Poetry / poems by individual poets

Book SynopsisTHE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLERA NEW STATESMAN BOOK OF THE YEARA SAINSBURY'S MAGAZINE BOOK TO GIFTFor the past decade, Lemn Sissay has composed a short poem as dawn breaks each morning. Life-affirming, witty and full of wonder, these poems chronicle his own battle with the dark and are fuelled by resilience and defiant joy. Let the Light Pour In is a collection of the best of these poems, and a book celebrating this morning practice.'How do you do it?' said night'How do you wake up and shine?''I keep it simple,' said light'One day at a time'Trade ReviewI am not sure I've read a more beautiful poetry book -- FEARNE COTTONWonderful . . . one of these books that just makes you happy to have in your bag -- JACKIE KAYI love Lemn for his hard-won light smashed out of darkness like gold from therock. Simple fast quatrains, dawn-written, day after day, just swallow one like an espresso and go -- JEANETTE WINTERSON * * New Statesman, Books of 2023 * *This wee beauty has me hooked from the preface. We truly have a national treasure in Lemn Sissay -- PATERSON JOSEPHIf you're looking for lovein every day, then findLet the Light Pour inby Lemn Sissay -- JESSICA HYNESA master of words: what he manages to do with language is help us remember that each word is important -- NIHAL ARTHANAYAKEWonderfully quotable . . . within those four lines, so much is said -- CLARE BALDINGThe most lovely present -- ANDI OLIVERA delight and a balm -- ADJOA ANDOHFull of resilience, defiance and joy * * Muddy Stilettos * *

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Book SynopsisDante’s dramatic journey down the circles of Hell, up the mountain of Purgatory and through the spheres of Heaven in search of redemption – and his encounter with devils, monsters and the souls of sinners and saints – is one of the cornerstones of Western literature, the summit of medieval thinking and arguably the highest poetic achievement of all time. This 700th Anniversary Edition of The Divine Comedy is presented in a verse translation by acclaimed poet and prize-winning translator J.G. Nichols, together with extensive notes, illustrations by Gustave Doré and a critical apparatus focusing on the author’s life and works.Trade ReviewFor sheer liveliness, combined with accuracy and closeness to the text, it will be hard to rival. - A.N. Wilson

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Book SynopsisA selection of Keats's greatest poemsOver the course of his short life, John Keats (1795-1821) honed a raw talent into a brilliant poetic maturity. By the end of his brief career, he had written poems of such beauty, imagination and generosity of spirit, that he had - unwittingly - fulfilled his wish that he should ‘be among the English poets after my death’. This wide-ranging selection of Keats’s poetry contains youthful verse, such as his earliest known poem ‘Imitation of Spenser’; poems from his celebrated collection of 1820 - including ‘Lamia’, ‘Isabella’, ‘The Eve of St Agnes’, ‘Ode to a Nightingale’ and ‘Hyperion’ - and later celebrated works such as ‘La Belle Dame sans Merci’. Also included are many poems considered by Keats to be lesser work, but which illustrate his more earthy, playful side and superb ear for everyday language.For more than seventy year

