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100 Best-Loved Poems
Here are some of the most-loved poems in the English language, chosen not merely for their popularity, but for their literary quality as well. Dating from the Middle Ages to the 20th century, these splendid poems remain evergreen in their capacity to engage our minds and refresh our spirits.
Among them are Marlowe: "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love"; Shakespeare: "Sonnet XVIII" ("Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"); Donne: "Holy Sonnet X" ("Death, be not proud"); Marvell: "To His Coy Mistress"; Wordsworth: "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud"; Shelley: "Ode to the West Wind"; Longfellow: "The Children's Hour"; Poe: "The Raven"; Tennyson: "The Charge of the Light Brigade"; Whitman: "O Captain! My Captain!"; Dickinson: "This Is My Letter to the World"; Yeats: "When You Are Old"; Frost: "The Road Not Taken"; Millay: "First Fig."
Works by many other poets — Milton, Blake, Burns, Coleridge, Byron, Keats, Emerson, the Brownings, Hardy, Housman, Kipling, Pound, and Auden among them — are included in this treasury, a perfect companion for quiet moments of reflection.
Among them are Marlowe: "The Passionate Shepherd to His Love"; Shakespeare: "Sonnet XVIII" ("Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"); Donne: "Holy Sonnet X" ("Death, be not proud"); Marvell: "To His Coy Mistress"; Wordsworth: "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud"; Shelley: "Ode to the West Wind"; Longfellow: "The Children's Hour"; Poe: "The Raven"; Tennyson: "The Charge of the Light Brigade"; Whitman: "O Captain! My Captain!"; Dickinson: "This Is My Letter to the World"; Yeats: "When You Are Old"; Frost: "The Road Not Taken"; Millay: "First Fig."
Works by many other poets — Milton, Blake, Burns, Coleridge, Byron, Keats, Emerson, the Brownings, Hardy, Housman, Kipling, Pound, and Auden among them — are included in this treasury, a perfect companion for quiet moments of reflection.
101 pages, Paperback
First published October 4, 1995
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 187 reviews
November 15, 2011
Whoa, Nelly what a surprise. This book was supposed to be just a little something to bump up my Amazon to $25 to get free shipping right? I keep a wish list full of Dover Thrift around for just that purpose and selected this one cos during the busy holidays it's nice to have books lying around to just read over any 5 minutes that may be free. For less then $2 I figured this would do because of only one poem I noticed that it contained: Do Not Go Gently Into That Good Night by Dylan Thomas. My people were Welsh once upon a time, and I was delighted to find that out, however recent. Anyway, this book is quite a gem! No poem contain therrein seems superfluous. All were indeed carefully selected and remind me how much I love poetry. (Not modern poetry, yuck.)This is the World's best folks. Wordsworth, TEnnyson, Burns, Poe(God rest him), Dickison, Shakespeare and even a couple by Sandburg. (FOG was the first poem I ever memorized, me and my entire 3rd grade class.)Oh, it even has that one about Lincoln that makes we feel all weepy eyed, "Captain, My Captain!". I still remember my teacher reading it to us with an unabashed tear rolling down her face. Powerful stuff is good poetry.
December 7, 2022
Sold this book and remember enjoying it. Different cover, I bought from a Coles. If I have it off not really, it was very similar with the authors (of the romantic era which `tended' to be romantic but strange really, as romantic writers were considered touched (supernaturally). In grade nine I recall learning it had something to do with the difficult era that came b4, and you can look it up, I just remembered, the industrial age,) and had some letters too in the book. Weird eh how history, even in art repeats itself over and over and over again (but never the same similar to how a trees' rings age). If I have a technical wrong, it stands, but am very sure I have it right. Going off on a tangent here though. Good book. Not too fussy on Larkin. (I mean Smith - I've never read any poetry by a Phil Smith.) Larkin is good except I ran into some poetry I was like um, and what exactly are you referring to...........
July 27, 2018
Beautiful and moving highly recommended!
Long review: https://sisterdelightbookcaffe.blogsp...
