“The Listeners” is the most famous and frequently anthologized poem by Walter de la Mare, an author otherwise known mostly for his horror fiction and works for children. It first appeared in print in 1912 in de la Mare’s third collection of poetry, The Listeners, and Other Poems. Written in a melodious, haunting, and almost incantatory style, the poem quickly became of one the canonical works that most every British student could expect to be required to memorize at some point in his or her education. So much so that in her 1966 study of Walter de la Mare, the critic Doris Ross McRossen asked, “What school child has not, at one time or another, intoned ‘"Is there anybody there?" said...
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