Poetry Books

Book Synopsis''Vengeance is in my heart, death in my hand,Blood and revenge are hammering in my head.''In Shakespeare''s first tragedy, Titus Andronicus, the Roman general Titus incurs the wrath of the Queen of the Goths when he enslaves her and kills one of her sons. The shocking violence of her revenge and his retaliation earn Titus its reputation as Shakespeare''s bloodiest play. This New Oxford Shakespeare edition offers a range of critical approaches to the play, considering its initial popularity in the theatre, the authors'' engagement with narrative sources and Roman history, and the ongoing problems scholars and theatremakers have had with the play''s presentation of violence, rape, and racial difference. Throughout, it incorporates up-to-date scholarship and close readings of a number of landmark productions to consider the play''s place in Shakespeare''s canon and to illustrate Titus Andronicus''s enduring value in interrogating some of wider culture''s darkest and most challenging concerns.The New Oxford Shakespeare offers authoritative editions of Shakespeare''s works with introductory materials designed to encourage new interpretations of the plays and poems. Using the text from the landmark The New Oxford Shakespeare Complete Works: Modern Critical Edition, these volumes offer readers the latest thinking on the authentic texts (collated from all surviving original versions of Shakespeare''s work) alongside innovative introductions from leading scholars. The texts are accompanied by a comprehensive set of critical apparatus to give readers the best resources to help understand and enjoy Shakespeare''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 SynopsisWith an illuminating new preface by Colm Tóibín, here is Thom Gunn''s extraordinary memorial to love, life and death in the time of the AIDS crisisThe Man With Night Sweats, originally published in 1992, sees Thom Gunn writing at the height of his powers. The collection begins with poems that celebrate love and sex and bodies whether the exuberance of a swimming otter, the nimble moves of a tow-headed skateboarder or the habituated coming together of two old lovers. In devastating contrast, the poems in the last section are unflinching portraits and accounts of the illness and deaths of friends during the AIDS epidemic. Written out of a lifetime's experience of perfecting his art, these poems are unsurpassed in elegiac intensity and among the most poignant responses to those terrible times.''Gunn has risen to his inescapable new subject with verse of quiddity, depth and terrible truthfulness.'' Financial Times''Elegies as unblinking and

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Book SynopsisThis annotation edition of Shakespeare's well-known tragi-comedyis perfect for students and Shakespeare enthusiasts alike. Extrawide margins and double spacing leaves lots of room for notes. Containstop tips on effectively annotation and different techniques.

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Book SynopsisIbsen's provocative play about truth in a society driven by power and money, given a startling contemporary spin in Thomas Ostermeier and Florian Borchmeyer's acclaimed version, here in an English translation by Duncan Macmillan.

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Book SynopsisFirst ever standalone edition of one of J.R.R. Tolkien's most important poetic dramas, that explores timely themes such as the nature of heroism and chivalry during war, and which features unpublished and never-before-seen texts and drafts.In 991 AD, vikings attacked an Anglo-Saxon defence-force led by their duke, Beorhtnoth, resulting in brutal fighting along the banks of the river Blackwater, near Maldon in Essex. The attack is widely considered one of the defining conflicts of tenth-century England, due to it being immortalised in the poem, The Battle of Maldon.Written shortly after the battle, the poem now survives only as a 325-line fragment, but its value to today is incalculable, not just as an heroic tale but in vividly expressing the lost language of our ancestors and celebrating ideals of loyalty and friendship.J.R.R. Tolkien considered The Battle of Maldon the last surviving fragment of ancient English heroic minstrelsy'. It would inspire him to compose, during the 1930s, hiTrade Review ‘If you were to choose only one [book] to gain some insight into the prolific smorgasbord of his multifaceted writing, this is peak Tolkien’ Wall Street Journal ‘Offers valuable insight into Tolkien’s creative process and enriching our understanding of his scholarly contributions’ Amon Hen, Bulletin of the Tolkien Society ‘Tolkien was a storyteller of genius’ Literary Review

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Book SynopsisPoetic prose meditations translated superbly into English. Austrian poet Friederike Mayröcker is widely considered one of the most important European poets of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The last book of hers to be published during her lifetime, as mornings and moosgreen I. Step to the window is an elliptical and, if at times cryptic, deeply personal, playful, and highly poetic collection of experiences, memories, dreams, desires, fears, visions, observations, and peregrinations through landscapes both real and imagined. The volume bears witness to her unique late lyrical style of pyrotechnical cut-up. Among many others, her beloved Derrida, Duchamp, Hölderlin, and Jean-Paul all appear, almost like guides, as Mayröcker bravely makes her way through infirmity, old age, and loneliness, prolonging her time as a prolific writer as much as possible.

