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Poetry And Writing

Dante: The Divine Comedy

Clive James

$32.99  $27.99

ABBEY'S CHOICE MAY 2013 ----- Renowned critic and poet Clive James presents the crowning achievement of his career: a monumental translation of Dante's The Divine Comedy. The Divine Comedy is the precursor of modern literature, and Clive James's new translation – his life's work and decades in the making – presents Dante's entire epic poem in a single song.

While many poets and translators have attempted to capture the full glory of The Divine Comedy in English, many have fallen short, according to Clive James. Victorian verse translations established an unfortunate tradition of reproducing the sprightly rhyming measures of Dante but at the same time betraying the strain on the translator's powers of invention. For Dante, the dramatic human stories of Hell were exciting, but the spiritual studies of Purgatory and the sublime panoramas of Heaven were no less so.

In this incantatory new translation, James – defying the convention by writing in quatrains – tackles these problems head-on and creates a striking and hugely accessible translation that gives us The Divine Comedy as a whole, unified, and dramatic work.

About the Author

Clive James is the author of more than thirty books. As well as verse and novels, he has published collections of essays, literary criticism, television criticism and travel writing, plus four volumes of autobiography. In 1992 he was made a Member of the Order of Australia, and in 2003 he was awarded the Philip Hodgins memorial medal for literature.

Telling Tales in Latin: A New Latin Course and Storybook for Children

Lorna Robinson ,  Soham De

$19.99  $18.00

Telling Tales in Latin teaches Latin through the magic of storytelling. Narrated by the chatty and imaginative Roman poet Ovid (who lived in the Rome of the first century B.C), this new course takes young learners on a journey through some of the tales from Ovid s Metamorphoses. Along the way, they pick up Latin words and grammar, explore the connections between Latin and English and discover how Ovid's stories still speak to us today. Each chapter introduces one of Ovid s much-loved stories, encouraging children to begin reading Latin immediately while exploring the literary and mythic context of the stories. At the end of each chapter there are suggested activities to help learners to think about what they have just read, and to understand how the stories connect to ideas and issues that are still relevant today, from relationships with others and philosophy, to science and caring for the planet. Soham De s illustrations bring Ovid s stories alive for a wide range of learners and make learning Latin a colourful journey of discovery. Telling Tales in Latin outlines how Latin is the basis for English grammar, unlocking the complexities of learning English (and other languages) along the way. It also contains the vocabulary and grammar needed for the OCR Entry Level Latin qualification, making this book the ideal first introduction to Latin.

Lost, Stolen or Shredded, or Has Anyone Seen the Mona Lisa?

Rick Gekoski

$29.99  $27.00

This book tells the stories behind the disappearances of some of our most famous works of art - and some that never existed at all. Like Sherlock Holmes' dog in the night time, sometimes the true significance of things lies in their absence. Rick Gekoski tells the very human stories that lie behind some of the greatest losses to artistic culture - and addresses the questions such disappearances raise. Some of the items are stolen (the Mona Lisa ), some destroyed (like Philip Larkin's diaries, shredded, then burnt, on his dying request) and some were lost before they even existed, like the career of the brilliant art deco architect, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, which foundered amid a lack of cash - but behind all of them lies an often surprising story which reveals a lot about what art means to us. Gekoski explores in depth the greater questions these tremendous losses raise - such as the rights artists and authors have over their own work, the importance of the search for perfection in creativity, and what motivated people to queue to see the empty space where the Mona Lisa once hung in the Louvre.

Farther Away

Jonathan Franzen

$19.99  $18.00

Jonathan Franzen's 'Freedom' was the runaway most-discussed novel of 2010, an ambitious and searching engagement with life in America in the 21st century. Now, a new collection of Franzen's non-fiction brings fresh demonstrations of his vivid, moral intelligence, confirming his status not only as a great American novelist but also as a master noticer, social critic, and self-investigator. In Farther Away, which gathers together essays and speeches written mostly in the past five years, the writer returns with renewed vigor to the themes, both human and literary, that have long preoccupied him. Whether recounting his violent encounter with bird poachers in Cyprus, examining his mixed feelings about the suicide of his friend and rival David Foster Wallace, or offering a moving and witty take on the ways that technology has changed how people express their love, these pieces deliver on Franzen's implicit promise to conceal nothing from the reader. Taken together, these essays trace the progress of unique and mature mind wrestling with itself, with literature, and with some of the most important issues of our day. 'Farther Away' is remarkable, provocative, and necessary.