Long review: https://sisterdelightbookcaffe.blogsp...
December 23, 2022
There are a lot of poems to love here, but there are a few that I think should not have been included and should have been subbed out for some that are more commonly accepted as universally beloved. Also, while this collection covers a wide swath of poets over the course of nearly 5 centuries, it is remarkably white and Anglocentric. Because of this, I believe the title is a bit of a misnomer. It would have been more appropriate to say that these were 100 of the best-loved poems of the Western canon. But all of that is personal opinion. There were many of my lifelong favorites in this collection, so the nostalgia factor alone, along with the very affordable price, made this a worthwhile acquirement.
September 9, 2024
Oh to be loved by a poet ❤️
April 10, 2016
For so little a price, it gives so many prized distillations from brilliant minds.
From the superb Ozymandias (Shelley), the sharp I'm Nobody! Who Are You? (Dickinson), to the charmingly fitting Requiem (Stevenson) or If- (Kipling), and concluded emphatically by Thomas' Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, this neat collection has inspired me to revisit and explore other poems, and to just soak in the wit, wisdom and beauty emanating from its unassuming pages.
Pickings:
From the superb Ozymandias (Shelley), the sharp I'm Nobody! Who Are You? (Dickinson), to the charmingly fitting Requiem (Stevenson) or If- (Kipling), and concluded emphatically by Thomas' Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, this neat collection has inspired me to revisit and explore other poems, and to just soak in the wit, wisdom and beauty emanating from its unassuming pages.
Pickings:
Sonnet XVIII William Shakespeare
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all to short a date:
Sometimes too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owe'st;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Because I Could Not Stop for Death Emily Dickinson
Because I could not stop for Death,
He kindly stopped for me;
The carriage held but just ourselves
And Immortality.
We slowly drove, he knew no haste,
And I had put away
My labor, and my leisure too,
For his civility.
We passed the school where children played,
Their lessons scarcely done;
We passed the field of gazing grain,
We passed the setting sun.
We paused before a house that seemed
A swelling of the ground;
The roof was scarcely visible,
The cornice but a mound.
Since then 't is centuries, but each
Feels shorter than the day
I first surmised the horses' heads
Were toward eternity.
April 29, 2016
Success, perhaps I’m not such a Neanderthal after all. Once I got to the mid-19th Century I started reading a few poems I liked. I also read some poems that sparked a deeper like and interest, I’ll call them really good. I even read poems that I want to think more about and reread, I’ll call them great. I never would have thought it possible but I have found I’m the kind of person that actually likes poetry, at least some poetry.
December 31, 2016
I loved this book!! So many beautiful poems that everyone must read. Rudyard kipling's poems were great! Edgar Alan Poe's the Raven, Shakespeare's sonnets, and Robert Frost's Stopping by woods on a snowy evening are just a few of the great poems compiled in this book. Excellent
February 22, 2009
This is a good selection of poems. It tends to have the classics that people should be familiar with and does have some that my Anthology of American Poetry doesn't have, because it includes British poets. It's worth owning. Then you can read "Do Not Go Gently Into That Good Night" by Dylan Thomas to your boy, Dylan, at bedtime.
July 27, 2014
Some great pieces: So We'll Go No More a Roving/Byron, O Captain! My Captain!/Whitman, The Village Blacksmith/Longfellow, Jabberwocky/Carroll and what may well be my favorite piece of poetry, The Emperor of Ice Cream/Stevens.
Would like to have had a wider variety, but overall a bettter than average, affordable anthology.
Would like to have had a wider variety, but overall a bettter than average, affordable anthology.
September 3, 2016
A magnificent collection of poems from some of the best poets of all time.
June 14, 2016
Note: Read for school
Great collection of poems,very enjoyable read.
Great collection of poems,very enjoyable read.
December 7, 2023
I decided I wanted to read poetry last night so I picked up this book and read it all in one go. I enjoy poetry collections with a lot of different authors, I like the variation in style.
