The Owl and the Pussycat voted most popular childhood poem
As National Poetry Day encourages Britain to embrace verse in everyday life, its favourite lines are revealed to be handed down through generationsA poll of the nations most beloved childrens poems...
View ArticleWhy poetry belongs to us all
On Poetry Day, Sarah Crossan argues that poetry is everywhere. And it is ours. So sing and share your songs and dont be afraid to snatch poetry back into your life and use it!Read the first chapter of...
View ArticleDo you know a poem off by heart?
Today is National Poetry day. Former education minister Michael Gove previously insisted that children learn poetry off by heart, while others insist this can ruin the experience. Do you know a poem...
View ArticleFoyle Young Poet of the Year meet the winners!
Find out who won the Foyle Young Poets poetry competition, created just for children and read the 15 winning poems here! Congratulations to all the winners who are reading their poems in London at a...
View ArticleWhat are your favourite childrens poems?
To mark National Poetry Day, share your nursery rhyme-free alternatives to the recent top 10 ranking of childrens poemsThe Owl and the Pussycat voted most popular childhood poemCan it really be true?...
View ArticlePoems we know by heart: our readers recite video
Its National Poetry Day, and weve been celebrating by collecting videos you filmed while reciting poems you know by heart from Oscar Wilde to William Blake via a lot of Shakespeare. Here are some of...
View ArticleSeamus Heaneys last poem published in Irish gallerys anthology
Collection features works from writers such as Roddy Doyle, Colm Tóibín and John Banville inspired by paintings on display at the National Gallery of Ireland in DublinA poem Seamus Heaney finished 10...
View ArticlePoster poems: forgetting
National Poetry Day asked us to remember. Heres your chance to consider the other side of the coin, with your poems on the everyday phenomenon of obliterationThursday was National Poetry Day, with this...
View ArticleAlan Bennett: joining the literature club
The playwright used to feel baffled in the face of poetry. All the more reason to compile an anthology of popular poets, from Hardy to LarkinWhen I was young, I used to feel that literature was a club...
View ArticleOn Clapton Pond at dawn
by Kate TempestThe pond was calmthe sky was newyour voice was soft your lies were true.You were me and I was youand I was going blind with you.Continue reading...
View ArticleKate Tempest: 'Rapping changed my life'
She is a Next Generation poet, has been Mercury-nominated for her music and called the laureate of south-east London for her plays. Kate Tempest talks about going down a storm The Saturday Poem: On...
View ArticlePoem of the week: The Natural and Social Science by Michael Donaghy
This elegant poem by the late Irish-American writer showcases his talent for free-range anecdote, smart satire and humourMichael Donaghys Collected Poems, reissued by Picador, reminds us that the...
View ArticleHaruki Murakami joint favourite to win Nobel prize for literature
Three days before the winner is announced, novelist shares odds of 4/1 with Kenyan writer Ngg wa Thiongo, while Belarusian journalist Svetlana Alexievich is third favourite at 7/1With just three days...
View ArticleTim Minchin: how my beat poem took the world by Storm
A dinner-party encounter with a homeopathy fan was the spark for my rationalist anthem, now a YouTube hit and a graphic novel thanks to Storm the Animated MovieMy 2006 solo show, So Rock, included a...
View ArticleLetter: Dannie Abse was a cultural attache for Welsh writers
Dannie Abse was a steady supporter of other Welsh writers; he was, in a sense, our cultural attache in what Dylan Thomas called the "capital punishment" London. Dannie and his wife, Joan, often stayed...
View ArticleWatch Elijah Wood in the world exclusive trailer for Dylan Thomas film Set...
Elijah Wood stars in Andy Goddard's movie as John Brinnin, an aspiring poet who oversees Dylan Thomas's first tour to America in 1950. Celyn Jones plays Thomas, with support from Shirley Henderson and...
View ArticleThe Cartographer Tries to Map a Way to Zion by Kei Miller review a rare...
The Forward prize-winning collection mingles grammatically correct English with patois to emphasise the different ways in which a place can be knownKei Miller's superb Forward prize-winning collection...
View ArticleThe Saturday poem: Bostin Fittle
by Liz BerryAt Nanny's I ate brains for tea,mashed with hard-boiled egg,or trotters, groaty pudding,faggots minced with kidney and suet.Right bostin fittle, Nanny said.She knew hunger, knew howto press...
View ArticleChristopher van Wyk: farewell to a South African literary icon
The death of the author, poet and activist who became a distinctive post-apartheid voice is a devastating cultural blowNot long after the death of Nobel laureate Nadine Gordimer, South Africa has lost...
View ArticleJohn Moat obituary
Poet who co-founded the creative-writing venture ArvonA chance meeting in a Berkshire pub in 1963 between two young poets, John Fairfax and John Moat, began a friendship that was to lead, with the...
View Article
