Other books that might interest you

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  National Gallery

  Jonathan Ball

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  A poetic collage of art in the modern world: from Rilkean elegies for an iPhone to a meditation on Melville's classic
  Jonathan Ball's fourth poetry book, the first in seven years, swirls chaos and confession together. At the book's heart is a question: Why create art? A series of poetic sequences torment themselves over this question, offering few answers and taking fewer prisoners. Loose sonnets that consider the artistic creations of Leatherface, monster-killer from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, sit alongside Rilkean elegies for an iPhone. Surreal meditations on the collage work of Guy Maddin are followed by all of the lines from Melville's Moby-Dick that mention "salt." Politicians and painters jostle while absurdist humour crashes into stark admissions of vulnerability in the wake of having children. A startling diversity of styles and subjects feed into the maelstrom of The National Gallery, and its dark currents will draw you in to drown.

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  A Rhyme A Dozen ― Beauty - 12...

  Elinor Wylie, Lord Byron, W B Yeats

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  ‘A dime a dozen’ as known in America, is perhaps equal to the English ‘cheap as chips’ but whatever the lingua franca of your choice in this series we hereby submit ‘A Rhyme a Dozen’ as 12 poems on many given subjects that are a well-rounded gathering, maybe even an essential guide, from the knowing pens of classic poets and their beautifully spoken verse to the comfort of your ears. 
  1 - A Rhyme A Dozen - 12 Poems, 12 Poets, 1 Topic - Beauty - An Introduction 
  2 - Beauty by Elinor Wylie 
  3 - For Beauty Being the Best of all We Know by Robert Seymour Bridges 
  4 - On Beauty by Khalil Gibran 
  5 - Ode To Beauty by Henry James Pye 
  6 - Ode to Beauty by Mary Robinson 
  7 - Ode To Beauty by Ralph Waldo Emerson 
  8 - The Fraility and Hurtfulness of Beauty by Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey 
  9 - She Walks in Beauty by Lord Byron 
  10 - Sonnet 54 - O! How Much More Doth Beauty Beauteous Seem by William Shakespeare 
  11 - He Remembers Forgotten Beauty by W B Yeats 
  12 - I Died for Beauty by Emily Dickinson 
  13 - Beauty of Truth by Khwaja Ghulam Farid

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  Sacred Sites - The Secret...

  Susan Suntree

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  Sacred Sites is a singular and memorable account of the evolution of the Southern California landscape, reflecting the riches of both Native knowledge and Western scientific thought. In his foreword, read by Peter Coyote, Pulitzer Prize winning poet Gary Snyder writes that this book "brings us home." Carrying readers from the Big Bang to the present, poet Susan Suntree describes the origins of the universe, the shifting of tectonic plates, and an evolving array of plants and animals that give Southern California its unique features today. She and Native American actor, Kalani Queypo, recount the migration of humans into the region, where they settled, and how they lived. Reflecting Native peoples' views of their own histories and ways of life, Suntree and Queypo recount narratives and songs of the First People, unforgettable shamans, and revered heroes. Founded on meticulous research, Suntree offers a rare and poetic vision combining Western and indigenous thinking to create an ever-deepening sense of a place and its people.  
   “Sacred Sites honors the power and beauty of our indigenous heritage and homeland. By knowing our history, we better understand the present and our journey into the future.” Anthony Morales, tribal chair, Gabrielino Tongva Council of San Gabriel                        
  “‘Human beings are the ones who have the power, through their songs, to affect the balance of the world.’ What an immensely beautiful book!” Stephen Greenblatt, Harvard University, author of The Swerve, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award       
  "Rooted in diversity and complexity, what many of the best books are about." Los Angeles Times 
  Bonus: Peter Coyote reads anthropologist Lowell John Bean's introduction to Southern California Native American cultures.

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  Hagiography

  Jen Currin

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  Jen Currin’s acclaimed debut collection, The Sleep of Four Cities, announced the arrival of a fully formed, arresting new talent, and the poems in her new collection, Hagiography, see her trademark wordplay and entirely contemporary take on the surrealist image moving into new territory. These poems push life’s barely hidden strangeness into the light, and present thought as a bright, emotionally complex event. In Hagiography, mind and sense and the world they move through are interwoven to create a mysterious, familiar, vexing and continuously fascinating human drama.
   
  There are no saints in Hagiography, but there are many curious characters looking for spiritual truth. Hagiography is populated by seekers: ghosts, spiders, sisters, pilgrims, children, tigers, therapists, witches, grandfathers and birds. Hagiography starts with death and ends with birth. In between, life after life.
   
  ‘Hagiography is a delight for the reader’s heart and mind – hagios, meaning sacred, plus graphein, to write. One lovely poem after another guides us through what holds us like a light.’ – Robin Blaser
   
  ‘Currin’s language is not so much surreal as it is devoted to the strangeness of what really happens to bodies and selves in the world ... this book is a conversionnarrative ... it is a story of how we believe language can change and how we believe change can speak.’
   
  – Aaron McCollough, author of Little Ease and Double Venus

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  Measure for Measure

  William Shakespeare

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  Measure for Measure is among the most passionately discussed of Shakespeare’s plays. In it, a duke temporarily removes himself from governing his city-state, deputizing a member of his administration, Angelo, to enforce the laws more rigorously. Angelo chooses as his first victim Claudio, condemning him to death because he impregnated Juliet before their marriage.Claudio’s sister Isabella, who is entering a convent, pleads for her brother’s life. Angelo attempts to extort sex from her, but Isabella preserves her chastity. The duke, in disguise, eavesdrops as she tells her brother about Angelo’s behavior, then offers to ally himself with her against Angelo.Modern responses to the play show how it can be transformed by its reception in present culture to evoke continuing fascination. To some, the duke (the government) seems meddlesome; to others, he is properly imposing moral standards. Angelo and Isabella’s encounter exemplifies sexual harassment. Others see a woman’s right to control her body in Isabella’s choice between her virginity and her brother’s life.The authoritative edition of Measure for Measure from The Folger Shakespeare Library, the trusted and widely used Shakespeare series for students and general readers, includes:-The exact text of the printed book for easy cross-reference -Hundreds of hypertext links for instant navigation -Freshly edited text based on the best early printed version of the play -Full explanatory notes conveniently linked to the text of the play -Scene-by-scene plot summaries -A key to the play’s famous lines and phrases -An introduction to reading Shakespeare’s language -An essay by a leading Shakespeare scholar providing a modern perspective on the play -Fresh images from the Folger Shakespeare Library’s vast holdings of rare books -An annotated guide to further readingEssay by Christy DesmetThe Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, is home to the world’s largest collection of Shakespeare’s printed works, and a magnet for Shakespeare scholars from around the globe. In addition to exhibitions open to the public throughout the year, the Folger offers a full calendar of performances and programs. For more information, visit Folger.edu.

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  Cymbeline

  William Shakespeare, Edith Nesbit

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  Cymbeline, the Roman Empire's vassal king of Britain, once had two sons, Guiderius and Arvirargus, but they were stolen twenty years earlier as infants by an exiled traitor named Belarius. Cymbeline now discovers that his only child left, his daughter Imogen, has secretly married her lover Posthumus Leonatus, an otherwise honourable man of Cymbeline's court. This edition of Cymbeline is an adaptation of Shakespeare's eponymous drama, narrated in plain modern English, capturing the very essence and key elements of the original Shakespeare's work. Read in English, unabridged.

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