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Book SynopsisIntroduces renowned Kurdish-Syrian writer Salim Barkat to an English audience for the first time, with translated selections from his most acclaimed works of poetry. Although Salim Barakat is one of the most renowned and respected contemporary writers in Arabic letters, he remains virtually unknown in the English-speaking world. This first collection of his poetry in English, representing every stage of his career, remedies that startling omission. Come, Take a Gentle Stab features selections from his most acclaimed works of poetry, including excerpts from his book-length poems, rendered into an English that captures the exultation of language for which he is famous. A Kurdish-Syrian man, Barakat chose to write in Arabic, the language of cultural and political hegemony that has marginalized his people. Like Paul Celan, he mastered the language of the oppressor to such an extent that the course of the language itself has been compelled to bend to his will. Barakat pushes Arabic to a point just beyond its linguistic limits, stretching those limits. He resists coherence, but never destroys it, pulling back before the final blow. What results is a figurative abstraction of struggle, as alive as the struggle itself. And always beneath the surface of this roiling water one can glimpse the deep currents of ancient Kurdish culture.Trade Review"Kurdish, reclusive, demanding, inventive to the point of miracle, prolific to the point of cataracts—in the republic of Arabic letters, Salim Barakat stands apart." * 4Columns *“Barakat’s exceedingly resistant and exhilaratingly strange verse—paradoxically written by someone who seems absolutely rooted to the depths of the earth while yet able to see humanity as if through the mind of some other being, perhaps language itself—is finally available to English readers. One can only hope that Huda Fakhreddine and Jayson Iwen’s resounding translation summons greater interest in the work of this astonishing modern master.” -- Ammiel Alcalay, poet, scholar, critic, and translatorTable of ContentsEvery Insider Shall Hail Me and Every Outsider Too (1973)Dinoka Breva, Come, Take a Gentle Stab (excerpt)Union of LineagesPike (1980)Dylana and Diram (excerpt)With the Same Traps, with the Foxes that Ride the Winds (1982)Fog Composed like a GentlemanRevengeThe Recklessness of Sapphire (1996)Ledgers of Plunder (excerpt)Digression in an Abridged ContextConfrontations, Pacts, Troughs, and Others … (1997)Plastics (excerpt)Ran’s Farm From Syria (2015)From All the Doors (2017)Lineages of Animal (2019)DogTurtleFleaFishHomo Erectus

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Book SynopsisIn the long-awaited follow-up to his bestselling collection, The Truth of You, poet Iain Thomas explores the unseen forces that shape our inner experience.A collection of over 200 pieces of poetry and prose, The Secret of You focuses on the thoughts and feelings that we might not share and have trouble expressing, the things that we need to let go in order to heal.   Enhanced by ink illustrations, Thomas’s newest volume asks and answers vulnerable questions on themes of love, loss, identity, shame, and more. 

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Book SynopsisIn late November 1623, Edward Blount finally took delivery to his bookshop at the sign of the Black Bear near St Paul’s a book that had been long in the making. Master William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, and Tragedies was the first collected edition of Shakespeare’s plays, appearing some seven years after their author’s death in 1616. There was no fanfare at the book’s arrival. There was nothing of the marketing that marks an important new publication in our own period: no advertising campaign, no reviews, interviews, endorsements or literary prizes. Nevertheless, it is hard to overstate the importance of this literary, cultural and commercial moment. Generously illustrated in colour with key pages from the publication and comparative works, this new edition combines the recent discovery of a hitherto unknown edition of the First Folio at Mount Stuart House on the Isle of Bute with the human, artistic, economic and technical stories of the birth of this landmark publication – and the birth of Shakespeare’s towering reputation.Table of ContentsAcknowledgements vii Prologue viii Introduction 1 Chapter one: The Plays & their Presentation 7 Chapter two: Shakespeare’s Reputation 77 Chapter three: Team Shakespeare: The Backers 114 Chapter four: Printing & Publishing 187 Chapter five: Becoming ‘The First Folio’ 215 Notes 242 Further reading 249 Picture credits 252 Index 254

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Book SynopsisAbandon all hope, ye who enter herereadthe now-famous words above the gate through which Dante, the protagonist of Inferno, crosses the threshold. But that forbidding inscription applies only to those without faith; and though Dante's journey through the nine circles of Hellbegins withterror and confusion.

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Book Synopsis* A Belletrist Book of the Month! A poignant collection of poetry and prose that tackles the complexities of heartache, gender roles, queerness, and toxic masculinity.Introspective, vulnerable, and tantalizing, this is a love letter to queerness — capturing the joy, grief, ecstasy, and hope that accompany it. The poems tackle the complexities of infatuation, heartache, sexual assault, and toxic masculinity. Across three acts, Weissmann offers readers an unfiltered view into his psyche through several romantic relationships. These poems magnify the reality of exploring emotional and physical intimacy with multiple genders, all while navigating the journey of self-love. Her, Him & I is a coming-of-age celebration of heartbreak and healing.

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Book SynopsisPiers Torday''s magical stage adaptation of the classic children''s Christmas tale by John Masefield. There are tricks, and then there''s magic!After a seemingly chance encounter on a train, orphaned schoolboy Kay Harker finds himself the guardian of a small wooden box with powers beyond his wildest dreams. Caught up in a battle between two powerful magicians, Kay fights to save not only the people he loves but the future of Christmas itself.Adapted by Piers Today from John Masefield''s classic children''s novel, this festive production opened at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, in October 2023, based on the original staging at Wilton''s Music Hall, London, 2017.''Very charming . . . and wildly imaginative.'' Daily Telegraph (on the 2017 premiere)''A classic winter's night yarn told with energy and flair.'' The Stage (on the 2023 revival)

