David talks to Mark Ford and Seamus Perry, hosts of the LRB’s Close Readings poetry podcast, about what makes a great political poem. Can great poetry be ideological? How much does context matter? And is it possible to tell political truths in verse? From Yeats’s ‘Easter 1916’ to Owen’s ‘Strange Meeting’ to Auden’s ‘Spain 1937’: a conversation about political conviction and poetic ambiguity.

To find out more about Close Readings and how to subscribe, just visit the LRB’s website https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/close-readings

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Next time: Lea Ypi on Ibsen’s The Wild Duck

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