Showing results by narrator "Denis Daly" in All Categories

A resourceful miner devises an ingenious scheme to expedite his fishing, but it does not quite go as planned.

In this rambling essay, Bertrand Russell reflects on the future of the world while the memory of the First World War was still strong in the public imagination. Russell notes the concomitant development of technology and the rise of political autocracies and explores whether man can be considered fit to handle the vast new powers at his disposal.

A significant focus of the literature of the ancient Near East, which includes the Bible, is the creation of the known world. The clay tablets, which were discovered in the ruins of the library of King Ashurbanipal (B.C. 668-626) at Kuyunjik (Nineveh), contain detailed descriptions of the views and beliefs of the Babylonians and Assyrians about the Creation.

Unlike the other verse novels of C. J. Dennis, this collection of 13 poems is focused on political satire. The action is set in the society of an arboreal race, known as Glugs, and described by the author "stupid race of docile folk". Among the targets of Dennis's mocking scrutiny are free trade, social conformity, and extravagant bureaucracy.

A group of highly opinionated individuals gather at a remote country estate in Hampshire and indulge in lengthy conversations about issues of the day over extravagant dinners. The young and idealistic Algernon Falconer resides in the opulent country house with seven young "handmaidens', whom he calls "Vestals." A learned and garrulous local clergyman, Dr. Opimian, becomes a friend and confidant of Mr. Falconer and decides that the young man would make a suitable husband for Morgana Gryll, a niece of one of his friends.

"Locksley Hall" is a dramatic monologue written in 1835 and published in 1842. Tennyson explained that the poem was not autobiographical but purely imaginary, "representing young life, its good side, its deficiences and its yearnings".

This poem consists of 11 stanzas of varying length, the first four of which were composed in 1802. These deal with the subject of death, a concept with which Wordsworth confesses to having struggled within childhood.

This poem was written by Wordsworth after a walking tour through the Welsh Borders. As usual with many of Wordsworth's poems, it opens with a description of the countryside which is then developed into a philosophical reflection about beauty and the suggestive power of recollection.

This evocative poem was first published in 1832 but republished in 1842 with extensive alterations.

As with many of Ostrovsky's plays, the target of the author's satire is the merchant class and the inevitable corruption associated with mercantile endeavors. In Ostrovsky's bitterly realistic world, all personal encounters end in transactions, some humourous and some tragic.

This collection follows on from Australian Christmas Yarns Volume I and consists of 10 stories by notable Australian author Mary Grant Bruce (1878-1958). These stories sketch challenges of landscape, relationship, loss and hope.

"Enoch Arden" is a long narrative poem that is built on a theme that has been widely explored in literature and on film. A man is separated from his family due to shipwreck and marooned on an island. After several years of absence from his home, it is assumed that he has died, and his wife remarries and starts a new family. After 10 years, the man finally makes his way home and has to deal with the trauma of discovering his wife and family happily established in a new relationship.

Joseph McCabe was one of the most learned and prolific of atheist writers. In his earlier life, he had been a Catholic priest, fluent in several languages, who taught philosophy and history in ecclesiastical colleges. He wrote over two hundred books and pamphlets and also translated a number of significant texts.

Robert Bridges, who was English Poet Laureate between 1913 and 1930, published three versions of his sonnet sequence, The Growth of Love: 1876 - 24 sonnets, 1889 - 79 sonnets, 1898 - 69 sonnets. This recording is of the 1889 edition. The poems are essentially meditations on the elusive subject of love, and display the poet's reverence for his great poetic forebears, particularly Milton and Shakespeare.

Not all the young poets whose lives were cut short during the First World War were actual casualties of the conflict. James Elroy Flecker and Rupert Brooke both died in 1915, each leaving a body of finished work which places him in the ranks of the major poets of the 20th century. Brooke seems to have had a premonition of his untimely demise for a considerable period. The subject of death is very prominent in his verse, which, even in its most playful moments, is characterized by a profoundly elegaic quality.

Solicitor, journalist, poet, and war veteran, Andrew Barton Paterson is today best known for his colorful and jingoistic verse, in particular The Man from Snowy River. Paterson's prose works include An Outback Marriage (1906), and Three Elephant Power and Other Stories (1917), the latter being a collection of tall tales and serious (but often humorous) reporting.

Although his output was small, John of the Cross (1542 - 1591) is considered one of the most important figures in Spanish poetry. All his verses explore the same theme: the search of the soul for union with its creator and the glory of the resulting "mystical marriage". This selection of 20 poems opens with his most famous poem, "The Obscure Night of the Soul" and concludes with a free translation of "Psalm 137 (By the Waters of Babylon)".

This aggressive diatribe against the Bible was published in 1894 and is based on an assertion that formed the basis of many of Ingersoll's attacks on organized religion - the concept of divine inspiration and the evils that spring from this contention.

This collection was published in 1901 and contains some of Lawson's best known stories. Most of the stories are set in the Australian bush, and feature many of Lawson's iconic characters, like squatters, swagmen, and struggling selector farmers. A persistent theme is the harshness of rural life and the inevitability of personal tragedy.

In his short life, Australian poet Barcoft Boake completed 30 poems, the most famous of which is the pastoral lament, "Where the Dead Men Lie", which was first published in the The Bulletin in December, 1891. This collection was prepared and edited by critic and anthologist, A. G. Stephens, who also appended a detailed memoir of the poet.