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Book SynopsisCovering the entire output of an archetypal - and tragically short-lived - romantic genius, the Penguin Classics edition of The Complete Poems of John Keats is edited with an introduction and notes by John Barnard.Keats''s first volume of poems, published in 1817, demonstrated both his belief in the consummate power of poetry and his liberal views. While he was criticized by many for his politics, his immediate circle of friends and family immediately recognized his genius. In his short life he proved to be one of the greatest and most original thinkers of the second generation of Romantic poets, with such poems as ''Ode to a Nightingale'', ''Bright Star,'' ''The Eve of St Agnes'' and ''La Belle Dame sans Merci''. While his writing is illuminated by his exaltation of the imagination and abounds with sensuous descriptions of nature''s beauty, it also explores profound philosophical questions.John Barnard''s acclaimed volume contains all the poems known to have been written by Keats, arranged by date of composition. The texts are lightly modernized and are complemented by extensive notes, a comprehensive introduction, an index of classical names, selected extracts from Keats''s letters and a number of pieces not widely available, including his annotations to Milton''s Paradise Lost.John Keats (1795-1821) lost both his parents at an early age. His decision to commit himself to poetry, rather than follow a career in medicine, was a personal challenge, unfounded in any prior success. His first volume of poetry, published in 1817, was a critical and commercial failure. During his short life he received little recognition, and it was not until the latter part of the nineteenth century that his place in English Romanticism began to be understood, and not until this century that it became fully appreciated.If you enjoyed Keats''s Complete Poems you might enjoy John Clare''s Selected Poems, also available in Penguin Classics.Table of ContentsThe Complete PoemsIntroductionNote to the Third EditionAcknowledgmentsTable of DatesFurther ReadingImitation of SpenserOn Peace"Fill for me a brimming bowl"To Lord Byron"As from the darkening gloom a silver dove""Can death be sleep, when life is but a dream"To ChattertonWritten on the Day that Mr. Leigh Hunt left PrisonTo HopeOde to Apollo ("In thy western halls of gold")Lines Written on 29 May The Anniversary of the Restoration of Charles the 2ndTo Some LadiesOn Receiving a Curious Shell, and a Copy of Verses, from the Same LadiesTo EmmaSong ("Stay, ruby-breasted warbler, stay")"Woman! when I behold thee flippant, vain""O Solitude! if I must with thee dwell"To George Felton MathewTo [Mary Frogley]To -- ("Had I a man's fair form, then might my sighs")"Give me Women, Wine, and Snuff"Specimen of an Induction to a PoemCalidore. A Fragment"To one who has been long in city pent""O! how I love, on a fair summer's eve"To a Friend who Sent me some RosesTo my Brother George ("Many the wonders I this day have seen")To Charles Cowden Clarke"How many bards gild the lapses of time!"On First Looking into Chapman's HomerTo a Young Lady who sent me a Laurel CrownOn Leaving some Friends at an Early Hour"Keen, fitful gusts are whispering here and there"Addressed to HaydonTo my BrothersAddressed to [Haydon]"I stood tip-toe upon a little hill"Sleep and PoetryWritten in Disgust of Vulgar SuperstitionOn the Grasshopper and CricketTo KosciuskoTo G[eorgiana] A[ugusta] W[ylie]"Happy is England! I could be content""After dark vapours have oppressed our plains"To Leigh Hunt, Esq.Written on a Blank Space at the End of Chaucer's Tale of The Floure and the LeafeOn Receiving a Laurel Crown from Leigh HuntTo the Ladies who Saw Me CrownedOde to Apollo ("God of the golden bow")On Seeing the Elgin MarblesTo B. R. Haydon, with a Sonnet Written on Seeing the Elgin MarblesOn The Story of RiminiOn a Leander Gem which Miss Reynolds, my Kind Friend, Gave MeOn the SeaLines ("Unfelt, unheard, unseen")Stanzas ("You say you love; but with a voice")"Hither, hither, love -"Lines Rhymed in a Letter Received (by J. H. Reynolds) From Oxford"Think not of it, sweet one, so - "Endymion: A Poetic Romance"In drear-nighted December"Nebuchadnezzar's DreamApollo to the GracesTo Mrs. Reynolds's CatOn Seeing a Lock of Milton's Hair. OdeOn Sitting Down to Read King Lear Once Again"When I have fears that I may cease to be""O blush not so! O blush not so!""Hence Burgundy, Claret, and Port""God of the meridian"Robin HoodLines on the Mermaid TavernTo - ("Time's sea hath been five years at its slow ebb")To the Nile"Spenser! a jealous honourer of thine""Blue! 'Tis the life of heaven, the domain""O thou whose face hath felt the Winter's wind"Sonnet to A[ubrey] G[eorge] S[pencer]Extracts from an Operai. "O! were I one of the Olympian twelve"ii. Daisy's Songiii. Folly's Songiv. "O, I am frightened with most hateful thoughts"v. Song ("The stranger lighted from his steed")vi. "Asleep! O sleep a little while, white pearl!"The Human Seasons"For there's Bishop's Teign""Where be ye going, you Devon maid?""Over the hill and over the dale"To J. H. Reynolds, Esq.To J[ames] R[ice]Isabella; or, The Pot of BasilTo HomerOde to May. FragmentAcrostic"Sweet, sweet is the greeting of eyes"On Visiting the Tomb of Burns"Old Meg she was a gipsy"A Song about Myself"Ah! ken ye what I met the day"To Ailsa Rock"This mortal body of a thousand days""All gentle folks who owe a grudge""Of late two dainties were before me placed"Lines Written in the Highlands after a Visit to Burns's CountryOn Visiting Staffa"Read me a lesson, Muse, and speak it loud""Upon my life, Sir Nevis, I am piqued"Stanzas on some Skulls in Beauly Abbey, near InvernessTranslated from Ronsard"'Tis 'the witching time of night'""Welcome joy, and welcome sorrow"Song ("Spirit that here reignest")"Where's the Poet? Show him, show him"Fragment of the "Castle Builder""And what is love? It is a doll dressed up"Hyperion. A FragmentFancyOde ("Bards of Passion and of Mirth")Song ("I had a dove and the sweet dove died")Song ("Hush, hush! tread softly! hush, hush my dear!")The Eve of St. AgnesThe Eve of St. Mark"Gif ye wol stonden hardie wight""Why did I laugh tonight?"Faery Bird's Song ("Shed no tear - O, shed no tear!")Faery Song ("Ah! woe is me! poor silver-wing!")"When they were come unto the Faery's Court""The House of Mourning written by Mr. Scott"Character of Charles BrownA Dream, after reading Dante's Episode of Paolo and FrancescaLa Belle Dame Sans Merci. A BalladSong of Four FaeriesTo Sleep"If by dull rhymes our English must be chained"Ode to PsycheOn Fame (I) ("Fame, like a wayward girl, will still be coy")On Fame (II) ("How fevered is the man who cannot look")"Two or three posies"Ode on a Grecian UrnOde to a NightingaleOde on MelancholyOde on IndolenceOtho the Great. A Tragedy in Five ActsLamia"Pensive they sit, and roll their languid eyes"To AutumnThe Fall of Hyperion. A Dream"The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone""What can I do to drive away""I cry your mercy, pity, love - ay, love""Bright star! would I were as steadfast as thou art"King Stephen. A Fragment of a Tragedy"This living hand, now warm and capable"The Cap and Bells; or, The JealousiesTo Fanny"In after-time, a sage of mickle lore"Three Undated FragmentsDoubtful Attributions:"See, the ship in the bay is riding"The PoetGripusAppendix 1: Wordsworth and Hazlitt on the Origins of Greek MythologyAppendix 2: The Two Prefaces to EndymionAppendix 3: The Order of Poems in Poems (1817) and Lamia, Isabella, The Eve of St. Agnes, and Other Poems (1820) and The Publisher's Advertisement for 1820Appendix 4: Keats's Notes on Milton's Paradise LostAppendix 5: Keats on Kean's Shakespearean ActingAppendix 6: Selection of Keats's LettersNotesDictionary of Classical NamesIndex of TitlesIndex of First Lines

