I told you about this a few months back – the Brit company that was going to offer downloads of poetry for $.95 each. Well, it”s here and it”s happening today. Not only is it happening today, but they”ve caused enough of a splash to make the front page of Yahoo and get a short news story there. iPoems is modeled on iTunes, and will let people download audio poems to their iPods for just under a buck apiece. The site was designed by the British company 57productions, and features over 1000 selections of poetry to download. They officially launch this morning and are offering free one month subscriptions to the site. Currently, you can go directly to the index of poetry and listen to streaming poetry to your heart”s content. I did – and discovered the absolute, pure delight of John Hegley, whose brother-in-law is “ten stone in his pajamas and that”s ten stone overweight”, and the incredibly thought-provoking intimacy of Michael Rosen“s “It didn”t seem odd to be eleven“, a reminiscence of visiting post-war Berlin just 12 years after the end of the war. “Twelve years,” he says. “I can smell that far back now.”
So – it may or may not be a financial success. I hope it is. I hope that people like me discover new artists there, new wordsmiths with whom to fall in love, new poets to emulate and read and delight in. I hope that even if it isn”t, that 57productions deems it worthy to keep going in the hopes that we really are moving toward a time when poets speak as loudly as movie makers and pop music artists. We can cross our fingers, at least. Poetry is a worthy art – and it deserves to be easily and widely heard. Check out iPoems – and prod them to include more artists and more poets!
[tags]ipoems, itunes, ipod poems[/tags]
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