November 7, 2017
I rated this a four because it was a really interesting book with great poems. If you like poem books this would be perfect for you. One of my favorite poems was the passionate Shepard to his love. I loved reading these because they also didn't have to hard of words to read. If one of your favorite poets are in this book. Read to find out.
October 7, 2015
I spent a restful rainy Sunday evening savoring the wonderful words, phrases and lyrical joy of reading this marvelous compilation of poetry.
Beginning with The Ballad of Lord Randal through Dylan Thomas’ Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, I was transformed to a world where writing was concise, crisp, clear and every word was laden with meaning.
As the rain splashed on the sky light in the living room and the thunder clapped, I sat in an overstuffed chair, cup of tea in hand and delighted in the images that gently rolled through my mind. Finding some of these poems anew was as cleansing as the spring rain.
For instance, as I read A.E. Housman’s To an Athlete Dying Young, I saw Isak Dinesen, portrayed by Meryl Streep, as she stands at the graveside of Dennys Finch Hatton in the movie Out of Africa.
The time you won your town the race
We chaired you through the market-place;
Man and boy stood cheering by,
And home we brought you shoulder-high.
To-day, the road all runners come,
Shoulder-high we bring you home,
And set you at your threshold down,
Townsman of a stiller town.
Smart lad, to slip betimes away
From fields were glory does not stay
And early though the laurel grows
It withers quicker than the rose.
Eyes the shady night has shut
Cannot see the record cut,
And silence sounds no worse than cheers
After earth has stopped the ears:
Now you will not swell the rout
Of lads that wore their honours out,
Runners whom renown outran
And the name died before the man.
So set, before its echoes fade,
The fleet foot on the sill of shade,
And hold to the low lintel up
The still-defended challenge-cup.
And round that early-laurelled head
Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,
And find unwithered on its curls
The garland briefer than a girl's.
Beginning with The Ballad of Lord Randal through Dylan Thomas’ Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night, I was transformed to a world where writing was concise, crisp, clear and every word was laden with meaning.
As the rain splashed on the sky light in the living room and the thunder clapped, I sat in an overstuffed chair, cup of tea in hand and delighted in the images that gently rolled through my mind. Finding some of these poems anew was as cleansing as the spring rain.
For instance, as I read A.E. Housman’s To an Athlete Dying Young, I saw Isak Dinesen, portrayed by Meryl Streep, as she stands at the graveside of Dennys Finch Hatton in the movie Out of Africa.
The time you won your town the race
We chaired you through the market-place;
Man and boy stood cheering by,
And home we brought you shoulder-high.
To-day, the road all runners come,
Shoulder-high we bring you home,
And set you at your threshold down,
Townsman of a stiller town.
Smart lad, to slip betimes away
From fields were glory does not stay
And early though the laurel grows
It withers quicker than the rose.
Eyes the shady night has shut
Cannot see the record cut,
And silence sounds no worse than cheers
After earth has stopped the ears:
Now you will not swell the rout
Of lads that wore their honours out,
Runners whom renown outran
And the name died before the man.
So set, before its echoes fade,
The fleet foot on the sill of shade,
And hold to the low lintel up
The still-defended challenge-cup.
And round that early-laurelled head
Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,
And find unwithered on its curls
The garland briefer than a girl's.
February 3, 2017
Title:100 Best-Loved Poems Jeremiah Gay
Editor: Philip Smith Book Review #5
This book was really cool because it holds poems from the 1800th century to now and it’s cool to how people felt and and turned it into something to explain their feeling with rhymes. Themes, “Whose woods these are I think I know, His house is in the village though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near, Between the woods and the frozen lake, The darkest evening of the year. He gives his harness bells a shake, To ask if there is some mistake. The only other sound’s the sweep Of easy wind and downy flake. The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.” -Robert Frost. The theme is the woods and the village, but this is a Unique poem because how detailed he went into describing the woods the landscape and what his horse does.
