# Poetry on Kindle - MERGED thread



## jrluzader (Jan 7, 2010)

I've searched through old posts and wasn't able to find many posts concerning poetry books.  If I missed something please forgive me (and allow me to blame the mistake on my newness).

My question is multifaceted:
Is there anyone out there who regularly reads poetry?
Does anyone have any suggestions for poetry works for the kindle (especially self-published)?


If it helps anyone out, my favorite big name poets (alive and dead) are Sharon Olds, Anne Sexton, Tony Hoagland, Charles Bukowski, and Alan Ginsberg.

I'd like to help out some self-publishing poets by buying their work (and I must admit that, as a poet myself, I am a bit curious as to whether self-published poetry sells at all).

Thanks.


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## marianneg (Nov 4, 2008)

Did you look on the Book Bazaar board as well?  I remember at least one of the regulars over there publishing a book of poetry.  It was probably a while back, though.  I think Len Edgerly (host of the Kindle Chronicles podcast) has published some poetry on the Kindle, too.


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## Winter9 (Jan 19, 2010)

Emily Dickinson!!!!


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## Richard Pierce (Feb 10, 2011)

_--- edited... no self-promotion outside the Book Bazaar forum. please read our Forum Decorum thread._


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## Darcia (Jul 16, 2010)

One of the best indie authors of poetry that I've ever read is Magdalena Ball. She also has several poetry ebooks with coauthor Carolyn Howard-Johnson. The imagery in their work is incredible.


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## Alain Gomez (Nov 12, 2010)

Winter9 said:


> Emily Dickinson!!!!


I second this.

Edgar Allen Poe is also very good.


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## Daphne (May 27, 2010)

I love poetry and read a lot. I have one favourite, old, dogeared anthology so that I can dip into all the best offerings from great poets - John Keats "The Eve of St. Agnes", Tennyson's "The Lady of Shalott", Samuel Taylor Coleridge's "Kubla Khan" - I could go on forever, so I would suggest a really good, varied anthology. Having said that I don't have a general anthology on my Kindle but do have the following:

Witty, snappy, modern.
 - fantastic, epic story if you enjoy the likes of Tolkien and enjoy Anglo-Saxon.
The Complete Works of Robbie Burns - would have preferred selected highlights - bit much, unless you really love Burns.
I do have one Indie book which I bought because I read the author's novel, which was beautifully written, and wanted to see her poetry - although this is still a couple down on my epic to-be-read list, so I'm still looking forward to trying it.


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## joangolfing (Sep 12, 2010)

I enjoy reading the poems in The Seashell Anthology of Great Poetry by Christopher Burns on my Kindle.


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## tim290280 (Jan 11, 2011)

I recently read The Rime of the Ancient Mariner on Kindle. I think poetry could benefit from Kindles a lot, plenty of collections could be put together, won't lose money, etc.


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## Daphne (May 27, 2010)

joangolfing said:


> I enjoy reading the poems in The Seashell Anthology of Great Poetry by Christopher Burns on my Kindle.


I've been wanting an anthology of classic poems on Kindle, and this could be just the thing. Thankyou.  (At least I can't wear the pages thin like I have on my paperback anthology!)


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## Harry Shannon (Jul 30, 2010)

Haven't read poetry in many years but adored Robert Frost, Carl Sandburgh, ee cummings, Dylan Thomas, Poe, Tennyson, the brilliant Emily Dickinson, and especially William Butler Yeats.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

I love poetry and read it frequently. W. H. Auden is probably the one that I read most often. Unfortunately, few of the great poets are available on Kindle yet.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

JRTomlin said:


> I love poetry and read it frequently. W. H. Auden is probably the one that I read most often. Unfortunately, few of the great poets are available on Kindle yet.


 Any that are in the public domain are available via feedbooks, mobilread, or manybooks if not Amazon. Of course that would not necessarily be most 20th century poets. Still I just looked up Auden and all the ones Harry mentioned. . .there are at least a few volumes for each poet. . .sometimes collections, sometimes commentary.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

Ann in Arlington said:


> Any that are in the public domain are available via feedbooks, mobilread, or manybooks if not Amazon. Of course that would not necessarily be most 20th century poets. Still I just looked up Auden and all the ones Harry mentioned. . .there are at least a few volumes for each poet. . .sometimes collections, sometimes commentary.


Auden isn't public domain. He isn't on Kindle. If he is on feedbooks they are violating his copyright. 