Tyrannosaurus Lex: The Marvelous Book of Palindromes, Anagrams, and Other Delightful and Outrageous Wordplay

Rod L. Evans ,  Rod L Evans, PH.D. PH.D. PH.D. PH.D. PH.D. PH.D. PH.D. PH.D.

$19.99  $18.00

Welcome to the Weird and Wonderful World of Words! Tyrannosaurus Lex is your guide to the intriguing world of logology--the pursuit of word puzzles or puzzling words--featuring: - A wealth of witty anagrams, palindromes, and puns - Clever paraprosdokians: sentences with surprising endings ( I've had a perfectly wonderful evening, but this wasn't it. --Groucho Marx) - Fascinating oronyms: a pair of phrases that differ in meaning and spelling, yet share a similar pronunciation ( The stuffy nose can lead to problems versus The stuff he knows can lead to problems. ) - Peculiar oxymora: words or phrases that are self-contradictory (Jumbo shrimp! Guest host! Gold silverware!) So sit back and get ready to learn about everything from antigrams and aptanagrams to kangaroo words and phantonyms. You'll never look at language the same again!

Caesar's Conquest of Gaul

Bob Carruthers

$22.99  $20.70

The Gallic Wars were a series of military campaigns waged by the Roman proconsul Julius Caesar against several Gallic tribes. They lasted from 58 BC to 50 BC and culminated in the decisive Battle of Alesia in 52 BC, in which a complete Roman victory resulted in the expansion of the Roman Republic over the whole of Gaul. The wars paved the way for Julius Caesar to become the sole ruler of the Roman Republic. Although Caesar portrayed this invasion as being a preemptive and defensive action, most historians agree that the wars were fought primarily to boost Caesar's political career and to pay off his massive debts. Still, Gaul was of significant military importance to the Romans, as these had been attacked several times by native tribes both indigenous to Gaul and further to the north. Conquering Gaul allowed Rome to secure the natural border of the river Rhine. The Gallic Wars are described by Julius Caesar as himself in this book, which was originally titled Commentarii de Bello Gallico, it is a pertinent and only slightly tendentious and altogether the most important historical source regarding the conflict. This updated edition contains the translated text and various illustrations depicting Roman warfare and key moments in Caesar's journey.

The Intellectual World of C. S. Lewis

Alister E. McGrath

$37.95  $34.15

Marking the 50th anniversary of Lewis' death, The Intellectual World of C. S. Lewis sees leading Christian thinker Alister McGrath offering a fresh approach to understanding the key themes at the centre of Lewis' theological work and intellectual development. Brings together a collection of original essays exploring important themes within Lewis' work, offering new connections and insights into his theology Throws new light on subjects including Lewis' intellectual development, the uses of images in literature and theology, the place of myth in modern thought, the role of the imagination in making sense of the world, the celebrated 'argument from desire', and Lewis' place as an Anglican thinker and a Christian theologian Written by Alister McGrath, one of the world's leading Christian thinkers and authors; this exceptional pairing of McGrath and Lewis brings together the work of two outstanding theologians in one volume

Forty-one False Starts: Essays on Artists and Writers

Janet Malcolm ,  Helen Garner

$32.99  $29.70

Forty-One False Starts is a brilliant collection of essays from one of the world's great writers of literary non-fiction. Janet Malcolm, writes David Lehman in the Boston Globe, 'is among the most intellectually provocative of authors, able to turn epiphanies of perception into explosions of insight.' The essays, many of which first appeared in the New Yorker and the New York Review of Books, reflect Malcolm's preoccupation with artists and their work. Her subjects are painters, photographers, writers, and critics. She delves beneath the onyx surface of Edith Wharton's fiction, appreciates the black comedy of the Gossip Girl novels, and confronts the false starts of her own autobiography. As the Guardian has said, 'Her books bring a gimlet-eyed clarity to often fraught and complicated subjects and are so lean, so seamless, so powerfully direct, they read as if they have been written in a single breath.'