Rhymes,”So we’ll go no more a roving, So late at night, Though the heart be still loving, and the moon be still as bright. For the sword outwears its sheath, And the souls wears out the breast, And the heart must pause to breathe, And love itself have rest. Though the night was made for loving, And the day returns too soon, Yet we’ll go no more a roving by the light of the moon.”-Lord Byron. Poems are built of rhymes and some t are really long and some are this size(small) but they all mean something and this one seems to me that love always come before what you enjoy or your job.
Editor: Philip Smith Book Review #5
This book was really cool because it holds poems from the 1800th century to now and it’s cool to how people felt and and turned it into something to explain their feeling with rhymes. Themes, “Whose woods these are I think I know, His house is in the village though; He will not see me stopping here To watch his woods fill up with snow. My little horse must think it queer To stop without a farmhouse near, Between the woods and the frozen lake, The darkest evening of the year. He gives his harness bells a shake, To ask if there is some mistake. The only other sound’s the sweep Of easy wind and downy flake. The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep.” -Robert Frost. The theme is the woods and the village, but this is a Unique poem because how detailed he went into describing the woods the landscape and what his horse does.
Rhymes,”So we’ll go no more a roving, So late at night, Though the heart be still loving, and the moon be still as bright. For the sword outwears its sheath, And the souls wears out the breast, And the heart must pause to breathe, And love itself have rest. Though the night was made for loving, And the day returns too soon, Yet we’ll go no more a roving by the light of the moon.”-Lord Byron. Poems are built of rhymes and some t are really long and some are this size(small) but they all mean something and this one seems to me that love always come before what you enjoy or your job.
January 30, 2019
This book was a great compilation of poetry from the 14th to the mid-20th century. It contained many of the most famous poems ever written. There were so many beautiful poems that I am going to want to re-read. The language and imagery touched me deeply. Some of my favorite poems were written by John Milton, William Cullen Bryant, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Edgar Allen Poe (how devastatingly sad is "The Raven!"), and Emily Dickinson.
This is a great book to get acquainted with a variety of poets and poetry styles.
This is a great book to get acquainted with a variety of poets and poetry styles.
June 11, 2022
I found this book for 99 cents at a thrift store and read all of these in only a few days. I really loved this selection, and got introduced to poets I didn't know of before, like Gerard Hopkins. I found some new favorite poems, too, like "My Last Duchess," "When You Are Old," and "The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter." I especially appreciate that they included my favorite poet, George Herbert ;) I truly love this little book, and would recommend it to anyone interested in poetry!
July 2, 2018
How do you rate this? These are the most famous, widely read, memorized for dramatic recitation sort of poems. Inspirational and high toned, full of drama. All of the old bards of traditional verse. A little tiring at times, all that splendor. Wordsworth, Longfellow, Browning, Keats, Blake, Byron, Coleridge, Shelley, Emerson, Kipling, Sandburg, Pound, Auden, Thomas, Poe, and many others.
March 25, 2022
Alternative Title - "O White Boi's, My White Boi's"
Reading poetry often brings me back to my confused upbringing, where I pored over psalms and prayers, hoping to feel or understand what it was everyone insisted was so important about Jesus and God. If I only squinted hard enough, or approached the altar of the good book with a pure enough spirit - then, THEN I'd be graced with the understanding that eluded me. I'd get the hype.
Many many days later, I grew up and realized religion wasn't for me. I found that these texts held their power not between their words, but between the people who believed the words.
This is pretty much how I feel about most poetry.
I'm giving up on trying to glean the value in everything I read. Half of these beloved poems are useless to me - empty, horny, dramatic scribblings which conjure no meaningful imagery or make any salient points beyond "gosh, milady, you're beautiful," and, "let's fuck bc we finna die," and, "golly gee, I love God and the trees he made".
Another quarter of the poems have a line or two that made an impression or gave me a thought. The last quarter were truly meaningful, and felt more like fully formed stories or arguments writ in verse. So, let's give this thing three stars and I can continue ignoring poetry until I die.