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Book Synopsis''Nowhere, beloved, can world be but within us''Rainer Maria Rilke (1875-1926) is one of the leading poets of European Modernism, and one of the greatest twentieth-century lyric poets in German. From The Book of Hours in 1905 to the Sonnets of Orpheus written in 1922, his poetry explores themes of death, love, and loss. He strives constantly to interrogate the relationship between his art and the world around him, moving from the neo-romantic and the mystic towards the precise craft of expressing the everyday in poetry.This bilingual edition fully reflects Rilke''s poetic development. It contains the full text of the Duino Elegies and the Sonnets to Orpheus, selected poems from The Book of Images, New Poems, and earlier volumes, and from the uncollected poetry 1906-26. The translations are accurate, sensitive, and nuanced, and are accompanied by an introduction and notes that elucidate Rilke''s poetic practice and his central role in modern poetry. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Trade ReviewA masterly introduction to Rilke ... a representative and well-judged assortment of poems, both familiar and uncollected ... a wealth of excellent and thoughtful notes * The Brown Book *Table of ContentsSELECTED EARLY POEMS; THE BOOK OF HOURS (SELECTIONS); THE BOOK OF IMAGES (SELECTIONS); NEW POEMS (SELECTIONS); UNCOLLECTED POEMS (SELECTIONS); SONNETS TO ORPHEUS (COMPLETE); DUINO ELEGIES (COMPLETE)

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Book Synopsis''sense too definite cancels yourindistinct literature''Stéphane Mallarmé was the most radically innovative of nineteenth-century poets. His writings, with their richly sensuous texture and air of slyly intangible mystery, perplexed or outraged many early readers; yet no writer has more profoundly influenced the course of modern poetry - in English as well as in French. In both form and content, his poems created new ways of conveying existential doubt, fragmentation, and discontinuity. This is the fullest collection of Mallarmé''s poetry ever published in English, and the only edition in any language that presents his Poésies in the last arrangement known to have been approved by the author. Apart from verse, it includes all the prose poems and the unique, unclassifiable Un Coup de dés... (A Dice Throw...). The lucid, wide-ranging introduction and invaluable notes help an understanding of this astonishing poet''s work. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

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Book Synopsis**WINNER OF THE COSTA POETRY AWARD 2018****SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2018 FORWARD PRIZE FOR BEST COLLECTION**A war-poem both historic and frighteningly topical, Assurances begins in the 1950s during a period of vigilance and dread in the middle of the Cold War: the long stand-off between nuclear powers, where the only defence was the threat of mutually assured destruction.Using a mix of versed and unversed passages, Morgan places moments of calm reflection alongside the tensions inherent in guarding against such a permanent threat. A work of variations and possibilities, we hear the thoughts of those involved who are trying to understand and justify their roles. We examine the lives of civilians who are not aware of the impending danger, as well as those who are. We listen to the whirring minds of machines; to the voice of the bomb itself. We spy on enemy agents: always there, always somewhere close at hand.Assurances is an intimate, dramatic work for many voices: lyrical, anxious, fragmentary and terrifying; a poem about the nuclear stalemate, the deterrent that is still in place today: how it works and how it might fail, and what will vanish if it does.Trade ReviewI seriously doubt I will read a more significant book of poetry this year. The finale is truly affecting, a plangent and profound speck of light. -- Stuart Kelly * Scotsman *[JO Morgan's] remarkable new book Assurances [is] a gripping narrative poem. -- Tristram Fane Saunders * Telegraph *

