A haiku, an ode, a sonnet, a limerick, an elegy ... more poetry,please.
Poetry Books
Wordsworth Editions Ltd Macbeth
Book SynopsisEdited, introduced and annotated by Cedric Watts, M.A., Ph.D., Emeritus Professor of English, University of Sussex. Shakespeare’s Macbeth is one of the greatest tragic dramas the world has known. Macbeth himself, a brave warrior, is fatally impelled by supernatural forces, by his proud wife, and by his own burgeoning ambition. As he embarks on his murderous course to gain and retain the crown of Scotland, we see the appalling emotional and psychological effects on both Lady Macbeth and himself. The cruel ironies of their destiny are conveyed in poetry of unsurpassed power. In the theatre, this tragedy remains perennially engrossing.
£999.99
Penguin Books Ltd I Dont Love You Anymore
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£11.69
Bonnier Books Ltd Loss The New Collection
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd An Inspector Calls
Book Synopsis''We don''t live alone ... We are responsible for each other''A policeman interrupts a rich family''s dinner to question them about the suicide of a young working-class girl. As their guilty secrets are gradually revealed over the course of the evening, ''An Inspector Calls'', J. B. Priestley''s most famous play, shows us the terrible consequences of poverty and inequality. The other powerful plays in this collection - ''Time and the Conways'', ''I Have Been Here Before'' and ''The Linden Tree'' - explore time, fate, free will and the effects of war. ''A vastly talented and exceptionally versatile and wise writer'' Iris Murdoch''Priestley was volcanic, fertile ... and never dull'' Anthony BurgessIf you enjoyed An Inspector Calls, you might like Arthur Miller''s Death of a Salesman, also available in Penguin Modern Classics.
£9.49
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Blood Brothers
Book SynopsisTwin brothers are seperated at birth because their mother cannot afford to keep them both. She gives one of them away to wealthy Mrs Lyons and they grow up as friends, in ignorance of their fraternity until the inevitable quarrel unleashes a blood-bath.
£10.99
HarperCollins Publishers A Christmas Carol
Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.''I am the Ghost of Christmas Present,'' said the Spirit. ''Look upon me!''A celebration of Christmas, a tale of redemption and a critique on Victorian society, Dickens'' atmospheric novella follows the miserly, penny-pinching Ebenezer Scrooge who views Christmas as ''humbug''. It is only through a series of eerie, life-changing visits from the ghost of his deceased business partner Marley and the spirits of Christmas past, present and future that he begins to see the error of his ways. With heart-rending characters, rich imagery and evocative language, the message of A Christmas Carol remains as significant today as when it was first published.
£5.62
Penguin Books Ltd The Crucible
Book SynopsisShows how the small city of Salem is stirred into madness by superstition, paranoia and malice, culminating in a violent climax, is a savage attack on the evils of mindless persecution and the terrifying power of false accusations. This is a depiction of innocent men and women destroyed by malicious rumour, and more.
£8.54
Wordsworth Editions Ltd Romeo and Juliet
Book SynopsisEdited, introduced and annotated by Cedric Watts, M.A., Ph.D., Emeritus Professor of English, University of Sussex. Romeo and Juliet is the world's most famous drama of tragic young love. Defying the feud which divides their families, Romeo and Juliet enjoy the fleeting rapture of courtship, marriage and sexual fulfilment; but a combination of old animosities and new coincidences brings them to suicidal deaths. This play offers a rich mixture of romantic lyricism, bawdy comedy, intimate harmony and sudden violence. Long successful in the theatre, it has also generated numerous operas, ballets and films; and these have helped to make Romeo and Juliet perennially topical.
£6.23
Andrews McMeel Publishing Love Poems
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£14.39
Penguin Books Ltd A Streetcar Named Desire
Book SynopsisWinner of the Pulitzer Prize, Tennessee Williams''s A Streetcar Named Desire is the tale of a catastrophic confrontation between fantasy and reality, embodied in the characters of Blanche DuBois and Stanley Kowalski. This Penguin Modern Classics edition includes an introduction by Arthur Miller.''I have always depended on the kindness of strangers''Fading southern belle Blanche DuBois is adrift in the modern world. When she arrives to stay with her sister Stella in a crowded, boisterous corner of New Orleans, her delusions of grandeur bring her into conflict with Stella''s crude, brutish husband Stanley Kowalski. Eventually their violent collision course causes Blanche''s fragile sense of identity to crumble, threatening to destroy her sanity and her one chance of happiness.Tennessee Williams''s steamy and shocking landmark drama, recreated as the immortal film starring Marlon Brando, is one of the most influential plays of the twentieth century.
