Poetry Please

Radio 4's longest-running poetry programme Poetry Please is thirty years old on 5th October 2009.

BBC Radio 4 is celebrating this momentous birthday of the people's poetry programme with a live edition broadcast from its hometown of Bristol, in collaboration with Bristol Old Vic on Sunday 11th October.

Presenter Roger McGough will be joined by special guest readers, including Stephanie Cole and Patrick Malahide, who have a strong connection with the city. A second programme will be recorded after the live edition, for broadcast on 18th October.

The programmes include only the best-loved poems of the last 30 years, with classic favourites and a sprinkling of unexpected hits among listeners.

With poems by Shakespeare, Larkin, Frost, Cope, Duffy, Auden, Yeats and Rosetti, here is delight, comfort and reflection, and the odd joke. There's also a special poem written to celebrate the occasion by Roger McGough.