11 Plus Exams Forum

I have been looking for a good book with some classical poems for my 13 year old. Any suggestions? Many thanks.

Try Seamus Heaney's anthology The Rattlebag.

Also - a wonderful anthology that was around when I did O levels (pre GCSE!) was Poets of Our Time with some wonderful war poets in as well as more modern (then) Ted Hughes, Betjeman, Charles Causley and maybe Louis MacNiece too, though that may have been a separate book.

If you haven't already, get him/her acquainted with some classics that are suitable for adolescents such as a handful of Shakespeare's sonnets, the witches' spells in Macbeth, the shared love sonnet between Romeo and Juliet when they meet, Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

I recently bought anthologies edited by Anne Fine called 'A Shame to Miss' - there are three of them for younger, middle and older readers. Some fantastic poems in them and some great wee notes from Anne Fine commenting on and explaining a few of them.

I had the Rattlebag when I was a teenager and loved it. I wonder where it got to...

We had a lovely evening last night. The boys asked me to read some of TS Eliot's cat poems, then asked about The Wasteland which was in the same collection. I said they wouldn't understand it. Reverse psychology works wonders. I had two small boys begging to be read The Wasteland by Eliot so we read some of it and then they discussed what they thought it meant. Is there a smug mum emoticon on here?

You may think that this is a odd selection for a 12-yr-old but I discovered this book at 11yrs and it changed my whole perception of poetry and I still dip into it now and it still has it's relevance,humour,and shock. The book is The book of Cautionary Tales by Hilaire Belloc. Your boys are obviously wanting to expand their exposure to all types and Belloc to me seems fresh and edgy. If this is too behind them, try an anthology of Pasternak- exquisitely and he creates atmosphere and emotions through unsentimental beautifully phrased use of words- great beauty under the circumstance of his life. And get them to read Dr Zhivago when they are a little older as it uses most the poetic prose which is the best I have read - the political back-drop can't hurt his history either.

There's always the romantics to fall on which I loved and before then I loved Ben Johnson
Undermilkwood is adult but the grace is art and I'm thinking of playing to my 12-yr-old- maybe a few edits...Richard Burton of course......

Enjoy it's all great but do add the fun in too.

There is also The Nation's Favourite Children's Poems (BBC) and Classic Poetry with poems selected by Michael Rosen.

Thank you for all your replies - they are really useful to us. Now let's see what we are going to buy...

The various anthologies of the poems that are displayed on the underground are good, too.

If anyone wants to get a younger one started on peotry, you could do worse than Roald Dahl's Revolting Rhymes. Mine loved them.

There is a nice anthology called "Because a fire was in my head" 101 poems to remember compiled by Michael Morpurgo, it has an excellent and varied selection of poetry.