The Nation's Favourite Poems - Griff Rhys Jones

For me, there are two types of books. There's the kind you make time for - a pot of strong hot tea, a blanket, and a prime spot on the sofa with your feet curled under you. And then there's the other kind - books that are so meaningful that you can't just read through them, but rather have to read a little at a time, and then sit back and digest the words, sounding them out in your head and putting your own meaning to them. Poetry books fall into the second category, a category I rather crudely call ' Bathroom Books'. These are the books that cover my bathroom windowsill, the books I grab for ... more

Through today’s highly efficient media, and indeed with the good people of ciao, we are often seeing polls of one kind or another, Top 5 Christmas films, Top 10 songs of all time. At the turn of the millennium a poll was undergone to find the top 100 pieces of music of all time, and aside from a token appearance by Mozart, Bach and Beethoven the words ‘of all time’ my as well have been replaced with ‘in the last 50 years, and I very much doubt that half of the voters were aware that the great Mozart’s most famous piece of music is, arguably, Twinkle, Twinkle little star. So in these ever ... more

I love poetry. It may not be the most common sentence uttered in the twenty-first century, and, admittedly, it wasn't something one would hear me saying until around a year or so ago. Before I came to university, I rarely read poetry, and I certainly never wrote it. Now I find myself engulfed in the art, and with this new addiction comes the reading of a lot of different poets. I own several collected works of individual poets, but not so many with variety, so when I saw The Nation's Favourite Poems I knew I had to buy it. I didn't buy it there and then, and when I found it, almost brand new ... more

♥ The nations favourite poems. ♥ "With a forward by Griff Rhys Jones" The best popular anthology ever printed in Britain" Auberon Waugh Published by the BBC Worldwide Ltd. Paperback edition first publication 1996. ISBN: 0 563 38782 3 Hardback edition first published in 1998. ISBN: 0 563 38487 5 All copyright remains with the individual authors. This anthology was printed and bound by Martin's the printers Ltd. Berwick-upon-Tweed. The great thing about Poetry is that readers will interpret it in differant ways. It will mean one thing to one, while it could mean something totally ... more

I have leafed through this collection countless times. It is versatile and diverse, which reflects the minds of the nation. This anthology is really more for pleasure than study, because it doesn't contain much commentary. The poems are organised in order of rating, and Rudyard Kipling's 'If' is the first entry. My personal favourite is Shakespeare's Sonnet 116, but there are also some great pieces by the likes of Yeats, Carol Ann Duffy and Matthew Arnold. The anthology is wide-ranging, but it is clear to see the prominence of certain genres within it. For instance, many of the poems are by ... more