Résultats lu par "Denis Daly" dans Toutes les catégories

This book, a true spiritual classic, consists of notes of several conversations had with, and letters written by, Nicholas Herman, of Lorraine, a humble man of little education. After having served as a soldier and a footman, Herman was admitted as a lay brother to the order of the barefooted Carmelites at Paris in 1666, where he took the name "Brother Lawrence." The conversations are supposed to have been recorded by Joseph de Beaufort, who later became vicar general to the Archbishop of Paris.

This book is a critical analysis by an ex-Muslim activist of religion in general and of Islam in particular. It describes the author's journey out of Islam and discusses in depth the many common misconceptions about Islam that are prevalent both within and outside the Islamic world.

In this recording are presented readings of all five editions of Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat, translated by scholar Edward Fitzgerald, as well as biographical material about Fitzgerald and Omar Khayyam and a laudatory poem by Andrew Lang.

The plot follows the usual trajectory of a young girl falling in love and the relationship becoming compromised by unforeseen circumstances. In this case, Austen’s heroine is a naïve country girl, Catherine Morland, who has an addiction to reading the Gothic horror novels which were so popular in the Regency period. When she is invited to stay at the family seat of her love interest and discovers it to be a vast and ancient castle, her romantic imagination runs riot. What secrets lie hidden in this vast pile over which the widowed head of the house exercises an iron control?

The Raven Edition of the works of Edgar Allan Poe (1809 – 1849) presents his complete literary output in five volumes. In addition to 11 prose pieces, volume five contains all of Poe’s verse and also his only play, the unfinished drama, "Politian". Poe’s poetic output consists of 54 pieces, most of them short, but it also includes four longer pieces, The Bells, Al Aaraaf, Tamerlane, and perhaps Poe’s most iconic poem, The Raven.

The story of the adventures of the mythical hero Gilgamesh is the most considerable literary production that has come down to us from ancient Babylonia. Unfortunately, it was not preserved in complete form. This recording is of the fullest translation which had yet been issued in English when it was first published in 1917.

Thomas Troward (1847-1916) was a divisional Judge in British-administered India, who, in his later years, developed a highly idiosyncratic New Thought philosophy. One of Troward's most startling assertions was that thought had the power to directly create phenomenal manifestation. This theme is explored in detail in this particular book. According to Troward, the universe is the expression of a Universal Creative Principle, which is activated by the self-contemplation of Spirit. To be complete, creation is obliged to incorporate physical expression.

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".

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam is a poetic marvel, a work that has survived translation into many languages, while losing little of its force and its wry character. As a source of literary imagery and memorable quotations it ranks with the Bible and the works of Shakespeare. While Edward Fitzgerald was neither the first nor the most scholarly of the English translators of the Rubaiyat, his translation has been largely responsible for the world-wide popularity of this monument of classic Persian poetry.

Miss Julie is probably the most famous play by the Swedish playwright August Strindberg, one of the founding fathers of naturalistic theater. In this claustrophobic drama, the interplay between social order and individual identity is explored in great detail. At the end the aristocratic Julie, goaded by her manipulative manservant, John, is faced with the ultimate decision: independence or annihilation.

Persuasion was the last novel completed by Jane Austen and was first published posthumously in December, 1817. The story represents an interesting configuration of Austen’s characteristic narrative patterns. The heroine, Anne Eliot, is something of an old maid—she is twenty-seven years old, still single and is considered by family and friends to have lost her youthful beauty. Several years earlier, her engagement to Captain Frederick Wentworth had been broken off, due to the insistence of her family that the Captain lacked the wealth and status needed for a suitable husband.

As the generating force of its plot, Twelfth Night uses a device which has since become a staple in comedy: gender confusion. Viola and her twin brother Sebastian, are shipwrecked on the coast of Illyria, a country ruled by the melancholy Duke Orsino. The twins are separated and Viola is led to believe that her brother has perished. She disguises herself as a male under the name of Cesario and makes her way to the ducal court, where Orsino employs her as a messenger, to communicate his love to the reclusive lady, Olivia—who is not willing to return his affection.

Queen Marguerite de Navarre was one of the most powerful women of her age. Her masterpiece, The Heptameron, is a collection of some 72 stories told by five gentlemen and five ladies who find themselves stranded in an abbey. Proposed as an edifying way of passing the time while a bridge is being repaired, the tale-telling - as well as the conversations that follow each story - quickly becomes a battle of wits between the sexes, with tales concerning illicit lovers, romantic conquests, lecherous monks, manly honor, and women's virtue.

Duke Vincentino, the ruler of Vienna, fears that under his mild sovereignty, the people may have become lazy and lax. He decides to “go over cover” in the disguise of a monk and appoint his deputy, Angelo, who is a reputed paragon of virtue, as temporary ruler. On assuming power, Angelo inaugurates draconian provisions regarding sexual propriety. One of the first victims of this new regime is young Claudio, who has impregnated his lover Juliet, and is accordingly sentenced to death.

Sense and Sensibility follows the fortunes of sensible Elinor and her volatile younger sister, Marianne, as each searches for a spouse—a quest made urgent by the family’s financial embarrassment. While Elinor pursues the heart of clergyman, Edward Ferrars, Marianne impulsively falls in love with a glamorous but unscrupulous adventurer, Willoughby. Elinor sees trouble brewing but the enraptured Marianne does not. The sisters question each other’s choices in love.

Unlike many of his contemporaries, the English poet Francis Thompson (1859-1907) was a true mystic. While more celebrated poets, like Wordsworth, Tennyson, and Arnold, were content to express their religious leanings in traditional devotional formulae, Thompson strove to portray the divine directly, in all its terrifying majesty. In this way he is more akin to earlier masters, like Henry Vaughan and George Herbert, than to the poets of his own day.

Although Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) is best known today as a master of macabre fiction, his writings cover a wide range of other forms, including poetry, drama, criticism, and historical commentary. The Raven Edition presents his complete literary output in five volumes, the first of which contains three tributes to Poe and eight of his stories.

Háfiz (1315-1390) was a lyric poet, a major figure in classical Persian literature. The compendious anthology of his poetry simply titled the Divan contains several hundred odes, from which this small selection was made by the translator. In the introduction Bicknell writes: ...we must look upon Háfiz as one of the few poets in the world who utters an unbroken strain of joy and contentment. His poverty was to him a constant fountain of satisfaction, and he frankly took the natural joys of life as they came....

During his lifetime, Hopkins, who was ordained as a Jesuit priest, was best known as a scholar and a teacher of languages. In his youth, he composed poetry prolifically, but destroyed all his juvenile work in 1867. In 1874, he commenced writing poetry again, but little of his verse was published in his lifetime. His work was rescued from obscurity by his friend and supporter, Robert Bridges, who later became poet laureate.

Unlike Peacock's other novels, Maid Marian has a substantial plot, based on the romantic legend of Robin Hood. As is usual with Peacock, the violence is presented in a rather humorous fashion and the characters indulge lavishly in eating and drinking. Beneath the veneer of this well-known and innocuous narrative, Peacock finds ample opportunity to satirize the foibles of church and secular government.