Poetry History category: 2770 books

A critical analysis of the poetic representations and legacies of five landmark blues artists   The Blues Muse: Race, Gender, and Musical Celebrity in American Poetry focuses on five key blues musicians and singers—Gertrude “Ma” Rainey, Bessie Smith, Billie Holiday, Robert Johnson, and Lead...

The later poetry of William Wordsworth, popular in his lifetime and influential on the Victorians, has, with a few exceptions, received little attention from contemporary literary critics. In Wordsworth's Poetry, 1815-1845, Tim Fulford argues that the later work reveals a mature poet far more varied...

Throughout the history of Thomas’s critical reception, psychoanalytic interpretations have been applied that have privileged the psychosexual over the psycho-linguistic elements of his work. The wealth of sexual and pseudo-sexual imagery has acquired a negative charge, and has been used to evidence...

“What is Poetry?—Poetry! that Proteus-like idea, with as many appellations as the nine-titled Corcyra! Give me, I demanded of a scholar some time ago, give me a definition of poetry? “Tres volontiers,”—and he proceeded to his library, brought me a Dr. Johnson, and overwhelmed me with a definition....

John Milton, whose epic poem ‘Paradise Lost’ is widely regarded as the greatest exemplar of its form in the English language, created a body of poetry and prose that reflected his strong personal convictions and passion for freedom during the political turmoil of his day. The Delphi Poets Series...

Widely regarded as one of the greatest poets of the English language, Edmund Spenser is famous for ‘The Faerie Queene’, an epic poem and fantastical allegory celebrating the Tudor dynasty. Spenser’s verse was notable for its premier craftsmanship and lyrical beauty, while his poetic innovations,...

From the nuts and bolts of craft to the sources of inspiration, this book is for anyone who wants to write poetry-and do it well. In this fortuitous collaboration, two spirited poets, themselves teachers of poetry, offer guidance to aspiring beginners and those who have already published. Brief...

A friend of Shakespeare, the Elizabethan poet Michael Drayton produced a prolific body of works of innovative metres and forms. The Delphi Poets Series offers readers the works of literature's finest poets, with superior formatting. This volume presents Drayton’s collected works, with beautiful illustrations...

With experience they begin to learn the art of understanding and appreciating poetry. They develop tact, and ironically tact can’t be taught. Guide books, notes by the teachers, and summary books, etc. are often helpful, but the differing interpretations can also confuse students. I would like to...

In his 2015 Garnett Sedgewick lecture, award-winning poet and literary critic Stephen Burt discusses the relation of poetry to time, space and place. He examines the widespread and popular view of contemporary critics who claim that modern lyric poetry is supposed to have a speaking self who resides...

The authors of this book participated in two interdependent colloquia that aimed to answer a two-fold question, namely, 'what is Hispanic poetry's destiny today and what part in its fate do critics play?' As a result Poetics of Hispanism covers a broad array of subjects: the relation of form to issues...

What are we really wishing for when we want poetry to have the prominence it had in the past? Why do American poets overwhelmingly identify with the political left? How do poems communicate? Is there an essential link between formal experimentation and political radicalism? What happens when poetic...

Tom Wayman’s poetry has been published around the world to great acclaim. Wayman is one of Canada’s most prolific and public poets, and his writing since the 1960s has been by turns angry, engaged, hopeful, tender, and hilarious. His voice and persona are his alone but simultaneously ours too....

The night can sweat with terror as before We pieced our thoughts into philosophy, And planned to bring the world under a rule, Who are but weasels fighting in a hole. W.B. Yeats, 'Nineteen Hundred and Nineteen' This is a book about how poetry, seen through the instance of a single poem, seeks to make...