We all have our favourite poems but knowing which poetry read can be pretty difficult, as you have very little idea which poets you will enjoy and which you don’t. If you are interested in reading poetry and have only a limited knowledge on the subject then a really good idea is to consider poetry books.

You can buy poetry books that contain a wide variety of different poems, though there will often be a theme linking the poems within the books- e.g. American poetry, or poetry for younger readers. By buying a poetry book that contains varied works on a theme that you are interested in, you can read through the book and find which authors you really like.

For example, I read through a mixed book of poetry and my very favourite turned out to be “If…” by Rudyard Kipling. Having discovered that I really liked his work, I then bought a poetry book of his other works and have since found some other poems that I really like.

In short, if you are new to poetry books, start with a broad brush approach, read varied works and then once you have an idea of what you really like, read more specifically, whether it be the works of a particular author, or poetry of a specific genre. There is so much variety within poetry that you are bound to find something you like, whether it is the short limericks of Edward Lear, or the Nobel Prize winning work of Seamus Heaney.