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Twenty Minutes

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Twenty Minutes: The Greatest Poem Never Read

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Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

The Greatest Poem Never Read

02/08/2012

BBC Radio 3 - Twenty Minutes, The Greatest Poem Never Read

Danny Karlin considers Robert Browning's Sordello: is it the best worst poem ever?

Danny Karlin, editor of the complete works of Robert Browning, stands up for one of the poet's least loved and least read poems: Sordello.

Danny Karlin, Professor of Poetry at the University of Bristol and editor of the complete works of Robert Browning, stands up for one of his poet's least loved and least read poems: 'Sordello'. A long story of a medieval troubadour, the poem was a complete and utter disaster on publication, set the career of its author back by twenty years, and has remained a black hole in Victorian poetry. Can anything of Browning's intentions be recovered, can the poem itself come to life at all? If we could find a way to read 'Sordello' should we? No one knows the poem better than Danny Karlin; can he convince us that we should try it? 

Producer: Tim Dee.

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