Showing results by publisher "Spoken Realms" in European

Today Thomas Gray is remembered almost solely for this melancholy meditation on the inevitability of death and the insignificance of fame. The poem was originally thought to have been inspired by the death of Gray's close friend, Richard West, but modern critics think this to be unlikely. Retiring by nature, Gray did not want the elegy to be published, but his hand was forced by an unscrupulous editor who planned to publish the poem without permission. The polished elegance of the versification has ensured that the poem has retained its appeal over the centuries.

As the Enlightenment movement was gathering strength in the early 18th century, various challenges to established religious faith were launched. In response, a number of celebrated commentators produced defences of religion and morality, and among these was Alexander Pope, who was inspired to write "some pieces on Human Life and Manners." The result was a collection of poems in rhyming couplets, designated "Epistles", which were published in instalments.

The lyrical ballad The Lady of Shalott is one of Tennyson's best-known and best-loved poems. It is based on the story of Elaine of Astolat, a figure from Arthurian legend, who dies from her unrequited love for Sir Lancelot. The subject matter provided inspiration for many of the Pre-Raphaelite painters. Tennyson published two versions of the poem, both of which are included in this recording. The first was written in 1832, and the second—the better-known of the two versions—in 1842.

Listed in the BBC's "100 Novels That Shaped Our World", Psmith, Journalist takes Wodehouse's immaculate hero to the apparently dull city of New York, where he takes command of twee family periodical Cosy Moments, converts it to the yellowest of yellow journals, and embarks upon a crusade to unmask the owner of the notorious Pleasant Street tenements. But soon the staff of Cosy Moments find themselves dodging ambushes and assassination attempts, as the mysterious tenement owner tries to put them out of business - permanently; and war breaks out among New York's notorious street gangs.

George Bernard Shaw embraced the concept of what he called creative evolution. In 1982, after having witnessed the horrors of the First World War, Shaw started work on Back to Methuselah, a large-scale presentation of the story of human development, starting from the Garden of Eden and extended far into the future. The first performance was held in New York in 1922. The five plays included are "In the Beginning", "The Gospel of the Brothers Barnabus", "The Thing Happens", "Tragedy of an Elderly Gentleman", and "As Far As Thought Can Reach".

R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) is a science-fiction drama that was first presented in Czech in 1921. It introduced the term "robot", which is derived from a Czech word meaning "worker," to international vocabulary. The action opens in a factory that has successfully produced thousands of robots, who are essentially mindless drones. An idealistic humanitarian activist launches a plan to imbue some of the robots with human traits. The robots which have been humanized then assume leadership over the other robots and seek to organize them in a revolution to take over the world.

Exiles is the only play written by James Joyce. It draws material from "The Dead", the final story in his famous short stories collection, Dubliners. It centers around four individuals - Richard, Robert, Bertha, and Beatrice - and the complex romantic entanglements between them as tensions rise and relationships are tested.

Seven Little Australians is the story of the mischievous seven children of the Woolcot family - Meg, Pip, Judy, Bunty, Nell, Baby, and the General, whose father little understands them and whose young stepmother is hardly an adult herself. The Australian bush sets an iconic backdrop for the misadventures of this energetic mob.

Keats commenced writing his epic poem, Hyperion, in 1818 and ceased working on it in the spring of 1819. He said that he gave the project up for having "too many Miltonic inversions." The unfinished poem, which ceases in the middle of the third canto, was published in 1820. The narrative is based on the Titanomachia, or War of the Titans, and describes the aftermath of their fall to the Olympian Gods.

John Keats (1795-1821) was one of the foremost English Romantic poets. Despite his early death from tuberculosis at the age of 25 he had a considerable poetic output, the majority of his best-known works being written in the year 1819. The six odes composed during this year are among his most famous and well-regarded poems. The first five were composed during the spring of 1819, while 'To Autumn' was composed in September. The exact order of composition of the first five is unknown.

Tweedle Dee and brother Dum recited a bit of Wonderlandic poetry. Nonsensical? Yes, but this is a brilliant sample of the world Alice found herself. If there is a moral to this delightful poem it may be that it is not wise to be an oyster. On second thought, perhaps there is no discernible moral - just smile worthy fun.

The story is of a female slave, Leila, who loves the Giaour, an infidel, and is in consequence bound, thrown in a sack, and drowned in the sea by her Turkish lord, Hassan. In revenge the Giaour kills Hassan, then in grief and remorse banishes himself to a monastery.

Conrad, the Corsair, is the chieftain of a pirate band, and plans to attack the Pacha, Seyd, and seize his possessions. Conrad's wife, Medora, prevails upon her husband to abandon his plan and remain at home. Confident in his plan and assured of his safe return, Conrad and his pirate crew set sail for the Pacha's island.

Although Rupert Brooke is known today as a "war poet", he was never actually engaged in combat: His death was the result of an infection from an insect bite that occurred while he was in transit to commence duty in Turkey. Unlike Wilfred Owen, who had a bitter experience of life in the trenches, Brooke's vision was of the glory rather than the horror of war. Only the first section focuses on issues stemming from the war. Poems in the other sections are generally wistful evocations of places that the poet had visited in his travels and reflections on youthful love.

Together with "The Vicar of Wakefield" and "She Stoops to Conquer", these two poems are the best-known works of the Irish literary maverick Oliver Goldsmith.

Slowbridge's customs have been set in stone by Lady Theobald, who has decreed that young ladies should always wear white muslin to social events and that their only decoration should be fresh flowers - which invariably wilt by the end of the evening. Enter Octavia, bedecked in yards of lace and ribbons and with a profusion of diamond jewelry. She is soon informed that only married ladies wear diamonds in England. She makes other mistakes: Young ladies do not ask men to join them on terraces; they do not invite men to play croquet on their lawns.

Arthur Ransome brilliantly wrote about Oscar Wilde in A Critical Study, published in 1912, and then went on to write the popular and better known children's series, Swallows and Amazons, in 1930. Ransome considers Oscar Wilde a visionary of whom every classical scholar must know. Oscar Wilde changed the culture of his own day and, by doing so, changed ours. Wilde tried various literary activities, poetry, drama, dialogues and essays, a novel, and even wrote about interior decoration. To him, art was supreme, and he pursued that ideal in every expression that he encountered.

In this collection, the authors were striving for a natural and unaffected style of verse that sought to avoid the elaborate structures and artifice that they considered had characterized much of the poetry of the 18th century. Of the 23 poems, only four are by Coleridge, including "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner", which is the most famous poem in the collection. The most notable contribution by Wordsworth is the concluding poem, "Tintern Abbey".

In this haunting poem, a guest on his way to a wedding reception is stopped by the Ancient Mariner. With his "glittering eye" he transfixes the guest and then relates a compelling tale of a sea voyage fraught with strange happenings. The Mariner tells of journeying through tyrannous storms to ice mast-high, through mist and snow to the deadly inertia of the doldrums. There are unearthly visitations, ill omens, and supernatural happenings - all leading to the revelation of the Mariner's strange fate.

A Word Is Not A Sparrow is a diverse anthology of stories set amid Russian repression through the centuries; personal narrator testimony about the impact in America of immigrant grandparents from Ukraine and elsewhere; powerful fables and allegories that deliver universal messages about displacement, migration, and human connection; and classic Cossack folk tales that are a touchstone of Ukrainian culture. Listen as we let these words fly out around the world.