Dissertation idea regarding "Poems on the Underground"

[90sWereBetter]

I begin my third year of my English degree in September, which of course means the dreaded dissertation begins. We've already been told to consider ideas over the summer months. My idea, which I've already floated to coursemates and one lecturer, is to do a deep poetic analysis of a selection of poems that have been displayed on the London Underground over the last 30 years, and to see how these poems reflect the changing city of London. My coursemates believe it's a great idea, whilst my lecturer said I just need to refine and focus the idea. This is good news for me, given this is the one dissertation idea that I'm happy with. Poetry analysis and historical context are two things I can do quite well. :P

The issues here is that I'll have to spend the summer reading pretty much every compilation of poems published by TFL, trying to create a list of poems that would be suitable for analysis (I rather need to concentrate on contemporary poems for my idea, I think...). I then need to further refine this list until I have 5-7 poems which I'm happy to analyse over the next year, before drawing up a plan, getting it approved by my assigned lecturer, and well, writing the 10,000-13,000 words that will define my degree.

Any thoughts on this idea? Can anyone on this forum recommend any contemporary poems which might be worth looking at?

(As a sidenote, I was in London on Saturday, and I didn't notice a single poem on any of the tubes I used. )

 

[DaveNewcastle]

(As a sidenote, I was in London on Saturday, and I didn't notice a single poem on any of the tubes I used. )

Many, if not all, of the poems published on the underground can be read in the TfL museum shop (or whatever its proper name is) in Covent Garden, London.