The Poetaster

Tim and Andrew bid farewell to Andrew's kitchen, at least for a few weeks, and indulge in a semi-professional recording studio. Full of the milk of human kindness as a result, Tim shrugs off his grumpy demeanour, and leads a discussion of the lifegiving qualities of the sun, as described by fellow curmudgeon Philip Larkin in his poem "Solar".

For Good Friday, Tim and Andy talk about another Easter poem, this time from twentieth-century surrealist David Gascoyne.

Tim is frantically doing his homework ahead of Easter celebrations, and is keen to bounce some ideas around about John Donne's poem "Crucifying". Metaphysical poets need a fair bit of unpacking but does this limit the emotional connection we feel with the poetry itself?

Andy is solo for this quick trot through Augustan poetry and the work of its leading writer, Alexander Pope. Balance, harmony, wit, and style are hallmarks of Pope's idea of good poetry, and we have a look at how these come through in the "Essay on Criticism" and "On a Certain Lady at Court".

Andy and Tim discuss Vincent O'Sullivan's response to the famous painting "The Milkmaid" by Vermeer. What happened before this woman started pouring the milk; what will happen after; and when did ordinary moments of everyday life become the subject of poetry?

Denis Glover was at the heart of the New Zealand poetry scene in the mid-twentieth century, and in this episode Andrew and Tim discuss one of the poems in Glover's "Sings Harry" sequence, featuring a farmer musing about his place in the world as he works the land.

Join Tim and Andrew as they dive into the English undergrowth in the company of the Romantic period's version of David Attenborough, Northamptonshire Peasant Poet John Clare.

Cricket tragics Tim and Andrew reunite for the first episode of 2026 to discuss Francis Thompson's gently elegiac "At Lords".