It has often been said that love, both sacred and profane, is the only true subject of the lyric poem. Nothing better justifies this claim than the splendid poems in this volume, which range from the writings of ancient China to those of modern-day Americ
To the nineteenth-century reader, George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824), was the archetype of the Romantic literary hero, a figure admired and emulated as much for the revolutionary panache with which he lived his life as the brio and allure of his verse.
The Everyman's Library Pocket Poets hardcover series is popular for its compact size and reasonable price which does not compromise content. Poems: Bronte contains poems that demonstrate a sensibility elemental in its force with an imaginative discipline
Of all the lasting innovations that William Wordsworth (1770-1850) brought to our literature, it is his discovery of nature and his fresh vision of human lives in the context of nature that have most influenced our cultural climate. Here, collected in thi
Simple yet capable of great complexity, the haiku is a tightly structured verse form that has a remarkable power to distill the essence of a moment keenly perceived. For centuries confined to a small literary elite in Japan, the writing of haiku is now pr
Just before the turn of the century, a renegade Russian aristocrat named Madame Blavatsky came to America claiming that man was descended not from the ape but from spiritual beings. Thus began Theosophy, the very first "new age" religion. This thought-pro
Alfred, Lord Tennyson was a more complex writer than his status as Queen Victoria’s favorite poet might suggest. Though capable of rendering rapture and delight in the most exquisite verse, in another mode Tennyson is brother in spirit to Poe and Baudel
These poems, selected from most of the cultures and histories of world literature, provide magnificent witness to the fact that love is as much an act of the imagination as it is of the body. From fourth-century Li Ch'ung's "Parody of a Lover" to John Bet
Here are 200 irresistible love letters from over the centuries, love letters both historic and fictional, love letters by poets and by princes, love letters enchanting, tragic, comic, superbly selected, beautifully printed, conveniently portable, to have