George Herbert’s shaped poetry subtly pushed back against the iconoclasm of the English Reformation Vanessa Braganza - Historian, Harvard University George Herbert’s pictures aren’t just decorative.

Writing towards the end of the first world war, the poet, novelist, journalist and suffragist Benson here dreams of a secure peace ...

John Ernest, chair of the Department of English at the University of Delaware, wants to bring poetry to life, so sometimes he’ll start his classes with a dramatic reading of a poem. On more than one ...

Bloom made his critical reputation with a book called The Anxiety of Influence, where he argued that poetry proceeds on the misreadings by strong poets of their predecessors. In this massive anthology ...

William Blake’s “The Clod & the Pebble” is a dialogue on tenderness and cruelty in three short stanzas. Read it with our critic A.O. Scott, and then play a game to memorize it.