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veelaughtland's review
4.0
Edwin Morgan was one of Scotland's most famous poets, and hailed from my very own city of Glasgow. I am envious of people who were able to study under him as a professor at the University of Glasgow, as unfortunately he retired a decade before I was born!
Possibly due to this, Edwin Morgan's poetry is widely taught in Scottish schools. Personally, I never studied any of his poetry when I was in secondary school (I wish I had!), although during my time teaching, I came across him a lot. So I guess you can say that I had my first taste of Edwin Morgan far too late. Unfortunately, many of my colleagues at the time intensely disliked Morgan, saying he had been "done to death". Well, in my opinion, if something is taught frequently, it must be because it's good, right? At least in this case I think this applies.
Morgan's poetry is beautifully simple, but still manages to evoke strong feelings in the reader, and this comes through extremely well in this particular volume (which I filched from my parent's book cupboard and kept as my own). Published as a part of the 2008 Aye Write! festival in Glasgow, the editors of the book asked various Scottish writers, musicians, poets, politicians, and the general public to vote on their favourite poems by Edwin Morgan. As a result, the majority of the poems in this volume have an explanation from the various famous people who picked them as to why they were their favourites. I noticed some familiar faces, and was particularly happy to see a selection by Stuart Murdoch, the lead singer of one of my favourite bands Belle and Sebastian!
There were quite a few poems here that I was familiar with, some that I had taught myself in the last two years, but there were also new ones that really sparked my attention. Overall, my favourites were The Apple's Song, The Death of Marilyn Monroe, A Demon, Midge, The Second Life and Strawberries.
If you have not read any of Morgan's poetry before, I would highly suggest you do. His work is accessible and extremely satisfying, even if you are not really a big poetry fan.
(And can we just speak for a minute about the brilliant cover art of this volume? I love Alasdair Gray's artwork, I really do.)
Possibly due to this, Edwin Morgan's poetry is widely taught in Scottish schools. Personally, I never studied any of his poetry when I was in secondary school (I wish I had!), although during my time teaching, I came across him a lot. So I guess you can say that I had my first taste of Edwin Morgan far too late. Unfortunately, many of my colleagues at the time intensely disliked Morgan, saying he had been "done to death". Well, in my opinion, if something is taught frequently, it must be because it's good, right? At least in this case I think this applies.
Morgan's poetry is beautifully simple, but still manages to evoke strong feelings in the reader, and this comes through extremely well in this particular volume (which I filched from my parent's book cupboard and kept as my own). Published as a part of the 2008 Aye Write! festival in Glasgow, the editors of the book asked various Scottish writers, musicians, poets, politicians, and the general public to vote on their favourite poems by Edwin Morgan. As a result, the majority of the poems in this volume have an explanation from the various famous people who picked them as to why they were their favourites. I noticed some familiar faces, and was particularly happy to see a selection by Stuart Murdoch, the lead singer of one of my favourite bands Belle and Sebastian!
There were quite a few poems here that I was familiar with, some that I had taught myself in the last two years, but there were also new ones that really sparked my attention. Overall, my favourites were The Apple's Song, The Death of Marilyn Monroe, A Demon, Midge, The Second Life and Strawberries.
If you have not read any of Morgan's poetry before, I would highly suggest you do. His work is accessible and extremely satisfying, even if you are not really a big poetry fan.
(And can we just speak for a minute about the brilliant cover art of this volume? I love Alasdair Gray's artwork, I really do.)
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