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volunteers bring you 16 recordings of Old Man Travelling; Animal Tranquillity and Decay, a Sketch by William Wordsworth. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for October 2, 2011. In 1842 the government awarded Wordsworth a civil list pension amounting to £300 a year. With the death in 1843 of Robert Southey, Wordsworth became the Poet Laureate. He initially refused the honour, saying he was too old, but accepted when Prime Minister Robert Peel assured him you shall have nothing required of you (he became the only laureate to write no official poetry). When his daughter, Dora, died in 1847, his production of poetry came to a standstill. (Summary from Wikipedia)...

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Animals, Instruction, Nature, Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 20 recordings of After Long Grief by Madison Cawein. This was the Weekly Poetry project for July 22, 2012. Madison Cawein was a poet from Louisville, Kentucky. His father made patent medicines from herbs. Cawein thus became acquainted with and developed a love for local nature as a child. His output was thirty-six books and 1,500 poems. His writing presented Kentucky scenes in a language echoing Percy Bysshe Shelley and John Keats. He soon earned the nickname the Keats of Kentucky. ( Summary from Wikipedia )...

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Nature, Philosophy, Romance, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 11 recordings of Echoes of Love’s House by William Morris. This was the Weekly Poetry project for January 9th, 2011. William Morris was an English textile designer, artist, writer, and socialist associated with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood and the English Arts and Crafts Movement. Morris wrote and published poetry, fiction, and translations of ancient and medieval texts throughout his life. Today, Morris's poetry is little-read. His fantasy romances languished out of print for decades until their rediscovery amid the great fantasy revival of the late 1960s following the phenomenal success of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings. But his textile and wallpaper designs remain a staple of the Arts and Crafts Revival of the turn of the 21st century, and the reproduction of Morris designs as fabric, wrapping paper, and craft kits of all sorts is testament to the enduring appeal of his work. The William Morris Societies in Britain, the US, and Canada are active in preserving Morris's work and ideas....

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Advice, Instruction, Literature, Philosophy, Romance, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 8 recordings of The Passing of the Year by by Robert W. Service. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for December 18, 2011. Robert William Service was a poet and writer who has often been called the Bard of the Yukon. This poem taken from Rhymes of a Rolling Stone, published in 1912.(Summary from Wikipedia) I have no doubt at all the Devil grins As seas of ink I spatter. Ye gods, forgive my literary sins — The other kind don't matter.(frontispiece)...

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Holiday, Psychology, Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 15 recordings of Adam and Eve (From “Paradise Lost,” Fourth Book) by John Milton. This was the Weekly Poetry project for Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 (though written nearly ten years earlier) in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse. A second edition followed in 1674, redivided into twelve books (in the manner of the division of Virgil's Aeneid) with minor revisions throughout and a note on the versification; most of the poem was written while Milton was blind, and was transcribed for him. Milton first presents Adam and Eve in Book IV with impartiality. The relationship between Adam and Eve is one of mutual dependence, not a relation of domination or hierarchy. While the author does place Adam above Eve in regard to his intellectual knowledge, and in turn his relation to God, he also grants Eve the benefit of knowledge through experience. ( Summary from Wikipedia)...

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Nature, Philosophy, Religion, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 13 recordings of Song of the Kicking Horse by Bliss Carman. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for September 26th, 2010.

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Nature, Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 17 recordings of Two Musicians by Sarah Orne Jewett. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for January 16, 2011. She published her first important story in the Atlantic Monthly at age 19, and her reputation grew throughout the 1870s and 1880s. Her literary importance arises from her careful, if subdued, vignettes of country life that reflect a contemporary interest in local color rather than plot. Jewett possessed a keen descriptive gift that William Dean Howells called an uncommon feeling for talk — I hear your people....

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Music, Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 17 recordings of Days by Ralph Waldo Emerson. This was the Weekly Poetry project for June 10, 2012. As a lecturer and orator, Emerson—nicknamed the Concord Sage—became the leading voice of intellectual culture in the United States. Herman Melville, who had met Emerson in 1849, originally thought he had a defect in the region of the heart and a self-conceit so intensely intellectual that at first one hesitates to call it by its right name, though he later admitted Emerson was a great man. Theodore Parker, a minister and Transcendentalist, noted Emerson's ability to influence and inspire others: the brilliant genius of Emerson rose in the winter nights, and hung over Boston, drawing the eyes of ingenuous young people to look up to that great new start, a beauty and a mystery, which charmed for the moment, while it gave also perennial inspiration, as it led them forward along new paths, and towards new hopes. ( Summary from Wikipedia )...