Reading poetry often brings me back to my confused upbringing, where I pored over psalms and prayers, hoping to feel or understand what it was everyone insisted was so important about Jesus and God. If I only squinted hard enough, or approached the altar of the good book with a pure enough spirit - then, THEN I'd be graced with the understanding that eluded me. I'd get the hype.
Many many days later, I grew up and realized religion wasn't for me. I found that these texts held their power not between their words, but between the people who believed the words.
This is pretty much how I feel about most poetry.
I'm giving up on trying to glean the value in everything I read. Half of these beloved poems are useless to me - empty, horny, dramatic scribblings which conjure no meaningful imagery or make any salient points beyond "gosh, milady, you're beautiful," and, "let's fuck bc we finna die," and, "golly gee, I love God and the trees he made".
Another quarter of the poems have a line or two that made an impression or gave me a thought. The last quarter were truly meaningful, and felt more like fully formed stories or arguments writ in verse. So, let's give this thing three stars and I can continue ignoring poetry until I die.
December 13, 2020
A slim volume. The editor explains that shorter poems were selected because of size constraints.
Emily Dickinson stands out like a breath of fresh air.
Good overview or introduction to what was considered good poetry. Rudyard Kipling is here, but not Robert Service.
Emily Dickinson stands out like a breath of fresh air.
Good overview or introduction to what was considered good poetry. Rudyard Kipling is here, but not Robert Service.
Read
April 17, 2018I did not like this book tbh. I get bored easily so this book was not fitting. I just read it for the 40 book challenge. I wouldn't recommend this book unless you love poetry. This book was just poems and I can't remember cause I was sooooooooooooooo bored.
September 15, 2018
A good collection of poems (though I'm hardly in the position to know if these are the “best-loved"), but I wish the formatting and overall book design was better.
March 3, 2022
I enjoyed (and remembered) many of the poems, but perhaps the phrase “by white British and American men” should be added to the title. More than 50 poets included, and only three or four of them were women.
January 8, 2019
My favorite poem is The Raven.
August 2, 2014
Note: This is a hard book to rate, as it is made up of many smaller poems, but I will try nonetheless. All of the ratings are on a scale of 1-10, ten being the best.
Quality of Writing: 7
Who knew poetry could be good? I certainly didn't. I hadn't been exposed to much poetry in school, and some of these poets' grasps on language was truly remarkable and a challenge to me as a writer. Some, of course, was the not-so-great stuff that I had learned in school, bringing this rating slightly down.
Pace: 2
I was falling asleep at the wheel of this book. I kept questioning whether I should read just one more poem or not. It was very awkward as a straight read-though. Though kudos for going in chronological order, which ended up making all the Romantics go together, the Victorians, etc. I noticed that.
Characters: 5
By this I mean the tiny biography of each poet that preceded his or her section of poetry. It would only be a few sentences long, but it was enough to shed light on their selection without being dull. I was pleased with it, and only longed for a few more sentences on some of them.
Enjoyability: 3
I do not like poetry. Even good poetry. Some of it was enjoyable (mostly the good stuff I hadn't been exposed to), but most of it was just, well, poetry.
Insightfulness: 7
Even if I didn't enjoy them, I can say this book was eye-opening to what poetry is capable of and why it exists as an art form. That is quite insightful to a poetry skeptic.
Ease of Reading: 1
I had to re-read several poems, and though I know this is the nature of a poem, it is still aggravating as a reader. The awkwardness of just reading through so many separate poems also threw me off.
All of this averages to a 4.2/10, which is a 2.1/5, hence the 2-star rating.
Quality of Writing: 7
Who knew poetry could be good? I certainly didn't. I hadn't been exposed to much poetry in school, and some of these poets' grasps on language was truly remarkable and a challenge to me as a writer. Some, of course, was the not-so-great stuff that I had learned in school, bringing this rating slightly down.
Pace: 2
I was falling asleep at the wheel of this book. I kept questioning whether I should read just one more poem or not. It was very awkward as a straight read-though. Though kudos for going in chronological order, which ended up making all the Romantics go together, the Victorians, etc. I noticed that.