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Book SynopsisTrade Review“[A] handsome new book . . . all this inchoate material is given context by Sieburth’s learned, elegantly written commentary. He is the perfect guide.”—Michael Dirda, Washington Post“[These] unfinished works written after 1861 and appearing in English together for the first time, Flares, My Heart Laid Bare, Belgium Disrobed, and a selection of ‘late prose poems and projects’ deliver what their titles seem to promise: a soul stripped of guises and illusions.”—Ange Mlinko, New York Review of Books“[A] fascinating volume . . . valuable as much for Mr. Sieburth’s brilliant prefaces as for the orts and scraps that Baudelaire scribbled on pieces of hotel stationery. Among the writings are acidulous outtakes from a never-written series of philosophical memoirs.”—Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal“Sieburth makes nuanced choices in his translations. . . . Late Fragments gathers Baudelaire’s final sketches in a way that presents a new image of a man who, much like Ezra Pound, failed to ‘make it cohere.’ Yet by exhibiting these failings, this volume shows Baudelaire at his most relevant: contradictory, fragmentary, raging against the vicissitudes of modern circumstance.”—Aaron Peck, Times Literary Supplement“Richard Sieburth’s superb translation of Baudelaire’s Late Fragments (Yale) is that rare book that provides more than it promises. It opens with a thirty-five-page biographical sketch that surpasses most full-length biographies of Baudelaire in its scholarly depth, succinctness and profound insight. The long introductions to each of the individual works contain some of the best criticism available of Baudelaire’s ‘counteraesthetic of dissonance, dispersion and disjointure’, reprising as it does ‘the entire French inheritance of aphorism, apothegm, epigram, maxim, réflexion, sentence, and pensée.’ Indeed, Baudelaire’s late turn towards the ‘form of the unfinished, the abandoned, the aborted, the ruined’ heralds the larger twentieth-century turn from contained lyric to disjunctive prose.”—Marjorie Perloff, Times Literary Supplement, “Books of 2022”“There could be no finer companion with whom to view the ruins of Late Baudelaire than Richard Sieburth, here in the multiple roles of translator, literary historian, and exegete, in this expansive and magnificent edition. Astonished voyager, set sail . . . ”—Eliot Weinberger“In Richard Sieburth’s lucid and precise translation and commentary, Baudelaire has found at long last a proper English voice.”—Alberto Manguel“Charles Baudelaire, one of the world’s great poets, was also something else: the maker of unforgettable, often troubling aphorisms and prose poems. Richard Sieburth’s commentary is infallibly subtle, and the translations are both loyal and imaginative.”—Michael Wood, Princeton University“Late Fragments is a marriage of true minds: Charles Baudelaire, one of the great poets, who seems more relevant with every passing year, and Richard Sieburth, one of today’s finest—and most poetic—translators. This is a brilliant and indispensable translation milestone.”—Marjorie Perloff, author of Infrathin: An Experiment in Micropoetics “Richard Sieburth’s translations splendidly capture the dazzling pyrotechnics of Baudelaire’s late style, by turns arrogant and abject, emitting bursts of fragmentary distress signals that often as not become provocations and missiles.”—Peter Nicholls, author of Modernisms: A Literary Guide “Syphilitic, misanthropic, maudit to the core, in his late years Baudelaire forged from his vertiginous miseries a compelling new idiom; these fractured, elliptical, haunting texts, beautifully translated by Richard Sieburth, present a fatally wounded heart laid bare, stray petals of evil adrift in the abyss.”—Mark Ford, University College London

