You might think poets make natural martyrs. Passionate, idealistic, enraptured by visions of artistic immortality; throughout history, barricades and prisons have been crammed full of poetic talent.
But the best poets are, by necessity, listeners and observers, detached from the action where martyrs are found. When they strive for heroic death, more often than not it ends in ignominy – think of Lord Byron, borne aloft in stately procession as he set out to liberate Greece, before promptly dying of fever.