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Book SynopsisJudicially condemned in 1857 as offensive to public morality, The Flowers of Evil is now regarded as the most influential volume of poetry published in the nineteenth century. Torn between intense sensuality and profound spiritual yearning, racked by debt and disease, Baudelaire transformed his own experience of Parisian life into a work of universal significance. With his unflinching examination of the dark aspects and unconventional manifestations of sexuality, his pioneering portrayal of life in agreat metropolis and his daring combination of the lyrical and the prosaic, Baudelaire inaugurated a new epoch in poetry and created a founding text of modernism.Anthony Mortimer, already praised for his virtuoso translations of Petrarch, Dante and Villon, has produced a new version that not only respects the sense and the form of the original French, but also makes powerful English poetry in its own right. Presented here in a dual-language edition, with extra material, notes and bibliography.Trade Review"Need I tell you that in this terrible book I have put all my heart, all my tenderness, all my religion (disguised), all my hatred? It is true that I shall write the opposite, that I shall swear by all the gods that it is a work of pure art, of mimicry, of mere dexterity - and I shall be lying through my teeth." - Charles Baudelaire"Baudelaire is indeed the greatest exemplar in modern poetry in any language, for his verse and language is the nearest thing to a complete renovation that we have experienced." - T.S. Eliot"The translations are very good indeed" - John Banville"The best way yet for us to enter the poet's dream-like world, producing, as his title says, beauty from the sordid world around him" - Nicholas Lezard, The Guardian"This should be read by any poetry lover" - Bill Spence, Yorkshire Gazette & Herald Need I tell you that in this terrible book I have put all my heart, all my tenderness, all my religion (disguised), all my hatred? It is true that I shall write the opposite, that I shall swear by all the gods that it is a work of pure art, of mimicry, of mere dexterity and I shall be lying through my teeth. - Charles Baudelaire Baudelaire is indeed the greatest exemplar in modern poetry in any language, for his verse and language is the nearest thing to a complete renovation that we have experienced. - T.S. Eliot The translations are very good indeed - John Banville The best way yet for us to enter the poet s dream-like world, producing, as his title says, beauty from the sordid world around him - Nicholas Lezard, The Guardian This should be read by any poetry lover - Bill Spence, Yorkshire Gazette & Herald"

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Book SynopsisThe King of pop culture poetry returns with his second collection! As the great Dominic Toretto once said, ‘I don’t have friends, I have family’. 2Black2Furious largely looks at both what family can be: linked by blood, heritage, found and chosen. Tyrone Lewis intersects his exploration on race, and continues to ask the question – what does it truly mean to be Black in a world weighted with perception. There’s also some Avril thrown in too, because you can’t go wrong with some Avril.Trade Review‘Jedi grand master poet’ – @SpitTheAtom

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Book SynopsisNotchedis translated from Jacques Dupin's mesmerisingÉchancré(P.O.L, 1991).

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Book SynopsisLady, the new collection of poems by Laurie Bolger, plays with the arc of a chick flick. Whilst trying to be the most honest version of themselves the poems play the parts of housewife, fitness instructor, landlady, hen, sister, mother, boxer or drunk. The poems get stuck on the ideal of small girl in a big dress when perhaps we are wild, dreaming big and taking it all in.

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Book SynopsisThe #1 New York Times bestselling poet returns with his most ambitious collection yet. In this third and final installment of his poetic trilogy, Yung Pueblo expands upon favourite themes while guiding readers further, toward a life lived authentically, intuitively, and in harmony with others. In these rapidly changing times, it is more important than ever to know ourselves well and fully, even and especially in the face of turmoil. The Way Forward encourages readers to connect more deeply to their intuition, using it to remain focused and grounded amidst a world in constant flux. In his latest collection of poetry and short prose, Yung Pueblo offers clear strategies for managing the unknown, inhabiting your personal power, and bringing your truest, healthiest self to relationships. Progressing naturally from both Inward and Clarity & Connection, The Way Forward is exactly that­­—an inspired beginning.