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Book SynopsisThis edition of one of the Western canon's most iconic plays brings back into print the pivotal 1890 translation by William Archer. It was this translation that was largely responsible for the huge impact that A Doll's House had in the English-speaking world, igniting as it did, in the words of one critic, 'a firestorm of critical debate and dissent' about marriage and women's rights. Accompanying the comprehensively annotated text of the play is a substantial introduction that combines critical analysis with biographical and historical context. An extensive series of appendices provides extracts from contemporary adaptations of A Doll's House; writings by William Archer and Bernard Shaw about the play; reviews of early productions in London, New York, Montreal, and Sydney; contemporary documents relating to Ibsen and feminism; and views of actresses on playing the role of Nora.Trade ReviewWith its balanced introduction and thoughtfully selected contextual materials (parodies, performance reviews, and more), Leonard Conolly's volume is a valuable and accessible resource for first-year drama students and seasoned Ibsen scholars alike. It allows twenty-first-century readers to see with fresh clarity the controversy that Ibsen's play sparked nearly a hundred and fifty years ago-and to recognize, perhaps, that the debate has not subsided quite yet." - Mary Christian, Middle Georgia State University"This excellent edition of A Doll's House shows twenty-first-century readers exactly why Ibsen's play galvanized their nineteenth-century counterparts-and why its impact remains apparent on our stages, in our classrooms, and in the societies of which they are a part. Conolly provides the critical analysis and historical context necessary to understand what aspects of the play and its author were, and were not, considered revolutionary in multiple national and theatrical settings. Conolly's contributions to this volume make for lively and informative reading, and his presentation of William Archer's translation makes the play-text clear and accessible for today's students. The well-selected appendix materials make for useful and enjoyable reading in and of themselves-especially the adaptations, 'sequels,' parodies, and Ibsen's own alternative ending. As a teacher of modern drama, I have long hoped for an edition of A Doll's House that was as suitable for students as this one-and now, I am glad to say, I have it." - Jennifer Buckley, University of IowaTable of ContentsAcknowledgementsIntroduction Henrik Ibsen and A Doll's House: A Brief ChronologyA Note on the TextA Doll's HouseA Note on Nora's Final ExitAppendix A: Contemporary Adaptations, Sequels, and Parodies 1. From a letter from Ibsen to a Danish newspaper regarding the ending of the play (17 February 1880) 2. Ibsen's alternative ending (1880) 3. From Henry Arthur Jones and Henry Herman, Breaking a Butterfly (1882) 4. From August Strindberg, 'A Doll's House' (1884) 5. From Walter Besant, 'The Doll's House—and After,' The English Illustrated Magazine (October 1890) 6. From Ednah Dow Cheney, Nora's Return: A Sequel to The Doll's House (1890) 7. From Israel Zangwill and Eleanor Marx-Aveling, 'A Doll's House Repaired,' Time (March 1891) 8. From F. Anstey, 'Nora; or, The Bird-Cage,' Mr Punch's Pocket Ibsen (1893) Appendix B: William Archer and A Doll's House 1. From Archer's review of the first performance in England of A Doll's House, Dramatic Review (4 April 1885) 2. From a letter to Charles Archer (13 June 1889) 3. From 'Ibsen and English Criticism,' Fortnightly Review (July 1889) 4. From William Archer, The Theatrical 'World' for 1893 (1894) 5. From The Collected Works of Henrik Ibsen (1906) Appendix C: Bernard Shaw and A Doll's House 1. On A Doll's House, Penny Illustrated Paper (1 June 1889) 2. From Shaw's review of A Doll's House, Manchester Guardian (8 June 1889) 3. From a letter to William Archer (11 June 1889) 4. From 'Still after the Doll's House,' Time (February 1890) 5. From The Quintessence of Ibsenism (1891) 6. From 'A Doll's House Again,' Saturday Review (15 May 1897) 7. From 'The Technical Novelty in Ibsen's Plays,' The Quintessence of Ibsenism (1913) Appendix D: The Critics 1. In London a. From The Era (28 March 1885) b. From The Times (8 June 1889) c. From The Globe (8 June 1889) d. From The Daily Telegraph (8 June 1889) e. From The Pall Mall Gazette (8 June 1889) f. From The Spectator (21 June 1889) g. From Clement Scott, 'A Doll's House,' The Theatre (1 July 1889) 2. In America a. From The Courier-Journal [Louisville, Kentucky] (8 December 1883) b. From The New York Times (27 September 1889) c. From The Boston Globe (31 October 1889) d. From The [New York] Sun (22 December 1889) e. From The New York Times (22 December 1889) f. From The [New York] Evening World (23 December 1889) g. From The [New York] Sun (16 February 1894) h. From The [New York] Evening World (7 June 1895) 3. In Montreal and Sydney a. From The [Montreal] Gazette (18 February 1890) b. From The Sydney Morning Herald (19 July 1890) Appendix E: Feminism 1. Henrik Ibsen, 'Notes for the Tragedy of Modern Times' (19 October 1878) 2. From Henrietta Frances Lord, preface to her translation of A Doll's House (1882) 3. From August Strindberg, preface to Getting Married (1884) 4. From Havelock Ellis, The New Spirit (1890) 5. From Ellen Battelle Dietrick, 'The Doll's House—T'Other Side,' Women's Penny Paper (15 and 22 March 1890) 6. From Annie Nathan Meyer, 'Ibsen's Attitude Towards Woman,' The Critic [New York] (22 March 1890) 7. From Max Nordau, Degeneration (1895) 8. From Ibsen's speech to the Norwegian Women's Rights League (26 May 1898) 9. From Louie Bennett, 'Ibsen as a Pioneer of the Woman Movement,' The Westminster Review (March 1910) Appendix F: Acting Nora 1. From 'Nora Helmer off for the Antipodes: An Interview with Miss Janet Achurch,' The Pall Mall Gazette (5 July 1889) 2. From 'Ethel Barrymore on Nora Helmer' (6 May 1905) 3. Alla Nazimova, 'Ibsen's Women,' The Independent (17 October 1907) 4. From Elizabeth Robins, Ibsen and the Actress (1928) 5. From Liv Ullmann, Changing (1976) Works Cited and Select Bibliography

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Book SynopsisThe debut English-language collection from a Ukrainian poet reflecting on her experiences of the invasion of her homeland.