Rotten Reviews Redux - A Literary Companion

Bill Henderson

$22.95  $20.65

A quarter century ago Pushcart Press took aim at ridiculous reviews that had trashed literary masterpieces through the centuries. Over 175 attacks were quoted in a little book that itself became a best-selling classic. Today much has changed. The rise of digital self-publishing has fired up hundreds of critical blogs. As the clich has it everybody is a critic - and they're often anonymous and far from nice.This collection, with a new introduction, by Pushcart editor Bill Henderson includes gems like: The final blow-up of what was once a remarkable, if minor. talent. (The New Yorker, 1936, on William Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom!) Diffuse...brackish...pretentious. (Virginia Wolfe, 1922, on James Joyce's Ulysses) Whitman is as unacquainted with art as a hog is with mathematics. (The London Critic, 1855, on Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass) It gasps for want of craft and sensibility. (New York Times Book Review, 1961, on Joseph Heller's Catch-22)

The Bourgeois: Between History and Literature

Franco Moretti

$34.00  $30.60

The bourgeois ...Not so long ago, this notion seemed indispensable to social analysis; these days, one might go years without hearing it mentioned. Capitalism is more powerful than ever, but its human embodiment seems to have vanished. 'I am a member of the bourgeois class, feel myself to be such, and have been brought up on its opinions and ideals,' wrote Max Weber, in 1895. Who could repeat these words today? Bourgeois 'opinions and ideals' - what are they? Thus begins Franco Moretti's study of the bourgeois in modern European literature - a major new analysis of the once-dominant culture and its literary decline and fall. Moretti's gallery of individual portraits is entwined with the analysis of specific keywords - useful and earnest, efficiency, influence, comfort, roba - and of the formal mutations of the medium of prose. From the working master of the opening chapter, through the seriousness of nineteenth-century novels, the conservative hegemony of Victorian Britain, the national malformations of the Southern and Eastern periphery, and the radical self-critique of Ibsen's twelve-play cycle, the book charts the vicissitudes of bourgeois culture, exploring the causes for its historical weakness, and for its current irrelevance.

The Oxford Companion to Modern Poetry in English

Jeremy Noel-Tod ,  Ian Hamilton

$76.95  $69.25

This impressive volume provides over 1,500 thoroughly revised and updated entries on modern poets active from 1910 to the present day. An extensive guide to the lives of influential poets writing in English, in Britain and around the world, this companion helps to illuminate the influences, inspirations, and movements that have shaped the lives and works of these important authors. First published in 1994 as the Oxford Companion to Twentieth Century Poetry in English and compiled by a team of 230 experts, including famous poets such as Carol Rumens and Andrew Motion, this edition also includes new biographical entries on more contemporary poets such as Don Paterson, Anne Carson, John Kinsella, and Leslie Marmon Silko. It also contains insightful entries by well-known peers, such as Seamus Heaney on Robert Lowell and Anne Stevenson on Sylvia Plath. The A-Z biographies are complemented by new appendices including coverage of poetry events and movements and lists of anthologies and important poetry prizes and prize-winners. In addition, many entries include details of in-depth supplementary material available online on the dedicated companion website. This superb reference work is the ideal companion for students of English Literature, Language, and Creative Writing, as well as for anyone with an interest in modern poetry.

Little Book of Banksias

National Library of Australia

$15.99  $14.40

The banksia is quintessentially Australian. Known and loved for its brush-like flowers and sweet honey nectar, the plant embodies both the beauty and harshness of the Australian landscape. Little Books of Banksias features poems and extracts by some of Australias greatest poets, including Dorothy Hewett, Archie Weller and Douglas Stewart. The artists represented in the publication include Marian Ellis Rowan, Marrianne Collinson Campell, Adam Forster and Ebenezer Edward Gostelow.

We are the Dead: Poems and Paintings from The Great War 1914-1918

David Roberts

$49.99  $45.00

A stylish and evocative anthology of poems about the experience of the Great War, illustrated throughout with powerful and moving paintings from the period.

The Collected Poems: A Dual-language Edition with Parallel Text

Marcel Proust ,  Harold Augenbraum ,  Harold Augenbraum

$29.99  $27.00

As a young man, Proust wrote both poetry and prose. Even after he embarked on his masterful In Search of Lost Time at the age of thirty-eight, he never stopped writing poetry. His verse is often playful, filled with affection and satire, and is peppered with witty barbs at friends and people in his social circle of aristocrats, writers, musicians, and courtesans. Few of the poems collected here under the editorship of Harold Augenbraum, founder of the Proust Society of America, have ever been published in book form or translated into English until now. In this dual-language edition of new translations, Augenbraum has brought together nineteen renowned poets and poetry translators to bring Proust's exuberant verse back to life. Marcel Proust (1871-1922) is generally viewed as the greatest French novelist and perhaps the greatest European novelist of the 20th century. He lived much of his later life as a reclusive semi-invalid in a sound-proofed flat in Paris, giving himself over entirely to writing In Search of Lost Time .

