Preface and Acknowledgements.- PART 1: READING POETRY Reading Aloud; Describing a Poem; Varieties of Poetic Style; Evaluation of Poetry.- PART 2: POETRY THROUGH THE CENTURIES Introduction; Medieval The Genesis of English Verse; The Renaissance A Time of Tension; The Early Seventeenth Century The Pilgrimage to \'The Kingdom of Man\'; Romanticism In Praise of Imagination; Victorianism Faith and Doubt; Modernism \'Make it New\'; After Modernism; Contemporary Poetry; Historical Tables.- Further Reading.- Glossary of Literary Terms.- Index.