Northern Lights - Cornerstones: Scandinavia's Samiland

Published: Dec. 7, 2015, 11 p.m.

As part of Radio 3's Northern Lights season the award-winning poet John Burnside explores his fascination with the S\xe1mi landscapes of Finnmark in northern Norway, reflecting on how they're shaped by ice as much as rock.

Winner of both the 2011 TS Eliot Prize for Poetry and the Forward Prize, John Burnside has returned time and again to find out more about the resilient culture of the S\xe1mi people of northern Scandinavia. Here, he considers the wild beauty of S\xe1miland (or Lapland), describing a region at such variance with the Santa-themed tourism flogged to visitors.

Producer: Mark Smalley.