Characters: 5
By this I mean the tiny biography of each poet that preceded his or her section of poetry. It would only be a few sentences long, but it was enough to shed light on their selection without being dull. I was pleased with it, and only longed for a few more sentences on some of them.
Enjoyability: 3
I do not like poetry. Even good poetry. Some of it was enjoyable (mostly the good stuff I hadn't been exposed to), but most of it was just, well, poetry.
Insightfulness: 7
Even if I didn't enjoy them, I can say this book was eye-opening to what poetry is capable of and why it exists as an art form. That is quite insightful to a poetry skeptic.
Ease of Reading: 1
I had to re-read several poems, and though I know this is the nature of a poem, it is still aggravating as a reader. The awkwardness of just reading through so many separate poems also threw me off.
All of this averages to a 4.2/10, which is a 2.1/5, hence the 2-star rating.
March 22, 2015
This collection of poems is okay, but I can't say that it includes my best-loved poems. Some are there, to be sure. Emily Dickinson's I'm Nobody! Who Are You? and Robert Frost's Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening are two of my all-time favs, and I lit up like a Christmas tree when I came across them. They never fail to make me happy. And I love Whitman, so it was great to see I Hear America Singing and Oh Captain! My Captain! (which never fails to make me cry like a baby). Reading this collection also brought back memories of talking about poetry in school. William Blake's The Tyger, A.E. Houseman's To An Athlete Dying Young, and Robert Herrick's To The Virgins, to Make Much of Time especially left me feeling very nostalgic.
Also, this collection made me fall in love with Percy Bysshe Shelley's Ozymandias and Rudyard Kipling's If. I'd read them ages ago, but this time they really spoke to me. And I found, for the first time, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's The Village Blacksmith, an ode to an ordinary man, that I simply adore. For these poems especially, I'm glad I read this collection.
More than anything, reading this collection made me want to collect all of my favorite poems in one place so I can leaf through the volume whenever my soul needs a boost.
Also, this collection made me fall in love with Percy Bysshe Shelley's Ozymandias and Rudyard Kipling's If. I'd read them ages ago, but this time they really spoke to me. And I found, for the first time, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's The Village Blacksmith, an ode to an ordinary man, that I simply adore. For these poems especially, I'm glad I read this collection.
More than anything, reading this collection made me want to collect all of my favorite poems in one place so I can leaf through the volume whenever my soul needs a boost.
January 25, 2016
This is another volume in the Dover Thrift Editions series. The book is quite an inexpensive way to get a collection of poems that is likely to include at least one or two you've read and loved.
The poems are arranged in chronological order, starting with a couple of ballads, Sir Thomas Wyatt, Christopher Marlowe and some Shakespeare sonnets. Near the end we have Wilfred Owen, e. e. cummings, W. H. Auden and Dylan Thomas.
If you have lead a poetry-deprived life, this book will expose you to a good variety of poets and allow you to find new favorites. This book would also make a wonderful gift for a teacher or a young person.
I found many poems that I had read so long ago I had forgotten them entirely until reading them in this book. So many familiar and beautiful lines:
"'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:/Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'/Nothing beside remains..."
"She walks in beauty, like the night/of cloudless climes and starry skies...."
"Under a spreading chestnut tree/The village smithy stands..."
"I'm nobody! Who are you?/Are you nobody, too..."
"so much depends/upon/a red wheel/barrow..."
This book is a small treasure and I hope many more people will discover it and sample the joys within.
The poems are arranged in chronological order, starting with a couple of ballads, Sir Thomas Wyatt, Christopher Marlowe and some Shakespeare sonnets. Near the end we have Wilfred Owen, e. e. cummings, W. H. Auden and Dylan Thomas.
If you have lead a poetry-deprived life, this book will expose you to a good variety of poets and allow you to find new favorites. This book would also make a wonderful gift for a teacher or a young person.
I found many poems that I had read so long ago I had forgotten them entirely until reading them in this book. So many familiar and beautiful lines:
"'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:/Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!'/Nothing beside remains..."