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Book SynopsisCelebrate Robert Frost's 150th birthday with a deluxe keepsake edition featuring 16 of his greatest poems—with brilliant essays highlighting his special genius and the power of memorization to unlock the magic of his languageDuring a public reading Robert Frost was once asked why he so frequently recited his poems from memory. With typical wit, he replied: “If they won’t stick to me, I won’t stick to them.” Remarkably among the modern poets, his poems “stick” to the reader:  Mending Wall, with its famous invocation of the rural maxim Good fences make good neighbors The Road Not Taken, about the beguiling possibilities of life Birches, which reminds us that One could do worse than be a swinger of birches Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening, with its unforgettable final line: And miles to go before I sleep. Here, poet and Frost biographer Jay Pari

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Book Synopsis*WINNER OF THE WRITERS'' PRIZE - BOOK OF THE YEAR*Inspired by a true story, The Home Child is a beautiful novel-in-verse about a child far from homeGround-breaking' Benjamin ZephaniahBeautifully crafted' GuardianExtraordinary' Hannah LoweIn 1908, Eliza Showell, twelve years old and newly orphaned, boards a ship that will carry her from the slums of the Black Country to rural Nova Scotia. She will never return or see her family again.With nothing to call her own, the wild beauty of her surroundings is the only solace Eliza has until another Home Child, a boy, arrives at the farm and changes everything.Inspired by the true story of Liz Berry's great aunt, this spellbinding novel in verse is an exquisite portrait of a girl far from home.One of the outstanding books of this year. Although this is a historical tale its resonance is timeless' Sunday TimesDeeply moving. A graceful,

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Book SynopsisThis collection contains all of Lear's most celebrated verse and prose productions, from the 1846 volume of limericks, A Book of Nonsense, to his Nonsense Songs, which includes The Owl and the Pussy Cat', long considered one of the nation's favourite poems, and lesser-known pieces composed in the same waywardly imaginative vein.Embodying his passion for nonsense, Lear's limericks, stories, poems, alphabets and miscellaneous pieces, each accompanied by one of the author's beguiling original illustrations, are fun, lyrical, lively and hilarious, and have enchanted children and adults since their first appearance in print.

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Book SynopsisWith its rich selection from each of Sarah Holland-Batt's books of poetry up to her Stella prize-winning collection The Jaguar (2022), this volume will introduce one of Australia's best-known and widely read poets to many readers for the first time.

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Book SynopsisTen poem. Ten poets. Ten earth-shattering encounters.

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Book SynopsisThe latest in the Seedbank series, the debut in English of a groundbreaking Indigenous poet of the Americas.In a fiercely personal yet authoritative voice, prolific contemporary poet Mikeas Sánchez explores the worldview of the Zoque people of southern Mexico. Her paced, steely lyrics fuse cosmology, lineage, feminism, and environmental activism into a singular body of work that stands for the self and the collective in the same instant. “I am woman and I celebrate every vein,” she writes, “where I guard my ancestors’ secrets / every Zoque man’s word in my mouth / every Zoque woman’s wisdom in my spit.”How to Be a Good Savage and Other Poems examines the intersection of Zoque struggles against colonialism and empire, and those of North African immigrants and refugees. Sánchez encountered the latter in Barcelona as a revelation, “spreading their white

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Book SynopsisSelected by editor Bardia Sinaee, the 2024 edition of Best Canadian Poetry showcases the best Canadian poetry writing published in 2022.Featuring:David Barrick • Nina Berkhout • Nicholas Bradley • Alison Braid • Louise Carson • Hilary Clark • Erin Conway-Smith • Nancy Jo Cullen • Kayla Czaga • Rocco de Giacomo • Jean Eng • Joel Robert Ferguson • Susan Gillis • Luke Hathaway • Beatriz Hausner • Robert Hogg • Evan Jones • Meghan Kemp-Gee • Joseph Kidney • Matthew King • Sarah Lachmansingh • T. Liem • Seth MacGregor • Sadie McCarney • Erin McGregor • Anna Moore • Rhiannon Ng Cheng Hin • Barbara Nickel • Peter Norman • Tolu Oloruntoba • Michael Ondaatje • Jana Prikryl • Matt Rader • Monty Reid • Lisa Richter • Meaghan Rondeau •

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Book SynopsisCrushed Wild Mint is a collection of poems embodying land love and ancestral wisdom, deeply rooted to the poet’s motherland and their experience as a parent, herbalist and careful observer of the patterns and power of their territory. Jess Housty grapples with the natural and the supernatural, transformation and the hard work of living that our bodies are doing—held by mountains, by oceans, by ancestors and by the grief and love that come with communing.Housty’s poems are textural—blossoms, feathers, stubborn blots of snow—and reading them is a sensory offering that invites the reader’s whole body to be transported in the experience. Their writing converses with mountains, animals and all our kin beyond the human realm as they sit beside their ancestors’ bones and move throughout the geography of their homeland. Housty’s exploration of history and futurity, ceremony and sexuality, grieving and thriving invites us to look

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Book SynopsisNew Weather was Paul Muldoon''s first book of poems. When it appeared in 1973, Seamus Heaney described its author as ''unusually gifted, endowed with an individual sense of rhythm, a natural and copious vocabulary, a technical accomplishment and an intellectual boldness that mark him as the most promising poet to appear in Ireland for years''. While the promise has been amply fulfilled, this new paperback edition gives Muldoon''s many, more recent admirers the opportunity to see what a versatile and substantial artist he was from the outset.