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Book Synopsis''She sees, coming up a second time,Earth from the ocean, eternally green;the waterfalls plunge, an eagle soars above them,over the mountain hunting fish.''After the terrible conflagration of Ragnarok, the earth rises serenely again from the ocean, and life is renewed. The Poetic Edda begins with The Seeress''s Prophecy which recounts the creation of the world, and looks forward to its destruction and rebirth. In this great collection of Norse-Icelandic mythological and heroic poetry, the exploits of gods and humans are related. The one-eyed Odin, red-bearded Thor, Loki the trickster, the lovely goddesses and the giants who are their enemies walk beside the heroic Helgi, Sigurd the Dragon-Slayer, Brynhild the shield-maiden, and the implacable Gudrun. New in this revised translation are the quest-poem The Lay of Svipdag and The Waking of Angantyr, in which a girl faces down her dead father to retrieve his sword.Comic, tragic, instructive, grandiose, witty and profound, the poems of the Edda have influenced artists from Wagner to Tolkien and a new generation of video-game and film makers.ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World''s Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford''s commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.Trade ReviewLarringtons version of The Poetic Edda has been beautifully translated, and the flow of each poem is perfect. * Kirsty Hewitt, Book Hugger *A 750-year-old haul of Icelandic verse might not sound like cutting-edge entertainment but these sinewy sagas include such modern elements as gutsy heroines and ultra-violence. * Christopher Hirst, Independent *these sinewy sagas include such modern elements as gutsy heroines and ultra-violence * Independent *

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Book SynopsisPoetic sequence drawing on the language of the legal case that followed the massacre on the slave ship Zong in 1781.

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Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.In black ink my love may still shine bright'Universally admired and quoted, Shakespeare's Sonnets have love, beauty and the passing of time at their heart. Featuring some of the best-known and best-loved lines in the history of poetry (Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?', Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds'), these evocative sonnets explore passion, the fleeting nature of beauty and the essence of true and everlasting love.Enticing lovers and scholars alike, these 154 beautiful and sensual sonnets are as relevant and important today as when they were written 400 years ago.Trade Review‘A symbol in the history of our national culture’ – The Guardian

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Book SynopsisCaitlin O'Ryan's debut collection is a journey of mirror smashing and everything we have come to accept being called into question. Her poems vibrate through the pages with a sense of urgency that says you are not alone, I also feel this. The title poem has amassed millions of views online and featured on BBC Woman's Hour.

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Book SynopsisSadder than salad.From apples to artichokes, these glittering, fragmented, painterly portraits of food by the avant-garde pioneer Gertrude Stein are redolent of sex, laughter and the joy of everyday life. Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kathy Acker to James Baldwin, Truman Capote to Stanislaw Lem and George Orwell to Shirley Jackson; essays radical and inspiring; poems moving and disturbing; stories surreal and fabulous; taking us from the deep South to modern Japan, New York''s underground scene to the farthest reaches of outer space.

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Book SynopsisJackie Kay was born in Edinburgh. A poet, novelist and writer of short stories, she has enjoyed great acclaim for her work for both adults and children. Her novel, Trumpet, won the Guardian Fiction Prize. She has published three collections of stories with Picador, Why Don't You Stop Talking, Wish I Was Here, and Reality, Reality; three poetry collections, Fiere, Bantam, and May Day; and her memoir, Red Dust Road. From 2016 to 2021 she was the third modern Makar, National Poet for Scotland. She lives in Manchester and is Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Salford.

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Book Synopsis'Orpheus, the pagan saint of poets, went through hell and came back singing. In twentieth-century mythology, the singer wears a steel helmet and makes his descent "down some profound dull tunnel" in the stinking mud of the Western Front. For most readers of English poetry, the face under that helmet is that of Wilfred Owen.' Professor Jon Stallworthy, from his Introduction.When Wilfred Owen was killed in the days before the Armistice in 1918, he left behind a shattering, truthful and indelible record of a soldier's experience of the First World War. His greatest war poetry has been collected, edited and introduced here by Professor Jon Stallworthy. This special edition is published to commemorate the end of the hellish war that Owen, though the hard-won truth and terrible beauty of his poetry, has taught us never to forget.Trade ReviewOthers have shown the disenchantment of war, have unlegended the roselight and romance of it, but none with such compassion for the disenchanted or such sternly just and justly stern judgment on the idyllisers. * Guardian, 1920 *For me, he is the greatest of all the war poets.... it is Owen's intense respect for the soldier that makes his poetry so powerful. Those who did not return have their meticulously maintained stone memorials on the fields of Flanders. But their memorial in our minds is largely built by Wilfred Owen -- Jeremy Paxman * Spectator *The greatest of all the War Poets… This edition…is a must for every poetry lover -- Emma Lee-Potter * Independent *

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Book SynopsisShakespeare's Sonnets are among the most lyrical and moving pieces of poetry in any language, abounding with examples of his genius for wordplay, rhythm and metaphor and dealing with the eternal themes of love, memory, beauty and the ravishes of time. First published in 1609, after Shakespeare had written many of his most famous works, the Sonnets have been the subject of literary curiosity ever since, mainly concerning the identity of the two addressees, `Mr W.H.' and the `Dark Lady', and the light they could shine on Shakespeare's life. This collection constitutes one of English literature's most profound poetic meditations on life and love, and is a vital complement to the plays, offering clues to Shakespeare's own biography. Presented here in an edition that makes them accessible to twentieth-century readers, these poems are worth returning to again and again.

