Showing results by narrator "Mitchley Richard" in All Categories

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.

In the war a great volume of poetry was written, produced and published in books, periodicals, newspapers or letters back to home. We often think of war as a necessity. We fight for a more just and better world. We often fail. But in our poets we gain a truth and a morality that shocks us, consoles us and holds our values to the light. In this volume we hear poems from the front, from home, from soldiers, from auxiliaries, from friend and from foe.

Robert Laurence Binyon, CH, was born on 10th August 1869 in Lancaster in Lancashire, England, to Quaker parents, Frederick Binyon and Mary Dockray. He studied at St Paul's School, London, before enrolling at Trinity College, Oxford, to read classics. Binyon’s first published work was Persephone in 1890. As a poet, his output was not prodigious, and, in the main, the volumes he did publish were slim, but his reputation was of the highest order. When the Poet Laureate, Alfred Austin, died in 1913, Binyon was considered alongside Thomas Hardy and Rudyard Kipling....

Strictly speaking The Lake Poets were not a movement or school of poetry. They were only so named as such by The Edinburgh Review so that they could be disparaged. It was a spectacular backfire! The three main figures would be rightly seen as among the most monumental figures in English poetry - William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and the underrated but immense Robert Southey, himself a 30-year poet laureate.

For the female poet there was always the confining hand of men to instruct that their time was perhaps spent more productively elsewhere. These lines, these gilded verses often protest otherwise. The contribution of women in these earlier centuries is immense, and in this series we bring together poets who have created some of the most beautiful and expressive verses ever written. And remember these words, these telling lines, have been written against the grain of society's male bias. With their remembered words these female poets have given us a history that we can all now share.

The human race prides itself on being the most organised of animals. We manage the fate of all other species. All other animals bow to our control or suffer. In diminishing numbers we allow some to live in the wild, but in increasing numbers we domesticate them, and whether they become part of the family, a best friend or a wonderfully decorative accessory, we take their compliance for granted.

The human race prides itself on being the most organised of animals. We manage the fate of all other species. All other animals bow to our control or suffer. In diminishing numbers we allow some to live in the wild, but in increasing numbers we domesticate them, and whether they become part of the family, a best friend or wonderfully decorative accessory, we take their compliance for granted.

We are captivated by colour. It seeps into our emotions, our vistas. It’s part of everyday life. Sometimes its part of something much darker. Our eminent authors in this volume bring you colours of every shade. From the terror of HP Lovecraft and the shadowed world of Edith Nesbit to the wordplay of Virginia Woolf - as well as many others. Color in all its light and shades, hues and tints is brought to the fore by these exceptional writers.

At some point in our lives we believe that creak, that low moan, that whisper is something unnatural, beyond our comprehension. And in these stories our instincts are right. We are afraid. And we should be. Perhaps even terrified. In this volume our classic authors take different approaches, but the result is inevitably the same. We are hooked by these unknowable forces, our emotions heightened and rattled by the expectation - or shock - of the next few words.

We sit. We lie. We wait. We are examined. We are left alone. Emotions fritter. The door reopens. The face. Is it tinged with sadness or reassuring and open? The words. Are they easy to comprehend? Is it good news or bad? We can answer that. It’s bad. Undeniably bad. None of our authors have good news for you. The diagnosis? You already know that. Death.

Our greatest fears are of the unknown. Usually we think those fears are in front of us...or behind us. But perhaps the human body itself holds the greatest horror. What happens after death? Do our bodies have a new existence either in whole...or part? Will others seek to claim them and do unspeakable things? We don’t know. But our authors do. And they have the talents and wits to make these diabolical stories vehicles for horror, for terror, for the unimaginable....

It is human nature to create and compete. Both of these are brought together in sport. Many games began in distant eons and gradually adapted and became codified to those we know today. In this volume we celebrate, through the verse of so many well-known poets, sports of all kinds. Sports for the rich, sports for the poor and all manner in between. As Henry Newbolt would say, ‘Play up, play up, and play the game'.

Victoria’s reign was long and presided over the restless expansion of the British Empire and reams of creative genius. Within these volumes we can bring only a glimpse of the richness, beauty and words of the poets and their musings on this remarkable age. Many are world-renowned - Tennyson, Browning, Arnold, Kipling, Austin, Hopkins, Hardy and Swinburne. Some are almost forgotten - Patmore, Newbolt, Synge. And some are barely noted - Lyall, Meynell and Merdeith. But together they encompass a great poetical age.

Victoria’s reign was long and presided over the restless expansion of the British Empire and reams of creative genius. Within these volumes we can bring only a glimpse of the richness, beauty and words of the poets and their musings on this remarkable age. Many are world-renowned - Tennyson, Browning, Arnold, Kipling, Austin, Hopkins, Hardy and Swinburne. Some are almost forgotten - Patmore, Newbolt, Synge. And some are barely noted - Lyall, Meynell and Merdeith. But together they encompass a great poetical age.

Victoria’s reign was long and presided over the restless expansion of the British Empire and reams of creative genius. Within these volumes we can bring only a glimpse of the richness, beauty and words of their poets and their musings on this remarkable age. Many are world renowned - Tennyson, Browning, Arnold, Kipling, Austin, Hopkins, Hardy and Swinburne. Some almost forgotten - Patmore, Newbolt, Synge. And some are barely noted - Lyall, Meynell and Merdeith. But together they encompass a great poetical age.

The office of Poet Laureate is a high honour amongst poets. The ancient Greeks had the first idea, and their heroes and poets wore wreaths of laurel in honour of the god Apollo. Many countries now have a laureate, as do many societies and organisations. But perhaps ranked first among them all is that of our own Poet Laureate. Unfortunately no single authentic definitive record exists of the office of Poet Laureate of England. In some form it can be traced back to 1189 and Richard Canonicus, who was employed by Richard I with the title 'versificator Regis'.

Westminster Abbey has seen much during its long, rich history: the coronations of Kings and Queens, the burials of Prime Ministers. However, it is also a church that remembers the men and women of the arts. Dedicated writers and poets who spoke so eloquently that the nation wished to remember them with plaques upon its walls so that all who travelled here could remember, too. Their works are worth remembering, and here, in these volumes, their wise words speak, too, and for us all. In volume 3 we collect together Edward Lear to William Wordsworth.

On a summer’s day we have perhaps all wished to take flight and view life and the world from the vantage point of a clear blue sky. Our feathered friends do it as a matter of course, and in this volume some of our finest wordsmiths speak with imagination, longing and desire on their behalf.

The short story is often viewed as an inferior relation to the novel. But it is an art in itself. To take a story and distil its essence into fewer pages while keeping character and plot rounded and driven is not an easy task. Many try, and many fail. Blackmore was one to succeed, as this audiobook ably demonstrates.

Westminster Abbey has seen much during its long, rich history: the coronations of Kings and Queens, the burials of Prime Ministers. However, it is also a church that remembers the men and women of the arts. Dedicated writers and poets who spoke so eloquently that the nation wished to remember them with plaques upon its walls so that all who travelled here could remember, too. Their works are worth remembering, and here, in these volumes, their wise words speak, too, and for us all. In volume 2 we collect together John Clare to DH Lawrence.