Episodes
| Series | Episode | Title | First Broadcast | Repeated | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 06 | 05 | Morning Has Broken | 20071007 | 20071013 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the lasting appeal of Elizabeth Farjeon's poem Morning Has Broken. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 08 | 01 | First Party At Ken Kesey's With Hell's Angels | 20071014 | 20071020 (R4) | First Party At Ken Kesey's With Hell's Angels, by Allen Ginsberg. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 08 | 02 | To His Coy Mistress | 20071021 | 20071027 (R4) | To His Coy Mistress, by Andrew Marvell. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 08 | 03 | The Quality Of Mercy Is Not Strain'd | 20071028 | 20071103 (R4) | Portia's speech in defence of Antonio in the Merchant of Venice. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 08 | 04 | Matilda | 20071104 | 20071110 (R4) | Hilaire Belloc's poem has been enjoyed by generations of children and parents since 1907. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 09 | 01 | The Listeners | 20081123 | 20081129 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems. Published in 1912, Walter de la Mare's poem has been popular with adults and children alike for its elusiveness. Peggy examines its enduring appeal and finds out why gardeners, spiritualists and teachers are still intrigued and inspired by it. Featuring contributions from the novelist Russell Hoban, de la Mare's grandson, Giles, and Professor of Radio at Bournemouth University, Sean Street. Peggy examines its enduring appeal of de la Mare's poem. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 09 | 02 | Ithaka | 20081130 | 20081206 (R4) | Peggy talks to people who have been inspired by Ithaka's treatment of the journey of life. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 09 | 03 | I Am | 20081207 | 20081213 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems. Peggy examines the poem's expression of feelings of dispossession engendered by the land grab of the agricultural enclosures of the early-19th century, and Clare's residency in a lunatic asylum at the time of writing it. Peggy examines Clare's expression of feelings of dispossession. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 09 | 04 | Let's Do It, Let's Fall In Love | 20081214 | 20081220 (R4) | Peggy hears from those to whom the exuberant lyrics of Porter's song speak volumes. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 10 | 01 | Adlestrop | 20091108 | 20091114 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds examines the enduring appeal of Edward Thomas' evocative poem. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 10 | 02 | To My Dear And Loving Husband | 20091115 | 20091121 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems. Anne Bradstreet's poem has been anthologised in nearly every collection of love poetry published. How did a near-invalid woman, who had to endure not only the privations of migrating to the New World but also the strict Puritan ethic established there, manage to write something so warm and personal that it still speaks to us today? The story behind one of the most tender and enduring of love poems. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 10 | 03 | Mending Wall | 20091122 | 20091128 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems. Robert Frost's Mending Wall gave us the epigram 'good fences make good neighbours'. They don't, of course, but we still need our walls and hedges. Peggy meets sheep farmers, wall artists and poetry enthusiasts as she explores the stories behind the poem. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 10 | 04 | An Arundel Tomb | 20091129 | 20091205 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems. Philip Larkin was disappointed by his 'Tomb poem': one of the pivotal details was wrong and another, he discovered, had been invented by a Victorian restorer 500 years later. 'Muddle to the end,' he complained, and yet it is now one of his best-loved and most quoted poems. Peggy Reynolds investigates the layers of mystery surrounding Larkin's much-loved poem. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 10 | 05 | My Last Duchess | 20091206 | 20091212 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems. The height of English Gothic, a poem in which an aristocrat tacitly admits to having done away with his young wife - a Medici no less. Peggy Reynolds teases out the many layers of Robert Browning's chilling but groundbreaking poem. Peggy Reynolds teases out the many layers of Robert Browning's chilling poem. