The Instruments of Art uses poetry to explore the lives and works of Edvard Munch, Vincent Van Gogh and others, the personal sacrifice involved, the singular vision and inspiration that set them in motion. God's creation, some argue, is a work of art, and Christ's life and death an expression of it. Deane follows this thread in a series of sonnets ......
Charles Olson's influence on the development of British and American poetry through his writing and teaching is immense. His work encompasses myth, history, scholarship and politics. This book includes extracts from a range of Olson's poetry and prose, including letters, interviews and the full text of the key essay 'Projective Verse'.
From a quick-tempered singing grandmother to a performance of The Mikado in an African village: David Kinloch's exploration of his relationship with his father is both unexpected and affectionate. An extended sequence of poems moves from personal memory to reflections on the values embodied in such cultural father-figures as the explorer David ......
The compelling works of John William Polidori (1795-1821) such as "The Vampyre" and "Ernestus Berchtold", exerted a powerful hold over literature and popular culture. This is a collection of Polidori's works, along with his lesser-known works such as his medical thesis on nightmares, his pamphlet on the death penalty, his poetry and diary.
Edward Lear (1812-1888) is one of the best-loved of English poets. His comic invention and unconstrained sense of the absurd have been enjoyed by generations of children, and treasured by adults conscious of the subtle melancholy that underlies the fun.
This collection includes all the favourite nonsense poems. Peter Swaab sets them alongside a ......
Moderniser, trouble-shooter, king-maker, architect of New Labour, power-broker, agent, asset, confidant: Peter Mandelson is emblematically the major political figure of our age. But who's happy? Whatever happened to happiness as a political imperative? And whatever happened to the public good? This book seeks answers to these questions and more.
The beauty and strangeness of inner landscapes is reflected in these powerful poems. As each poem tends to the intricacies of human experience, their focus on the fractal patterns within familiar structures the tree within the leaf, the series of recurrences that unfold to create a fugue add an element of discovery and revelation to the poems, ......
Ballads are memorable. This book was finished when the poet was fifty, with too much to remember: the shadows of the greater world, the bulldozers down the street tearing through a Victorian school, the generosity of its founders, its green graceful bell tower and its nesting jackdaws turned to a cry in the air.
The bricks go off to salvage and ......
