Showing results by narrator "Ghizela Rowe" in All Categories

Two Gentlemen of Verona is believed to be one of Shakespeare's early comedies and as a result provides us with the first examples of a number of themes and devices that are further explored in many of his plays. These include loyalty, friendship and the nature of love.

Here, in this volume history’s greatest poets convey thoughts, feelings and sentiments of love to you in quick (or bite-size) conversations of verse that can slip into your day and your partner's heart.

For much of history women have been seen rather than heard. Their thoughts, their views, have lain too long in the shadows of our culture. Whilst this traditional view has some merit it is not entirely accurate. Here, gathered together in these volumes, we can, through their words, experience their lives; we can hear their voices, their thoughts, joys, loves and losses. For the female poet there was always the confining hand of men to instruct that their time was perhaps spent more productively elsewhere.

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.

Born in 1832 in Germantown, Pennsylvania into a poor family, author and poet Louisa May Alcott received part of her education from family friends Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. Best known for her novel Little Women, Alcott shows a different side of herself in this collection of short stories. This audiobook presents the opportunity to explore Alcott’s take on other subjects in a different discipline. These stories reveal a multifaceted and lesser-known Alcott.

The question is asked by each of us, but the answer remains elusive. Dictionaries summon up many words, but none fulfill. Love itself is often ethereal, felt but only seen in a glance, a look, a fleeting touch. Part of love’s beauty is perhaps in the fact that the question never can be adequately answered; it's ephemeral, a chimera of the heart and only felt. Our own experiences are unique and personal to ourselves and of little help defining it for another.

The Caroline era was dominated by the growing religious, political and social conflict between the King and his supporters; the Royalists and it's Puritan opposition; the Roundheads. In contrast to the wars raging across Europe at the time, the Caroline period in Britain was an uneasy peace, as a dark shadow of civil conflict between the King and Parliament worsened toward the latter part of Charles’ reign. Whilst theatre unquestionably fell from its glittering peak achievements of William Shakespeare and Ben Jonson, in poetry the standard was perhaps only just shy of this bar.

English law is a pinnacle of human society. The phrase 'Be you ever so high the law is above you' inspires us all to believe that before it all are treated equally. But in the imposing wood-panelled courts, in front of the beady eyes of wig-decked judge, delivering justice tempered with mercy, our vision twists and falls prey to the mind.

The seas and oceans have a mystical power over us: From a playful day at the beach to the hysterical waves of a storm, this ever-changing element evokes both beauty and fear. Its great mass, its shimmering beauty, its raging howl, and all in colours from blue to grey to green and crystal clear. In these collections of verse our poets - including Tennyson, Swinburne, Keats, Shelley, and many others - explore the relationship between ourselves and the great mystical waters.

Women, so often referred to as the gentler sex - in this volume at least, this is an unfounded and unlikely description. From their minds and pens comes a series of macabre, twisted tales that are anything but gentle. But as they weave their magic, usually black, and mesh you into their narrative you just know 'sugar and spice and all things nice' are not likely to be what little girls really are made of and certainly not these femme fatales....

The seas and oceans have a mystical power over us: From a playful day at the beach to the hysterical waves of a storm, this ever-changing element evokes both beauty and fear; its great mass, its shimmering beauty, its raging howl and all in colours from blue to grey to green and crystal clear. In these collections of verse our poets - including Tennyson, Swinburne, Keats, Shelley, and many others - explore the relationship between ourselves and the great mystical waters.

The human form is familiar to all of us. We like limbs connected to bodies. Writers of the dark and macabre are not too concerned if that remains the case. Indeed limbs, or rather pieces of the body, sometimes are best written about when not connected. It’s one of our greatest fears. It quite rightly riddles us with a very unsettling feeling. So why then do we turn the page? We’re about to find out.

Joseph Thomas Sheridan Le Fanu was born on August 28th, 1814, at 45 Lower Dominick Street, Dublin, into a literary family with Huguenot, Irish and English roots. Between 1838 and 1840 Le Fanu had written and published twelve stories which purported to be the literary remains of an 18th-century Catholic priest called Father Purcell. Set mostly in Ireland they include classic stories of gothic horror, with grim, shadowed castles, as well as supernatural visitations from beyond the grave, together with madness and suicide.

Love whether fleeting or of the ages, expressed with a look, a touch, or a thought is wanted by us all. Our classic poets did not surrender to the logic of the group or seek advice from others quick to blame but slow to embrace. Their legacy remains because it is true, because in that look, that touch, that thought, that display of words the heart remembers us and treasures us. Here are words and verse of love. For your ears, your loved one’s ears and hearts everywhere.

Andrew Marvell was born in Winestead-in-Holderness, in the East Riding of Yorkshire on March 31st, 1621. He was educated at Hull Grammar School, and at the age of 13 he attended Trinity College, Cambridge, and eventually received his BA degree. It is thought that in 1642 Marvell travelled in Europe and, while England was embroiled in its civil war, remained there until 1647, mastering several languages including French, Italian and Spanish.

Wilfred Owen was born on 18th March 1893 at Plas Wilmot, near Oswestry in Shropshire, the eldest of four children. His mother's strong Anglican views passed through to Wilfred, and the Bible, along with books on the Romantic poets, particularly John Keats, were particular favourites and contributed to his initial devotion to the church. In 1913 Wilfred began work as a private tutor teaching English and French at the Berlitz School of Languages in Bordeaux, France, and later with a family.

With classics such as ‘My Last Duchess’ and ‘The Pied Piper of Hamelin’ Robert Browning’s status as one of the great Victorian poets will always be secure in popular culture, while for the more literary he is considered a master of dramatic verse and dramatic monologues. It is interesting to note that his career bloomed late. Indeed, it was only after the death of his wife Elizabeth in 1861 and his return to England from their life in Italy that his work came into wider acceptance and critical acclaim.

Once more the year begins. The first month of the Gregorian calendar. Cold winds howl, the landscape shivers, frost, snow, ice are the many blankets for the land. Daylight is thin; it arrives late and leaves early, ceding the hours to shadow and the ink of night. From the pens of our remarkable poets, including Shelley, Dickenson, Shakespeare, Whitman, Gilbran and a wealth of others, come sumptuous verse that describe our moods, feelings, travels and desires of the dawning year.

Edgar Poe was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on 19th January 1809. Poe is also one of a number of authors credited with inventing the detective genre with his Parisian sleuth C. Auguste Dupin. He's featured in three stories, including the legendary ‘Murders in the Rue Morgue’, and by sheer deduction, logic and a touch of Gallic arrogance revealed what was hidden to the rest of us.

Aleksander Głowacki, who wrote under the nom de plume Boleslaw Prus, was born on 20th August 1847 at Hrubieszów in the Kingdom of Poland, at that time, controlled by the Russian Empire. It seems he had doubts as to the scale of his talents and early on adopted the name ‘Boleslaw Prus’, for both his journalistic and literary offerings. His work as a short-story writer met with much acclaim. He wrote several dozen of them, originally published in newspapers and ranging in length from micro-story to novella. His keen observation of everyday life and sense of humor are evident in them.