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Book SynopsisThis book brings together for the first time Ben Lerner's three acclaimed volumes of poetry, along with a handful of newer poems, to present a decade-long exploration of the relationship between form and meaning, between private experience and public expression. No Art is an exhilarating argument both with America and with poetry itself, in which online slang is juxtaposed with academic idiom, philosophy collides with advertising, and the language of medicine and the military is overlaid with echoes of Whitman and Keats. Here, clichés are cracked open and made new, made strange, and formal experiments disclose new possibilities of thought and feeling. No Art confirms Ben Lerner as one of the most searching and ambitious poets working today.Trade ReviewBen Lerner's poems are remarkable for their graceful, trenchant exploration of aesthetics, politics, voice, address, music, and structure. For admirers of Lerner's fiction who are just now coming to his poems, this volume will offer a compelling illustration of how poetry thinks and pleasures distinctly; for those coming to Lerner's writing for the first time altogether, an ardent, adamant, ever-questing poetics awaits you -- Maggie NelsonBen Lerner's poetry, like his prose, is subject to its own agitated brilliance. Many would settle for his quickness and reach but Lerner works in tension with these and resists securing either himself of the reader. The result is poetry of rare immediacy and effect -- Lavinia GreenlawNo Art is a feast comprising form-defining modern prose poems, intellectual ease, and a distinctive style in fusing sound with vivid imagery and structure, humour with sadness -- Charlotte Runcie * Daily Telegraph *I look forward to Ben Lerner's poetry the way I used to anticipate a new record by my favourite band. He can be painfully funny and urgently serious in the same poem, self-excoriating and intellectually generous. For ten years I've gone to his work whenever I need reminding what's still possible, the expanse we have to fill, the lack (of subtlety, of life) we all write against. So many young British poets have already been influenced by his poetry, but No Art makes it available to a wider audience in the UK -- Luke KennardBen Lerner's poems are brilliant. Again and again they decode and recode the daily mysteries. The questing intelligence and ironist's wink are underpinned by a real moral force -- Nick LairdBen Lerner's hilarious, humane poetry is an instrument of phenomenal sensitivity: a telescope through which unforgettable images of the interior and exterior worlds are made visible, in the highest definition -- Oli HazzardLerner is funny and smart, and his high-wire sequences are a pleasure to read -- John McAuliffe * Irish Times *Dealing mostly in intricately patterned sequences and variations [... Lerner's] prose poems allow for moments of grace and insight... There is added colour and weight to Lerner's thought, a more discursive, personal tone, less fractured through formal constraint or interruption, and the increasingly oppressive presence of the future, of ideas and posterity and survival, supply a gravitas and vulnerability which suits his voice and concerns. It bodes well for whatever Ben Lerner does next -- Declan Ryan * TLS *

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Book SynopsisBestselling and Goodreads Choice Award-winning author Trista Mateer returns with another mythical approach to self-care in her newest poetry collection, Persephone Made Me Do It. Following her previous work in this series, Mateer weaves together mythology, tarot, poetry, and conversation to reveal a new side of a very old story. Alternating between the perspectives of poet and goddess, Persephone’s lore is explored, related to modern issues, and ultimately reclaimed.“You want to talk about duality? You want to talk about love? Let us speak instead of chaos.”In this new collection of art and feminist verse from Trista Mateer, Persephone might have flowers in her hair—but she is out for blood.

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Book SynopsisPoems that consider doubleness and truth-telling through the voice of an Asian American poet, while referencing a range of writers and pop culture figures. Emily Dickinson begins one of her poems with the oft-quoted line, “Tell all the truth but tell it slant." For Asian Americans, the word “slant” can be heard and read two ways, as both a racializing and an obscuring term. It is this sense of doubleness—culminating in the instability of language and an untrustworthy narrator—that shapes, informs, and inflects the poems in John Yau’s new collection, all of which focus on the questions of who is speaking and who is being spoken for and to. Made up of eight sections, each exploring the idea of address—as place, as person, as memory, and as event —Tell It Slant does as Dickinson commands, but with a further twist. Yau summons spirits who help the author “tell all the truth,” among whom are reimagined traces of poets, movie stars, and science fiction writers, including Charles Baudelaire, Thomas de Quincey, Philip K. Dick, Li Shangyin, and Elsa Lanchester. Trade Review"Yau’s charming latest reflects on a lifetime of making art from the periphery. Playing on the eponymous phrase, Yau explores artistic process and the limits of communication, all under the specter of anti-Asian hate and racism. Many poems make overt reference to painting and painters, suggesting Yau’s strong association with poetry and painting as primarily imagistic and often abstract art forms: . . . This wise and sometimes ominous collection shines." * Publishers Weekly starred review *“Emily Dickinson famously brought her poetic attention to two slanted things: light ('a certain slant of') and truth ('tell all the…but tell it…'), it is part of Yau’s far-reaching genius to remind us that both light and truth depend on perception, as he turns a racist slur (slanted eyes) into the sign by which we recognize the trustworthy phenomenologist. In this latest collection, Tell It Slant, Yau—following his inclination—holds the mirror up to vision itself: watchful of his own watching, noting what poetry sees, involved in close observations which are endlessly productive of lively and original insights, creatively sampling the doxa, and always returning to ekphrasis, 'scout[ing] the path the painter has left for us to follow,' the poet has given us his most tender, open, resonant, and beautiful book yet. My slant? I think we are astonishingly lucky to add Yau to the list of our great American poets at this moment, when we most need his work to help us recognize that gradual and constant dazzle which is the transformational capability of attention.” -- Laura Mullen“In this innovative and lyrical new book, Yau employs serial variations and pantoums in which the repetitions become a form of mesmerizing insistence. Using voices that revel in the multiple and shadowy selves inside the self, and that implicate the reader through indirection and surprise, where a reader may smile and wince at the same time, Yau has written a set of remarkable poems.” -- Arthur Sze

