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  Chips and Splinters - A...

  Edward S Sorenson

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  A delightful selection of entertaining poems, short essays, and written conversations involving the people of 20th-century rural Australia and some of their working animals. 
  This collection includes “When Dad Drives Home From Town,” “When the Sailor Rode the Brumby,” “The Old Barn School,” and many more.

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  The Luck

  Jane Routh

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  A new collection from Jane Routh, author of Circumnavigation, shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection, and Teach Yourself Mapmaking, a Poetry Book Society Recommendation.
  After lockdowns have swept calendars clear, leaf-fall, early sunrise and gales are Jane Routh's measures of time, as she goes about her tasks in the hill pasture and woodlands where she has the luck to live.
  With sharp, lyrical description and down-to earth understanding, her poems consider the flora and fauna around her, formative moments and lifespans – as well as the dead who won't be forgotten. Her elegant and informed writing conveys a sense of belonging in a particular place and the care for its future, carrying a universal resonance.

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  The Eclogues

  Virgil

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  This book of poems, written between 42 en 39 BC, was a bestseller in ancient Rome, and still holds a fascination today. Held to be divinely inspired not only by the Romans themselves, but by the Medieval Catholic church, The Eclogues is one of the most beloved collections of Latin short poetry. (Summary by Caeristhiona) The translator of this version is unknown. This recording is done in the form of a dramatic reading: in each eclogue, every character is read by a different Librivox volunteer.Readers of the eclogues that were done by multiple readers:Eclogue 1Meliboeus: Denny SayersTityrus: Kara ShallenbergEclogue 3Menalcas: Leni RibeiroDamoetas: Rosalind WillsPalaemon: Kara ShallenbergEclogue 5Menalcas: Leni RibeiroMopsus: Anna SimonEclogue 7Meliboeus: Denny SayersCorydon: Leni RibeiroTityrus: Anna SimonEclogue 8Pollio: Anna SimonDamon: Ruthie GoldingAlphesiboeus: Squid VarilekovaEclogue 9Lycidas: Greg ElmensdorpMoeris: Leni RibeiroAlso available: a Librivox recording of The Eclogues in their original Latin.

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  The Decadent Poets - Where words...

  Oscar Wilde, Charles Baudelaire,...

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  Decadent poetry was a late 19th-century movement that seemingly originated with the first use of the word by Charles Baudelaire.  The movement championed the idea that art should exist for its aesthetic value, unburdened by moral or social obligations.  As a consequence, it challenged the strict moral codes of the Victorian era, often exploring themes associated with eroticism, forbidden desires, artificiality, the ravages of time, beauty, death, and decay which were often perceived as transgressive, even taboo. 
  Within its ranks are a who’s-who of unconventional and confrontational talent as well as perhaps its greatest exponent; Oscar Wilde, whose embracing of moral rebelliousness and unmasking of Victorian hypocrisy sums up the movement’s greatest achievement.

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  Lycidas - Much shorter poem from...

  John Milton

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  John Milton was born in Bread Street, London, on December 9th, 1608.  His early years were privately tutored before gaining a place at St Paul’s School and in 1625 he matriculated at Christ's College, Cambridge, earning a BA in 1629 and an MA in 1632. At Cambridge he had developed a reputation for poetic skill but also experienced alienation from his peers and university life as a whole.  
  The next 6 years were spent in private study. He read both ancient and modern works of theology, philosophy, history, politics, literature and science, in preparation for a poetical career.  Milton mastered Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, Spanish, and Italian. To these he would add Old English (whilst researching his History of Britain) and also acquired more than a passing acquaintance in Dutch.  
  Although he was studying, some of his poetry from this time is remarkable; L’Allegro and Il Penseroso in 1631 and Lycidias in 1638. 
  In May 1638, Milton embarked upon a 15 month tour of France and Italy. These travels added a new and direct experience of artistic and religious traditions, especially Roman Catholicism.  He cut the journey short to return home during the summer of 1639 because of what he claimed were "sad tidings of civil war in England."  
  Once home, Milton wrote prose tracts against episcopacy, in the service of the Puritan and Parliamentary cause.  
  He married 16-year-old Mary Powell in June 1643 but she left him after only a few months during which he wrote and published several writings on divorce. Mary did return after 3 years and their life thereafter seemed harmonious.  Milton received a hostile response to the divorce tracts and drove him to write Areopagitica, his celebrated attack on pre-printing censorship.  
  With the parliamentary victory in the Civil War, Milton wrote The Tenure of Kings and Magistrates (1649) which defended popular government and implicitly sanctioned the regicide which led to his appointment as Secretary for Foreign Tongues by the Council of State.  
  On 24 February 1652 Milton published his Latin defense of the English People, Defensio Pro Populo Anglicano, also known as the First Defense. Milton's Latin prose and intellectual sweep, quickly gained him a European reputation.  
  Tragically his first wife, Mary, died on May 5th, 1652 following the birth of their fourth child.   The following year Milton had become totally blind, probably due to glaucoma.  He then had to dictate his verse and prose to helpers, one of whom was the poet Andrew Marvell.  
  He married again to Katherine Woodcock but she died in February 1658, less than four months after giving birth to a daughter, who also tragically died.  
  Though Cromwell’s death in 1658 caused the English Republic to collapse Milton stubbornly clung to his beliefs and in 1659 he published A Treatise of Civil Power, attacking the concept of a state-dominated church. Upon the Restoration in May 1660, Milton went into hiding for his life. An arrest warrant was issued and his writings burnt. He re-emerged after a general pardon was issued, but was nevertheless arrested and briefly imprisoned before influential friends, such as Marvell, now an MP, intervened 
  His third marriage was to Elizabeth Mynshull. Despite a 31-year age gap, the marriage seemed happy and Milton spent the remaining decade of his life living quietly in London, apart from a short spell in Chalfont St. Giles, during the Great Plague of London.  
  Milton was to now publish his greatest works, which had been gestating for many years.  Paradise Lost, perhaps the classic English Epic poem was originally published in 10 books in 1667.  This was followed by Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes in 1671.  Because of his anti-monarchy views their reception was muted but over the centuries since Milton has established himself as second only to Shakespeare.  He died of kidney failure on November 8th, 1674 and was buried in the church of St Giles Cripplegate.

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  Spring 1918

  Sara Teasdale

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  LibriVox volunteers bring you 13 recordings of Spring, 1918 by Sara Teasdale. This was the Weekly Poetry project for May 11th, 2014.

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