5 Excellent Poetry Resources

Learning to write poetry doesn’t have to be a difficult endeavor—these resources are a helpful guide on the English language as well as descriptive writing.

Cropped image of "The Poetry Reading," before 1938, by Vittorio Reggianini. Oil on canvas. Public Domain

Poetry is often defined in mysterious ways. The most common belief one will hear in a creative writing program is that it’s all about “feelings.” Students are challenged to write about their personal experiences, then workshop them with a group in a validating way.

This idea would have been utterly alien to Virgil, Shakespeare, and Tennyson. The great poets of history learned their craft in ways more like students of science than English today, with a heavy emphasis on the nuts and bolts of literary technique.

William Shakespeare was very aware of the eternal nature of poetry. Slavenko/Shutterstock

For those interested in learning how to write poetry, here are five resources that cut through the mystification, laying out aspects of meter, rhyme, and how “The Greats” actually wrote.

‘The Ode Less Travelled: Unlocking the Poet Within’

This book by celebrity comedian Steph—en Fry is every bit as funny as you might expect. It’s also insightful in ways that you would not. Fry admits to writing poetry in private but not publishing it, as it wouldn’t be judged on its own merits. He’s willing, though, to give readers a droll handbook that surveys the basic elements of writing verse. While there are many handbooks like this out there, none are quite so entertaining.

Fry naturally begins with a discussion of “The Great Iamb,” the two-syllable metrical foot that is natural to English. Think of the heartbeat: “ba BUM, ba BUM, ba bum.” He moves through other types of meters before delving into rhyme, stanzas (line groupings), familiar forms like the sonnet and the ode, and unfamiliar ones like the clerihew. For a casual read, “The Ode Less Travelled” is surprisingly wide-ranging, and the ideal primer text for nervous beginners.

‘Learning the Secrets of English Verse’

Where Fry is entertaining, our next selection is rigorous. In “Learning the Secrets of English Verse: The Keys to the Treasure Chest,” David J. Rothman and Susan Delaney Spear bring to bear their years of experience in teaching poetry to young people.

Rothman was a student of Robert Fitzgerald, the famed poet and translator of Homer. The curriculum Rothman presents in this book is a modified version of the one Fitzgerald offered in his class on “Versification” at Harvard. Rothman himself taught a graduate-level creative writing program at Western Colorado University from 2010 to 2019. He and Spear, a former student of Rothman’s and for many years a high school English teacher, bring a rigorous approach to form.

“Learning the Secrets of English Verse” is, quite simply, the most comprehensive book on how to write poetry written in modern times. It provides a systematic introduction to all the major metrical forms in English, ordered from earliest to latest, beginning with Anglo-Saxon alliterative meter. Then rhyming stanza forms are treated in order of length, from couplet to sonnet. Explanations are paired with exercises that increase in difficulty as skills increase.

The authors argue that, while their rigorous approach may seem “dry,” students will actually come away more interested in poetry than if they were taught to write verse based on feelings alone. By learning these ancient techniques, poets acquire “a different and profound power.” Treating English as more like a scientific discipline helps students better understand the tools of language. It’s less like putting on a straitjacket, as students sometimes think, and more “about learning the steps in a dance.”

“Learning the Secrets of English Verse” is a useful resource for teachers and students in late high school and college, as well individuals who are serious about learning to write quality poetry. If you only buy one volume on the subject, look no further than here.

Inspiring young minds to think in poetic terms is one benefit of teaching poetry mechanics. Biba Kayewich

“Shakespeare’s Use of the Arts of Language”

Moving beyond handbooks and textbooks, we come to “case studies” in poetry. Rather than surveying many different forms and poets across time, certain books give us a deep dive into the work of a single great poet, illuminating how genius works.

One of the best of these examples is “Shakespeare’s Use of the Arts of Language,” by Sister Miriam Joseph. First published in 1947 when Sister Miriam was an English professor at Saint Mary’s College, it presents a codification of all the literary devices contained in Shakespeare’s works, broken into categories and subcategories. This includes everything from the standard figures of speech to grammar schemes, and even types of logical argumentation.

I discovered Sister Miriam’s work through an endorsement from the accomplished poet and playwright Nicholas Korn, who uploads weekly readings of his work to his “Wild Sonnets” YouTube channel. Korn swears by Sister Miriam’s book so much that he maintains a stockpile of copies to hand out to aspiring poets for free.

The ‘Iliad,’ by Alexander Pope (and Homer)

Alexander Pope’s translation of Homer’s “Iliad,” adapted into elegant heroic couplets, is rightly regarded as a literary masterpiece. The critic Samuel Johnson even called it “the greatest version of poetry which the world has ever seen.” Published by subscription from 1715 to 1720, it made Pope the 18th-century equivalent of a millionaire. He bought a villa in Twickenham, England, where he lived like an English lord for the rest of his days.

Just as impressive as his translation are the footnotes that accompany it—they’re longer than the translation itself. Even three centuries later, Pope’s learned commentary on Homer remains the best single source of information about the “poetical fire” of the blind bard. Pope’s notes delve into Homer’s methods of limning character, extended similes, epithets, Greek terms, and even the unique postures of the heroes when they are slain. He also compares passages from Roman authors like Virgil and Horace, who emulated Homer, but never surpassed him.

"Homer Singing His 'Iliad' at the Gates of Athens," circa 1814, by Guillaume Lethière. Oil on canvas. Nottingham City Museums and Galleries, England. The Clark

In 1996, Penguin Classics did a great service to humanity by publishing Pope’s complete translation and footnotes in an inexpensive paperback edition.

‘Poetry Circle’

Here we enter the digital age. Technically, this next resource is not a book, but a monthly newsletter sent via email.

James Sale has been writing poetry for more than 50 years. He has an awful lot to say about the subject. In each installment of his free Wider Circle newsletter, he provides helpful tips for how to write verse from a practical perspective. His first tip may seem obvious but is important: “The first way to write great poetry is to write bad poetry! Don’t be parsimonious—write lots of it.” Greatness has to begin somewhere.

Sale provides aspirational poetry quotes and updates on his own work, which includes an ambitious epic poem he’s in the process of finishing.

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