We have all read and loved poetry, and even if you aren’t that big a fan of literature studies, there are some classic poems that you simply could not have missed. Remember those “Daffodils” classes from school? Chances are, you have read more than one poem that was written by one of the poet laureates of Britain. After all, they are forefather, the founders and the stalwart practitioners of one of the most beloved art forms on earth.
Suggested read: “Poetry Can Wreck Your Heart Into The Tiniest Of Pieces, And Still Hold You Together In The Strangest Of Ways”
Before we can get into the full list of all the poet laureates of Britain, it is important to understand who a poet laureate is. The practice of appointing a poet laureate started way back in 1668, when Dryden was appointed the official Poet Laureate of England by Charles II. The poet laureate is expected to compose poems on important occasions and events. Even though this isn’t officially said, it is assumed that only the best poet writing during the time will compose poetry for the monarchy, which is why the title of Poet Laureate is an incredible honor. Here are all the people who have been awarded this title in England, because of their incredible art.
1. John Dryden
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1668-1688
I am sore wounded but not slain
I will lay me down and bleed a while
And then rise up to fight again
2. Thomas Shadwell
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1689-1692
Words may be false and full of art,
Sighs are the natural language of the heart.
3. Nahum Tate
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1692-1715
When I am laid, am laid in earth,
May my wrongs create
No trouble, no trouble in thy breast;
Remember me, remember me, but ah! forget my fate.
Remember me, but ah! forget my fate
4. Nicholas Rowe
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1715-1718
Guilt is the source of sorrows, the avenging fiend that follows us behind with whips and stings.
5. Laurence Eusden
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1718-1730
Hail glorious Off-spring of a glorious Race!
Britannia’s other Hope, and blooming Grace!
Thou smil’st already on the burnish’d Shield,
And thy weak Hand the little Sword can wield:
Already, clad in Arms, Thou mov’st along,
The Love, and Wonder of each ravish’d Throng!
6. Colley Cibber
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1730-1757
Tea! Thou soft, thou sober,
sage and venerable liquid …
to whose glorious insipidity,
I owe the happiest moments of my life,
let me fall prostrate.
7. William Whitehead
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1857-1785
Wisdom alone is true ambition’s aim, wisdom the source of virtue, and of fame, obtained with labour, for mankind employed, and then, when most you share it, best enjoyed.
8. Thomas Warton
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1785-1790
O come then, Melancholy, queen of thought!
O come with saintly look, and steadfast step,
From forth thy cave embower’d with mournful yew,
Where ever to the curfew’s solemn sound
Listening thou sitt’st, and with thy cypress bind
Thy votary’s hair, and seal him for thy son.
9. Henry James Pye
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1790-1813
The sultry hours are past, and Phobus now
Spreads yellower rays along the mountain’s brow:
The broken clouds unnumber’d tints display,
Drinking the effulgence of departing day;
And to our eyes present a radiant view,
Italia’s purpled ether never knew.
Suggested read: 8 Of The Best Contemporary Poets You Should Be Reading
10. Robert Southey
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1813-1843
They say it was a shocking sight,
After the field was won,
For many thousand bodies here
Lay rotting in the sun;
But things like that, you know, must be
After a famous victory.
11. William Wordsworth
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1843-1850
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze
12. Alfred, Lord Tennyson
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1850-1892
Though much is taken, much abides; and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
13. Alfred Austin
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1896-1913
Let not the roses lie
Too thickly tangled round my tomb,
Lest fleecy clouds that skim the summer sky,
Flinging their faint soft shadows, pass it by,
And know not over whom.And let not footsteps come
Too frequent round that nook of rest;
Should I-who knoweth?-not be deaf, though dumb,
Bird’s idle pipe, or bee’s laborious hum,
Would suit me, listening, best
14. Robert Bridges
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1913-1930
I will not let thee go.
The stars that crowd the summer skies
Have watched us so below
With all their million eyes,
I dare not let thee go.I will not let thee go.
Have we chid the changeful moon,
Now rising late, and now
Because she set too soon,
And shall I let thee go?
15. John Masefield
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1930-1967
I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.
16. Cecil Day-Lewis
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1968-1972
Is it birthday weather for you, dear soul?
Is it fine your way,
With tall moon-daisies alight, and the mole
Busy, and elegant hares at play
By meadow paths where once you would stroll
In the flush of day?
17. Sir John Betjeman
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1972-1984
And if there is some scenery,
Some unpretentious greenery,
Surviving anywhere,
It does not need protecting
For soon we’ll be erecting
A Power Station there.When all our roads are lighted
By concrete monsters sited
Like gallows overhead,
Bathed in the yellow vomit
Each monster belches from it,
We’ll know that we are dead.
18. Ted Hughes
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1984-1998
He could not stand. It was not
That he could not thrive, he was born
With everything but the will –
That can be deformed, just like a limb.
Death was more interesting to him.
Life could not get his attention.
19. Andrew Motion
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 1999-2009
General Petraeus, when the death-count of American troops
in Iraq was close to 3,800, said ‘The truth is you never do get
used to losses. There is a kind of bad news vessel with holes,
and sometimes it drains, then it fills up, then it empties again’—
leaving, in this particular case, the residue of a long story
involving one soldier who, in the course of his street patrol,
tweaked the antenna on the TV in a bar hoping for baseball,
but found instead the snowy picture of men in a circle talking,
all apparently angry and perhaps Jihadists. They turned out to be
reciting poetry. ‘My life’, said the interpreter, ‘is like a bag of flour
thrown through wind into empty thorn bushes’. Then ‘No, no’, he said,
correcting himself. ‘Like dust in the wind. Like a hopeless man.
Suggested read: Spoken Word Poems By Women That Will Lead You To Yourself
20. Carol Ann Duffy
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Years of poet laureate-ship: 2009-present
I dust her shoulders with a rabbit’s foot,
watch the soft blush seep through her skin
like an indolent sigh. In her looking-glass
my red lips part as though I want to speak.
Full moon. Her carriage brings her home. I see
her every movement in my head…. Undressing,
taking off her jewels, her slim hand reaching
for the case, slipping naked into bed, the way
she always does…. And I lie here awake,
knowing the pearls are cooling even now
in the room where my mistress sleeps. All night
I feel their absence and I burn.
Carol Ann Duffy is the current poet laureate of Britain. This was the ultimate list of all the poet laureates of Britain, and we hope you enjoyed reading excerpts from some of the greatest poetry ever written!
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