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 10 | 06 | On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer | 20091213 | 20091219 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems. Much have I travelled in the realms of gold...' Keats' sonnet - his first great poem - begins. Keats couldn't read Greek and the poem records him touching the ancient world through translation and his already fecund imagination. Peggy explores the stories behind its creation and its enduring appeal. Peggy Reynolds explores the stories behind the Keats' poem and its enduring appeal. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 11 | 01 | Not Waving But Drowning | 20101205 | 20101211 (R4) | Adventures in Poetry' returns to unpack a new series of classic poems whose lines or images have entered our national consciousness. This week, presenter Peggy Reynolds asks what it is about Stevie Smith's poem 'Not Waving but Drowning' which has kept it relevant since 1957. The phrase itself turns up endlessly in newspapers, both red-tops and broadsheets, and is particularly loved by writers on sports pages - not, you might think, the obvious place to look for soul-searching poetry. But underneath the snappy economy of the first line runs a complex and universal emotional truth, examined here by a Samaritan, a sports writer and Stevie Smith's biographer. Produced by Christine Hall. Peggy Reynolds opens a new series of Adventures in Poetry with Not Waving but Drowning. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems ~Adventures In Poetry' returns to unpack a new series of classic poems whose lines or images have entered our national consciousness. |
| 11 | 02 | Waltzing Matilda | 20101212 | 20101218 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds investigates Banjo Paterson's classic lyric Waltzing Matilda. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 11 | 03 | The Gate Of The Year | 20101219 | 20101225 (R4) | The Gate of the Year: Peggy Reynolds hears the story behind the poem King George VI quoted in his first Christmas broadcast on 25th December 1939, written by the unknown Minnie Louise Haskins. It takes her from an unassuming suburb of Bristol to Sandringham, via the correspondence pages of The Times and the hand of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, and it has popped up at the opening of two world wars and on countless teatowels, Internet sites and books of inspirational verse. Producer Christine Hall. Peggy Reynolds on how a young woman from Bristol put words into the mouth of a King. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 11 | 04 | The Wreck Of The Hesperus | 20101226 | 20110101 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds continues her Adventures in Poetry by asking why one of the most popular poems of the 19th century 'The Wreck of the Hesperus' by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, has since fallen out of favour. The ballad of a reckless sea captain who takes his young daughter on a voyage despite warnings of an approaching storm, the poem was recited in parlours across the English speaking world, and learnt by every schoolchild in America for decades. Peggy explores the poem with Jay Parini, who has made a study of Longfellow; talks to the former Children's Laureate Michael Morpurgo; and to Linda Greenlaw, a sea captain who sails the same sea as the captain in the poem. With them, she uncovers the events in Longfellow's life which inspired the poem and discovers that it still retains the power to terrify and move its readers. Producer: Jane Greenwood. Peggy Reynolds explores 'The Wreck of the Hesperus' by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 11 | 05 | Journey Of The Magi | 20110102 | 20110108 (R4) | A cold coming we had of it, / Just the worst time of the year / For a journey, and such a long journey ...' TS Eliot's poem for Epiphany, 'Journey of the Magi', is one of his most popular poems. Yet it is deceptively complex and, as Peggy Reynolds discovers, takes us on our own journey to somewhere very far removed from the simple certainties of the Three Wise Men at the manger. Producer Christine Hall. Peggy Reynolds investigates one of TS Eliot's most popular poems, Journey of the Magi. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 11 | 06 | Kubla Khan | 20110115 | Peggy Reynolds continues her Adventures in Poetry as she explores Samuel Taylor Coleridge's celebrated poem Kubla Khan. Written in 1797 in a remote farmhouse in the Quantock Hills, the poem came to Coleridge as a vision in an opium-induced dream, which was famously interrupted by a visitor from the nearby village of Porlock. Peggy is fascinated by the fragmentary nature of the poem and the way in which phrases from it have resonated through literature, and even music, ever since. She is joined by Coleridge's biographer Richard Holmes; James Watt, an expert on the real Kubla Khan; Tim Clayton an expert in 18th culture; and by Martyn Ware, a sound artist who has been inspired by the poem to create a new, and vividly evocative soundscape based on the poem. Produced by Jane Greenwood. Peggy Reynolds explores Samuel Taylor Coleridge's dream-like poem Kubla Khan. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems | |
