Poetry > R Poetry

Advantages: captures voices from the past.
Disadvantages: Kipling has a reputation for being racist.

Kipling has been much criticised for the racist and pro empire elements of his writing. Kipling was born in India in 1865 and later sent to England to be educated. he was stepped in the Empire and in the times, but was not a blind celbrant as some critics have suggested. The lines "East is east and West is West" are most often quoted to back up the theory that Kipling was racist, however it is worth noting that he goes on to point out that when two ...
...As a recorder of the time, Kipling is perhaps most famous for his backroom ballads: poetry using the voices and tales of the comman soldier which do refelct the racist attitudes of the time. He records the disasters, like a fatal attempt at kabul river where many men drowned in the ford, and is often surprisingly realistic. "God help them if they blunderd For their boots 'ud pull them under At the ford of kabul River in the dark" - long boots ... Read review

Advantages: Robert Browning Amazing Poet! Exquisite use of Languague, imagery etc.
Disadvantages: Some difficult Vocabulary and a slightly disturbing, sinister poem.

NOTE: In this review i want to make clear that i am fully reviewing the play and taking it from a very diffrent angle. I am looking at how the voice of the narrator i.e. speech and use of poetic description play a major role in this highly succesfull poem. I want to be judged on a sort of essay style review with my feeling been writtin as the reader gets the feeling... and such. REVIEW: In a dramatic monologue the voice of the narrator is an important ...
...how the reader reacts to him. In “Porphyria’s Lover,” by Robert Browning, the narrator murders his lover but also tries to make the reader feel sympathy for him. The poet reveals the narrator’s personality through language, characterisation, imagery, setting and narrative point of view. The opening of the poem uses language relating to the weather to reveal the narrator’s mood: “The sullen wind………………..., tore the elm-tops down for spite, And, ... Read review

Advantages: a treat for those who love clasical literature
Disadvantages: not for the readers of modern literature

I find this collection of poems to be a treat for any person's mind. These poems take its reader back in time way back to the 17th century. For a lover of clasical literature, Browing's poems bring true delight to one's heart. In short, this is indeed a precious collection to posses and I cherished every moment of time I spent reading these wonderful set of poems. I would like to add a word of caution for those of you who love contemporary works. ... Read review

Advantages: It's funny...
Disadvantages: No good if you don't "do" funny...

Andrew Motion is Poet Laureate, which means he is obligated to write reverential poetry about the Queen on demand and generally fawn and prostrate his poetic muscles before her: as she sees fit. He does seem like a nice bloke though. Luckily for us this isn’t a review of the poetry of Andrew Motion, who will almost certainly NEVER publish a body of work under such a silly and wonderful title as “Neither is the Horse”. ***************************************************** ...
...that little known poet RORY Motion. As I understand it Rory is no relation whatever to Andrew but will still accept compliments about his Laureate-dom quite beautifully if you feel the need to proffer them. Rory is the sort of poet who has a one-man pantomime horse that he tends to wander about in. He does a good deal of wandering about, primarily in his home town of Huddersfield. Rory doesn’t like lots of things about the modern world, but rather ... Read review

Advantages: A fascinating man and a simply great poet
Disadvantages: It's almost all love poetry. So if you don't like that...

Robert Graves was not a man to let the past tell its own story. The front of my rather decrepit Penguin edition of his autobiography - and possibly his most famous work - 'Goodbye to All That', describes him as 'the greatest love-poet in English since John Donne'. Praise indeed; and not given lightly. It is interesting to note, however, that Graves began his poetic life as a teenage soldier on the Western Front with his first book, 'Over The Brazier'. ...
...disapproved, on the grounds that it would not give a good impression. Presumably what they meant was that they did not want the Folks at Home to consider too deeply the number of 'schoolboy militants' currently fighting in France.) His war-poetry, it seems, has gone out of fashion, save one or two pieces written in retrospect, which are widely anthologised. But why is it that Graves is recognised almost entirely as a love-poet? Why, when he was a ... Read review