Shelley

In the second part of our conversation with Fiona Sampson, who chaired 2022's Keats-Shelley and Young Romantics Prizes, we discuss the joys and the challenges of reading Shelley, Keats and the Romantics in general in 2023.

The winner of 2022's Keats-Shelley Poetry Prize is 'December Moth outside a care-home window' by Susan Holland. 
Fiona Sampson writes: ‘This poem is full of linguistic relish and brilliant imagery, with some really exceptional phrase-making including the last line’s ‘glowing impassable threshold.’ Intense, almost forensic observation creates a rich study of will and intention.’
Susan lives on Kintyre, where she wrote the poem. She kindly agreed to to read the poem down the phone, which I hope only adds to its poignancy and power. 
Read 2022's Keats-Shelley Prize shortlists
Read 2022's Young Romantics Prize shortlists
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Our guest on this episode of the Keats-Shelley Podcast is the poet, biographer and critic Fiona Sampson - who is also Chair of 2022's Keats-Shelley and Young Romantics Prizes. 
Read 2022's Keats-Shelley Prize shortlists
Read 2022's Young Romantics Prize shortlists
Our conversation begins with Fiona reading her favourite Shelley poem, Hymn to Intellectual Beauty - which inspired the title of Fiona's new book, Starlight Wood. This forms the basis of our discussion, which roams freely to ponder issues including: the importance of reading aloud; what is 'Intellectual Beauty'; and what does it mean for an atheist like Shelley to write a hymn? Fiona Sampson the poet unravels the sound patterns of Shelley's verse and compares the 'Hymn' to its sister-poem, Mont Blanc. Fiona Sampson the biographer tells the story of the poem's composition and the infamous summer without a summer of 1816, which also inspired Mary Shelley to begin Frankenstein. 
Part 2 of the conversation will follow.
Read more about Fiona Sampson here.
Buy a copy of Starlight Wood here.