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Book SynopsisFrank O'Hara (1926-66) composed poems 'any time, any place', collaborating with and inspired by a circle of artists, musicians and poets, immersed in the creative life of New York. For O'Hara, the city was a place of possibility, both disorientating and exciting, and his poems have an immediacy that draws its energies from the pace and rhythms of city life, and from the contemporary artforms of jazz, film and painting. It is this openness to experience that makes O'Hara an indispensable poet of the imaginative experience of the modern city. Reviewing this new selection in the Guardian, Charles Bainbridge wrote: 'Frank O'Hara is a wonderful poet - funny, moving, chatty, engaging, enthusiastic, risk-taking, elegiac, supremely urban - and anything that encourages people to read him is a good thing. His poems have a disarming intimacy, a kind spontaneous enthusiasm and his work proves, with tremendous elan and energy, that you don't have to adopt a solemn tone in order to write poetry of seriousness and purpose. As O'Hara himself says of the nature of writing in the brilliantly comic "Personism: A Manifesto": "You just go on your nerve. If someone's chasing you down the street with a knife you just run, you don't turn around and shout, 'Give it up! I was a track star for Mineola Prep'." '

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a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

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Book SynopsisCharles Bukowski examines cats and his childhood in You Get So Alone at Times, a book of poetry that reveals his tender side. The iconic tortured artist/everyman delves into his youth to analyze its repercussions.“The Walt Whitman of Los Angeles.”—Joyce Carol Oates“He brought everybody down to earth, even the angels.”—Leonard Cohen, songwriter

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Book Synopsis“The hallucinatory prose-poems of Arthur Rimbaud rank among the glories of 19th-century French literature.” — New York TimesOne of the world''s most influential poets, Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891) is remembered as much for his volatile personality and tumultuous life as he is for his writings, almost all of which he produced before the age of twenty. Paul Schmidt''s acclaimed collection brings together his complete poetry, prose, and letters, including The Drunken Boat, The Orphans'' New Year, After the Flood, and A Season in Hell. Complete Works is divided into eight seasons—Childhood, the Open Road, War, the Tormented Heart, the Visionary, the Damned Soul, a Few Belated Cowardices, and the Man with the Wind at His Heels—that reflect the facets of Rimbaud''s life. Insightful commentary by Schmidt reveals the courage, vision, and imagination of Rimbaud''s poetry and sheds light on one of the most enigmatic figures in letters.Trade Review“Rimbaud was pure dynamite . . . he restored literature to life.” — Henry Miller “The best edition in English” — Montreal Gazette “Visionary . . . Wicked . . . A Genius.” — The New Yorker “The hallucinatory prose-poems of Arthur Rimbaud rank among the glories of 19th-century French literature.” — New York Times “Paul Schmidt has wavered--no, has hovered--between solicitude and critique, and the result of such suspension is his beautiful, daring, careful work . . . serves us the Rimbaud that matters in its fine mesh.” — Richard Howard, Pulitzer Prize-winner poet and translator; professor, Columbia University “This collection is interesting for the light it casts on the background to the writing of ‘A Season in Hell’ and the poems later referred to (by Paul Verlaine) as ‘The Illuminations’. As well as the poems themselves, Schmidt includes transcriptions of letters (to Verlaine and others) and biographical details from the life of this most nihilistic genius.” — The Guardian “A mystic in the wild state.” — Paul Claudel

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Book SynopsisBeowulf is the greatest surviving work of literature in Old English, unparalleled in its epic grandeur and scope. It tells the story of the heroic Beowulf and of his battles, first with the monster Grendel, who has laid waste to the great hall of the Danish king Hrothgar, then with Grendel''s avenging mother, and finally with a dragon that threatens to devastate his homeland. Through its blend of myth and history, Beowulf vividly evokes a twilight world in which men and supernatural forces live side by side. And it celebrates the endurance of the human spirit in a transient world.Alexander''s translation is marked by a conviction that it is possible to be both ambitious and faithful [and] ...communicates the poem with a care which goes beyond fidelity-to-meaning and reaches fidelity of implication. May it go on ... to another half-million copies. - Tom Shippey, Bulletin of the International Association of University Professors of EnglishTrade ReviewMichael Alexander is much the best translator from Old English. His Penguin Beowulf is much to be recommended -- A.N. Wilson

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Book SynopsisThis attractive collection gathers more than 150 of her memorable works. Featuring insights about nature, love, life, death and immortality, these poems are among the best loved in English literature.

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Book SynopsisMcAlpine's first Carcanet collection explores themes of marriage, motherhood, and family life, distilling everyday occurrences into moments of self-discovery.