£9.49
Ebury Publishing Dont Grow Up Its a Trap
£18.70
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Blood Brothers
Book SynopsisA new Student Edition of Willy Russell''s enduring 1983 play, Blood Brothers, offering accessible and vivid insights into the play and the context in which it was written through a C21st lens. As well as exploring the key themes, characters and dramatic devices of the play, and how they map onto our experience today, it conveys how groundbreaking Blood Brothers was at the time in representing working-class lives on stage, as well as explicitly exposing the flaws of the British class system.The commentary by Rebecca Hillman encourages students to:* consider what it must have been like to be at the very first performance of the play in a school classroom in Liverpool; * consider the significance of key phrases in the text, such as living on the never never and the debt must be paid* make comparisons between life in 1980s Britain and today - the shrinking pound, the global slump and the price of oil;* think about what the play celebrates - friendship, family, community, neig
£10.99
Atlantic Publishing, Croxley Green A Corner of a Foreign Field
£21.25
Rizzoli International Publications Sunny Spells and Scattered Showers
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£20.00
Prakash Books Greatest Works of Edgar Allan Poe
Book Synopsis
£18.71
Wordsworth Editions Ltd The Selected Poems of Emily Dickinson
Book SynopsisWith an Introduction by Emma Hartnoll.Initially a vivacious, outgoing person, Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) progressively withdrew into a reclusive existence. An undiscovered genius during her lifetime, only seven out of her total of 1,775 poems were published prior to her death. She had an immense breadth of vision and a passionate intensity and awe for life, love, nature, time and eternity. Originally branded an eccentric, Emily Dickinson is now recognised as a major poet of great depth, startling originality and courage for as she wrote: ‘Assent and you are sane; /Demure you’re straightaway dangerous / And handled with a chain’.
£6.83
Penguin Books Ltd Journeys End
Book SynopsisHailed by George Bernard Shaw as ''useful [corrective] to the romantic conception of war'', R.C. Sherriff''s Journey''s End is an unflinching vision of life in the trenches towards the end of the First World War, published in Penguin Classics.Set in the First World War, Journey''s End concerns a group of British officers on the front line and opens in a dugout in the trenches in France. Raleigh, a new eighteen-year-old officer fresh out of English public school, joins the besieged company of his friend and cricketing hero Stanhope, and finds him dramatically changed. Laurence Olivier starred as Stanhope in the first performance of Journey''s End in 1928; the play was an instant stage success and remains a remarkable anti-war classic.R.C. Sherriff (1896-1975) joined the army shortly after the outbreak of the First World War, serving as a captain in the East Surrey regiment. After the war, an interest in amateur theatricals led him to try his hand
£8.54
Spark A Midsummer Night's Dream (No Fear Shakespeare):
Book SynopsisRead Shakespeare’s plays in all their brilliance—and understand what every word means! Don’t be intimidated by Shakespeare! These popular guides make the Bard’s plays accessible and enjoyable.Each No Fear guide contains: The complete text of the original play A line-by-line translation that puts the words into everyday language A complete list of characters, with descriptions Plenty of helpful commentary
£7.59
Simon & Schuster Ltd Violet Bent Backwards Over the Grass
Book SynopsisTHE SUNDAY TIMES TOP TEN BESTSELLER THE HIGHLY ANTICIPATED DEBUT BOOK OF POETRY FROM LANA DEL REY, VIOLET BENT BACKWARDS OVER THE GRASS 'Violet Bent Backwards Over the Grass is the title poem of the book and the first poem I wrote of many. Some of which came to me in their entirety, which I dictated and then typed out, and some that I worked laboriously picking apart each word to make the perfect poem. They are eclectic and honest and not trying to be anything other than what they are and for that reason I’m proud of them, especially because the spirit in which they were written was very authentic.' Lana Del Rey Lana’s breathtaking first book solidifies her further as 'the essential writer of her times' (The Atlantic). The collection features more than thirty poems, many exclusive to the book: Never to Heaven, The Land of 1,000
£15.29
HarperCollins Publishers Bird School
Book Synopsis'This is some of the best English prose of our time' SPECTATOR A feast for mind and soul' ISABELLA TREE 'A marvellous and revelatory guide to our native bird-life' DAILY MAIL Step into the hide for a glorious new encounter with the British wild Close to Adam Nicolson's home in Sussex, there is a forgotten field overrun by bracken and thicketed by brambles. It is the haunt of deer and many birds nightingales, the occasional cuckoo, ravens, robins, owls and in summer the sweet-singing warblers that come north from Africa to breed in English woods. This gorgeous book charts his attempt to encounter birds, to engage with a marvellous layer of life he had previously almost ignored. He wanted to look and listen, to return to bird school' and see what it might teach him. He built a small shed amongst the trees with nesting boxes and bird feeders. Cocooned inside, season after season, he got to know the birds: where they nest, how they sing, how they mate and fight, what preys on them, what they are like as living things. Beautifully written and woven through with philosophy, literature, science and a sense of wonder, always conscious that that this is an age in which the natural world is under siege, Bird School pulls back the curtain on seemingly ordinary birds, taking a long, careful and concerned look at our relationship with the wild. 'Golden threads of literary, philosophical and scientific insight run through Nicolson's book, along with a sense that we are embarking on an adventure with him into a realm that we cannot hope to fully understand' THE TIMES 'A worthy addition to a literary lineage that stretches back to the 18th-century writer and naturalist Gilbert WhiteBird School, then, is a fitting title: we should learn to rekindle our enduring love affair with birds, before they vanish from our sight' DAILY TELEGRAPH
