Apparently, Ruth Padel's poetry is good enough to land her a professorship. Padel, Darwin's great-great-granddaughter was elected the first female professor of poetry at Oxford univeristy after then-frontrunner, Darek Walcott withdrew from the competition. Quite an accomplishment.
For those who missed the audio guide, you Padel's poetry of Darwin is collected in her recent publication, Darwin: A Life in Poems. The themes of her poetry is drawn directly from Darwin's writings. For example, ""Vegetation he's never seen, and every step a new surprise. / New insects, fluttering about still newer flowers. It has been / for me a glorious day, like giving to a blind man eyes" is derived from Darwin's exclamation that seeing the South American jungle was "like giving to a blind man eyes".
Hopefully, Darwin would have approved!
Ben Picozzi
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