| 12 | 01 | Next To Of Course God America I | 20120401 | 20120407 (R4) | Known as the poet who didn't use capitals or punctuation, ee cummings loved life and the natural world. But he also loved satirising the pretensions of American politicians, and their uses and misuses of patriotism. That's certainly what he does in his acclaimed 1926 sonnet, 'next to of course god america', which crashes together some of the USA's revered foundational texts to great effect. His use of wit puts him in a very different league to the British war poets. Peggy Reynolds begins the new series of Adventures in Poetry by exploring the impact and wider associations of cummings' poem. She hears about the circumstances in which Cummings wrote it: serving in the Ambulance Corps during the First World War, he was detained by the French for over 3 months, under suspicion of being a German spy. Professor David Herd of the University of Kent, an expert on Twentieth Century American poetry, argues that after undergoing such imprisonment, it's perhaps no surprise that Cummings had cause to parody the consequences of politicians resorting to tub-thumping patriotic rhetoric at times of crisis. We hear how the poem still speaks to people today, among them American journalist Michael Goldfarb, who was an unembedded reporter in Iraq during the 2003 invasion. Producer: Mark Smalley. Satirising politicians and patriotism is at the heart of a provocative poem by ee cummings Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 12 | 02 | The Raven | 20120408 | 20120414 (R4) | Peggy Reynolds explores one of the most iconic poems ever published. Over 160 years since its first appearance, it is still inspiring film makers, horror writers and theatre directors to produce their own interpretations. Yet many loathed the poem, including W.B Yeats who said it was insincere and vulgar. The poem granted its author instant fame, yet he spent most of his life in poverty. To try and capitalise on its success he wrote an essay about its composition, which many believe to imbued with an over inflated sense of mastery. The poet attracted nearly as much controversy as his poem. An inveterate gambler, alcoholic and occasional drug abuser, he was a philanderer whose most popular poems were about his devotion to a lost love. There's also a demonic bird involved. Need any more clues? Nevermore With guests including the poet and falconer Helen Macdonald, Professor of English John Sutherland, the poet Jay Parini, the raven master at the Tower of London and occasional appearances by feathered friends, Peggy Reynolds unpicks Edgar Allan Poe's The Raven. Producer: Sarah Langan. Peggy Reynolds explores Edgar Allan Poe's iconic gothic poem. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 12 | 03 | Dear Mr Lee | 20120415 | 20120421 (R4) | UA Fanthorpe's poem Dear Mr Lee is an engaging piece of ventriloquism, written in the voice of a school pupil who has been studying Laurie Lee's classic memoir, Cider With Rosie, in her English class. Fanthorpe has captured the enthusiasm and despair of adolescence, as the pupil confesses to 'Laurie' that she loves everything about his book, except the essays she's had to write about it. Part of the poem's success lies in the fact the Fanthorpe herself taught English for many years, and demonstrates an unusual empathy with a student struggling with the demands of the exam system and a rather tenuous grasp of literary criticism. Peggy Reynolds talks to Lee's biographer Valerie Grove, to UA Fanthorpe's partner Rosie Bailey, to poets Michael Rosen and Wendy Cope, to several of Fanthorpe's notable ex-students including MP Fiona MacTaggart, and to some current students of GCSE English and their inspiring teacher, who all bring their own enthusiasms to the poem. Producer: Sara Davies. Peggy Reynolds explores the appeal of UA Fanthorpe's poem. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |
| 12 | 04 | Vitai Lampada | 20120422 | 20120428 (R4) | Henry Newbolt's poem Vitai Lampada - better known to most by its rousing chorus play up, play up and play the game!- seems at first sight to be a product solely of its time and place: he wrote it at the end of the 19th century and it features cricket, war and a public school ethos about sport and leadership. However, as Peggy Reynolds unpacks the poem and talks to people who still know it, some surprises emerge. Play up and play the game! Henry Newbolt's poem is unravelled by Peggy Reynolds. Programme exploring the background, effect and lasting appeal of some well-loved poems |