New Poems on the Underground 2006

by Gerard Benson, Judith Chernaik, Cicely Herbert

Genres: Poetry

144 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2006

Reviews

[Rick · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is less a review of a book and more of a concept: a delightful way to expand poetry’s audience. The idea came to the British and then was borrowed by Americans. Why not select quality short poems, or excerpts of poems that can stand apart from their whole, and print them on posters that appear on public transportation? A great idea. (And while the Brits got their first, we Yanks chose the better title: Poetry in Motion is the banner under which the idea was executed by the MTA in New York. Here’s a website for accessing the poems from the MTA: http://www.poetrysociety.org/motion/m...) The London Underground has been running its series since 1986. There is an earlier collection or two but this is the one I found in a Waterstone’s in York and it’s an entertaining, wide-ranging anthology, I’m guessing the 2006 in the title refers to the year the poems, close to 80 of them, were published in the book, not on the Tube. British poets (Shakespeare, Chaucer, Hardy), American poets (Moore, Dove, Crane, Hughes), poets in translation (Dante, Basho, Youseff), young poets (McLeod, Ahmend, Teng, Hawkes), Chinese poets (Li Bai, Lu Xun), famous poets (Marlowe, Dickinson, Yeats, Wordsworth), poets known to poets (Rosenberg, Larkin, Alvi, O’Hara, Cardenal), and unknown poets. There are poems on war, love, nature, aging, listening to music, washing up, the London Eye, poetry, food, waterways, miracles, and even one on poems on the underground: “Proud readers / Hide behind tall newspapers. // The young are all arms and legs / Knackered by youth. // Tourists sit bolt upright / Trusting in nothing. // Only the drunk and the crazy / Aspire to converse. // Only the poet / Peruses his poem among the adverts. // Only the elderly person // Observes the request that the seat be offered to an elderly person.” By D. J. Enright, who died in 2002 at the age of 82. One hopes he lived to see the provocative inaccuracy of his truthful observation. (People do read the poems, I’ve seen them; people do give up their seats to the elderly, the handicapped, and pregnant. The sin is that it isn’t universal, not that it doesn’t occur at all.) Maybe it was just Housman’s over read “When I Was One and Twenty” that is ignored by those knackered by youth and the untrusting tourists. Maybe the day Enright’s poem appeared someone noticed the elderly poet straining to see it through the arms and legs and surrendered his or her seat just below the placard to Enright for a better view of his work. Enright’s poem, which at first struck me as too obvious in its cleverness, quickly grew on me—you have to love, for one, the phrase “knackered by youth”; it is a poem about seven or eight things, only one of which is poems on the underground. It’s about observation, about behavior, about communication, about self-pity, about aging, and about poetry. That’s the magic of poetry, it sings many songs with one verse. New Poems on the Underground 2006 is a small, diverting (in the richest sense of the word), diverse collection of potent words written from one soul to our randomly encountered souls, riding the crowded ways through our lives, waiting without knowing for this connection between thoughts and life.

[Sarah · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love this idea of displaying poems on public transportation but I love that more than the actual collection of poems. Of the 60ish there were 3 that were standouts to me, and the rest just weren't really my style. I don't want to hold that against this book because I know the variety is kind of the whole point, but all the same, I'd give this 3 stars.

[Netsen7Bookdragon · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved these poems, although some I have come across before and wouldn’t exactly call them new. Still an enjoyable read on a lazy Friday afternoon.

[E A · Rating 3 out of 5]

poems i read on the orange 34 bus. turns out they are not about the tunnels under london, i was hoping for centuries worth of poems about tunnels under london, sounded like some tim powers shit!

[Judith Rich · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this and the original anthology. I love the concept. It's also a good bedtime read because the poems are all short (having to fit, as they do, into an Underground advertising space).

When I go to London, I'm always thrilled if I find a poem on the Underground. Sadly few and far between these days.

[Claire · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm enjoying some of the poems in this anthology gifted to me by a friend in England who said he'd read it while backpacking. There are mostly old classics in this slim book, so don't be fooled by the "new" in the title.

[Rachel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fantastic collection of poems from around the world.