The Book of Virtues


William J. Bennett - 1993
    Bennett's bestselling The Book of Virtues is an inspiring anthology that helps children understand and develop moral character—and helps parents teach it to them.Responsibility. Courage. Compassion. Honesty. Friendship. Persistence. Faith. Everyone recognizes these traits as essentials of good character. In order for our children to develop such traits, we have to offer them examples of good and bad, right and wrong. And the best places to find them are in great works of literature and exemplary stories from history. William J. Bennett has collected hundreds of stories in The Book of Virtues. From the Bible to American history, from Greek mythology to English poetry, from fairy tales to modern fiction, these stories are a rich mine of moral literacy, a reliable moral reference point that will help anchor our children and ourselves in our culture, our history, and our traditions—the sources of the ideals by which we wish to live our lives. Complete with instructive introductions and notes, The Book of Virtues is a book the whole family can read and enjoy—and learn from—together.

The Book of the City of Ladies


Christine de Pizan
    1429) builds an allegorical fortified city for women using examples of the important contributions women have made to Western Civilization and arguments that prove their intellectual and moral equality to men. Earl Jeffrey Richards' acclaimed translation is used nationwide in the most eminent colleges and universities in America, from Columbia to Stanford.

Poetry of the Thirties


Robin Skelton - 1964
    But from within their strongly defined unity of ideals, an astonishingly varied body of poetry emerged.Robin Skelton has arranged the poetry to make an illuminating ‘critical essay’ of the period, and in his introduction he brilliantly probes the moods and mores of an intensely troubled and creative decade.

The Roaring Girl


Thomas Dekker - 1611
    Each volume includes a critical introduction biography of the author, discussions of dates and sources, textual details, a bibliography and information about the staging of the plav. New Mermaids include plays by Beaumont, Behn, Boucicault, Chapman, Congreve, Dekker, Dryden, Etherege, Farquhar, Ford, Goldsmith, Hevwood, Jonson, Kyd, Marlowe, Marston, Massinger, Middleton, Peele, Rowley, Sheridan, Synge, Tourneur, Vanbrugh, Webster, Wilde, and Wvcherley.

North


Seamus Heaney - 1975
    Here the Irish experience is refracted through images drawn from different parts of the Northern European experience, and the idea of the north allows the poet to contemplate the violence on his home ground in relation to memories of the Scandinavian and English invasions which have marked Irish history so indelibly.

Poems to Learn by Heart


Ana Sampson - 2013
    But do you know the rest of the verse, or even the rest of the poem?An anthology to warm the coldest heart or charm the least romantic soul, this is a collection of poems (or in some cases, extracts) that are not only memorable, but lend themselves to being learned by heart.This is the perfect book for anyone with even the vaguest interest in poetry, providing a wonderful opportunity to revisit those much-loved lines remembered from earlier days.

A Shropshire Lad


A.E. Housman - 1896
    E. Housman's A Shropshire Lad, first published in 1896. Scholars and critics have seen in these timeless poems an elegance of taste and perfection of form and feeling comparable to the greatest of the classic. Yet their simple language, strong musical cadences and direct emotional appeal have won these works a wide audience among general readers as well.This finely produced volume, reprinted from an authoritative edition of A Shropshire Lad, contains all 63 original poems along with a new Index of First Lines and a brief new section of Notes to the Text. Here are poems that deal poignantly with the changing climate of friendship, the fading of youth, the vanity of dreams — poems that are among the most read, shared, and quoted in our language.

The Norton Introduction to Poetry


J. Paul Hunter - 1986
    The most wide-ranging collection of its kind, The Norton Introduction to Poetry offers a complete course in reading and writing about poetry that is designed to appeal to students of all backgrounds, abilities, and interests.It not only sharpens students close-reading skills and deepens their appreciation for the emotional power of poetry, but also connects poetry to the larger world by providing a thorough introduction to poetry 's authorial, cultural, and critical contexts.

The Penguin Book of Russian Poetry


Robert Chandler - 2015
    Prose briefly gained the high ground in the second half of the nineteenth century, but poetry again became dominant in the 'Silver Age' (the early twentieth century), when belief in reason and progress yielded once more to a more magical view of the world. During the Soviet era, poetry became a dangerous, subversive activity; nevertheless, poets such as Osip Mandelstam and Anna Akhmatova continued to defy the censors. This anthology traces Russian poetry from its Golden Age to the modern era, including work by several great poets - Georgy Ivanov and Varlam Shalamov among them - in captivating modern translations by Robert Chandler and others. The volume also includes a general introduction, chronology and individual introductions to each poet.For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

Letters of Note: An Eclectic Collection of Correspondence Deserving of a Wider Audience


Shaun Usher - 2013
    Kennedy, Groucho Marx, Charles Dickens, Katharine Hepburn, Mick Jagger, Steve Martin, Clementine Churchill, Ray Bradbury, Kurt Vonnegut and many more.

Fanny Hill, or Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure


John Cleland - 1748
    She soon escapes her fate for the loving arms of a wealthy young man, but misadventure and fate conspire to keep her from domestic bliss. Instead, Fanny discovers that sex need not be just for love; that it can be had for pleasure. She then sets out to explore those pleasures in as wide a variety as she can. With old men and young, and women as well; in positions of power, and situations where she has none; either watching or participating, Fanny's journey through the realms of sexual pleasure is a literary tour-de-force.

The Heptameron


Marguerite de Navarre
    When told they must wait days for a bridge to be repaired, they are inspired - by recalling Boccaccio's Decameron - to pass the time in a cultured manner by each telling a story every day. The stories, however, soon degenerate into a verbal battle between the sexes, as the characters weave tales of corrupt friars, adulterous noblemen and deceitful wives. From the cynical Saffredent to the young idealist Dagoucin or the moderate Parlamente - believed to express De Navarre's own views - The Heptameron provides a fascinating insight into the minds and passions of the nobility of sixteenth century France.

The Way of the World


William Congreve - 1700
    With Mirabell? You call my blood into my face with mentioning that traitor. She durst not have the confidence. I sent her to negotiate an affair, in which if I'm detected I'm undone. If that wheedling villain has wrought upon Foible to detect me, I'm ruined. O my dear friend, I'm a wretch of wretches if I'm detected.

English Victorian Poetry: An Anthology


Paul NegriLewis Carroll - 1998
    An Introduction and brief biographical notes on the poets are included.

Early Irish Myths and Sagas


Jeffrey Gantz - 1981
    Rich with magic and achingly beautiful, they speak of a land of heroic battles, intense love and warrior ideals, in which the otherworld is explored and men mingle freely with the gods. From the vivid adventures of the great Celtic hero Cu Chulaind, to the stunning 'Exile of the Sons of Uisliu' - a tale of treachery, honour and romance - these are masterpieces of passion and vitality, and form the foundation for the Irish literary tradition: a mythic legacy that was a powerful influence on the work of Yeats, Synge and Joyce.