£19.80
Nick Hern Books Small Island
Book SynopsisThis edition is the prescribed text for the English Mastery Secondary programme. Hortense yearns for a new life away from rural Jamaica, Gilbert dreams of becoming a lawyer, and Queenie longs to escape her Lincolnshire roots. In these three intimately connected stories, hope and humanity meet stubborn reality, tracing the tangled history of Jamaica and Britain. Andrea Levy's epic novel Small Island, adapted for the stage by Helen Edmundson, journeys from Jamaica to Britain in 1948 – the year that HMT Empire Windrush docked at Tilbury. It premiered at the National Theatre, London, in April 2019, directed by Rufus Norris. 'Honest, skilful, thoughtful and important. This is Andrea Levy's big book' Guardian on Andrea Levy's Small IslandTrade Review'A landmark in the National Theatre's history: a tumultuous epic about first-generation Jamaican immigrants... skilfully adapted... one of the most important plays of the year' * Guardian *'In this inspiring adaptation, which compresses the book into a gripping three-hour state-of-the-nation epic, Small Island has found its ideal home... the show acknowledges struggle and strife on all sides, flies the flag for compassion and achieves a hard-won (and still to be fought for) inclusivity' * Telegraph *'A passionate engagement with the past that's sure to resonate with audiences at a time when the very idea of Britain is under such fierce scrutiny' * Evening Standard *'This is a show that shoots arrows of empathy and engagement out towards its audience and they respond... from a novel dealing with the past [comes] a play for today' * WhatsOnStage *'A moving stage adaptation of the late Andrea Levy's great novel about the Windrush generation... Edmundson does some supreme work compacting a sprawling book into a pacy three-hours-ten-minutes - she has a knack for skilfully distilling story... a ferociously entertaining three hours of theatre' * Time Out *'Beautifully translated to stage by adaptor Helen Edmundson, using thrilling theatrical solutions to honour Levy's epic - and still urgent - tale... a stirring spectacle that never loses sight of the people at its heart' * Broadway World *
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd A View from the Bridge Penguin Modern Classics
Book SynopsisArthur Miller''s play A View from the Bridge is a tragic masterpiece of the inexorable unravelling of a man, set in a close-knit Italian-American community in 1950s New York. Eddie Carbone is a longshoreman and a straightforward man, with a strong sense of decency and of honour. For Eddie, it''s a privilege to take in his wife''s cousins, Marco and Rodolpho, straight off the boat from Italy. But, as his niece Catherine begins to fall for one of them, it''s clear that it''s not just, as Eddie claims, that he''s too strange, too sissy, too careless for her, but that something bigger, deeper is wrong - and wrong inside Eddie, in a way he can''t face. Something which threatens the happiness of their whole family.This Penguin Classics edition includes an introduction by the author and a new foreword by actor Philip Seymour Hoffman.
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd The Peace of Wild Things
Book SynopsisI come into the peace of wild thingswho do not tax their lives with forethoughtof grief. I come into the presence of still water.And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a timeI rest in the grace of the world, and am free. The poems of Wendell Berry invite us to stop, to think, to see the world around us, and to savour what is good. Here are consoling verses of hope and of healing; short, simple meditations on love, death, friendship, memory and belonging; luminous hymns to the land, the cycles of nature and the seasons as they ebb and flow. Here is the peace of wild things.Trade ReviewWendell Berry is the most important writer and thinker that you have (probably) never heard of. He is an American sage -- James RebanksOur modern-day Thoreau ... He is unlike anybody else writing today -- Andrew Marr * New Statesman *The poet laureate of America's farmland * Observer *Wendell Berry's poems have a real twinkle in their eye in the face of a dark world -- Colum McCann * Atlantic *He has returned American poetry to a Wordsworthian clarity of purpose * Baltimore Sun *
£8.54
Nick Hern Books Princess & The Hustler
Book Synopsis‘My name is Phyllis Princess James. I will wear this crown every day. I will never take it off even when I am asleep.’ Meet Princess. A cheeky ten-year-old, with a plan to win the Weston-super-Mare Beauty Contest. Trouble is, her mum is busy working several jobs, her brother, a budding photographer, won't even take her picture and then – The Hustler returns. In 1963 Bristol, as Black British Civil Rights campaigners walk onto the streets, Princess finds out what it really means to be black and beautiful. Chinonyerem Odimba's play Princess & The Hustler was first seen at the Bristol Old Vic in February 2019, followed by a UK tour, in a co-production between Eclipse Theatre Company, Bristol Old Vic and Hull Truck Theatre, directed by Dawn Walton. The play was shortlisted for the Alfred Fagon Best New Play Award 2018.Trade Review'Written with heart and purpose... every character in it deserves to be heard' * Guardian *'Odimba's dialogue is witty and flavourful, and the action fizzes with detail... in a story that radiates love and hope, Odimba explores a crucial slice of black British history... richly textured, passionate and enormously affecting' * The Times *'A crucial slice of black British history... Chinonyerem Odimba's beautifully crafted play kaleidoscopes multiple issues with warmth, integrity and humour' * Observer *'Joyously playful... beautiful and celebratory, this is history with a beating heart' * Broadway World *
