Authored by a team of experienced scholars and teachers and aimed at non-native students of English literature, An Introduction to Poetry in English approaches its subject from multiple angles.
First the book explores in five opening chapters the musical qualities of poetic language (metre, rhythm and rhyme), poetic form (both fixed and free), the links between poetry and orality, and the transmutations of a poetic theme. Then, a selection of poems provides examples of these poetic features as well as texts for further study. Finally, eleven commentaries on works by poets from William Shakespeare to Benjamin Zephaniah demonstrate how to apply the concepts explained in the book through close readings of individuel poems.