Narrative poems
Narrative poetry is a form of poetry that tells a story, often using the voices of both a narrator and characters; the entire story is usually written in metered verse. Narrative poems do not need rhyme.
4 episodes
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Childe Harold's Pilgrimage
Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, the poem that made Byron famous.
6 January 2011
Featuring: Jonathan Bate, Jane Stabler, Emily Bernhard Jackson
Piers Plowman
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Langland's exploration of what it means to live a good life, written when the Black Death had overturned many of the old certainties.
29 October 2020
Featuring: Laura Ashe, Lawrence Warner, Alastair Bennett
The Epic
Melvyn Bragg discusses the history of the epic form, from it's creation by Homer to its more modern incarnations in the hands of James Joyce, J R R Tolkien and Philip Pullman.
6 February 2003
Featuring: John Carey, Karen Edwards, Oliver Taplin
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Coleridge's poem of a grim voyage in which a sailor shoots an albatross and is forced to tell the story of his crime forever.
4 March 2021
Featuring: Sir Jonathan Bate, Tom Mole, Rosemary Ashton