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd Heroes
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewThis is a spirited retelling of stories that Fry clearly knows and loves * The Times *Assured and engaging. The pace is lively, the jokes are genuinely funny, and Fry once again proves himself a master of great learning worn lightly * Guardian *Here, indeed, be monsters, myriad adventures and machinating gods. Fry is a personable and passionate narrator * Mail on Sunday *Just as delightful and difficult to put down as the first. Heroes makes the stories relatable without skimping on the gory details, or sacrificing the truths of the myth. It's rich, it's funny and you'll feel like you've learned a lot * Herald *Fry brilliantly retells the dramatic, funny, tragic and timeless tales of these heroic men and women in all their grit and glory. Filled with white-knuckle chases and twisted labyrinths, impossible puzzles and blood-curdling monsters * Northern Ireland Homes & Lifestyle *Just as delightful and difficult to put down as the first. It makes stories relatable without skimping on the gory details * Sunday Life *Rich, funny and you'll feel like you've learned a lot along the way * Eastern Daily Press *Tales of fatal flaws, perilous journeys and shining acts of heroism are told with gusto and young and old will be engrossed. The audiobook is an absolute gem too, read by the author who has a winning way of bringing these epic tales to life * Western Morning News *Joyfully informal yet full of the literary legacy. The Greek gods of the past become relatable * Guardian (on 'Mythos') *The best thing he's written since his superb first novel . . . entertaining and edifying * Telegraph (on 'Mythos') *A rollicking good read * Independent (on 'Mythos') *Perfect for the 21st Century. Ebullient, funny, Fry retells the Greek myths with elegance * The Times (on 'Mythos') *A wondrous new immersion in ancient stories we only thought we knew. Brilliant, funny, erudite, inventive, surprising and enthralling -- Richard North Patterson (on 'Mythos')Fry makes the stories relatable without skimping on the wonderful gory details, or sacrificing the traditional truths of the myth * i (The paper for today) *Stephen Fry has created a magnificent book. Humorous, but with serious stories told with wit and erudition. This is a book that will delight readers of all ages. Fry's writing is never less than delightful * Moorlander *Fry is a natural storyteller and his lively retellings make for an entertaining read * Hannah Beckerman, Observer *The comedian and polymath retells age-old Greek myths in dramatic, modernised style * i *One of the nation's favourite intellectuals retells the epic myths of the Greek heroes in his own unique and very enjoyable way * Cambridge Independent *Ebullient and funny * The Times *Entertaining and edifying * Daily Telegraph *A rollicking good read * Independent *Fry exhibits enormous erudition and enthusiasm * Mail on Sunday *
£10.44
Faber & Faber Homers Odyssey
Book SynopsisOriginally commissioned for BBC Radio, Simon Armitage recasts Homer''s epic as a series of dramatic dialogues. His version bristles with the economy, wit and guile that we have come to expect from one of the most individual voices of his generation.
£11.69
Silver Press The Gender of Sound
Book SynopsisHistory is filled with unacceptable noises: high pitch, gossip, talkativeness, hysteria, wailing and ritual shouts. Who makes them? Those deviant from or deficient in the masculine ideal of self-control: women, catamites, eunuchs and androgynes fall into this category. From the myths of antiquity to Margaret Thatcher via Sigmund Freud and Gertrude Stein, The Gender of Sound charts the gendering of voice through Western culture. This enquiry into the way we hear sounds invites reimagining our conceptions of human order, virtue and selfhood. Putting a door on the female mouth has been an important project of patriarchal culture from antiquity to the present day. Its chief tactic is an ideological association of female sound with monstrosity, disorder and death.
£7.59
Wordsworth Editions Ltd The Tempest
Book SynopsisEdited, introduced and annotated by Cedric Watts, M.A., Ph.D., Emeritus Professor of English, University of Sussex. The Wordsworth Classics' Shakespeare's Series presents a newly-edited sequence of William Shakespeare's works. The textual editing takes account of recent scholarship while giving the material a careful reappraisal. The Tempest is the most lyrical, profound and fascinating of Shakespeare's late comedies. Prospero, long exiled from Italy with his daughter Miranda, seeks to use his magical powers to defeat his former enemies. Eventually, having proved merciful, he divests himself of that magic, his ‘art’, and prepares to return to the mainland. The Tempest has often been regarded as Shakespeare's ‘farewell to the stage’ before his retirement. In the past, critics emphasised the romantically beautiful features of The Tempest, seeing it as an imaginative fantasia. In recent decades, however, The Tempest has also been treated as a potently political drama which offers controversial insights into colonialism and racism. Frequently staged and diversely filmed, the play has influenced numerous poets and novelists.
