A celebration of English poems

Read by Richard Mitchley, Ghizela Rowe & Tim Graham (Unabridged: 1hr 5mins)

Featuring poems by Amelia Opie, Sir John Suckling, Margaret Cavendish: Duchess of Newcastle, Thomas Nashe & more

Poetry. A form of words that seems so elegantly simple in one verse and so cleverly complex in another.  Each poet has a particular style, an individual and unique way with words and yet each of us seems to recognise the path and destination of where the verses lead, even if sometimes the full comprehension may be a little beyond us.

Through the centuries every culture has produced verse to symbolize and to describe everything from everyday life, natural wonders, the human condition and even in its more hubristic moments, the crushing triumph of an enemy.

In the volumes of this series, we take a look at poetry through the prism of individual regions of England, or sometimes more quaintly known as ‘Albion’, or ‘Blighty’, through the centuries of its gloried history.

England, despite its perception of reserve and under-statement has, in reality, strode the global stage at various time in many things, both good and bad, from Empire to long distance running. Here our focus in on its literature.  Famed for its fiction and dramas, it is equally admired for its plethora of gifted poets and the dazzling verse which has added so much to its artistic legacy.  These classic poets are wonders of their age and of their art.  Genius is written in their names.

In this volume we have collected verse from poets born in the East of England.  These flat lowlands face out towards Europe yet within their counties are centuries of poetical history that indelibly mark out their talents as among our very best.  Our poets include and many others.

In this compilation - 

1 - Born in England - Exploring English Poetry - The East - An Introduction

2 - June, a Tale by William Cowper

3 - Sweet Meat Has Sour Sauce, or The Slave Trader in the Dumps by William Cowper

4 - An Apology For Her Poetry by Duchess of Newcastle, Margaret Cavendish

5 - If Infinite Worlds, Infinite Centres by Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle

6 - Love Turned to Hatred  by Sir John Suckling

7 - I Prithee Send Me Back My Heart by Sir John Suckling

8 - A Litany in Time of Plague by Thomas Nashe

9 - Fair Summer Droops from Summer's Last Will and Testament by Thomas Nashe

10 - The Burning Babe by Robert Southwell

11 - New Prince New Pomp by Robert Southwell

12 - Collins Complaint by Nicholas Rowe

13 - The Brave by Nicholas Rowe

14 - A Rose by Sir Richard Fanshawe

15 - Of Beauty by Sir Richard Fanshawe

16 - Dear Pretty Youth by Thomas Shadwell

17 - Nymphs and Shepherds by Thomas Shadwell

18 - Shall We Go Kiss Kiss by Nicholas Breton

19 - Pretty Twinkling Starry Eyes by Nicholas Breton

20 - A Valentine by Matilda Betham Edwards

21 - Written In London on the 19th March,1796 by Matilda Betham Edwards

22 - The Youth and the Philsopher by William Whitehead

23 - The Je Ne Sais Quoi by William Whitehead

24 - The Night Patrol by Arthur Graeme West

25 - God How I Hate You by Arthur Graeme West

26 - The Repulse by Thomas Stanley

27 - Celia, Sleeping or SInging by Thomas Stanley

28 - Upon Kind and True Love by Aurelian Townsend

29 - To the Countess of Salisbury by Aurelian Townsend

30 - Part in Peace by  Sarah Fuller Adams 

31 - Nearer, My God, to Thee by Sarah Fuller Adams

32 - Secret Love by Amelia Opie

33 - Ode on the Present Time, 27th January, 1795 by Amelia Opie

34 - And If I Did What Then by George Gascoigne

35 - The Fairies Farewell by Richard Corbet

36 - One of Shakespeare's Women by Gerald Massey

37 - Christ in Flanders by Lucy Whitmell

38 - A Sixer by G F Wilson

39 - My Beautiful Lady (An Extract) by Thomas Woolner

40 - April, 1918 by Henry Christopher Bradby

41 - St Patricks Day. With an Irish Shamrock by Charlotte Elizabeth Tonna