Edit: The _Companion to Auden_ is on Kindle but that is a book about Auden (well worth reading) and not a collection of his poetry. Very little if any of Cummings is on Kindle yet either. The major 20th century poets just aren't represented well. That will come, I'm sure, but it's taking time.


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## tim290280 (Jan 11, 2011)

Harry Shannon said:


> Haven't read poetry in many years but adored Robert Frost, Carl Sandburgh, *ee cummings*, Dylan Thomas, Poe, Tennyson, the brilliant Emily Dickinson, and especially William Butler Yeats.


 

I remember having to study ee cummings in Lit class. I always found him so pretentious.


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## James Everington (Dec 25, 2010)

I don't read as much as I should; my favourites are Christina Rossetti, e.e. cummings, T.S. Eliot, Keats & Ted Hughes.

That Seashell anthology looks interesting!


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## Thalia the Muse (Jan 20, 2010)

The Seashell Anthology is EXCELLENT. The formatting is good, too.

I also have The Giant Book of Poetry, another huge anthology. There's surprisingly little overlap, given that both books are large anthologies of poetic "greatest hits," and The Giant Book might be a tad stronger on contemporary poems than the Seashell. However, it is illustrated with oddly amateurish drawings -- but you can just click past those. 

For both books, when you download the sample it includes the entire table of contents, so you can see exactly what you're getting and whether your favorite poets are represented. And they're both priced reasonably for the Kindle -- unlike the Garrison Keillor anthologies, which are well above the $10 mark.


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## James Everington (Dec 25, 2010)

That's good to know about the formatting - that's kind of what I was worried about with poetry. Have sampled anyway, so we shall see.


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## Mike McIntyre (Jan 19, 2011)

Raymond Carver!


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## bnapier (Apr 26, 2010)

Is poetry something that hasn't really been explored in this form yet? I haven't seen many titles (hardly any at all, actually) and didn't know if it was because of the formatting woes we've experienced with my book or just because there were no published poets that had been willing to try it yet.

Thoughts?

_--- edited... no self-promotion outside the Book Bazaar forum. please read our Forum Decorum thread._


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## NapCat (retired) (Jan 17, 2011)

bnapier said:


> Is poetry something that hasn't really been explored in this form yet? I haven't seen many titles (hardly any at all, actually) and didn't know if it was because of the formatting woes we've experienced with my book or just because there were no published poets that had been willing to try it yet.
> 
> Thoughts?
> 
> _--- edited... no self-promotion outside the Book Bazaar forum. please read our Forum Decorum thread._


Go to the Kindle Store and search on "poetry"
I come up with 2,505 pages of poetry books.

Happy Rhyming !!


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## James Everington (Dec 25, 2010)

I've only got two poetry books on Kindle - one is an anthology with loads of famous poems (Whitman, Tennyson, Ginsberg etc.) - think it is called the Seashell Anthology.

The other I haven't read yet, but it's by an indie author whose short stories I liked a lot. It is the Haiku Diary by Neil Schiller.

cheers
James


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## Daphne (May 27, 2010)

I have four poetry books on my Kindle and am planning to buy another. You may find this thread interesting: Poetry Suggestions, Anyone. 


Some entertaining, Liverpudlian poetry.


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## SheriLeigh (Feb 21, 2011)

Poetry is a niche market already - a very very small one. And it's hard to read on Kindle, I've found. Line breaks, fitting words on a page. It's important in poetry, much moreso than for prose.

That said, I love poetry. William Stafford is one of my fav's. And Mary Oliver and Sharon Olds. I'm in awe of what they can do with words.


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## bnapier (Apr 26, 2010)

SheriLeigh said:


> Poetry is a niche market already - a very very small one. And it's hard to read on Kindle, I've found. Line breaks, fitting words on a page. It's important in poetry, much moreso than for prose.
> 
> That said, I love poetry. William Stafford is one of my fav's. And Mary Oliver and Sharon Olds. I'm in awe of what they can do with words.


I totally understand that. My book, A Mouth for Picket Fences, was released in trade paperback in September of 2010 and the press has just now gotten the formatting right for the conversion to Kindle. The spacing and line breaks seem like a totally separate art on their own!


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## TomNew (Jun 8, 2011)

Is your book out?


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

***merged a couple of poetry threads together -- sorry for any confusion.  ***


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## Mike McIntyre (Jan 19, 2011)

One fish
Two fish
Red fish
Kindle


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## R J Askew (Dec 4, 2011)

Yes, I regularly read the short stuff and write it because it is the most exciting form of writing.

