Lepanto: With Explanatory Notes and Commentary


G.K. Chesterton - 1911
    But not only have English classes neglected this masterpiece of rhyme and meter, History classes have neglected the story of the pivotal battle upon which the poem is based. This book brings together the poem, the historical background of the famous battle, a riveting account of the battle itself, and a discussion of its historical consequences. The poem is fully annotated, and is supplemented with two interesting essays by Chesterton himself. Well-known Chesterton expert, Dale Ahlquist, has gathered together all the insightful commentaries and explanatory notes. Here is the story behind the modern conflict between Christianity and Islam, between Protestant and Catholic Europe, and the origin of the Feast of the Holy Rosary. A fascinating blend of literature, history, religion and romance!This book can not be sold in the following countries: AUSTRALIACANADAGREAT BRITAINNEW ZEALANDSOUTH AFRICA

The Prisoner of Chillon


Lord Byron - 2004
    Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Aepyornis Island


H.G. Wells - 1894
    Born in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, he grew up in the rural community of Hazel Grove. Wells attended high school in Ottawa, Ontario and university in Halifax, Nova Scotia. As an undergraduate, he spent summers working in Iqaluit, Nunavut as an airline cargo handler. After a brief stint at graduate school in Montreal, Quebec, he returned to Iqaluit in 2001 and later that year transferred to the remote settlement of Resolute, on Cornwallis Island, where he worked until 2003, when he moved to Halifax with his wife, Rachel Lebowitz. At this point he started contributing book reviews and essays on Canadian poetry to periodicals including Books in Canada, Quill & Quire and Maisonneuve. In the spring of 2004, his first chapbook of poems, Fool's Errand, appeared. In the fall of that year, Toronto's Insomniac Press published his full-length collection of Arctic poems, Unsettled, under Paul Vermeersch's 4 AM Books imprint. In 2004, Wells started working for Via Rail Canada as a service attendant. In 2006 he became the Reviews Editor for Canadian Notes & Queries. In 2007, after moving to Vancouver, he published Sealift, a CD recording of 24 poems from Unsettled; "Achromatope," a letterpress broadside; and After the Blizzard, a limited edition chapbook. In the spring of 2008, Jailbreaks, his anthology of Canadian sonnets, was published. Anything But Hank!, the children's book he co-wrote with Lebowitz, with illustrations by Eric Orchard, was published in the fall. In 2009, after moving back to Halifax, Wells published Track & Trace, his second trade collection of poems, with illustrations by renowned graphic artist Seth. Track & Trace was shortlisted for the 2010 Atlantic Poetry Prize. In 2010, he published The Essential Kenneth Leslie, the first collection of Leslie's poems to be published since 1972.

The Battle of the Books


Jonathan Swift - 1704
    It depicts a literal battle between books in the King's Library (housed in St James's Palace at the time of the writing), as ideas and authors struggle for supremacy. Because of the satire, "The Battle of the Books" has become a term for the Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns. It is one of his earliest well-known works.

The Princess


Alfred Tennyson - 1847
    The poem tells the story of an heroic princess who forswears the world of men and founds a women's university where men are forbidden to enter. The prince to whom she was betrothed in infancy enters the university with two friends, disguised as women students. They are discovered and flee, but eventually they fight a battle for the princess's hand. They lose and are wounded, but the women nurse the men back to health. Eventually the princess returns the prince's love.Excerpt from The Princess Sir Walter Vivian all a summer's dayGave his broad lawns until the set of sunUp to the people; thither flock'd at noonHis tenants, wife and child, and thither halfThe neighboring borough with their Institute, Of which he was the patron. I was thereFrom college, visiting the son, -the sonA Walter too, -with others of our set, Five others: we were seven at Vivian-place. And me that morning Walter show'd the house, Greek, set with busts. From vases in the hallFlowers of all heavens, and lovelier than their names, Grew side by side; and on the pavement layCarved stones of the Abbey-ruin in the park, Huge Ammonites, and the first bones of Time: And on the tables every clime and ageJumbled together; celts and calumets, Claymore and snow-shoe, toys in lava, fansOf sandal, amber, ancient rosaries, Laborious orient ivory sphere in sphere, The cursed Malayan crease, and battle-clubsFrom the isles of palm; and higher on the walls, Betwixt the monstrous horns of elk and deer, His own forefathers' arms and armor hung. And 'this, ' he said, 'was Hugh's at Agin-court;And that was old Sir Ralph's at Ascalon.A good knight he! we keep a chronicleWith all about him, '-which he brought, and IDived in a hoard of tales that dealt with knightsHalf-legend, half-historic, counts and kingsWho laid about them at their wills and died;And mixt with these a lady, one that arm'dHer own fair head, and sallying thro' the gate, Had beat her foes with slaughter from her walls.