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Book SynopsisPoetry of how we shape what is lost or past, and how it shapes us.Bernard O'Donoghue investigates anchorage as a place we build for ourselves out of memory and story. The Ireland of his youth is rich in colour and precise in detail, and while he acknowledges the power of the past, he also brings it into question: ''I wish I''d never started on this story; / It may have been a dream, or maybe not . . .'' O''Donoghue''s informal and at times playful tone is that of a poet disarming themselves as well as their reader. Here are the paradoxes at the heart of human nature: what we are most attached to can be, in the end, what ties us down; the reluctance to return can arise out of the fear of finding ourselves locked out.''O''Donoghue''s poems are an object lesson in how to write poetry that matters.'' PN Review''The poignancy of O''Donoghue''s migratory imagination is . . . the perfect travelling companion.'' Times Literary Supplement''Compelling and simple diction . . . full of gentle, sometimes undetectable flashes of humour.'' London Magazine''As with everything O''Donoghue writes, the more you look, the more you see.'' Scotsman

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Book SynopsisThis elegant hardback edition presents over 100 of Yeats'' best loved poems, featuring gilded page edge, a gold embossed cover design and beautiful endpapers. This collection of masterful poetry demonstrates the extraordinary range and beautiful lyricism of Ireland''s most accomplished poet, William Butler Yeats. The poems selected here cover love and regret, Irish folktales, beauty, politics, family and satire. From the romantic ideals of his youth to the innovative realist of his later years, this collection spans the breadth of Yeats'' output. Includes: • ''He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven'' • ''The Second Coming'' • ''A Coat'' • ''The Song of Wandering Aengus'' • ''An Irish Airman Foresees His Death'' • ''The Stolen Child''This elegant pocket-sized gift edition is presented with a gold embossed cover design, beautifully designed endpapers, ivory pages and

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Book SynopsisA recipient of an Eric Gregory Award as a young poet, Ian Gregson’s debut collection, Call Centre Love Song went on to be shortlisted for a Forward Prize for Best First Collection. Described by Carol Rumens as ‘combining a postmodernist’s sense of ‘things being various’ with a traditionalist’s concern for shape and completeness’, Gregson’s work is formally diverse, eminently accessible and packed with wit, but this is never glib or throw-away. There is deep commentary going on in these poems, on how we make and break connections, on the possibilities and limits of language and perception. Brilliant, often funny, frequently poignant and always timely, The Slasher and the Vampire as Role Models, is a new and collected that shows Gregson at the height of his linguistic dexterity as poet with something real to say.Trade Review"Gregson’s work is characterised by a belief that poetry should include and incorporate modern experience and not simply cordon off a special lyric arena where the world stops and ‘poetry’ begins." — Patrick McGuinness

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Book SynopsisThe newly drawn Stanza Stones Trail runs through forty-seven miles of the Pennine region, some of the most strikingly varied landscape in the world. The terrain bears the deep scars of industrial exploitation, as well as those less obvious: the signs left by a hundred local generations are carved into the region's abounding rocks. Simon Armitage was born and raised here, in the village of Marsden, and in 2012 he was commissioned through the Ilkley Literature Festival to write site-specific poetry. Armitage composed six new poems on his Pennine walks and, with the help of local expert Tom Lonsdale and letter-carver Pip Hall, found extraordinary, secluded sites and saw his words carved into stone. This book is a record of that journey, containing the poems and the accounts of Lonsdale and Hall. The many layers of stone and sediment found beneath the surface of the rock reflect the drama of the landscape itself. Covered in decades of industrial soot and grime, the colours released by the carver's tools will likely never return to shades of black and grey, but become a small reminder of the changes that our natural environment undergoes, and the marks, small and large, of humankind.

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Book SynopsisThought-provoking, comforting and wise, the simple truths of The Prophet remain compelling and rewarding to this day.Complete & Unabridged. Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library; a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket sized classics with gold foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover.Utterly unique and beloved around the world, The Prophet is a collection of twenty-six poetic essays by the Lebanese artist, philosopher and writer Khalil Gibran. Telling the story of the prophet Al-Mustafa and his conversations with various acquaintances as he returns home after a long absence, the book touches on subjects of universal concern, including love, friendship, passion, pain, religion and freedom.Trade ReviewI have loved many books over the years, but the one I would never be parted from and read again and again is The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran . . . Each time I open the book I find myself feeling that if the whole world was to read it, it would be a far better place -- Lesley Pearse * Independent *

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Book Synopsis‘Bilston is a magician with words’ - GuardianThe perfect, witty gift for Valentine’s and beyond. Alexa, what is there to know about love? is a wonderful collection of poems by Brian Bilston, Twitter’s ‘unofficial poet laureate’, in which he frets over the challenges of modern life, extols the pleasures of books, broods over politics, and ponders the curiosities of language.But at its heart, this is a collection of poems about love. From our caveman days to the internet era, from first dates to love in old age, Alexa, what is there to know about love? has a love poem for every time, place and occasion – and will stir the soul of even the most jaded romantic.‘Brian Bilston is a laureate for our fractured times.’ - Ian McMillan‘Someone who knows their way round both a joke and a bittersweet narrative.’ - The Times‘Part John Cooper Clarke, part Frank Sidebottom . . . all brilliant.’ - EsquireTrade ReviewBrian Bilston is a laureate for our fractured times -- Ian McMillanSomeone who knows their way round both a joke and a bittersweet narrative -- The TimesPart John Cooper Clarke, part Frank Sidebottom . . . all brilliant. * Esquire *Bilston is a magician with words * Guardian *

