Chris McCabe, poet and joint librarian at the Poetry Library Photograph: Jack Goffe

As Britain waits for the newly installed poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy, to produce her first verse, this ceremonial post means little to many Londoners.

Standing outside the Exmouth Arms pub enjoying an afternoon pint, a London woman clad in a leather jacket, said, “I don’t know what the poet laureate is or what they do. Most people probably don’t even know the position exists.”

It may come as a surprise to many Londoners that while the poet laureate has been writing poetry for the royals for nearly 350 years, this prestigious post doesn’t actually require the artist to produce a single verse.

"While Ms Duffy is expected to write poems to commemorate major state occasions and events involving the Royal Family, however, she is not forced to write poems during her time in office," said Toby Sargent, a spokesman for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport which organises the search for the newly appointed poet laureate.

“The poet laureate may sit in her library for the entire term and write nothing at all.”

Male domination of this position came to an end after 341 years when Carol Ann Duffy, 53, was appointed as the first female poet laureate on May 1. The appointment was made by the Queen on the advice of the Government and poetry specialists in London.

The 10-year post is traditionally rewarded with 'a butt of sack', which is approximately equivalent to 600 bottles of sherry and a £5,000-a-year salary.

“On one level the laureateship might seem to be a fusty and bourgeois role divorced from real lives, and the possibilities of people connecting with poetry in any meaningful way, but on the other hand we are talking about this now: poets’ faces become known, poems get published, people become interested,” said Chris McCabe, a poet and joint librarian at The Poetry Library at the Southbank Centre.

Mr. McCabe also said it is entirely possible that Ms Duffy could move the country forward both intellectually and psychologically. “Besides pushing at the possibilities of language, working in new forms and
tackling big issues, it could be argued that the fundamental aims of a poet laureate is to contribute to the intellectual progression of the country as well as to move people by way of the heart,” said McCabe.

Ms Duffy succeeds Andrew Motion who held the post since 1999. Both Ms. Duffy and Mr. Motion are in the company of a number of notable poets such as John Dryden, William Wordsworth, Alfred Lord Tennyson and John Betjeman.