology. Professor Sarah Rivett explores the profound impact that Algonquin languages have had on the European mindset, and on the culture of the USA.

How can writers make 'goodness' compelling, as a theme or character trait ? Why is virtue-signalling seen as a negative thing? Is poetry the best form for exploring goodness? And do we need more writing about goodness, and more imaginative imagery for it'? Ian McMillan is joined by guests Toby Litt, Will Harris, Kate Fox and Kelcey Wilson-Lee.

Presenter: Ian McMillan

Puns have a long history in human writing. Most of us recognise them as those little gems of comedy genius that make you laugh, or groan, but they're useful for being more than just funny, they're also fundamental to what makes poetry work and they provide the engine of change in language by allowing ideas to slip from one meaning to another. Artist and composer Hannah Catherine Jones, comedy writer Jack Bernhardt, poet Nasser Hussain and Sam Leith - Literary editor of The Spectator - join Ian Macmillan to reveal the linguistic power of the pun.