How Poems Work: Meanings, techniques and effects in 100 poems from Beowulf to the Iraq War

by Matthew Jenkinson, Robert Gullifer

In this annotated anthology, Robert Gullifer and Matthew Jenkinson demystify poetry while showing that there are many good reasons to pick poems apart. From Beowulf to the Iraq War, a millennium of poetry is presented to give readers a sense of how poems have evolved since we first started writing them down. Historical backgrounds, meanings, techniques and effects are explained and analysed clearly and logically to help readers understand what poets have been trying to say to us across the centuries. At the same time, major themes that have recurred in poetry are highlighted, so general readers, teachers and students can navigate the poems as they by time period, by technique, or by theme. This book has been designed so it is useful to anyone interested in learning about or teaching poetry, as well as those revisiting poems and poets they may have already encountered. Those poems and poets have been carefully selected to ensure that How Poems Work covers much of the existing poetic canon while broadening it to include diverse historically important poets who have been previously overlooked, or to include less well-known poems by already canonical poets. Includes poems that are technically interesting, to allow the kind of analysis expected in classrooms and examinations. appeals to a wide audience across the English-speaking world by including British and American poems alongside those from other cultures. The publication of How Poems Work has been made possible by the generous support of the Warden and Fellows of New College, Oxford through the New College Ludwig Humanities Research Fund. 'How Poems Work' is an excellent resource. It's packed full of poems, spanning ages, and the analysis for each is clear and perceptive. Robert Gullifer and Matthew Jenkinson have skilfully woven in contextual factors too. It's a must for any poetry-lover's bookshelf.
Sarah Barker, English teacher & AHT.

303 pages, Paperback

Published October 25, 2018

Reviews

[A Severs]

A brilliant introduction to a range of poets and poems for anyone who wants to understand a bit more about the techniques employed by poets. I learned a lot and, as time went by, found myself able to analyse the poems fairly accurate using what I'd learnt in previous pages. Reading so many great poems has also made me think much more poetically!

This book is perfect for picking up in the odd moments that present themselves during the day - in this way one can often read a couple a day, leaving the necessary time for reflection in between.

I would love to read a second volume, one which perhaps focussed on a more diverse cast of poets.

[Patrick]

I struggled a bit with the book for the first 200 pages, thinking that I might in fact be too old for a book on How Poems Work, or that I don't like English-language poetry, or that the Anglo-Saxon literary canon is only mid, but I enjoyed the book a bit more as it got closer to the twentieth century.

[MsB]

Fantastic!