£5.96
Batsford Poetry of the Zodiac
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£14.24
Wordsworth Editions Ltd A Midsummer Night's Dream
Book SynopsisEdited, Introduced and Annotated by Cedric Watts, M.A., Ph.D., Emeritus Professor of English, University of Sussex. The Wordsworth Classics’ Shakespeare Series, with Romeo and Juliet, Henry V and The Merchant of Venice as its inaugural volumes, presents a newly-edited sequence of William Shakespeare’s works. The textual editing takes account of recent scholarship while giving the material a careful reappraisal. Its lyricism, comedy (both broad and subtle) and magical transformations have long made A Midsummer Night’s Dream one of the most popular of Shakespeare’s works. The supernatural and the mundane, the illusory and the substantial, are all shimmeringly blended. Love is treated as tragic, poignant, absurd and farcical. ‘Lord, what fools these mortals be!’, jeers Robin Goodfellow; but the joke may be on him and on his master Oberon when Bottom the weaver, his head transformed into that of an ass, is embraced by the voluptuously amorous Titania. Recent stage-productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream have emphasised the enchanting, spectacular, ambiguous and erotically joyous aspects of this magical drama which culminates in a multiple celebration of marriage.
£6.23
Batsford A Nature Poem for Every Night of the Year
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£21.25
Wordsworth Editions Ltd Hamlet
Book SynopsisEdited, Introduced and Annotated by Cedric Watts, M.A., Ph.D., Emeritus Professor of English, University of Sussex. The Wordsworth Classics' Shakespeare Series presents a newly-edited sequence of William Shakespeare's works. The Textual editing takes account of recent scholarship while giving the material a careful reappraisal. Hamlet is not only one of Shakespeare's greatest plays, but also the most fascinatingly problematical tragedy in world literature. First performed around 1600, this a gripping and exuberant drama of revenge, rich in contrasts and conflicts. Its violence alternates with introspection, its melancholy with humour, and its subtlety with spectacle. The Prince, Hamlet himself, is depicted as a complex, divided, introspective character. His reflections on death, morality and the very status of human beings make him ‘the first modern man’. Countless stage productions and numerous adaptations for the cinema and television have demonstrated the continuing cultural relevance of this vivid, enigmatic, profound and engrossing drama.
£5.96
Scholastic Macbeth Full Play with Annotations and Key Quotations
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£6.99
Batsford A Nature Poem for Every Day of the Year
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£21.25
Granta Books The White Book
Book Synopsis'A brilliant psychogeography of grief, moving as it does between place, history and memory... The White Book is a mysterious text, perhaps in part a secular prayer book' Deborah Levy, Guardian SHORTLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL BOOKER PRIZE From the author of The Vegetarian and Human Acts comes a book like no other. The White Book is a meditation on colour, beginning with a list of white things. But it is also a book about mourning, and of rebirth and the tenacity of the human spirit. It is a stunning investigation of the fragility, beauty and strangeness of life from one of the great literary voices of our time. 'Wonderful. A quietly gripping contemplation on life, death and the existential impact of those who have gone before' Eimear McBride 'The White Book is a profound and precious thing... Han Kang is a genius' Lisa McInerneyTrade ReviewA brilliant psychogeography of grief, moving as it does between place, history and memory... Poised and never flinches from serene dignity... The White Book is a mysterious text, perhaps in part a secular prayer book... Translated seamlessly by Smith, The White Book succeeds in reflecting Han's urgent desire to transcend pain with language -- Deborah Levy * Guardian *Wonderful. A quietly gripping contemplation on life, death and the existential impact of those who have gone before -- Eimear McBrideThe White Book is a profound and precious thing, its language achingly intimate, each image haunting and true. It is a remarkable achievement. Han Kang is a genius -- Lisa McInerneyThere is beauty and pain in every sentence and image, made sharper by their simplicity and aching honesty * New Internationalist *Each [chapter] is a miniature work of art in its own right... there is a crispness to [Han's] pieces evocative of the stark luminescence of white... This is a book you want to underline and highlight every other line or word as you read, yet every time I went to make my mark, my pencil hovered over the margins - deep as drifts of pillow-white snow - as I remained reticent to taint the perfect whiteness in front of me. The White Book is a shimmering, evocative work. Smith's peerless translation captures every last tiny nuance, the resultant prose so beautiful and affecting that it stops you in your tracks -- Lucy Scholes * National UAE *A fragile work of literature * Live Mint *Delicate and thoughtful and concise and dense and strong; this is the kind of writing I like to read slowly -- Jon McGregor * Guardian *An astonishingly rendered work of fiction... Precise, subversive, fierce and deceptively opaque... A sublime expression of grief's incongruous byways, its busy inactivity, its larger, more elaborate intrusions -- Catherine Taylor * Financial Times *[Han] in her new work transgresses literary convention and examines the constellation of pain at the heart of her mother's first pregnancy... Shot through with pain and paradox [...] Kang transforms obliteration into promise. Loss and living are counterpointed, neither meaning revoked -- Katherine Waters * Arts Desk *[An] astonishing novel... with such tenderness [that] incites us to examine our own experience and place in the world... It's a profound piece of work [...] that is as much concerned with what is unsaid and omitted, as what is revealed... Han's painful, exquisite story is a philosophical lament for all