[W T Clark]

Thank you for reminding me of Gilgamesh, a book I've read much about, but never read.
I can't help you, sadly, David.

But "A LITTLE History of Poetry" I do remember reading, and I have to say, it seems pretty off the mark.

I read somewhere that he was aiming his book at teenagers. But from the actual contents of the book, either he is unintentionally patronising, or Carey believes that literary-minded teenagers are rather simple.
For instance, he tells us that Dante is probably unpalatable to a modern audience. Well, if you are looking for someone morally agreeable, then why are you interested in poetry? And actually, the very gruesomeness of Dante's inferno seems to me very relevant to our world.

Or, to take another example Carey rather disparagingly comments that Hart Crane's poetry deserves to be read highly quickly, with little attention paid to literal meaning. Yeah, in other words, "intellectually-demanding Modernists are crap; why do I have to include this guy? how long until I get to Larkin?" A similar thing happens with his final selection of poetry: we get Maya Angelou(!) as one of our most prominent contemporary poets. Uh, right, bye-bye Geoffrey Hill, or Barry MacSweeney, accessibility trumps all.

The book was certainly entertaining, but I can't really respect Carey's tastes.

Sorry, David, for gatecrashing your thread.