written and posted by members of Lancashire Dead Good Poets' Society

Thursday 13 June 2013

Grass Green Glass

07:30:00 Posted by Damp incendiary device , , , , 5 comments
As this is a Betjeman week, I've gathered two collections of words related to the former poet-laureate.  The words have been fed into word clouds which give an immediate sense of the content.  The first collection is taken from five of his poems: In a Bath Teashop, Ireland with Emily, Westgate-on-Sea, Cornish Cliffs, and A Bay in Anglesey.  The titles alone give you a fair idea of what the poet was about.  The amalgamation of words serve as a fair guide to his mind.
Grass
Green
Glass

The second collection of words is taken from the Wikipedia page about the poet, his life and work.  There is a strong sense of place in the descriptions.  I like the juxtaposition of the natural detail which stands out in the former and the man-made elements, cities and buildings, which are prominent in the second.
Oxford
Victorian
London

There's something to be said for poetry which can capture a life lived, based on keen observations from the poet.  The factual summary of a life is practical but somewhat grey by comparison.

5 comments:

Ashley Lister said...

You have to show me how to do the word cloud thing.

To evoke such a striking visual representation of text is startling and revealing.

Great post,

Ash

Damp incendiary device said...

http://www.wordle.net/

:-)

Standard said...

Thanks for the link! I just copied and pasted 'Bin Bag' and Prototypes in and love the results. Printed them out and they shall now adorn my flat.

I don't think I can stop. Gonna do more!

Unknown said...

Love the clouds and love what you've done with Betjeman... something very poetic about seeing the significance of his choice of words!

Colin Daives said...

What a wonderful use of word clouding.