History of the Eighteenth Century in Ten Poems

Smallpox was rife in the eighteenth century, leaving its mark both on its sufferers, and on the literature of the period... Read more

Explores the aesthetics and impact of war poetry in the early eighteenth century, focussing on Joseph Addison's poem, Th... Read more

Matthew Prior's The Ladle was one of the most popular poems of the eighteenth century. This podcast explores its appeal.... Read more

Much popular music of the eighteenth century is found in poetic miscellanies. But how was it performed? Giles Lewin expl... Read more

Introduces the poetry of rural life, and its debt to classical sources. Often idealised, the rural and the rustic play a... Read more

This podcast explores the culture of Jacobitism in the eighteenth century, using a popular ballad. The culture of Jacobi... Read more

This podcasts introduces the popular eighteenth century epigram. Epigrams were hugely popular in the eighteenth century,... Read more

An introduction to the world of fashion and the politics of the petticoat, seen through the poetry of the time. This pod... Read more

This podcast looks at cricket seen through eighteenth-century eyes, focussing on a poem by James Dance, called 'Cricket:... Read more

This podcast looks at the relationship between tobacco and poetic inspiration, through some popular comic poems.