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Book SynopsisRajiv Joseph (born June 16, 1974) is an American playwright. He was named a finalist for the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo,[1] and he won an Obie Award for Best New American Play for his play Describe the Night.Trade Review‘Joseph writes sly, funny dialogue laced with jolts of lyricism. He has a distinctive voice with mordant humor and adventurous tonal range!’ * The Hollywood Reporter *

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewPRAISE FOR DOWN IN THE VALLEY: It is a fine thing to revisit this writer's landscape and hear his amiable voice in it again. * Times Literary Supplement *A beautiful illustration of how, in some way, we are all indelibly influenced by the landscape of our childhood. -- Raynor Winn, author of The Salt Path

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Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.What are those blue remembered hills,What spires, what farms are those??First published in 1896, A.E. Housman?s best-loved collection of poetry is a poignant exploration of love, loss, the inevitable passage of time and the fragility of life. Using elegant melodic simplicity, Housman?s poems arouse profound emotional resonance through their portrayal of an idyllic rural England, evoking a sense of nostalgia and longing for times gone by.A Shropshire Lad became popular with young British soldiers during the First World War and is now widely considered a classic work of English poetry. With lyrical beauty and universal themes, these 63 poems have inspired generations of readers across the world.

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Book SynopsisIt's 1671, and the charismatic and unpredictable Colonel Blood is planning the greatest heist of all time: stealing – in plain sight – the Crown Jewels from the Tower of London. With an audacious plan and a gang of misfits by his side, can he possibly pull it off? And is King Charles II in any mood to have his crown jewels handled? Based on the scarcely believable true story, Simon Nye's play The Crown Jewels is a riotous and uproarious royal affair. It opened at the Garrick Theatre in London's West End in 2023 before touring, and was directed by Sean Foley with a star-studded cast including Al Murray, Mel Giedroyc, Carrie Hope Fletcher, Aidan McArdle, Neil Morrissey, Joe Thomas and Tanvi Virmani. It will appeal to any amateur theatre company – monarchists and republicans alike – who want to get their hands on a royally funny caper to perform.Trade Review'Genius... had the audience howling with laughter... hilarious' * Daily Express *'An astonishing story... a royally great subject' * London Theatre *'An amazing true story... full of great moments and set pieces' * British Theatre Guide *'A fun and raucous ride' * Manchester Evening News *'Bawdy and exuberant… one not to be missed' * Buzz Magazine *'A regal riot… good old-fashioned fun and frolics at its very best' * Entertainment South Wales *'The witty script interwoven with current themes and topics made for a laugh-a-minute-show that had the entire theatre in stitches' * Kent Live *

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Book Synopsis'We know all too well that we're up to our necks in the shit, and it is for this very reason that we walk with our heads held high!' An irrepressible fraudster known only as the Maniac is brought into Police Headquarters just as the officers are preparing for a judicial review of the recent 'accidental' death of a suspect in custody. Outwitting his captors, the Maniac dupes them into performing a farcical recreation of the incident, exposing the absurd corruption and terrifying idiocy at the heart of the system. Dario Fo and Franca Rame's riotous satire has been widely performed around the world since its premiere in 1970. Tom Basden's acclaimed adaptation was first performed at Sheffield Theatres in 2022, directed by Daniel Raggett, and starring Daniel Rigby as the Maniac. The production transferred to the Lyric Hammersmith Theatre in 2023, before moving to the Theatre Royal Haymarket in London's West End.Trade Review'An Italian classic reborn as an unmissable police satire' * Metro *'A glorious comedy that leaps off the stage' * The Times *'A riotous satirical farce brought bang up to date... Tom Basden's full-blooded adaptation [is] a furious but funny broadside against police malpractice... supremely, dazzlingly funny' * Guardian *'A glorious romp from the super-talented Tom Basden' * Observer *'Wickedly funny... nothing less than brilliant... the audience is constantly in stitches... much cheaper than a therapy session and vastly more entertaining' * Time Out *'Fabulous... an unforgettable theatrical experience. Brilliantly adapted by Tom Basden, it is a biting, bang-up-to-the-minute satire... Each minute is packed with jokes, word play and punchy references... The laughs aren't just one-a-minute – there seems to be one every second. A fantastic show' * Reviews Hub *'Brilliant... a whirlwind high-speed farce... Tom Basden's bang up-to-date English version would undoubtedly have met with Signor Fo's whole-hearted approval... wildly inventive... glorious chaos' * WhatsOnStage *'Pretty special... Basden's script is packed with contemporary references, but among the comic zingers are weightier concerns about undercover police work and corruption.... It's brilliantly executed... unforgettable' * The Stage *'Simply brilliant... The comic lines come thick and fast, but the underlying political punch is serious and to the point... A tour de force, a great night out… A must-see' * British Theatre Guide *'Both deeply political and utterly hilarious... a biting indictment of British law enforcement... a comic work for the ages with a script packed with zingers... a masterclass in how to combine social issues and comedy' * Broadway World *'A sure-fire, fearlessly political, no holds-barred, angry hit of a show' * Everything Theatre *'Gloriously unruly... one of the most daring and original shows to arrive in the West End in recent memory' * Independent *'Uproarious... a bomb-blast comedy... an institutionally funny play' * Evening Standard *

