Listen Again 2008

Listen Again 2008

to a selection of poems read at the Wordsworth Trust during 2008.

Any Old Death Will Do by Rommi Smith
Recorded live on 6 May 2008. Any Old Death Will Do is taken from Poems from Mornings and Midnights (Peepal Tree 2005), which will be available from Peepal Tree later this year. MP3 file - 5min 44secs, 5831k.

Butterwell by Paul Batchelor
Recorded live on 3 June 2008. Butterwell is taken from The Sinking Road (Bloodaxe, 2008). MP3 file - 3min 48secs, 3585kb.

Café Des Artistes by John Hartley Williams
Recorded live on 1 July 2008. Café des Artistes is taken from John's new, soon to be published book. MP3 file - 2min 43secs, 2575kb.

Crumpsall by Bernard O'Donoghue
Recorded live on 17 June 2008. Crumpsall is an unpublished poem. MP3 file - 2min, 1909kb.

Dragonflies by Frances Leviston
Recorded live on 3 June 2008. Dragonflies is taken from Public Dream (Picador, 2007). MP3 file - 1min 26secs, 1356kb.

Green Apples by Polly Atkin
Recorded live on 27 May 2008. MP3 file - 1min 26secs, 1349kb.

Elegy by Sean O'Brien
Recorded live on 20 May 2008. MP3 file - 4min 19secs, 4046kb.

Harry Patch by Andrew Motion
Recorded live on 9 Sept 2008. MP3 file - 8min 56secs, 8401kb. Depending on the speed of your Internet connection, this file may take a short time to download due to its size.
Read an interview with Andrew Motion describing what made a request to write about 109-year-old Harry Patch, the last surviving First World War soldier, so appealing - from the Telegraph.co.uk - Harry Patch: A century's life shaped by four months at war - click here (opens in new window).

Mr Mercer Leaves His Wife by Mark Ward
Recorded live on 27 May 2008. MP3 file - 1min 12secs, 11432kb.

November by Mark Ward
Recorded live on 1 July 2008.MP3 file - 58secs, 933kb.

Of Travelling By Land by Matthew Francis
Recorded live on 17 June 2008. Of Travelling By Land is taken from Mandeville (Faber 2008), based on The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, a medieval chronicler. MP3 file - 2min 59secs, 2811kb.

The London Eye by Patience Agbabi
Recorded live on 6 May 2008. The London Eye was commissioned for Earth Has Not Anything to Shew More Fair, ed. Peter Oswald, Alice Oswald and Robert Woof (Shakepeare's Globe and The Wordsworth Trust). Reprinted in her new collection Bloodshot Mononchrome, (Canongate 2008). MP3 file - 1min 20secs, 1269kb.

The World Won't Miss You For A While by Kathryn Simmonds
Recorded live on 3 June 2008. The World Won't Miss You For A While is taken from Sunday at the Skin Launderette (Seren, 2008). MP3 file - 1min 35secs, 1506kb.

Wells-Next-The-Sea by Sophie Hannah
Recorded live on 26 August 2008. MP3 file - 1min 33secs, 1455kb.

Wordsworth Parody Poems - Nursery Rhyme and An Argument with Wordsworth by Wendy Cope
Recorded live on 26 August 2008. MP3 file - 2min 46secs, 2602kb.

Wordsworth's Umbrella by Gladys Mary Coles
Recorded live on 20 May 2008. MP3 file - 2min 48secs, 2622kb.


All files open in new windows. If the files fail to open automatically, you may need to update your media player such as Windows Media Player or Apple Quicktime. Copyright in the recordings belongs to the Wordsworth Trust but copyright in the poems, and the words spoken in the introduction, belongs to the poets.

Click here for further information about our Poetry Programme 2009.