This a compendium of poems from some of the greatest authours from the 20th century. Great book! Comes in a set of two books one is modern the other is contemporary.

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE my anthology of modern poetry!! All of the great classics in one stop. Beautiful!

The Norton Anthology of Modern and Contemporary Poetry, Third Edition by Richard Ellman (2003)

When I was in the hospital, this was all I wanted with me. Enough said.

Done with the modern anthology, on to contemporary. Enjoyed most of both. A good selection of poetry from the most influential poets.

This is a truly wonderful anthology-- Nortons are the best. I got this for a class last semester and kept it. It is a two volume set, with one volume of modern poetry (from late 1800's to 1980's) and one volume of contemporary poetry (from 1940's to present). I know the dates overlap, but 'modern' and 'contemporary' are two different poetic idioms that overlapped quite a bit in transition. Modern poetry-- think Ezra Pound, Edna St. Vincent Millay, William Butler Yeats. Contemporary-- think Gwendolyn Brooks, W. S. Merwin, Sylvia Plath. Some especially good things about this anthology are the sheer number of poets represented, the section of poetics (writings about poetry by poets), and the thoughtful and enlightening biographical material (much better than in most anthologies).

I'd recommend it as a must for any poetry lover's bookshelf. It starts with a selection of Walt Whitman and traverses through many greats of English and American modern literature and is nicely balanced with postcolonial and feminist contributions as well. I found lots of poets I knew and loved (Eliot, Yeats, Thomas, cummings, Hughes, Dickinson, Plath) and found a few new ones I'd never read before and loved (Roethke, Crane, Graves).

There are 2000-odd pages across two volumes and it's only about $50-60 on Amazon. Definitely worth the investment! My favourite book purchase I've made in ages.

This is a really good collection of works. I have been reading the usual Great Poets and was looking for something more contemporary. This works! Right now I'm reading the poetry of Gwendolyn Brooks.

for class.. but ive really come to appreciate the massive amount of footnotes

I still have my college copy given to me by my great friend, Pam Lah. We would read these poems aloud sitting on new spring grass outside our dorm.