Six Poets: Hardy to Larkin: An Anthology - Hardcover

A prose stylist of disarming grace and sly humor . . . Surprising, funny, and deeply affecting. Charles McGrath, The New York Times Book Review
--Charles McGrath"

One of the greatest living English writers. David Thomson, The Nation--David Thomson"

There is probably no other distinguished English man of letters more instantly likable than Bennett. Michael Dirda, The Washington Post Book World
--Michael Dirda"

"A prose stylist of disarming grace and sly humor . . . Surprising, funny, and deeply affecting."--Charles McGrath, The New York Times Book Review
--Charles McGrath

"One of the greatest living English writers."--David Thomson, The Nation--David Thomson

"There is probably no other distinguished English man of letters more instantly likable than Bennett."--Michael Dirda, The Washington Post Book World
--Michael Dirda

In this candid, thoroughly engaging book, Alan Bennett creates a unique anthology of works by six well-loved poets. Freely admitting his own youthful bafflement with poetry, Bennett reassures us that the poets and poems in this volume are not only accessible but also highly enjoyable. He then proceeds to prove irresistibly that this is so.
 
Bennett selects more than seventy poems by Thomas Hardy, A. E. Housman, John Betjeman, W. H. Auden, Louis MacNeice, and Philip Larkin. He peppers his discussion of these writers and their verse with anecdotes, shrewd appraisal, and telling biographical detail: Hardy lyrically recalls his first wife Emma in his poetry, though he treated her shabbily in real life. The fabled Auden was a formidable and off-putting figure at the lectern. Larkin, hoping to subvert snooping biographers, ordered personal papers shredded upon his death.
 
Simultaneously profound and entertaining, Bennett’s book is a paean to poetry and its creators, made all the more enjoyable for being told in his own particular voice.