_sorry, no self-promotion outside the Book Bazaar_


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

Do any of you read poetry on Kindle and what do you feel are the pros and cons? What would make it more enjoyable - perhaps a free audiobook with it to hear the poet reading?


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## Geemont (Nov 18, 2008)

The problem with poetry on Kindle is the screen size. One line will not always fit on the screen, and the text will wrap down to the next line. Call me fussy, but this isn't OK for poetry, though fine for prose. I have _Leaves of Grass_ as a ebook, but to get the lines right, the text is too small. I'd probably prefer to read it as a DTB.

Also, a lot of poetry is lacking on Kindle: Ezra Pound and William Carlos Williams, for example. Where are _The Cantos_ or _Patterson_?

The bigger question: Do people still read poetry? Can people even write poetry anymore? The last time I pursued modern or contemporary poems it read mostly like song lyrics. Not for me.


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## James Everington (Dec 25, 2010)

It's a lot harder to find well-formatted poetry as Kindle books - some of the 'free classics' versions are terrible.

I've an anthology called The Seashell Anthology which is well formatted and has a ton of poems in. It does have some Pound and WC Williams, but only the obvious ones...

The only other I've bought and kept on Kindle is The Haiku Diary by Neil Schiller (disclaimer - he's a self-published author I fraternise a bit with). It's exactly as it sounds - a diary as a series of haiku.


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

It's certainly harder to do a Kindle conversion of a poetry collection, and the rollover lines you talk about are one of the main problems. Usually, if the font size is set as the smallest on Kindle, most poetry lines should fit on the screen. If a poet uses very long lines I turn the Kindle sideways and change the display to landscape. This actually lets me get the whole line on to the screen, whereas it wouldn't fit on a book page. As an editor I'm always having to decide where to break lines that are too long and how to display them well.

If the Kindle conversion is done well, the rollover line should indent a little so that the reader knows it's part of the previous line. But most poetry conversions aren't done well, and the free ones are mostly dreadful. They are hard to do. We're almost there.

I found the Faber one by Alice Oswald good and readable. But I think poetry does always need some help and I would like to put free audiobooks with ours to tempt people. Poetry can only break even at the best of times so it needs all the help it can get or it will miss out on the Kindle as well as in printed book form.

As for whether people read poetry - I think more people read it than ever before but they mostly like it at live events (of which there are many and I run about 3 a month with the chance for people to submit to an anthology so people also have a great chance of getting published) and they also really enjoy it online. Poetry is a massive activity on the internet and in poetry venues. It's just getting people to read the books or get poetry on Kindle - once we can convert it well!

Leaves of Grass would be a real challenge to convert - and also a real challenge for a printed book poetry editor.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

I'm honestly not much interested in poetry at all. . .I have a couple of my mother's books with poems she loved and I pick them up from time to time just to browse -- mostly in memory of my mother as they were her favorites. . .but I'm just not going to sit down and read poetry for fun.  Sorry.   And, when I do, it's the older stuff. . .nothing newer, frankly, than Robert Frost. . . . .

(And, a reminder, we're here in the Book Corner so no self-promotion, please.  )


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## Brad Murgen (Oct 17, 2011)

I don't think poetry is a good fit for Kindle... presentation and format of the poem is sometimes just as important as the words themselves, and when you can change the font size and all that on Kindle, the poet loses part of their art.  It's better experienced in print, if you ask me.


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

It's interesting you pick up a poetry book to remember your mother and probably says a lot about how we enjoy poetry and the significance it can have. Sorry if anything I said sounded like self promotion. I've avoided mentioning any writing by myself or my press in these posts. Alice Oswald is a favourite author of mine from Faber, and they seem to be doing well with Kindle conversions of poetry where many aren't. Mentioning books we like is ok isn't it? I'll get used to the rules.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

poetry does seem like a hard sell sometimes, though, as noted below, some of the live performances are real popular

accessible poetry seems more accepted its seems, judy blume, etc; i tend to prefer that myself

i haven't had much problem reading whitman or dickinson on my phone; again, as noted below, i also just turn my phone sideways


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## jumbojohnny (Dec 25, 2011)

If a spirit of compromise is adopted by the author / publisher, then it is possible to have satisfactorily formatted poetry on Kindle. By compromise I mean maybe losing the original stanzas and perhaps combining them into twos, or perhaps vice versa; perhaps losing some formatting which helps make the poem in its printed book form, it's a hard one that, I know, but as ultimately, it is about the words, I think it can be accepted, just.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

jumbojohnny said:


> If a spirit of compromise is adopted by the author / publisher, then it is possible to have satisfactorily formatted poetry on Kindle. By compromise I mean maybe losing the original stanzas and perhaps combining them into twos, or perhaps vice versa; perhaps losing some formatting which helps make the poem in its printed book form, it's a hard one that, I know, but as ultimately, it is about the words, I think it can be accepted, just.


totally agree!

sometimes it's even kind of fun to take a very spacing-disjointed poem, where words are spaced apart in a much more emotional rather than standardized way, and reformatting experimentally, just to see if a more ebook format form works, even if differently

though i'll have to also say, there'll be those times where a particular poem just won't work doing that, and that's ok too

"most" of my regular poems are centered, and i've had no problems on the kindle with that; for the nook, i keep seeing "?" marks at the end of each line via things like the adobe digital editions reader (i don't a nook) and no one can tell me why (yet)

and my more recent left-justified prose-poem work has no real problems either (at least on the kindle)

thank jumbojohnny ;-) glad this thread is still going


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

It's so nice to see a few poetry devotees on Kindle! What we lack in numbers we make up for in enthusiasm....

I have almost managed to format poetry perfectly for Kindle. It's not really stanza breaks that are the problem, but getting long lines to indent a little if they roll over so that the reader knows it's still the same line. Amazon has an annoying way of making that go wrong when it's uploaded, even if it works perfectly in the previewer and has all been done the correct way.

I'm going to try using InDesign instead of Word to see if Word might be causing the problem.

I love the idea of reading poetry on a phone too. I think we can enjoy it and poetry somehow really works in those situations where you want to read one while you have a moment.


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## jumbojohnny (Dec 25, 2011)

Hello, Adele, yeah, that can be a problem, but please don't rely on the KDP previewer within the publishing process, if ever anything gave false results, that does, or at least can; instead use the annoyingly similarly named standalone Kindle Previewer, it is far more accurate. Also, Word can never be replicated 100% by Kindle, you can take advice on the KDP forums to match page size and font type and size, but even then, it is never a 100%, this tends not to matter with paragraph based fiction for want of a better phrase, it simply doesn't matter if a para ends on a line with 10 words or 3, but obviously with poetry we need something more robust. It will mean quite a bit of trial and error, and if you can't access the Kindle Previewer before publishing, then maybe the cost of an ebook or two (price it as low as possible while you do this, free if poss.) But all worth it in the end.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Adele Ward said:


> It's so nice to see a few poetry devotees on Kindle! What we lack in numbers we make up for in enthusiasm....
> 
> I'm going to try using InDesign instead of Word to see if Word might be causing the problem.
> 
> I love the idea of reading poetry on a phone too. I think we can enjoy it and poetry somehow really works in those situations where you want to read one while you have a moment.


hi adele, yea, i have a few books on my phone, for a couple of reading apps ;-) and it is nice to just open up a volume and read a verse or two; i read somewhere that in other countries, particularly like in japan, reading on the phone as been the preference for over a decade!

i don't have an ipad, but it seems that would be nice too

let us know if you can about how indesign works for you vs word, i'm curious

thanks


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

jumbojohnny said:


> maybe the cost of an ebook or two (price it as low as possible while you do this, free if poss.) But all worth it in the end.


when i gave my wife a kindle a year ago, i never thought i'd be using it to preview my mobi files


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

I think we do use the Previewer. It does look right, after much work to find out how to get the long rollover lines to work. Then we upload it to Amazon and it goes wrong again. I'm sure we're almost there with it. We have everything perfect except making the long rollover lines indent in the right way, however the reader increases the font.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Adele Ward said:


> Then we upload it to Amazon and it goes wrong again. I'm sure we're almost there with it. We have everything perfect except making the long rollover lines indent in the right way, however the reader increases the font.


maybe (hopefully) the new kf8 conversion features will fix that; right now i'm staying away from it, got enough getting the current conversions done


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

maybe things've improved, availability wise, since last year, esp early last year, but as napcat way early last year points out, a search for "poetry" on the kindle store on amazon has a huge list

i just did a kindle amazon store search and got this for poetry :

"Showing 1 - 12 of 25,572 Results"

my own favs cover a huge range and variety, from dickinson and whitman, to frost and ee cummings, to plath and judy blume meant erma bombeck, have no idea how or why i linked the two!

it's all whether they ring something for me, enjoyment, impact, and/or just whimsy

anyway, hope this thread's still around, best wishes everyone


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

I'm reading Alice Oswald's book Memorial, published by Faber, on Kindle. I love Oswald's poetry but I'm not too keen on this one. I'm sure there must be far more poetry on Kindle if books by Faber and the main poetry publishers are there. They do manage to format it well too.