the shades of life -- Sinead Gleeson * Irish Times *Incantatory... The White Book reveals Han to be an innovative author committed to formal experimentation... Intensely personal, hypnotically serene, and mournfully meditative, Han's thanatopsis reminds readers of the revivifying power of memory and the extent to which we are uniquely endowed within the natural world to withstand the vagaries of forgetfulness and life's nagging ephemerality -- Brian Haman * Asian Review of Books *An intensely emotional series of accounts that form an outline of losses which are invisible, but still palpably felt -- Eric Anderson * Lonesome Reader *Evocative and beautifully laconic, this book is about belonging, grief and the sensory experience of being alive * Book Riot *A brilliant psychogeography -- Deborah LevyA tender evocation of grief and absence... Han Kang is a real artist * Irish Times *Formally daring, emotionally devastating and deeply political -- Katie Kitamura * International New York Times *
£9.49
Faber & Faber Faber Poetry Diary 2026
Book SynopsisThe Faber Poetry list, originally founded in the 1920s, was shaped by the taste of T. S. Eliot, who was its guiding light for nearly forty years. Each passing decade has seen it grow with the addition of poets who are among the finest of their generation. The Faber Poetry Diary is a celebration of this remarkable Faber list.Victoria Adukwei Bulley Simon ArmitageGeorge BarkerEmily BerryWilliam BlakeMary Jean ChanJohn ClareGillian ClarkeWendy CopeJulia CopusStephen CraneJohn DonneT.S. EliotMatthew FrancisLavinia GreenlawThomas HardySeamus HeaneyGerard Manley HopkinsTed HughesIshion HutchinsonBen JonsonJohn KeatsZaffar KunialPhilip LarkinD.H. LawrenceLachlan MackinnonAnge MlinkoDaljit NagraSylvia PlathCamille RalphsRichard ScottWilliam ShakespearePercy Bysshe ShelleyStevie SmithWislawa SzymborskaEdward ThomasDerek WalcottWalt WhitmanWilliam WordsworthW.B. Yeats
£999.99
Penguin Books Ltd A History of England in 25 Poems
Book Synopsis
£21.25
WW Norton & Co The Odyssey
Book SynopsisA lean, fleet-footed translation that recaptures Homer’s "nimble gallop" and brings an ancient epic to new life.Trade Review"The first version of Homer's groundbreaking work by a woman will change our understanding of it for ever... Emily Wilson’s crisp and musical version is a cultural landmark. Armed with a sharp, scholarly rigour, she has produced a translation that exposes centuries of masculinist readings of the poem." -- Charlotte Higgins, Poetry Book of the Day - The Guardian"... Emily Wilson proves an appropriately beguiling female translator... This is certainly an Odyssey for our moment … [a] swift, unornamented text." -- The Spectator"Wilson’s Odyssey feels like a restoration of an old, familiar building that had over the years been encrusted with too much gilt. Wilson translates as though translation is a moral choice — you owe fidelity not to the author, nor to the protagonist, but to the truth behind the words and the times. She scrapes away at old encrusted layers, until she exposes what lies beneath." -- Financial Times"It is immensely satisfying to see The Odyssey in the hands of such a careful and creative scholar who can pore over the semantic nuances of Homer's Greek as well as those of her own English. Considerations of gender aside, perhaps Wilson's greatest achievement is to disprove the increasingly held view that versions of ancient texts require an established poet to be parachuted in, like a literary James Bond, to rescue their English lines from the prosaic. For a translation of The Odyssey that knows what it is talking about and sings as it speaks, this is the one to read." -- New Statesman"Wilson’s approach has been to translate the text in a way that resonates with today’s politics. Her translation, spare and provocative, will engage a new generation of students." -- Times Literary Supplement"The real reason why Emily Wilson’s version of this nearly three-millennia-old poem is so important is that it combines intellectual authority with addictive readability." -- Edith Hall - The Sunday Telegraph"... Emily Wilson’s brilliant introduction to her new translation of The Odyssey shows the classical world as capable of feminist inflections." -- The Observer"... a perceptive reading of The Odyssey... Readers who want to get a feeling for the poem will find Wilson’s translation full of insights..." -- London Review of Books"Wilson’s translation is a superb achievement and a striking departure from the tradition of Homeric translation into English... [She] has produced a wonderfully distinctive—and modern—version of the poem." -- London Evening Standard"All the artistic choices work. I must admit when I heard we were reviewing The Odyssey, I thought ‘Oh no, it’s going to be wordy and dull’ […] but it wasn’t, it really felt fresh and alive and exciting." -- Sophie Hannah - BBC Radio 4, Saturday Review"... Emily Wilson's terrific new translation..." -- The i Paper"Emily Wilson wipes the dust of ages from Homer’s prose in her new translation of The Odyssey. Accessible and entertaining, she provides an elegant rendering of the classic." -- Peter Campbell, Favourite reads of 2017 - as chosen by scientists - The Guardian"Now we have an excellent new translation of the epic by the British classicist Emily Wilson. Norton trumpets it as “the first English translation of the ‘Odyssey’ by a woman.”