Addressed to all readers of poetry, this is a book about the poet's role throughout the last three centuries. The Modern Poet shows how many successive generations of poets across the English-speaking world have had to collaborate and to battle with the culture of the universities.

`Crawford's descriptions are eloquent.' Michael Schmidt, The Independent `This book opens intellectual borders ... Crawford comes out as a poet in the first person, breaking with "impersonality", demanding a place in the story ... This "I" makes the book beguiling and accountable.' Michael Schmidt, The Independent `Crawford amusingly exposes the persistent "wild man" pose of some poets - Frost and Yeats in particular ... He speaks up convincingly for several marginalized figures; there is an excellent discussion of Hugh MacDiarmid's later poetry.' Jeremy Noel-Tod, Times Literary Supplement `Endlessly fascinating and provocative book ... The Modern Poet is an important book. Impeccably researched and passionately argued, it isn't a dry contribution to bibliography but a call to imaginative action.' Brian Morton, Sunday Herald

Robert Crawford is Professor of Modern Scottish Literature at the University of St Andrews, and author of four volumes of poetry and four books of criticism. He is co-editor (with Simon Armitage) of The Penguin Book of Poetry from Britain and Ireland since 1945.