Poetry - Keeley Street

Poetry Courses
Study online or in London

From introductory courses to the more in-depth longer courses, revisit classic works or enjoy discovering new poets, sharing your views in lively class discussions.

Courses available both in-person and online

Join us in the heart of London for in-person classes. Our modern campus in Covent Garden is easy to reach and buzzing with creativity. With modern purpose-built facilities and state-of-the-art equipment, it’s the perfect space to support your learning journey. Explore our facilities >

Prefer learning online? Our live online courses bring expert teaching to you, wherever you are.

Whether you choose to study in-person or online, all our courses are live, interactive, and taught by expert tutors. Wherever and however you want to learn, we’re here for you.

Courses available both in-person and online

We offer a range of long and short courses allowing you to choose between in-person and online learning.

Learn in the centre of London with our in-person courses. Our purpose-built facilities in Covent Garden mean we are ideally located and easy to get to. 

See our guide to online learning for more information about accessing our live online courses.

All our courses are live, interactive, and taught by expert tutors. No matter how you prefer to learn, we've got the class for you.

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  1. Poetry from the Edge
    Course start date:  Mon 12 May 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Laurie Smith
    Some poets began their writing lives, and sometimes lived much of them, outside the 'normal' modern urban lives which most of us experience. They have lived at the margins and despite - or perhaps because of - their geographic, political or emotional isolation, they have become major poets. We will look at how each has achieved national and international success with their poetry. Poets include C P Cavafy, Stevie Smith, Derek Walcott, Seamus Heaney and Bob Dylan.
    Full fee £229.00 Senior fee £183.00 Concession £149.00
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  2. Leonard Cohen: song, poetry, prose and persona
    Course start date:  Thu 15 May 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Richard Niland
    This class explores the work of Leonard Cohen, examining his poetry, song, prose and persona in the context of the literary and musical traditions that shaped his art. We delve into Cohen’s meditations on life and the modern world through his absorption and reworking of a rich range of cultural influences.
    Full fee £169.00 Senior fee £135.00 Concession £110.00
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  3. Poets of the Silver Age, the Revolution and the Terror
    Course start date:  Fri 13 Jun 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Stephen Winfield
    This course will look, decade by decade, at the leading figures of the generation caught up in the turmoil of the Revolution whose lives and poetry together form a veritable seismograph of the unfolding tragedy. Their extraordinary interrelationships and the originality and power of their writing constitute one of the richest periods in the history of Russian Literature.
    Full fee £119.00 Senior fee £95.00 Concession £77.00
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  4. Demystifying Poetry
    Weekend
    Course start date:  Sat 21 Jun 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Whether you are new to poetry or an experienced reader of verse, this course will enable and enhance your enjoyment by exploring the techniques that poetry uses to affect our response and create meaning. Exploring rhythm and rhyme, voice, mood, imagery, language and allusions, we will focus on a diverse range of poetic examples to examine how this powerful form of literature works to create emotion and connection with the reader.
    Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00
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  5. Landmark Poetry: places and spaces
    Weekend
    Course start date:  Sat 28 Jun 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    What is the role of poetry ‘off the page’ in public spaces? Can a poem change the way we might re-encounter cultural history? Do statues serve as ‘informants’ from the past? We read poetry by Jackie Kay, Lemn Sissay and Dorothea Smartt commissioned for bridges, pavements, monuments, even super sewer ventilation shafts to identify the challenges, revisions and celebrations that emerge from exploring the place of poetry in public spaces.
    Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00
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  6. The Best of Contemporary Poetry
    Course start date:  Fri 4 Jul 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Lewis Ward
    On this in-college literature course we will take the temperature of the contemporary poetry scene through close readings from the 'Forward Book of Poetry 2025', which showcases poems from the best collections recently published in the UK and around the world.
    Full fee £119.00 Senior fee £95.00 Concession £77.00
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  7. Gender, Desire and the Body in Poetry
    Course start date:  Tue 8 Jul 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Ranging from sixteenth century love sonnets via bawdy Restoration verse to a Victorian eroticised poetic narrative, this course examines how the language of love and desire, and the poetic representations of gendered bodies, provide an idiom that can be used to express both conservative and more subversive cultural ideas.
    Full fee £79.00 Senior fee £63.00 Concession £51.00
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  8. Wild Nights: poetry and desire
    Course start date:  Wed 24 Sep 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Laurie Smith
    Some friendships, including with people of the same sex, may become so intense as to be love, though not necessarily of a sexual kind. We will look at some great poets who have had this experience and expressed it brilliantly in their work: Shakespeare and Byron, Tennyson and Emily Dickinson, Arthur Rimbaud and Thomas Hardy, C P Cavafy and the great 20th century Russian poet Some Marina Tsvetaeva, and finally our recent Poet Laureate, Carol Ann Duffy.
    Full fee £259.00 Senior fee £207.00 Concession £168.00
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  9. Poetry of the Troubles: Seamus Heaney and his Contemporaries
    Evening
    Course start date:  Fri 3 Oct 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Lewis Ward
    On this in-college literature course we will read Seamus Heaney’s North (1975), his first collection to deal explicitly with the Troubles in Northern Ireland, alongside poems on the same theme by contemporaries including Michael Longley, Seamus Deane and Derek Mahon.
    Full fee £149.00 Senior fee £149.00 Concession £97.00
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  10. An introduction to poetry
    Weekend
    Course start date:  Sat 25 Oct 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Suzannah V. Evans
    Come and revel in the possibilities of expression and form offered by poems across time, guided by lively group discussion and tutor expertise.
    Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00
    Rating:
    95% of 100
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  11. A Day with T.S. Eliot
    Weekend
    Course start date:  Sat 15 Nov 2025

    Location on this date:  Keeley Street

    Tutors:  Suzannah V. Evans, Phyllis Richardson
    Come and explore the Nobel Prize-winning poet, T. S. Eliot, in a stimulating group context where our focus will be on immersing ourselves in the language and contexts of his striking poetry.
    Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £55.00 Concession £45.00
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  12. Full fee £69.00 Senior fee £69.00 Concession £45.00
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