... But Wilson’s rendering is remarkable in other ways as well." -- The International New York Times"... a monumental piece of work on her part..." -- Stig Abell - BBC Radio 4 Front Row"Emily Wilson... is the first woman to translate Homer's entire epic into English, and she has produced something extraordinary. In her hands, a work believed to have been written at around the end of the eighth century BC is transformed into something that might have been written yesterday: vivid, exciting and utterly immersive... her accessible and fascinating introduction explains the poem's origins and reception, and such crucial concepts as 'guest-friendship' (xenia)." -- The Lady"Emily Wilson, […] whose translation of The Odyssey – the first translation by a woman, might I add – is currently destroying me, so it’s good. You can just tell from the way she writes and from her very ballsy interpretive translation that she’s got a wicked, daring mind, and a deeply poetic one." -- Hannah Epperson - Female First"I thought this was just moving, it was musical, it was direct, it was straightforward […] anyone could read it and really, really enjoy it." -- Rosie Goldsmith - BBC Radio 4, Saturday Review"A masterpiece of translation—fluent, elegant, vigorous." -- Rowan Williams, University of Cambridge"As the first English translation of this ancient tale by a woman, this lively, fast-paced retelling of Homer’s epic is long overdue. Much as Homer did in his time, Wilson whisks the audience into a realm both familiar and fantastical. The world of Odysseus and his adventures take shape before the reader’s eyes, luminescent once more, in this engaging new translation." -- Justine McConnell, King's College London"This will surely be the Odyssey of choice for a generation." -- Lorna Hardwick, The Open University"I am not quite sure why, but this instantly hot-wired me into tears." -- Sarah Perry, author of The Essex Serpent"I think this is a really significant literary moment." -- Mark Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time"Friends, believe the hype. This translation is a marvel!... The sheer energy of the iambic pentameter is revelatory. Her word choices! The rhythm and the politics so delicious, so alive. And the man is devious and quick and fit to bursting with arrogance and cunning. He's perfect. It's sublime." -- Max Porter, author of Grief is the Thing with Feathers"The Odyssey translated by Emily Wilson. One of the great narratives of all time. You think you know it ? Not until you read this one. Stunning translation/interpretation." -- Susan Hill"Poetry that reads like a thriller." -- R.L. Stine, author of the Goosebumps series"The new Emily Wilson translation of The Odyssey is brilliant and sharp and swift and funny and will repay the reader a thousand times over." -- Katherine Rundell"... this new version of The Odyssey... is a fresh and worthwhile addition to the many existing translations, both for newcomers and veteran readers... Wilson offers a neat, accurate and lively verse translation..." -- Minerva"There are many other [other than being the first female translation] stunning things about Wilson’s translation, from the five-beat lines to the straightforward speech, free from the elegant clunkiness that we usually see when scholars try to carry words over from one language to another. But one of them is certainly an awareness of her own daring." -- Eidolon"The real reason why Wilson’s version of this nearly three-millennia-old poem is so important is that, in delicate, five-foot iambics, it combines intellectual authority with truly addictive readability." -- The Telegraph"Utterly readable and gripping." -- Mail on Sunday"I’m inordinately excited to read the first translation of a Homeric epic ever published by a woman." -- Imogen Russell Williams, Summer Books 2018 - Times Literary Supplement"This – the first English translation of Homer’s epic poem by a woman – is vivid, fresh and a genuine page-turner." -- Event’s 100 sizzling summer reads - Mail on Sunday"Emily Wilson is the first woman to translate The Odyssey into English, and her fine, plain language makes this ancient and compelling story hum with new life... Wilson is a brilliant companion on the decade-long journey to Ithaka's shores." -- Erica Wagner - Boat International"A gorgeous take on an age old classic makes its mark." -- Book of the Month - The Bookseller"... last year’s translation by Emily Wilson – the first complete English version by a woman – offers a fascinatingly fresh perspective on the poem, importing this ancient adventure to a whippy modern idiom while keeping a beady eye on centuries of inherited power dynamics in translation. “Tell me about a complicated man,” her translation begins, with the air of someone about to scrub the grime off an old painting. It’s fabulous stuff." -- Tim Martin, The Best Books About the Greek Islands - The Economist, 1843 Magazine"I just reread The Odyssey — the recent brilliant translation by Emily Wilson — while on Ithaca. I read it sitting on the very white pebbled shore on which Odysseus must have landed. Wonderful when both author and story are on the mysterious cusp of fact and fancy. " -- Michael Morpurgo - Mail Online"The real reason this version of a nearly three-millennia-old poem is so important is that it has intellectual authority as well as truly addictive readability." -- Paperbacks to Read this Week - The Telegraph"... a fabulous new translation of which Emily Wilson has provided. An accessible and authoritative reading of the first great story of the western canon, it not only matches the number of lines of the original, but also its drama, musicality and pace." -- Philippa Joseph, Best History Books 2018 - History Today" Scholarly and readable, this is an up-to-the-minute translation that sets some records straight. " -- William Wall, Irish Writers' Best of 2018 - The Independent"Emily Wilson’s 2017 translation of The Odyssey (WW Norton) is quite extraordinary... It is powerful and immensely readable... The translation of Homer for our times..." -- Mark Mazower, Books of the Year 2019
£14.24
Penguin Books Ltd Inferno
Book SynopsisA translation that describes Dante's descent into Hell with Virgil as a guide. It depicts a cruel underworld in which desperate figures are condemned to eternal damnation for committing one or more of seven deadly sins. It also includes explanatory notes and illustrations showing the different layers of hell.Trade ReviewThe perfect balance of tightness and colloquialism...likely to be the best modern version of Dante -- Bernard O'Donoghue
£9.25
HarperCollins Publishers Macbeth
Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.''Stars, hide your fires!Let not light see my black and deep desires.''One of Shakespeare''s darkest and most violent tragedies, Macbeth''s struggle between his own ambition and his loyalty to the King is dramatically compelling. As those he kills return to haunt him, Macbeth is plagued by the prophecy of three sinister witches and the power hungry desires of his wife.