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Fantasy, Philosophy, Myths/Legends, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 20 recordings of Simplex Munditiis by Ben Jonson. This was the Weekly Poetry project for February 26, 2012. Ben Jonson was an English poet and playwright. He had a huge influence on both the theatre of his day and that which came after. Much of his poetry was inspired by the classical world of Ancient Greece and Rome. He also wrote a lot of satirical poetry on everyday topics, of which this poem is one such example. (Summary by Lucy Perry)...

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Philosophy, Romance, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 18 recordings of There Was a Cherry-Tree by James Whitcomb Riley. This was the Weekly Poetry project for May 13, 2012. Riley began his career writing verses as a sign maker and submitting poetry to newspapers. Thanks in part to an endorsement from poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, he eventually earned successive jobs at Indiana newspaper publishers during the latter 1870s. Riley gradually rose in prominence during the 1880s through his poetry reading tours. He traveled a touring circuit first in the Midwest, and then nationally, holding shows and making joint appearances on stage with other famous talents. Regularly struggling with his alcohol addiction, Riley never married or had children, and was involved in a scandal in 1888 when he became too drunk to perform. He became more popular in spite of the bad press he received, and as a result extricated himself from poorly negotiated contracts that limited his earnings; he quickly became very wealthy. (Summary from Wikipedia)...

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Instruction, Memoirs, Nature, Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 12 recordings of Past Days by Emily Brontë . This was the Weekly Poetry project for November 28th, 2010 Anne Brontë was a British novelist and poet, the youngest member of the Brontë literary family. She wrote a volume of poetry with her sisters (Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, 1846) and in short succession she wrote two novels. Agnes Grey, based upon her experiences as a governess, was published in 1847. Her second and last novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall appeared in 1848. Anne's life was cut short with her death of pulmonary tuberculosis when she was 29 years old. She published under the androgynous pen name Acton Bell. Please note, at the time of this poetry project, the Gutenburg index was mis-interpreted and this poem was mistakenly attributed to Emily Brontë / Ellis Bell. The recorded introductions will reflect this mistake....

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Instruction, Literature, Philosophy, Romance, Religion, Poetry

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An exposition of Epicurus atomic theory and the ethical tenets based upon it. Drawing upon this materialist philosophy, Lucretius cites the fear of death as the cause of man's ills, and shows the way to freedom from that fear. (Summary by bropops4)...

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Ancient Texts, Classics (antiquity), Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 12 recordings of A Bird in a Gilded Cage by Arthur J. Lamb. This was the Weekly Poetry project for October 2, 2011. A Bird in a Gilded Cage is a song composed by Arthur J. Lamb (lyrics) and Harry Von Tilzer (music). It was a sentimental ballad (or tear-jerker) that became one of the most popular songs of 1900,[1] reportedly selling more than two million copies in sheet music. (summary from Wiipedia)...

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Fantasy, Music, Philosophy, Romance, Poetry

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James Whitcomb Riley was an American writer, poet, and best selling author. During his lifetime he was known as the Hoosier Poet and Children's Poet for his dialect works and his children's poetry respectively. His poems tended to be humorous or sentimental, and of the approximately one thousand poems that Riley authored, over half are in dialect. His famous works include Little Orphant Annie and The Raggedy Man. (summary from Wkipedia)...

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Advice, Instruction, Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 16 recordings of Are The Children at Home? by Margaret Elizabeth Sangster. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for August 5, 2012. Margaret Elizabeth Sangster was an American poet, author, and editor. She was popular in the late 19th and early 20th century. Among Sangster's prose works are several volumes of stories for children, and of these, Little Jamie was written when she was seventeen years old. Hours with Girls and Winsome Womanhood were her most popular works. Her volumes of poetry include, Poems of the Household, Home Fairies and Heart Flowers, On the Road Home and Easter Bells...

