Don Juan is a satiric poem by Lord Byron, based on the legend of Don Juan, which Byron reverses, portraying Juan not as a womanizer but as someone easily seduced by women. It is a variation on the epic form. Byron himself called it an "Epic Satire". Modern critics generally consider it Byron's masterpiece. The poem is in eight line iambic pentameter with the rhyme scheme ab ab ab cc – often the last rhyming couplet is used for a humor comic...

"Shakespeare's Sonnets are among the most lyrical and moving pieces of poetry in any language, abounding with examples of his genius for wordplay, rhythm and metaphor and dealing with the eternal themes of love, memory, beauty and the ravishes of time. First published in 1609, after Shakespeare had written many of his most famous works, the Sonnets have been the subject of literary curiosity ever since, mainly concerning the identity of the two addressees,...

A fascinating survey of Victorian literature from one of England’s greatest minds
Dishing out his signature brand of harsh wit, G. K. Chesterton casts a critical eye on the poets and novelists that defined the Victorian age in English literature. “Her imagination was sometimes superhuman—always inhuman,” he writes of Emily Brontë. “Wuthering Heights might have been written by an eagle.”...

In Paradise Lost, Milton produced a poem of epic scale, conjuring up a vast, awe-inspiring cosmos ranging across huge tracts of space and time. And yet, in putting a charismatic Satan and naked Adam and Eve at the center of this story, he also created an intensely human tragedy on the Fall of Man. Written when Milton was in his fifties blind, bitterly disappointed by the Restoration, and briefly in danger of execution, Paradise Lost's apparent ambivalence...

Dr. Faustus is a great Elizabethan tragedy by Christopher Marlow originally published in 1600. The story is based on an earlier anonymous classic German legend involving worldly ambition, black magic and surrender to the devil. It remains one of the most famous plays of the English Renaissance. Dr. John Faustus, a brilliant, well-respected German doctor grows dissatisfied with the limits of human knowledge - logic, medicine, law, and religion, and...

The celebrated Scottish poet brings together nearly 20 years of work in this anthology— “a rare thing: a book of poems which sparkles” (Scotsman, UK).
Liz Lochhead has built an impressive reputation as poet, playwright and performer attracting a large and admiring public. She gained worldwide acclaim as the Scots Makar—or Scotland’s National Poet—from 2011 to 2016, and before that served for...

"Considered the preeminent verse satirist in English, Alexander Pope (1688-1744) brought wide learning, devastating wit and masterly technique to his poems. Models of clarity and control, they exemplified the classical poetics of the Augustan age. This volume contains a rich selection of Pope's work, including such well-known poems as the title selection -- a philosophical meditation on the nature of the universe and man's place in it -- and "The...

"'This book covers the beginning and end of a close friendship. Some of these poems were very hard to write, but I used them as therapy. I hope that other people can relate to these poems as words they found hard to express themselves.' Julie Tsiricos"--

Idylls of the King (1859-1885) is a cycle of narrative poems by British poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Written while Tennyson was serving as Poet Laureate, Idylls of the King reworks the medieval Arthurian legend in blank verse and with an elegiac tone. Based on Sir Thomas Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur and the early British Mabinogion manuscripts, Tennyson's work connects an ancient tradition to the reign and ideals of Queen Victoria. "The Coming of Arthur"...

"Carcanet publishes several Catulluses: C.H. Sisson's, Len Krisak's, Simon Smith's. But Isobel Williams's Catullus: Shibari Carmina is different in kind from the earlier versions. 'Translating Catullus has been, for me, like cage fighting with two opponents,' the translator writes: 'not just A Top Poet, but the schoolgirl I was, trained to show the examiner that she knew what each word meant.' The struggle is intensified by the presence of a third...