FORMER poet laureate Sir Andrew Motion has launched an iTunes-style website for poetry featuring a host of famous names reading their favourite verse.
More than 1600 different recordings of work by hundreds of writers can be listened to for free or downloaded to keep for a fee from the Poetry Archive.
Recordings include Spike Milligan reading The Land Of The Bumbly Boo and war poet Siegfried Sassoon's The Dug Out as well as contemporary figures including Carol Ann Duffy.
There is also a section including work by authors who died before the invention of recording equipment featuring actors such as Dame Judi Dench and Dame Helen Mirren.
Among the recordings are Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe reading a Shakespeare sonnet and The Hour star Romola Garai reading Matthew Arnold's Dover Beach.
Sir Andrew said: "We're hoping this will be The Big Bang for poetry, which is ideally suited to being enjoyed, like music, wherever you are. At the Poetry Archive, we wanted to demonstrate that the sound of a poem is as important to its life and meaning as the words on the page."
Downloads cost 89p for individual poems, and albums cost £9.99 or less.
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