£5.62
Penguin Books Ltd The Odyssey
Book SynopsisA tale of Odysseus and his ten-year journey home after the Trojan war forms one of the earliest and greatest works of Western literature. Confronted by natural and supernatural threats - from the witch Circe who turns his men into pigs, to the twin terrors of Scylla and Charybdis.Trade Review“[Robert Fitzgerald’s translation is] a masterpiece . . . An Odyssey worthy of the original.” –The Nation “[Fitzgerald’s Odyssey and Iliad] open up once more the unique greatness of Homer’s art at the level above the formula; yet at the same time they do not neglect the brilliant texture of Homeric verse at the level of the line and the phrase.” –The Yale Review “[In] Robert Fitzgerald’s translation . . . there is no anxious straining after mighty effects, but rather a constant readiness for what the occasion demands, a kind of Odyssean adequacy to the task in hand, and this line-by-line vigilance builds up into a completely credible imagined world.” –from the Introduction by Seamus Heaney
£9.49
Faber & Faber Flowers and Insects Some Birds and a Pair of Spiders
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£13.49
Faber & Faber The Poems of Seamus Heaney
£34.00
Candlestick Press Ten Poems about Cats
Book Synopsis
£6.95
Vintage Publishing Dunbar
a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.
£9.49
Nick Hern Books Noughts & Crosses
Book SynopsisAn electrifying, bittersweet love story with echoes of Romeo and Juliet, set in a society divided by racial bigotry and a world rocked by terrorism. Adapted from Malorie Blackman's best-selling novels. Sephy (a Cross) is the daughter of the Deputy Prime Minister. Callum is the son of a Nought agitator. United by a shared sense of injustice as children, and separated by intolerance as they grow up, their desire to be together begins to eclipse all family loyalty – sparking a political crisis of unimaginable proportions. 'I wanted to turn society as we know it on its head, with new names for the major divisions, i.e. Noughts (the underclass) and Crosses (the majority, ruling society)' - Malorie Blackman Dominic Cooke's adaptation of Noughts & Crosses was first performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon in 2007.Trade Review'Dominic Cooke's excellent adaptation... a dark, politically unsentimentalised story about teenage love transcending the barriers in a deeply divided society... heart-rending' * Independent *
£10.44
Spark Othello (No Fear Shakespeare): Volume 9
Book SynopsisRead Shakespeare’s plays in all their brilliance—and understand what every word means! Don’t be intimidated by Shakespeare! These popular guides make the Bard’s plays accessible and enjoyable.Each No Fear guide contains: The complete text of the original play A line-by-line translation that puts the words into everyday language A complete list of characters, with descriptions Plenty of helpful commentary
£7.99
Penguin Books Ltd The Odyssey
Book SynopsisConfronted by natural and supernatural threats - shipwrecks, battles, monsters and the implacable enmity of the sea-god Poseidon - Odysseus must use his wit and native cunning if he is to reach his homeland safely and overcome the obstacles that, even there, await him.Trade Review“[Robert Fitzgerald’s translation is] a masterpiece . . . An Odyssey worthy of the original.” –The Nation “[Fitzgerald’s Odyssey and Iliad] open up once more the unique greatness of Homer’s art at the level above the formula; yet at the same time they do not neglect the brilliant texture of Homeric verse at the level of the line and the phrase.” –The Yale Review “[In] Robert Fitzgerald’s translation . . . there is no anxious straining after mighty effects, but rather a constant readiness for what the occasion demands, a kind of Odyssean adequacy to the task in hand, and this line-by-line vigilance builds up into a completely credible imagined world.” –from the Introduction by Seamus Heaney
£15.29
