Poetry Afternoon: Wilfred Owen

Books on the Hill is hosting a poetry afternoon on Wednesday 4 November, with lecturer Michael King taking the lead. He'll be spending the session in the Reading Room, looking at the First World War poetry of Wilfred Owen.

If you've come across Owen's work before, you'll know he's one of the big names of the Great War, but King is going to do more than just read the poems. He'll be talking through how Owen's own experience of the conflict shaped the work he left behind, and how that work went on to challenge the romanticised accounts of war that were so common at the time. It's the kind of session that works best if you're happy to sit with a few poems and hear them picked apart rather than just skimmed over.

The whole thing runs from 14:00 to 16:00 in the Reading Room at Books on the Hill, 1 Holywell Hill, St Albans, AL1 1ER. It's a mid-afternoon slot, so it's more of a coffee-and-cake sort of thing than a late-night event. On that front, tea and coffee are provided, so you can settle in for the full two hours. Tickets start from £15.