Poetry has always played an important role in Gyles Brandreth’s life. “I was lucky in that my parents loved words and language,” says the much-loved author and broadcaster. “There’s a poem by Philip Larkin, that I do my own version of, which begins ‘They tuck you up, your mum and dad’ – because my mum and dad tucked me up in bed when I was a little boy and read me lots of books, along with poetry by the likes of Edward Lear, AA Milne and Lewis Carol.”
At an early age, Gyles had the good fortune of meeting TS Elliot in person, who taught him a simple poem from his Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats that would trigger Gyles’s lifelong passion for learning poems by heart. The importance of this simple practice was highlighted five years ago when Gyles came to Cambridge to visit the Memory Laboratory at the University of Cambridge. “I learnt fascinating stuff about how reciting poetry to babies before they are born improves their use of language,” he recalls. “I also learnt that older people can help keep dementia at bay by learning poetry by heart.”
It was this experience that inspired Gyles to start Poetry Together, a charity and competition that aims to unite old and young people through the shared joy of reciting poetry aloud – and from memory. “As an older person with grandchildren, I thought this would be a good way of getting younger and older people together,” explains Gyles. “Over the years we’ve seen some incredible interactions between participants. For example, last year we held our final in London, where a 90-year-old former soldier from the Chelsea Pensioners’ Hospital recited a war poem from the first world war with a fourteen-year-old boy. Afterwards, over tea, I overheard this ninety-year-old veteran telling the young boy about some of the realities of war and what it was really like to be a soldier.”
To coincide with Armistice Day, Gyles will make an appearance on ITV’s This Morning on Friday 11 November around 11am; he will be joined by some of this year’s Poetry Together winners who will recite their poems – some of which touch upon themes of Remembrance. Among them will be Benjamin Andrews, who is a student at Sancton Wood School in Cambridge, where the final of Poetry Together was held on 1 November.
To try your hand at learning poetry by heart, check out Gyles’s anthology, Dancing By The Light of The Moon: Over 250 poems to read, relish and recite. Gyles also has a podcast called the Commonwealth Poetry Podcast, in which he and his daughter Aphra learn about the different countries of the Commonwealth through local poetry traditions.