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

I hope Amazon does something to help with this. It's a nightmare for many poetry publishers.


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## jumbojohnny (Dec 25, 2011)

I think we are all in what could be called 'the early days' still. Although all is fine for readers (with some exceptions), it is a different kettle of fish for publishers. But I do believe this K8 business deals with some but not all formatting hurdles, so I think we will all get there in the end.


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## jumbojohnny (Dec 25, 2011)

There is a mob, and I use the word with fondness, which have a base in Scarborough, are led by a young entrepreneur and brilliant poet, Jamie McGarry, and all publish under the banner of Valley Press. Although it is an, what's that word? eclectic I think, (although was that Catweazle's name for electricity? Or even Arthur Weasley's attempt?) bunch which includes novelists and painters and travel writers, in the main they are poets, even those aforementioned. Jamie is for sure on Kindle, whether his fellows and fellowesses have followed or will do, I have no idea, but do take a gander at his published poems.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

definitely early days   and i know amazon has some video or files to help learn using kf8, but i just don't have time right now to dig into a whole new format, though eventually i want to

adele, i won't be able to check back immediately, but can you give me an example, a few lines, made up or otherwise, that's been problematic for you?

i know i have a poem from 1981 i haven't been able to include in any of my ebooks cause of the jumps (like multiple tab indents, but often manually chosen in regard to # of spaces), and i haven't been able to format well yet

back later


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

Thanks for offering to help adanlerma. I didn't see your post straight away because I got swamped with work. 

It's not specific lines. The problem is with all poetry lines if they're a bit long for the width of the page/screen and a word or two need to 'roll over' on to the next line. To let readers know this is still part of the previous line we need the words to indent slightly. This can also happen if readers raise the font size, making more lines 'roll over'.
We have tried the correct way of laying this out, which is to set the indented position as the margin, and to then have a 'negative margin' for rollover lines. It works. But when we upload to Amazon it goes wrong again with whatever they do to it.
Poetry needs to work the opposite way to prose. With prose, the first line of a paragraph is indented, then all the lines roll over automatically left justified. Kindle seems to keep doing this to poetry too, which means each line is indented as it's a new line, and any rollover lines left justify. 
I hope this makes sense! I'm not sure if using InDesign would cure it. We have been using Word but we do also have InDesign.
From what I can hear it seems to be a common problem and a lot of publishers are opting to have the whole poem left justified, including any rollover lines. But a reader can't see if it's a rollover line unless it indents. It could be a new line.
Boy this sounds complicated!
I read Alice Oswald's book Memorial on Kindle and they got the rollover lines to indent in the right way. They have to be able to indent like this automatically, no matter how large people choose to set the font.


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## jumbojohnny (Dec 25, 2011)

There is one thing that can be done re over-long lines for Kindle. If you make an image file for some or all of the poems, then you can control the size of the font in an indirect way, ie, if you make sure the text on the source image file is formatted as you want then the resulting final image file will retain this, as it will be just that file. If you do do this though, do start with a file sized to the standard Kindle page, you'll know in advance then if it's ok or too small etc.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Adele Ward said:


> Thanks for offering to help adanlerma. I didn't see your post straight away because I got swamped with work.
> 
> I read Alice Oswald's book Memorial on Kindle and they got the rollover lines to indent in the right way. They have to be able to indent like this automatically, no matter how large people choose to set the font.


no problem adele, this is like bonus stuff to get to when able; i do understand what you're saying now a bit better

my own work is short-lined (mostly), so haven't seen much of that problem 'cept when i raise the font size real big

any idea how alice got her work to indent automatically?

thanks!


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

jumbojohnny said:


> There is one thing that can be done re over-long lines for Kindle. If you make an image file for some or all of the poems, then you can control the size of the font in an indirect way, ie, if you make sure the text on the source image file is formatted as you want then the resulting final image file will retain this, as it will be just that file. If you do do this though, do start with a file sized to the standard Kindle page, you'll know in advance then if it's ok or too small etc.


good idea johnny; most text tools in image editors give a choice of strong or precise or soft or such-other type characteristic, so that might be worth experimenting with


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## Tony Rabig (Oct 11, 2010)

I don't read it as often as I should, but I've bought a number of ebook poetry titles, most recently James Dickey's The Whole Motion: Collected Poems, 1945-1992 (Wesleyan Poetry Series) (pricy but worth it -- if the 14.39 price makes you gag, several of his other collections are also available at lower prices, and I'd recommend Poems, 1957-1967 (Wesleyan Poetry Series) as a good second choice at 9.99)

Donald Justice's Collected Poems are worth a look too.

