ENGL 340, British and Irish Poetry Since 1930

A warm, insightful and informative portrait of the Welsh poet who spoke with the tongue of angels and looked like an unmade bed-or so said The New York Times. If poetry can be explained through an understanding of the poet, and if a poet can be understood through a knowledge of his childhood, his home environment, his schooling, his friends, his childhood memories, and the landscape he selected to write from and about, then this program is a genuine clue to the work of Dylan Thomas. At the very least, it provides the background that produced "Do Not Go Gentle," the site and sights of "Over St. John's Hill," the characters of "A Child's Christmas in Wales," and other landmarks on the trail of Dylan Thomas.

Seamus Heaney, one of the finest poets writing in the English language, and the late Richard Ellmann, biographer of Joyce and Wilde, and critic of Yeats, in literary dialogue about these three brilliant Dublin writers. The literary dialogue between Heaney and Ellmann uses documentary material pertaining to Joyce, Yeats, and Wilde, and was filmed at such literary landmarks as the Hill of Howth, Sandymount Green, Trinity College, and the Joyce Tower at Sandycove.

The 1970s and '80s were a time of turmoil and dislocating change in Britain as customs and values were repeatedly challenged-a period in which, as Angela Carter put it, there was nothing sacred. This program examines the evolution of the British novel during the period 1970-90, spotlighting Fay Weldon, Angela Carter, Penelope Fitzgerald, John Berger, Malcolm Bradbury, Hanif Kureishi, Alasdair Gray, James Kelman, Martin Amis, Margaret Drabble, Jeanette Winterson, Salman Rushdie, and Ian McEwan as well as some of their key works.

A documentary film shot on location in Dublin and France which traces the artistic life of Samuel Beckett through his prose, plays and poetry.

Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney has been judged by Robert Lowell to be the most important Irish poet since Yeats. This classic program looks back over Heaney's career at the time his best-selling collection Seeing Things-a return to the rural childhood territory of his very first book-was published, offering a rare opportunity to hear the poet read and discuss his work. Through poems including "Death of a Naturalist," "The Toome Road," "Wheels Within Wheels," "The Strand at Lough Beg" and "Seeing Things," he describes his efforts to balance losses with life's marvels, the lyrical with the elegiac, and social responsibility with creative freedom in a society divided by religion and politics.

Read by noted actors Michael Gough, Edward Fox, and Eileen Atkins, T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land powerfully expresses the disillusionment and disgust of the post-World War I era in Europe. In this program, Professor Frank Kermode, of Cambridge University; Eliot biographer Peter Ackroyd; and poets Sir Stephen Spender and Craig Raine examine the complex nature of Eliot's influential poem, analyze its appeal, and trace the reasons why it became one of the best-known emblems of the 20th century.

This program from the Famous Authors series begins by contextualizing W.B. Yeats' early life in 19th century Ireland and introducing the Yeats' artistic family and the Irish legends that were so influential in his life and work. Yeats eventually became a ring leader of a group of artists in London called the Tragic Generation. Yeats became known as a political and literary voice of Ireland and an advocate for the performance of Irish drama.

A prolific virtuoso of poetic forms and techniques, W. H. Auden achieved literary fame on both sides of the Atlantic. This program traces his life's story and provides a sampling of his very best works, including "Musee des Beaux Arts," "In Memory of W. B. Yeats," "Epitaph on a Tyrant," "Leap Before You Look," and "The Shield of Achilles.