Good-Bye, Mr. Chips


James Hilton - 1934
    Hilton's classic story of an English schoolmaster.Mr. Chipping, the classics master at Brookfield School since 1870, takes readers on a beguiling journey through the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Sometimes Chips, as he is affectionately known, is an old man who dreams by the fire; then he's a difficult young taskmaster schooling his students, or a middle-aged man encountering the lovely Katherine, whose "new woman" opinions work far-reaching changes in him. As succeeding generations of boys march onward through Chips' mind, Hilton's narrative remains masterful. He seamlessly interweaves a poignant love story with the jokes and eccentricities of English public school life, while also chronicling a new, uncertain world full of conflict and upheaval that extends far beyond the turrets of Brookfield.

The Other Side of the Hedge; The Celestial Omnibus


E.M. Forster - 1904
    M. Forster, by E. M. Forster. To purchase the entire book, please order ISBN 1417908599.

Daddy


Sylvia Plath - 1965
    You died before I had time——Marble-heavy, a bag full of God, Ghastly statue with one gray toe Big as a Frisco sealAnd a head in the freakish Atlantic Where it pours bean green over blue In the waters off beautiful Nauset. I used to pray to recover you.Ach, du.In the German tongue, in the Polish town Scraped flat by the rollerOf wars, wars, wars.But the name of the town is common. My Polack friendSays there are a dozen or two. So I never could tell where you Put your foot, your root,I never could talk to you.The tongue stuck in my jaw.It stuck in a barb wire snare. Ich, ich, ich, ich,I could hardly speak.I thought every German was you. And the language obsceneAn engine, an engineChuffing me off like a Jew.A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen. I began to talk like a Jew.I think I may well be a Jew.The snows of the Tyrol, the clear beer of Vienna Are not very pure or true.With my gipsy ancestress and my weird luck And my Taroc pack and my Taroc packI may be a bit of a Jew.I have always been scared of you,With your Luftwaffe, your gobbledygoo. And your neat mustacheAnd your Aryan eye, bright blue.Panzer-man, panzer-man, O You——Not God but a swastikaSo black no sky could squeak through. Every woman adores a Fascist, The boot in the face, the brute Brute heart of a brute like you.You stand at the blackboard, daddy, In the picture I have of you,A cleft in your chin instead of your foot But no less a devil for that, no not Any less the black man whoBit my pretty red heart in two.I was ten when they buried you. At twenty I tried to dieAnd get back, back, back to you.I thought even the bones would do.But they pulled me out of the sack, And they stuck me together with glue. And then I knew what to do.I made a model of you,A man in black with a Meinkampf lookAnd a love of the rack and the screw. And I said I do, I do.So daddy, I’m finally through.The black telephone’s off at the root, The voices just can’t worm through.If I’ve killed one man, I’ve killed two——The vampire who said he was you And drank my blood for a year,Seven years, if you want to know.Daddy, you can lie back now.There’s a stake in your fat black heart And the villagers never liked you.They are dancing and stamping on you. They always knew it was you.Daddy, daddy, you bastard, I’m through.

Poirot: Four Classic Cases


Agatha Christie - 1991
    A brand new Poirot omnibus, featuring four of the world-renowned detective's most challenging cases: Three-Act Tragedy, Sad Cypress, Evil Under the Sun and The Hollow

Agnes Grey & Poems


Anne Brontë - 1992
    Possessed of an unshakeable sense of entitlement and a boundless sense of self-worth, assured of the adoration of all, Matilda can break men's hearts for fun. Agnes-diffident, careworn and poor-can only gape in astonishment at the figure her pupil cuts in the world. Employed to lead and form her, she is instead buffeted about in Matilda's tumultuous wake. She loves her young student-it is impossible not to. But it is hard not to wonder if Matilda's good fortunes will ever end.

The Passionate Shepherd to His Love


Christopher Marlowe - 2012
    

Ajax / Electra / Oedipus Tyrannus


Sophocles
    The subjects of his plays were drawn from mythology and legend. Each play contains at least one heroic figure, a character whose strength, courage, or intelligence exceeds the human norm—but who also has more than ordinary pride and self-assurance. These qualities combine to lead to a tragic end. Hugh Lloyd-Jones gives us, in two volumes, a new translation of the seven surviving plays. Volume I contains Oedipus Tyrannus (which tells the famous Oedipus story), Ajax (a heroic tragedy of wounded self-esteem), and Electra (the story of siblings who seek revenge on their mother and her lover for killing their father).

Delicious Laughter: Rambunctious Teaching Stories from the Mathnawi


Rumi - 1990
    Included here are the notorious "Latin Parts" that Reynold Nicholson felt were too unseemly to appear in English in his 1920s translation. For Rumi, anything that human beings do--however compulsive or ludicrous--affords a glimpse of the inner life.

Of Mice and Men: The Play


John Steinbeck - 1937
    

Drum Taps


Walt Whitman - 1865
    Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.