Founder of Poems on the Underground marks 40th anniversary

Judith Chernaik dreamed up the idea for Poems on The Underground with her Gospel Oak neighbours 40 years ago.

She told the Ham&High earlier this year how this London tradition started with a jolly night with Cicely Herbert and Gerard Benson.

The poems now go up three times a year in the advertising spaces in Tube carriages (Image: Wikimedia Commons)

They were part of the 'Barrow Poets' whose mission was to make verse more accessible by performing in schools and pubs, and she was the book-loving New Yorker struck by the beauty of literary London who suggested putting poems on the Tube's empty advertising spaces.

"You have to understand I had come from New York where the subway was unclean and dangerous but we just had to use it - I still think London has one of the great transport systems of the world," she said.

It turned out that London Underground was fully on board with the idea and with a minimum of fundraising, the first five poems went up in carriages in January 1986.

They included Percy Shelley's Ozymandias, a poem by Robert Burns and another by Seamus Heaney.

Today celebrated poets Imtiaz Dharker and George Szirtes choose six poems three times a year.

They will join Judith at a "joyful event" next month to talk about the idea which has been copied on subway systems all over the world - from Moscow to Beijing.

Judith said: "It was quite an extraordinarily popular idea that was taken up and has led to a lot of interesting travel where I've been invited to attend the launch at various metro systems.

"There is something very different about seeing a poem on a Tube. It's a special way of reading a poem and reaches you in a different way."

Also at the library in Keats Grove will be guest poet Nick Mahoka and the Apollo Quartet for a mix of poetry, music and a slice of London's cultural history.

The event starts at Keats Community Library at 7.30pm on June 4. Tickets £12 from WeGotTickets.com or from the library on 0207 431 1266.