Does anyone know any good poets?
I have to write a literary paper on someone and his or her life and writings. I have no idea who to write it on. It can’t be someone like Stephen King. I am looking for a poet similar to Edgar Allen Poe who writes gothic poetry so to speak. Does anyone know of any good poets or authors I could do my paper on?
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I can’t help with the Poe thing, but I can happily recommend Seamus Heaney and Anna Akhmatova for starters.
Well, I’m currently in Brit. Lit. and yesterday we read V. by Tony Harrison. He’s more recent, but his work is VERY interesting, to say the least. Beware, V. has lots of cursing. He forces you to pay attention through his language. It was the first poem I could actually remember after I left class.
Good Luck, I’m actually finishing up the final copy of my Lit. paper tonight, so I feel your pain!
Yeats and Longfellow (the Psalm of Life is far and away one of my favorite poems of all time). They aren’t Poe-like, but they are wonderful.
Charles Bukowski is a fav. So is Anne Sexton.
The Beats (Allen Ginsburg is the most poetic) are always a safe bet, too.
Robert Frost. Excellent poet.
For more gothic writing styles: Percy Shelley, W. B. Yeats, Ambrose Bierce, or William Blake. For tortured poets/authors: Emily Dickenson, Sylvia Plath, or Hemingway.
Rimbaud or Byron would be good too!
@aprilsimnel i can’t believe those two slipped my mind, good call!
Keats Shelley Byron: Brits. Go for it.
Do NOT write about Sylvia Plath! Any research on her would require you understanding Vulgan Poetry, and nothing is worth that pain.
If you want a good poet, go with Oscar Wilde. Any paper on him is easily researched, and teachers adore him.
Without question the greatest poet of modern times is Rod McKuen. Next to him, the likes of Ezra Pound and T. S. Eliot are lightweights. If you’re some kind of perv, check out Gerard Manley Hopkins or John Clare.
I would recommend William Blake. I find his poetry fascinating.
I have a grudge against McKuen. He said he wrote the song “If You Go Away”, which was actually from french songwriter Juaques Brel.
I second W. B. Yeats; he had a complicated life, and a lot of it is reflected in his poetry.
There’s also Philip Larkin, a favorite of mine. He understands the music of language, and you can see it in “This be the verse” and “Going, going.”
btw, Yeats rhymes with Hates.
Sylvia Plath is my favorite.
Oscar Wilde is good too. I’m also a fan of Yeats…but despite filmfann’s opinion I have always loved Plath.
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