Selected Poems

Rabindranath Tagore

$5.99  $5.40

HarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics. In 1913, Rabindranath Tagore became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, and he remains one of the most important voices of Bengali culture to this day. Tagore's poetry continues to rise above geographic and cultural boundaries to capture the imaginations of readers around the world.

Is Shakespeare Dead?

Mark Twain

$19.99  $18.00

An exponent of the theory that William Shakespeare, the modestly educated provincial man from Stratford-upon-Avon, could not have written the works - full of erudition and accurate professional jargon - which are attributed to him, Mark Twain offers an eloquent and entertaining analysis of this issue of authorship, peppered with personal recollections of his own first encounters with the Bard's plays, on a boat on the Mississippi.

An African Millionaire

Grant Allen ,  Gary Hoppenstand

$9.95  $8.95

A classic of crime and adventure, Grant Allen's An African Millionaire is perfect for fans of books such as Arsene Lupin , Gentleman Thief . Wealthy, confident and handsome, Charles Van Drift is not accustomed to being swindled and his brush with Colonel Clay both rattles and infuriates him. As his South African diamond fortune takes hit after hit from the quick-witted master of disguise, Allen leaves even the reader guessing: who can you trust? Van Drift grows more suspicious of those around him and a few too many misguided accusations shake the millionaire's confidence. Colonel Clay is in his head. Gary Hoppenstand contributes an introduction discussing the reception of the work when it was first serialised in The Strand and the significance of Colonel Clay as the first recurring gentleman rogue.

The Beggar's Opera and Polly

John Gay ,  Hal Gladfelder

$14.95  $13.45

'Gamesters and Highwaymen are generally very good to their Whores, but they are very Devils to their Wives.' With The Beggar's Opera (1728), John Gay created one of the most enduringly popular works in English theatre history, and invented a new dramatic form, the ballad opera. Gay's daring mixture of caustic political satire, well-loved popular tunes, and a story of crime and betrayal set in the urban underworld of prostitutes and thieves was an overnight sensation. Captain Macheath and Polly Peachum have become famous well beyond the confines of Gay's original play, and in its sequel, Polly, banned in Gay's lifetime, their adventures continue in the West Indies. With a cross-dressing heroine and a cast of female adventurers, pirates, Indian princes, rebel slaves, and rapacious landowners, Polly lays bare a culture in which all human relationships are reduced to commercial transactions. Raucous, lyrical, witty, ironic and tragic by turns, The Beggar's Opera and Polly - published together here for the first time - offer a scathing and ebullient portrait of a society in which statesmen and outlaws, colonialists and pirates, are impossible to tell apart.

Death of a Hero

Richard Aldington ,  James H Meredith

$9.95  $8.95

One of the great World War I antiwar novels--honest, chilling, and brilliantly satirical Based on the author's experiences on the Western Front, Richard Aldington's first novel, Death of a Hero, finally joins the ranks of Penguin Classics. Our hero is George Winterbourne, who enlists in the British Expeditionary Army during the Great War and gets sent to France. After a rash of casualties leads to his promotion through the ranks, he grows increasingly cynical about the war and disillusioned by the hypocrisies of British society. Aldington's writing about Britain's ignorance of the tribulations of its soldiers is among the most biting ever published. Death of a Hero vividly evokes the morally degrading nature of combat as it rushes toward its astounding finish.

The Nobleman and Other Romances

Isabelle de Charriere ,  Caroline Warman ,  Caroline Warman

$9.95  $8.95

Born Dutch, noble, and free-spirited, Isabelle de Charriere (also known as Belle de Zuylen) was an enlightened woman whose writings - not unlike Jane Austen's - tackled the intricacies of high society, particularly in matters of love. Published when she was only twenty- two, The Nobleman is a Persuasion-like tale whose heroine challenges her stodgy father in order to marry a man of unassuming ancestry. But Charriere did not confine herself to simple marriage plots and country courtships. Another story, Eagonlette and Suggestina , is a thinly veiled critique of Marie Antoinette, cleverly disguised as a fairy tale. The Nobleman and Other Romances will delight fans of Jane Austen and Enlightenment-era French literature.

Under the Greenwood Tree

Thomas Hardy ,  Simon Gatrell

$14.95  $13.45

This edition presents a critically established text based on comparisons of every revised version. Hardy placed this tale among his Novels of Character and Environment, a group which is held to include his most characteristic work. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.
           
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