"She walks in beauty, like the night/of cloudless climes and starry skies...."
"Under a spreading chestnut tree/The village smithy stands..."
"I'm nobody! Who are you?/Are you nobody, too..."
"so much depends/upon/a red wheel/barrow..."
This book is a small treasure and I hope many more people will discover it and sample the joys within.
May 13, 2015
The fourth, and final, Dover poetry anthology I am reviewing. As with the others, it is an easily portable, inexpensive book.
Includes work by 58 poets. Ten were born before 1600, another six in the 17th century, twelve in the 18th century, and two in the 20th century. So 28 were born in the 19th century. There are five selections from John Keats, and four each from Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson, and William Blake. Other big names represented are Poe, Whitman, Yeats, Frost, Sandburg, and Cummings. There is a short blurb about each poet, as well as an index of titles and an index of first lines.
From my original list of 18 I have selected ten poems that deserve mention here:
"The Raven' - Edgar Allan Poe
"The Charge of the Light Brigade" - Alfred, Lord Tennyson
"Jabberwocky" - Lewis Carroll
"Gunga Din" - Rudyard Kipling
"The Road Not Taken" - Robert Frost
"Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening" - Frost
"Chicago" - Carl Sandburg
"Anyone Lived In A Pretty How Town" - E.E. Cummings
"Musee des Beaux Arts" - W.H. Auden
"Do Not Go Gently Into That Good Night" - Dylan Thomas
Includes work by 58 poets. Ten were born before 1600, another six in the 17th century, twelve in the 18th century, and two in the 20th century. So 28 were born in the 19th century. There are five selections from John Keats, and four each from Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson, and William Blake. Other big names represented are Poe, Whitman, Yeats, Frost, Sandburg, and Cummings. There is a short blurb about each poet, as well as an index of titles and an index of first lines.
From my original list of 18 I have selected ten poems that deserve mention here:
"The Raven' - Edgar Allan Poe
"The Charge of the Light Brigade" - Alfred, Lord Tennyson
"Jabberwocky" - Lewis Carroll
"Gunga Din" - Rudyard Kipling
"The Road Not Taken" - Robert Frost
"Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening" - Frost
"Chicago" - Carl Sandburg
"Anyone Lived In A Pretty How Town" - E.E. Cummings
"Musee des Beaux Arts" - W.H. Auden
"Do Not Go Gently Into That Good Night" - Dylan Thomas
April 28, 2017
Christopher Marlowe has me awed about his poetry. He was killed at a very young age of 29 which I shall be soon. So his poetry felt terribly personal to me. Also, I am a big Shakespeare buff.
Marlowe in a deliciously lovely poem titled The Passionate Shepherd to his Love asks her in a simple line to,
Come live with me and be my Love
It sounds almost ethereal and enchanting in a voice that I read in and imagine to be Marlowe's. A deep, resonating baritone which when heard melts even the most hardened hearts. I particularly love the simple imagery he describes about sitting on rocks and seeing the shepherds feed their flocks. I am so very deeply smitten with Marlowe's words.
Also, this collection has a lovely composition of ballads. Poems from most of my favorite poets like Cummings, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Yeats, Pound, Marianne Moore, Dylan Thomas have been included and for this reason, this book is definitely a little special. Nothing like reading Dylan Thomas on a rainy night.
Marlowe in a deliciously lovely poem titled The Passionate Shepherd to his Love asks her in a simple line to,
Come live with me and be my Love
It sounds almost ethereal and enchanting in a voice that I read in and imagine to be Marlowe's. A deep, resonating baritone which when heard melts even the most hardened hearts. I particularly love the simple imagery he describes about sitting on rocks and seeing the shepherds feed their flocks. I am so very deeply smitten with Marlowe's words.
Also, this collection has a lovely composition of ballads. Poems from most of my favorite poets like Cummings, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Yeats, Pound, Marianne Moore, Dylan Thomas have been included and for this reason, this book is definitely a little special. Nothing like reading Dylan Thomas on a rainy night.
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