Back in 2015, the Paris Review ran an article on Robert Frost’s poem, “The Road Not Taken” and concluded that it is - by some distance - the best known and most widely referenced poem of the twentieth century. Nothing else comes close. And yet, it is as misunderstood as it is famous. Many poems, or extracts from poems, are misread outside their original context - like Frost’s other line, “good fences make good neighbours” and Beckett’s “Fail Again, Fail Better”. 

And what of Irish poetry - are the best known Irish poems well understood? What is the most searched for Irish poem anyway? In this week’s episode, Darach and Peadar consider the pitfalls that face such research but march in regardless. They also reflect on the most popular song lyrics in Irish and what those words say about us.

Listener mail this week from Belgium and Tipperary! 

For more comments see @EnyaComments on twitter.

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