A celebration of language used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities.
We British - An epic broadcast for National Poetry Day.
This is history and poetry as only the BBC can do it. It's a all-day "history of Britain through poetry" in celebration of National Poetry Day. The details: 1 - Foundation StonesThe British are brilliant at writing poems. On National Poetry Day, Andrew Marr is using them to tell our story.In this opening episode, Andrew looks at the various origins of our story found in some of the earliest verses written in these islands. Then he plunges into the majestic weirdness and strange familiarity of…
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Tim, Four Quartets read by Jeremy Irons SP is posted in Poetry for you and anyone else that will enjoy it. ---------------------------- R
Did anybody grab last week's BBC Saturday Play?
They had Jeremy Irons reading TS Eliot's
Four Quartets.
Since RadioDownloader got taken down, I have to be ridiculously
vigilant or I miss something great.
Mid-Term Break
I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close,
At two o'clock our neighbours drove me home.
In the porch I met my father crying--
He had always taken funerals in his stride--
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.
The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram
When I came in, and I was embarrassed
By old men standing up to shake my hand
And tell me they were "sorry for my trouble,"
Whispers informed strangers I was the eldest,
Away at school, as my mother held my hand
In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs.
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses.
Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops
And candles soothed the bedside; I saw him
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now,
Wearing a poppy bruise on the left temple,
He lay in the four foot box as in a cot.
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear.
A four foot box, a foot for every year.
- Seamus Heaney, Irish Poet
I think that with a content or language disclaimer anything goes. The disclaimer should keep the meek from inheriting the post. ----------------- Rick
I also have a fair collection of poetry slams, where the language and imagery can be rather graphic. Any comments?
Gil
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