"For me, forensic engagement restricts the poem to the exam hall, where it will soon be forgotten. It is memory that takes a poem outside and into the world. The poem then exists in the street, on the bus, in the pause between stations. I don´t want poetry to be a political battleground. I just want people, of any age, to remeber the stuff, for no better reason than it´s wonderful. Because it expresses the essence of what it means to be human - and life would be empty without it. If the poem is never known by heart, it stays on the page, little more than a crossword puzzle, a plaything of clever cleverness and never personally meaningful. It can never spontaneously arise at the right moment to provide comfort, solace, wisdom. It can never provide joy."
C.P. Nield, "Learn it by heart for the sake of civilisation", in Standpoint, May 2015
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