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Children, Philosophy, Tragedy, War stories, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 9 recordings of Cana by James Freeman Clarke, from The World's Best Poetry, edited by Bliss Carman. This was the Weekly Poetry project for November 14th, 2010. Trivia: After hearing the song John Brown's Body, Clarke suggested that Mrs. Julia Ward Howe write new lyrics; the result was The Battle Hymn of the Republic. He published but few verses, but at heart was a poet....

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Advice, Philosophy, Religion, Poetry

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The work was composed between 1790 and 1793, in the period of radical foment and political conflict immediately after the French Revolution. The title is an ironic reference to Emanuel Swedenborg's theological work Heaven and Hell published in Latin 33 years earlier. Swedenborg is directly cited and criticized by Blake several places in the Marriage. Though Blake was influenced by his grand and mystical cosmic conception, Swedenborg's conventional moral structures and his Manichean view of good and evil led Blake to express a deliberately depolarized and unified vision of the cosmos in which the material world and physical desire are equally part of the divine order, hence, a marriage of heaven and hell. The book is written in prose, except for the opening Argument and the Song of Liberty. The book describes the poet's visit to Hell, a device adopted by Blake from Dante's Inferno and Milton's Paradise Lost....

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Literature, Philosophy, Satire, Poetry

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James Allen was a British philosophical writer known for his inspirational books and poetry and as a pioneer of the self-help movement. In the introduction Lily Allen writes: It cannot be said of this book that James Allen wrote it at any particular time or in any one year, for he was engaged in it over many years and those who have eyes to see and hearts to understand will find in its pages the spiritual history of his life. It was his own wish that The Divine Companion should be the last manuscript of his to be published. 'It is the story of my soul,' he said, 'and should be read last of all my books, so that the student may understand and find my message in its pages.' (Summary by Wikipedia and Lily Allen)...

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Psychology, Philosophy, Romance, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 13 recordings of Pillow and Stone by Abram S. Isaacs. This was the Weekly Poetry project for April 24, 2011. Abram S. Isaacs (1851-1920) was an American rabbi, author, and professor. Isaacs received his education at the New York University, from which he was graduated in 1871. He became a Rabbi at Barnett Memorial Temple at Paterson, New Jersey. For thirty-five years he occupied a chair at the New York University, first as Professor of Hebrew, then of Germanic languages, and later of Semitics. (summary from Wikipedia)...

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Instruction, Philosophy, Religion, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 13 recordings of The Higher Pantheism by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. This was the Weekly Poetry project for September 18, 2011. Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson, FRS was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom during much of Queen Victoria's reign and remains one of the most popular poets in the English language. ( Summary by Wikipedia )...

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Animals, Instruction, Nature, Philosophy, Psychology, Religion, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 9 recordings of The Song Against Songs by G. K. Chesterton. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for October 16, 2011. Chesterton was a large man, standing 6 feet 4 inches (1.93 m) and weighing around 21 stone (130 kg; 290 lb). His girth gave rise to a famous anecdote. During World War I a lady in London asked why he was not 'out at the Front'; he replied, 'If you go round to the side, you will see that I am.' On another occasion he remarked to his friend George Bernard Shaw: To look at you, anyone would think a famine had struck England. Shaw retorted, To look at you, anyone would think you have caused it. P. G. Wodehouse once described a very loud crash as a sound like Chesterton falling onto a sheet of tin.( Summary from Wikipedia )...

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Adventure, Humor, Music, Philosophy, Satire, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 15 recordings of Petals by Amy Lowell. This was the Weekly Poetry project for November 27, 2011. Amy Lawrence Lowell (February 9, 1874 – May 12, 1925) was an American poet of the imagist school from Brookline, Massachusetts who posthumously won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1926. Lowell was born into Brookline's prominent Lowell family, sister to astronomer Percival Lowell and Harvard president Abbott Lawrence Lowell. She never attended college because her family did not consider that proper for a woman, but she compensated with avid reading and near-obsessive book collecting. She lived as a socialite and travelled widely, turning to poetry in 1902 after being inspired by a performance of Eleonora Duse in Europe. In the post-World War II years, Lowell, like other women writers, was largely forgotten, but with the renaissance of the women's movement in the 1970s, women's studies brought her back to light. According to Heywood Broun, however, Lowell personally argued against feminism. Her poem, “Petals” is published in her collection A Dome of Many-Colored Glass (1912). (Summary adapted from Wikipedia by Bob Go...

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Instruction, Nature, Philosophy, Poetry