Am waiting for a good collection of Philip Larkin. Believe there are some good collections of Cavafy's poems and Ursula LeGuin's poems coming this year.


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## Skate (Jan 23, 2011)

Much as I love my Kindle and poetry, I've only ever bought one poetry book for Kindle ('Conamara Blues' by John O'Donohue) and I wouldn't buy any more. When I read a poem I like (which I did plenty of times in that book), I want to be able to flip back to it to read whenever I feel like it. I haven't worked out how to do that on a Kindle. You can't just flick through to find a loved line or stanza. So I'll stick to paper books for poetry, I think.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Skate said:


> Much as I love my Kindle and poetry, I've only ever bought one poetry book for Kindle ('Conamara Blues' by John O'Donohue) and I wouldn't buy any more. When I read a poem I like (which I did plenty of times in that book), I want to be able to flip back to it to read whenever I feel like it. I haven't worked out how to do that on a Kindle. You can't just flick through to find a loved line or stanza. So I'll stick to paper books for poetry, I think.


skate, you should be able to do a search for the line or partial stanza right from the page you're at, via the search or menu function; we have a b&w kindle from christmas before last, and it can search out a word or words

also, if the poet creates an internal index, and places a link to that index after each poem, that's even easier than (on our old kindle) of going to the menu, scrolling down to index, and selecting

i put an index into each ebook i do, from a reader's perspective, mine ;-)

see if you can do a search anyway on yours, really neat if you have a few key words or phrase or poem title in mind

that being said, there's always gonna be something to be said for a paper product one can hold and flip through; but i feel it compliments the digital version, but just my preference ;-) best wishes


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## Skate (Jan 23, 2011)

adanlerma said:


> skate, you should be able to do a search for the line or partial stanza right from the page you're at, via the search or menu function; we have a b&w kindle from christmas before last, and it can search out a word or words
> 
> also, if the poet creates an internal index, and places a link to that index after each poem, that's even easier than (on our old kindle) of going to the menu, scrolling down to index, and selecting
> 
> ...


Thanks, Adan. I have to admit to not having played around with the menu much. This particular poetry book doesn't have links to the index unfortunately, but I'll have a play around and see what I can do. The problem with my memory is, I tend to remember things visually - so I'll tend to remember the 'shape' of the poem I liked, rather than the actual words.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Skate said:


> Thanks, Adan. I have to admit to not having played around with the menu much. This particular poetry book doesn't have links to the index unfortunately, but I'll have a play around and see what I can do. The problem with my memory is, I tend to remember things visually - so I'll tend to remember the 'shape' of the poem I liked, rather than the actual words.


ahh, yes, i use a lot of centered text to get "shape" and recently, with left justified, am "kinda" getting the hang of some shaping through that too, it's fun 

anyway, best wishes, it'll help a lot as more authors put in their own internal indexes i think, take care


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## Adele Ward (Jan 2, 2012)

Faber and Faber did the Alice Oswald book and I don't know who they would have asked to create the ebook. So I can see it can be done in the correct way, with lines rolling over and indenting no matter how people raise the font.

I find I do enjoy poetry on my Kindle, although I wasn't sure if I would. One good thing is that you can turn it round and read in landscape mode, which is very good for poetry with long lines.


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## Ann in Arlington (Oct 27, 2008)

Folks, we're in the Book Corner.  Please take discussions of poetry from a writer's/publishers point of view (i.e. is it selling, how you format, etc.) to the Writer's cafe.  Some posts may have been deleted or modified.  Thanks.


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## adanlerma (Jan 16, 2012)

Adele Ward said:


> Faber and Faber did the Alice Oswald book and I don't know who they would have asked to create the ebook. So I can see it can be done in the correct way, with lines rolling over and indenting no matter how people raise the font.
> 
> I find I do enjoy poetry on my Kindle, although I wasn't sure if I would. One good thing is that you can turn it round and read in landscape mode, which is very good for poetry with long lines.


yea, me too, i like the horizontal mode; and personally i haven't had much problem enjoying poetry on the kindle, phone, or computer app, but most what i've read was fairly straightforward/traditional format wise

i'm sure the newer and upcoming models of everything will be able to do more and more, just taking a bit w/readers for some reason


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