Showing titles in Poetry

Richard Ellmann has revised and expanded his definitive work on Joyce's life to include newly discovered primary material, including details of a failed love affair, a limerick about Samuel Beckett, a dream notebook, previously unknown letters, and much more.

Joy Davidman is known, if she is known at all, as the wife of C. S. Lewis. Their marriage was immortalized in the film Shadowlands and Lewis' memoir, A Grief Observed. Now, through extraordinary new documents as well as years of research and interviews, Abigail Santamaria brings Joy Davidman Gresham Lewis to your ears in the fullness and depth she deserves. A poet and radical, Davidman was a frequent contributor to the communist vehicle New Masses and an active member of New York literary circles in the 1930s and '40s.

It's easy to feel at home in Mitford. In these high, green hills, the air is pure, the village is charming, and the people are generally lovable. Yet Father Tim, the bachelor rector, wants something more. Enter a dog the size of a sofa who moves in and won't go away. Add an attractive neighbor who begins wearing a path through the hedge. Now, stir in a lovable but unloved boy, a mystifying jewel theft, and a secret that's 60 years old.

I know you don’t want to talk sometimes. Sometimes because it hurts and sometimes because you’re just not supposed to talk about what you want to talk about. Sometimes it can be hard to say, “this is beautiful,” when no one else can see what you see. Or, “Here, this is where the pain is.” But some part of you knows, the truth about the words you cannot say is that they only hurt until you say them. They only hurt until the person who needs to hear them, hears them.

A three-time Christy Award winner, Lynn Austin crafts rousing tales of hope and redemption. All She Ever Wanted stars Kathleen Seymour, a woman who seems to have it all, though she hides a dark family secret. To her horror, everything comes crashing down when she loses her job and her daughter is caught shoplifting. Desperate to regain control over her life, Kathleen returns to her estranged family to mend her severely broken relationships before it is too late.

This varied, well-chosen selection brings onto one audiobook the best of Dylan Thomas. Here is the legendary recording of "Under Milk Wood", with Richard Burton and Richard Bebb as narrators; but here also are two radio productions he wrote before that great classic, and though interesting in their own right, they show how "Under Milk Wood" grew gradually in his imagination.

Peggy Ashcroft and Tony Britton star in this 1971 BBC Radio production of Noël Coward’s classic comedy about a disastrous weekend house party. Judith Bliss is a famous actress who, after a string of successful roles, has retired to her country retreat. Missing the adulation of her public, she has has invited a fan over for a weekend of uninterrupted adoration - unaware that the rest of her family has company arriving too.

With Professor Esolen you will enter the terrible gates of Hell and progress level by infernal level to its diabolical depths. Professor Esolen places a special emphasis on the drama of the poem, leading you through each canto in succession. Professor Esolen will more than satisfy your curiosity about Hell and the fate of the damned. He will reveal in all its starkness the horror of sin and awaken in your heart a longing for divine love.

Evgenii Onegin is best known in the West through Tchaikovsky’s opera Eugene Onegin. But the original narrative poem (consisting of 389 stanzas, the form of which has become known as the "Pushkin sonnet") is one of the landmarks of Russian literature. In the poem, the eponymous hero repudiates love, only to later experience the pain of rejection himself. Pushkin’s unique style proves timeless in its exploration of love, life, passion, jealousy, and the consequences of social convention.

The 250th anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns (1759 - 1796), one of the most popular of poets, was celebrated in 2009. A pioneer of the Romantic movement, works such as "A Red, Red Rose", "A Man’s a Man for a’ That", and the ubiquitous "Auld Lang Syne", have made him an international figure. Naxos AudioBooks’ popular Great Poets series marked the anniversary with this audio, bringing together all the key works.

This inspiring collection, edited by Pádraig ó Tuama, presents fifty poems about what it means to be alive in the world today. Each poem is paired with Pádraig's illuminating commentary that offers personal anecdotes and generous insights into the content of the poem. Engaging, accessible and inviting, Poetry Unbound is the perfect companion for everyone who loves poetry and for anyone who wants to go deeper into poetry but doesn't necessarily know how to do so.

For every moment in your life there is a poem. In Dancing by the Light of the Moon, we have a remarkable collection of over 250 best-loved poems in the English-speaking world. Allow Gyles Brandreth to be your guide to not only the wonders of poetry - and there are many - but also its practical uses in everyday life.

A masterly new recording by Ralph Fiennes. Four Quartets is the culminating achievement of T. S. Eliot's career as a poet. While containing some of the most musical and unforgettable passages in 20th-century poetry, its four parts, 'Burnt Norton', 'East Coker', 'The Dry Salvages' and 'Little Gidding', present a rigorous meditation on the spiritual, philosophical and personal themes which preoccupied the author.

Following the success of his acclaimed translations of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Pearl, Simon Armitage shines light on another jewel of Middle English verse. In his thoroughly enjoyable version, Armitage communicates the energy, charm and humour of the tale - the earliest example of a 'debate poem'. An unnamed narrator overhears a fierce verbal contest between the two eponymous birds, which moves entertainingly from the eloquent and highfalutin to the ribald and ridiculous.

Philip Larkin (1922-1985) is one of the most beloved poets in English. Yet after his death a largely negative image of the man himself took hold; he has been portrayed as a racist, a misogynist and a narcissist. Now Larkin scholar James Booth, for seventeen years a colleague of the poet's at the University of Hull, offers a very different portrait. Drawn from years of research and a wide variety of Larkin's friends and correspondents, this is the most comprehensive portrait of the poet yet published.

A collection of three medieval English poems, translated by Tolkien for the modern-day reader and containing romance, tragedy, love, sex and honour.

"My fame is written in the heavens, and my fate too..." So speaks Odysseus as he starts to recount his struggles to sail home to Ithaca, in one of the greatest pieces of storytelling in Western literature. The Odyssey is his incredible traveller's tale, and also the story of his faithful wife Penelope who waits for him, besieged by suitors, and their son Telemachus who has a quest of his own.

Alfred Lord Tennyson is one of Britain’s greatest and most popular poets. Even during his lifetime, he was considered a national institution: Queen Victoria appointed him Poet Laureate in 1850, a position he held for 42 years, and in 1884 he became the first writer to be granted a baronetcy. In a long and fruitful career, he penned numerous classic works, and this BBC Radio collection showcases some of the very best. We begin with two of his masterpieces, dramatised by award-winning poet Michael Symmons Roberts.

There were many things that Hollie McNish didn't know before she was pregnant. How her family and friends would react; that Mr Whippy would be off the menu; how quickly ice can melt on a stomach. These were on top of the many other things she didn't know about babies: how to stand while holding one; how to do a poetry gig with your baby as a member of the audience; how drum'n'bass can make a great lullaby. But Hollie learned. And she's still learning, slowly.

Punk. Poet. Pioneer. The Bard of Salford’s hugely anticipated new collection of poetry is his first in over 30 years. These are poems as scabrous, wry and vivid as only John Cooper Clarke could deliver. Inimitable and iconic, this collection will be a complete joy for lifelong fans and a whole new generation.