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Book SynopsisForget what you think you knowInfluencer, rapper and spoken word artist Humble the Poet is here to revolutionise your life and help you reach your full potential.Full of insights, wisdom and clarity, Unlearn is a brutally-honest, empowering book that defies conventional thinking. You will shed the sabotaging habits, fixed mindsets and past regrets that characterise modern life and instead tap into your best, most authentic self.Structured as 101 short and accessible life lessons covering everything from Money is a Funny Thing' to Love is a Gift Not a Loan', this is the ideal book to turn to whenever you need a flash of inspiration.Profound in its simplicity,Unlearnis the perfect invitation to a new beginning and to pursue a life of fulfilment.Trade Review‘This is not a book. This is a mirror that forces you to look into the deepest parts of yourself and have an honest conversation. These simple truths hit hard. This is the straight-talking best friend that everyone needs.’ Lilly Singh, New York Times bestselling author of How to Be a Bawse

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Book SynopsisThe enchanting festive poem from Carol Ann Duffy, former Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, and adorned with sumptuous illustrations by artist Margaux Carpentier, Christmas Eve at The Moon Under Water is the perfect festive gift for the poetry lover in your life.All the lights were on at The Moon Under Waterand the landlord, an Owl, was slowly pulling a pintto test his ale. Toothsome. It was Christmas Eveand the fire in the ancient grate gargled its flames...A horse walks into a bar. A hedgehog plays the piano. An owl mulls a flagon of wine. On Christmas Eve at The Moon Under Water, anything is possible, so when the landlord announces a festive prize for the best performance of the night, all and sundry pile into the pub, eager for a chance at victory.In Christmas Eve at The Moon Under Water all the old rivalries of the natural world are suspended for one miraculous night, as man stands shoulder to shoulder with animal, and predator and prey add warble and wail to the Yuletide chorus.

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Book SynopsisA beautiful anthology featuring some of the brightest voices in contemporary American poetry who challenge, expand, and illuminate the meaning of the label Asian American and Pacific Islander in today's world.In this thoughtfully curated, intergenerational collection, poets of multiple languages, lands, and waters write against and through the contested terrain of AAPI identity. Too often, Pacific Islanders and Asian Americans are squeezed into the same story. The poets gathered here, and the lineages they represent, exceed this sameness. May this anthology uplift complexities and incite transformation and joy.Contributors include Marilyn Chin, Joshua Nguyen, Teresia Teaiwa, Haunani-Kay Trask, and many more writers, both established and emerging.

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Book SynopsisLaura's Desires is a diptych of two formally distinct long poems, each approaching various pop-cultural artifacts as a way to engage with longing, vulnerability, and the possibility of liberation. Referencing pop culture artifacts, from hit '90s singles like Selena's Dreaming of You to heroines of cult classic TV and films (Laura Palmer and Variety's Christine), this dynamic collection looks to these iconic touchstones as sites for feminist analysis and intervention. Traveling through dreamscapes, fantasy, and the quotidian, Laura's Desires forges a path away from fear and shame, guiding us towards liberation.

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Book SynopsisA debut poetry collection about Earth and to Earth that contemplates imposed systemsgender, capitalism, time, wage and exploitationand how they are mapped onto us, the trees, and the planet.Immersed in a tangled weave of contemporary life where big box stores and suburban parking lots coexist alongside the instructive silence of juniper trees and a pulsing waterfall, Our Air sketches the possibilities of eco and social interdependence during late-stage capitalism.Their inscriber, Nora Treatbaby, is a trans woman reckoning with the constraints of gender categories, when being a woman is an implausible dream and an insane vibration. With sincere curiosity and a sprinkling of levity, these poems advocate for the world-building potential available in a material commitment to gentle friendship with all networks of life on Earth.

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Book SynopsisIn these skillful new translations by poet Graham Foust and scholar Samuel Frederick, whose work has previously been shortlisted for the National Translation Award in Poetry, each line is gnomic yet ample, opening spaces of reflection on mortality and infinity. Now preserved in this portable, English-language volume, these poems from Georg Büchner Prize winner Ernst Meister’s last decade are oracular and entrancing. While the collections previously published by Wave—Of Entirety Say the Sentence, In Time’s Rift, and Wallless Space—provide expansive access to Meister’s late work, Uncollected Later Poems (1968–1979) delivers granular, endlessly rewarding profundities. Trade ReviewPoetry translation is such tricky and unappreciated work—“translation is impossible,” Graham Foust and Samuel Frederick declare in their introduction to a volume of Ernst Meister's work in which they've performed that exact miracle. —Arielle Greenberg, American Poetry ReviewLike his subject matter, Meister’s writing is ominous, intangible, and inescapable. —Publishers WeeklyMeister compacts a meditation on the nature of space, nothingness and our interaction with the two in the work’s sparse, dense lines. —Lindsay Choi, The Daily Californian

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