Ovid's Metamorphoses is one of the great works in classical literature, and a primary source for our knowledge of much of classic mythology, in which the relentless theme of transformation stands as a primary metaphor for the often cataclysmic dynamics of life itself. For this book, British poets Michael Hofmann and James Lasdun have invited more than forty leading English-language poets to create their own idiomatic contemporary versions of some of the most famous and notorious myths from the Metamorphoses.

Apollo and Daphne, Pyramus and Thisbe, Proserpina, Marsyas, Medea, Baucis and Philemon, Orpheus and Eurydice—these and many other immortal tales are given fresh and startling life in exciting new versions. The contributors—among them Fleur Adcock, Amy Clampitt, Jorie Graham, Thom Gunn, Seamus Heaney, Ted Hughes, Lawrence Joseph, Kenneth Koch, Michael Longley, Paul Muldoon, Les Murray, Robert Pinsky, Frederick Seidel, Charles Simic, and C. K. Williams—constitute an impressive roster of today's major poets. After Ovid is a powerful re-envisioning of a fundamental work of literature as well as a remarkable affirmation of the current state of poetry in English.

A biography of the poet discusses his friendships with other aspiring writers, painters, and musicians, his repressive family life, his need for affection and fear of the encroachment on his writing that marriage represented, and his work.

A revised and expanded edition of the classic volume of Yeats' work, including the play The Death of Cuchulain.

This selection of works by Wallace Stevens—the man Harold Bloom has called “the best and most representative American poet”—was first published in 1967. Edited by the poet's daughter Holly Stevens, it contains all the major long poems and sequences, and every shorter poem of lasting value in Stevens' career, including some not printed in his earlier Collected Works. Included also is a short play by Stevens, "Bowl, Cat and Broomstick."

This is an entirely new selection of Keat's finest poetry containing all his best known work as well as a sample of less familiar pieces. Keats published three volumes of poetry before his death at age twenty-five of tuberculosis and, while many of his contemporaries were prompt to recognize his greatness, snobbery and political hostility led the Tory press to vilify and patronize him as a "Cockney poet." Financial anxieties and the loss of those he loved most had tried him persistently, yet he dismissed the concept of life as a vale of tears and substituted the concept of a "vale of Soul-making." His poetry and his remarkable letters reveal a spirit of questing vitality and profound understanding and his final volume, which contains the great odes and the unfinished Hyperion, attests to an astonishing maturity of power.

This volume is the first to present Wordsworth's great poem in all three of its forms. It reprints, on facing pages, the version of The Prelude that was completed in 1805, together with the much-revised work published after the poets death in 1850. In addition, the editors include the two-part version of the poem, composed in 1798-99. Each of these poems possesses distinctive qualities and values; to read them together provides an incomparable chance to observe a great poet composing and re-composing, throughout a long life, his major work.There are no fewer than seventeen manuscripts of The Prelude in the Wordsworth library at Grasmere. Working with these materials, the editors have prepared an accurate reading version of 1799 and have newly edited from manuscripts the texts of 1805 and 1850―thus freeing the latter poem from the unwarranted alterations made by Wordsworth's literary executors. The editors also provide a text of MS. JJ (Wordsworth's earliest drafts for parts of The Prelude) as well as transcriptions of other important passages in manuscript which Wordsworth failed to include in any fair copy of his poem. The texts are fully annotated, and the notes for all three versions of The Prelude are arranged so that each version may be read independently. The editors provide a concise history of the texts and describe the principles by which each has been transcribed from the manuscripts.

There are many other aids for a thorough study of The Prelude and its background. A chronological table enables the reader to contextualize the biographical and historical allusions in the texts and footnotes.

"References to The Prelude in Process" presents the relevant allusions to the poem, by Wordsworth and by members of his circle, from 1799 to 1850. Another section, "Early Reception," reprints significant comments on the published version of 1850 by readers and reviewers.

Finally, there are seven critical essays by Jonathan Wordsworth, M. H. Abrams, Geoffrey H. Hartman, Richard J. Onorato, William Empson, Herbert Lindenberger, and W. B. Gallie.

His adoption of classical ideals was combined with a vigorous interest in contemporary life and a strong faith in native idiom. Within the urbane elegance of his verse forms he contrived a directness and energy of statement clearly related to colloquial speech, and this characteristic fusion of restraint and vitality gave to the seventeenth-century lyric its most distinctive quality. As well as the entire body of Jonson's non-dramatic verse, extensively annotated, this edition contains many of the songs from his plays and masques and his translation of 'Horace, of the Art of Poetry'. His 'Conversations with Drummond', which adds much to our sense of the man, appears as an Appendix, as does 'Discoveries'; together they shed valuable light on Jonson's poetic theory and practice.

For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 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.

This is the second edition of the "Norton Critical Edition" of Milton's "Paradise Lost". It represents an extensive revision of the first edition. The text of the poem remains that of Milton's 1674 edition, retaining the original punctuation but with modernized spelling and italics. Material for the study of contemporary religious and political issues is now included, as well as selections from his earlier poetry and prose.

Book by Kenney, Richard

Book by Kenney, Richard

Poems on the Underground continue to delight London's travellers. Every four months, another five poems appear in the tube carriages, chosen by the novelist Judith Chernaik and the poets Cicely Herbert and Gerard Benson. This book includes all the poems and illustrations for "100 Poems on the Underground". It is also illustrated in colour with 24 posters from the golden age of London Underground art. The posters have been selected from the London Transport Museum archives to complement the spirit of the book. In addition to their graphic imagery, they feature lines of poetry of special interest, proving that poetry had a role to play in Underground travel as many as 80 years ago. There is an extended introduction, notes on the new poems and on the posters and an index of first lines. Bound and jacketed with head and tail bands, it also has a ribbon marker.

This anthology of poetic parodies celebrate not only the poems of English and American literature but also the experience of travelling by London Underground and London Transport's fleets of buses. The parodies have featured in the London magazine "Midweek" during 1995. Poets whose works have been subject to parody include Philip Larkin. Poems include "Tube, or not Tube: that is the question" and "The Song of Hiawalthamstow".