Poetry Detective

From the first National Poet of Wales, a down-to-earth, investigative approach to unraveling the mystery of reading and writing poetry

Have you ever thought that poetry is a mystery designed to baffle you or even make you feel inadequate? In Poetry Detective, Gwyneth Lewis helps readers get beyond this misconception—and the paralyzing dread that can go with it—by providing straightforward, practical tools for reading and writing poetry with confidence and pleasure. As Lewis shows, becoming a poetry detective can not only demystify poems but also illuminate our lives in profoundly enriching ways.

Lewis presents the reading of a poem as an investigation, not a test of innate brilliance or sensitivity. Readers shouldn’t expect to “get” a poem immediately any more than detectives expect to solve a case the minute they arrive on the crime scene. Instead, Lewis shows how to follow clues such as rhythm, sound, and metaphor to first figure out what’s happening at the most literal level of a poem, from its speaker to its “plot.” Each chapter examines a range of poems, from the classic to the contemporary, and provides writing exercises that help readers develop poems of their own.

Whether you’re a new reader or writer of poetry, or a more experienced reader or poet seeking fresh insight and inspiration, Poetry Detective is an original and compelling guide to this timeless art.