It's about consuming a drug, in this case the Lotos. Listen to the poem!

Earlier, on my ride home from work, I was listening to the album "The Way Through" by the American rapper Deca. There's a song where he says "lotus-eaters" in one of the lyrics, and for some reason those words just kind of stuck in my head. After being home for an hour or so, I was reading online that William Blake was a big inspiration to him, so I looked on my bookshelf real quick to see if I had any of his works. With "lotus-eaters" still on the mind, I reached for a green book which I hadn't opened but once or twice before, and turns out it was a collection of Tennyson and the very first page I opened to was The Lotos Eaters. How peculiar is that?

This is exactly what I've been looking for, a reading with that exact voice! Thank you so much. This is my favorite poem ever. I truly wish I was in the land of the lotos eaters.

Yes 10 minutes is the limit. I got it in with 2 seconds to spare.

When this version was recorded in 2008 I believe that there was indeed a 10 minute time limit for recordings, but this restriction has now, praise be, been removed. I hope therefore that Spoken Verse might be kind enough to do his many admirers and followers a great favour by rerecording it at a slightly more measured pace, which would allow more to be made of the emphases. I for one would be extremely happy to hear such a version!.

The last stanza was particularly good, in my opinion. The 'rolled to starboard', etc., was uttered in a more prosaic, almost Eliotian diction, through which I always envisioned this poem. One wonders if Eliot got his 'I will show you fear in a handful of dust' from the 'handfuls of white dusts' of Tennyson. Same for the last lines. Amazing. Your speech fitted the poem perfectly: drowsy, slow, quasi-numb; sounds like an opium-induced experience. Tennyson had a 'magical ear' indeed.

Great reading with a full, sonorous voice. Only mispoke once: "sort task to eyes" for "sort task to hearts". I too am looking forward to a somewhat slower recitation. Just today I discovered Keats' "On Sleep", and the beginning of the Choric Song seems to have borrowed heavily from it. "WHAT is more gentle than a wind in summer? What is more soothing than the pretty hummer That stays one moment in an open flower, And buzzes cheerily from bower to bower? What is more tranquil than a musk-rose blowing In a green island, far from all men’s knowing? More healthful than the leafiness of dales? More secret than a nest of nightingales? More serene than Cordelia’s countenance? More full of visions than a high romance? What, but thee Sleep? Soft closer of our eyes! Low murmurer of tender lullabies! Light hoverer around our happy pillows! Wreather of poppy buds, and weeping willows!"

This was an experience!! A brilliant experience.

What a beautiful voice!

Fantastic to hear you read a longer poem. The intricate music of this poem captures one in a unique kind of enchantment. Truly a marvelous experience. As I listen, I think there must have been a time when people often read long poems like this to each other in the evenings. What an extraordinary way to pass the time. . .

@LalicaBRUS Why, thank you kindly. Please visit my channel page and listen to a few more. You can find your favourites by putting the poet's name or anything from the title into the "search uploads" box over the videos.

Amazing. This is indeed a difficult poem to read. A little stretched and monotonous on the beginning, but no less than astonishing from the chorus song onwards. The only problem; it sounded to me a little hasty sometimes. For example, the transitions from line to line, section to section, should be slower, I believe; whereas 'Hateful is the dark-blue sky,' should be strongly emphasized, each syllable deeply stressed, uttered slowly. Same for 'Let us alone'.

Fabulous reading! I'd have taken it slightly more slowly though. (Did you have to go fast to fit it in for KZfaq ?) Incredibly, the poem isn't in Helen Gardner's OBEV.