Classic Poetry Aloud Index

Top 10 Poems

What are the world’s most popular poems?

Between May 15th 2007, and March 21st, 2008, Classic Poetry Aloud had some half a million downloads from across the globe. This shows the most downloaded poems, and so the world’s most popular poems, to be:

  1. She Walks in Beauty by Lord Byron
  2. Ode to Autumn by John Keats
  3. If by Rudyard Kipling
  4. Sonnet 18: Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day? by William Shakespeare
  5. Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
  6. How Do I Love Thee? by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
  7. O Captain! My Captain! by Walt Whitman
  8. Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley
  9. Death by John Donne
  10. Ode on a Grecian Urn by John Keats

9 Comments

9 responses so far ↓

  • Kirstie // March 24, 2008 at 1:00 am

    I love the voice of the man who reads the poetry, it is pure beauty. :]

  • classicpoetryaloud // March 28, 2008 at 6:26 pm

    Kirstie, you are too kind. It is the poetry that matters. I only read it.

  • JoAnn // April 28, 2008 at 2:34 pm

    I am so grateful you take the time to produce this wonderful podcast. I enjoy poetry and your selection has exposed me to “new” poems and poets I now love. Of course you read it so well. I look forward to listening regularly.

  • Joe // May 10, 2008 at 2:32 am

    As an English teacher, I really appreciate this site. It gives the students I teach a location where they can hear the words with great care and emotion.
    Thanks and keep it up!

  • Neil Johnson // May 11, 2008 at 3:13 pm

    What a fantastic idea. Whilst one can gain a lot through reading poetry, it always brings, for me, an additional element to hear it out loud.

    I can and will recommend this site to others - keep up the good work!

  • classicpoetryaloud // May 14, 2008 at 9:51 pm

    Many thanks everyone for your kind comments. I hope that future readings will continue to provide what you are looking for.

  • txabi // June 21, 2008 at 7:58 pm

    I haven’t heard someone read poetry so well since I finished university; thanks so much for sharing this with all of us.

  • petrina // July 2, 2008 at 4:07 pm

    Great readings and poems!!

  • classicpoetryaloud // July 9, 2008 at 9:55 pm

    Txabi and Petrina - thank you for your kind words. This sort of support really makes the whole Classic Poetry Aloud project worthwhile.

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