The Poem and the Journey

“It’s a generous, likable, diligent and smart piece of work” – Andrew Motion Guardian “Ruth Padel is Virgil in the ‘Inferno’ of poetry. She guides the reader gently and deftly on the journey… This is much more than a book about poetry, this is a handbook for living!” – Fiona Shaw “Brilliant… Padel draws on a huge range of references to make a powerful case for poetry as a living art form” Independent “As a writer you would probably choose Ruth Padel as your ideal reader. Her eye misses very little of the nudging and winking that goes on in a poem, and she seems able to tune into the silent music of text on the page…she finds more than most to engage with and enjoy” – Simon Armitage “An enlivening, illuminating book, lucid, accessible and probing” The Times

Ruth Padel is a prize-winning poet, Fellow of both the Royal Society of Literature and the Zoological Society of London, and first Resident Writer at Somerset House, London. Her collections include Rembrandt Would Have Loved You, Voodoo Shop and The Soho Leopard, all shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize, and more recently Darwin- A Life in Poems, shortlisted for the Costa Poetry Award.Highly acclaimed for her nature writing in a book about conservation, Tigers in Red Weather, and her novel, Where the Serpent Lives, she has also published books on contemporary poetry, including 52 Ways of Looking at a Poem and The Poem and the Journey.In 2014, Ruth Padel is the first Writer in Residence at Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, and is recording her experiences in her blog at http-//

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