This introductory programme establishes the continuity and variety of poetry over six centuries, touching on different genres by using extracts from some of the many poems featured in the series - from Chaucer to Ted Hughes.

Wilfred Owen's 'Anthem for Doomed Youth' and Edward Thomas' 'Old Man' are among the featured poems, while Cyril Cusack reads a selection of poems by W.B. Yeats, and Ian Richardson and Isla Blair give voices to an excerpt from Eliot's 'The Waste Land'.