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Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE 2021 PULITZER PRIZE IN POETRYSHORTLISTED FOR THE FORWARD PRIZE FOR BEST COLLECTIONSHORTLISTED FOR THE T. S. ELIOT PRIZEPOETRY BOOK SOCIETY RECOMMENDATIONPostcolonial Love Poem is a thunderous river of a book, an anthem of desire against erasure. It demands that every body carried in its pages bodies of language, land, suffering brothers, enemies and lovers be touched and held. Here, the bodies of indigenous, Latinx, black and brown women are simultaneously the body politic and the body ecstatic, and portrayed with a glowing intimacy: the alphabet of a hand in the dark, the hips' silvered percussion, a thigh's red-gold geometry, the emerald tigers that leap in a throat. In claiming this autonomy of desire, language is pushed to its dark edges, the astonishing dune fields and forests where pleasure and love are both grief and joy, violence and sensuality.Natalie Diaz defies the conditions from which she writes, a nation who

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Book SynopsisAs a poet, editor and essayist, T. S. Eliot was one of the defining figures of twentieth century poetry. This selection, which was made by Eliot himself, includes many of his most celebrated works, including The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock and The Waste Land.Other volumes in this series: Auden, Betjemen, Plath, Hughes and Yeats.

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Book SynopsisSet in 1820s Russia, this title follows the fates of three men and three women. It offers the reader many literary, philosophical, and autobiographical digressions, often in a highly satirical vein.Trade ReviewOne of the finest of all verse translations into English ... reproduces every facet of the original: the precise meaning, the wit, the lyricism. Not once is there a false note. -- Robert Chandler * Independent *

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Book SynopsisAn acclaimed translation of Dante Alighieri's The Divine Comedy Volume 1: Inferno that retains all the style, power and meaning of the originalA Penguin Classic This vigorous translation of Inferno preserves Dante's simple, natural style, and captures the swift movement of the original Italian verse. Mark Musa's blank verse rendition of the poet's journey through the circles of hell recreates for the modern reader the rich meanings that Dante's poem had for his contemporaries. Musa's introduction and commentaries on each of the cantos brilliantly illuminate the text. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguiTrade Review"Musa operates on the principle that a translator's first duty is to render the original text as exactly as possible without compromising the literary quality of the work.... [This is] the best English-language version of the Inferno currently available." —Library Journal

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Book SynopsisThe books in this A Level poetry series contain a glossary and notes on each page. The approach encourages students to develop their own responses to the poems, and an A Level Chief Examiner offers exam tips. This text contains poems and letters by Keats in chronological order.

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Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE COSTA POETRY AWARDPOETRY BOOK SOCIETY RECOMMENDATIONFlèche (the French word for arrow') is an offensive technique commonly used in fencing, a sport of Mary Jean Chan's young adult years, when they competed locally and internationally for their home city, Hong Kong. This cross-linguistic pun presents the queer, non-white body as both vulnerable (flesh') and weaponised (flèche'), and evokes the difficulties of reconciling one's need for safety alongside the desire to shed one's protective armour in order to fully embrace the world.Central to the collection is the figure of the poet's mother, whose fragmented memories of political turmoil in twentieth-century China are sensitively threaded through the book in an eight-part poetic sequence, combined with recollections from Chan's childhood. As complex themes of multilingualism, queerness, psychoanalysis and cultural history emerge, so too does a richly imagined personal, maternal and natio

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Book SynopsisWilliam Wordsworth is chiefly remembered as one of the ‘Lake Poets’. Yet he was also one of the founders of English Romanticism, a writer whose early revolutionary fervor imbued his verse and his ideals.Much of Wordsworth’s work was inspired by nature, but to a style rich in lyrical imagery he brought a deep interest in liberal humanitarianism and a profound concern for the lives, habits and speech of ordinary people, especially country people.This pocket-sized collection includes: ‘I wandered lonely as a cloud’ (‘Daffodils’), ‘Ode. Intimations of Immortality’, ‘Character of the Happy Warrior’, ‘The Solitary Reaper’, ‘To a Sky-Lark’, ‘Tintern Abbey’, and extracts from ‘The Prelude’.Also available in the 'Pocket Poets' series:9781782437116 Keats: 'Ode to a Nightingale' and Other Poems9781782437109 Kipling: 'If–' and Other Poems 9781782437093 Burns: 'A Red, Red Rose' and Other Poems

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Book SynopsisA bold reimagining of Fernando Pessoa's poetry into a mixed dialect of Scots and English by an exciting next-generation, prize-winning Scottish poet.

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