Showing results by author "Michela Bertazzo" in All Categories

LibriVox volunteers bring you 23 recordings of Upon His Mistress Dancing by James Shirley. This was the Weekly Poetry project for January, 15, 2012.James Shirley (sometimes spelt Sherley) was a prolific English playwright and poet who was active in the first half of the seventeenth century. (Summary by Lucy Perry)

I will pray with the Spirit, and I will pray with the Understanding also: or a discourse touching prayer from 1 Corinthians 14:15. Wherein is briefly discovered,1. What prayer is.2. What it is to pray with the Spirit.3. What it is to pray with the Spirit, and with the Understanding also.But, we know not what we should pray for as we ought; only the Spirit helpeth our infirmities, Romans 8:26 - Summary by Adapted from Title Page

While hunting, the boy Anchises stumbles upon Venus's forest retreat and is so kindly entertained by the goddess that he becomes the proud father of Aeneas, the hero of Vergil's Aeneid. The poem is an epyllion like Marlowe's "Hero and Leander" and Shakespeare's "Venus and Adonis," a short erotic poem with a mythological subject. The style is Spenserian, the stanzas rhyming ababbccc.When Brittain's Ida was published in 1628, the publisher ascribed it to Edmund Spenser. However, in 1926 Ethel Seaton discovered and published Fletcher's original manuscript, whose opening stanzas make clear that ...

"These Sonnets furnish us with a circumstantial and very interesting history of Spenser's second courtship, which, after many repulses, was successfully terminated by the marriage celebrated in the Epithalamion. As these poems were entered in the Stationers' Registers on the 19th of November, 1594, we may infer that they cover a period of time extending from the end of 1592 to the summer of 1594. It is possible, however, that these last dates may be a year too late, and that Spenser was married in 1593. We cannot be sure of the year, but we know, from the 266th verse of the Epithalamion, that ...

Spenser explains in the dedication of this volume that the hymns to love and to beauty were written early in his career and their "heavenly" counterparts much later, in response to the dissatisfaction that one of the author's patrons expressed toward the earlier poems, although to a modern sensibility those are in no way offensive except perhaps in focusing upon the sublunary world. However that may be, all four poems are idealistic, expressing the neo-Platonic philosophy that was growing in popularity in Elizabethan England. According to this doctrine, the soul is primary and shapes the body ...

Sidney envisions the world as an ideally ordered structure that rewards good and punishes evil, but this order, vitiated by sin, has fallen prey to random chance. The function of poetry is, by teaching (through delight of various sorts), to restore the original order so far as is humanly possible. This treatise defends the dignity of poetry, by which Sidney means literature in general, and criticizes the literature of his own day. Much of this criticism sounds to a modern ear like unimaginative carping, but its probable function was to defend the author against the charge of partiality arising...

Also known as "A Political History of the Devil"This book is divided into two parts: first, the history of the devil from his fall from heaven up to the time the book was written and second about his private conduct. Partly funny, partly religious, and partly critical of what was written before, the book is purely delightful to read. This is a lesser known work by the author of Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders. ( Stav Nisser.)

Henry IV, Part 2 is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed written between 1596 and 1599. It is the third part of a tetralogy, preceded by Richard II and Henry IV, Part 1 and succeeded by Henry V. The play picks up where Henry IV, Part 1 left off. Its focus is on Prince Hal's journey toward kingship and his ultimate rejection of Falstaff. (Summary from Wikipedia)Characters:Rumour the Presenter and Lady Percy: Cecelia PriorKing Henry IV: Mark F. SmithHenry, Prince of Wales, afterwards King Henry V: Max Porter ZasadaPrince John of Lancaster: Brian EdwardsPrince Humphrey of Gloucester: ...

Venus y Adonis es un poema de William Shakespeare, escrito en 1592-93. El argumento está basado en pasajes de las metamorfosis de Ovidio. Es un trabajo complejo y caleidoscópico que utiliza un tono y una perspectiva constantemente cambiantes, para presentar puntos de vista contrastantes sobre la naturaleza del amor.

Henry VI, Part 2 or The Second Part of Henry the Sixth (often written as 2 Henry VI) is a history play by William Shakespeare believed to have been written in 1591, and set during the lifetime of King Henry VI of England. Whereas 1 Henry VI deals primarily with the loss of England's French territories and the political machinations leading up to the Wars of the Roses, and 3 Henry VI deals with the horrors of that conflict, 2 Henry VI focuses on the King's inability to quell the bickering of his nobles, the death of his trusted adviser Duke Humphrey of Gloucester, the rise of the Duke of York ...

Shakespeare’s famous second Henriad reaches its thrilling conclusion in this chronicle of King Henry V’s spirited leadership over his country—a Henry who is a far cry from the prodigal prince who we saw in Henry IV, Part 1 and Henry IV, Part 2. Now grown up and more mature than he was in his youth, Henry V is persuaded by the English clergy that he has an ancestral claim to the French throne, and when France’s haughty Dauphin facetiously rebuffs him with a gift of tennis balls, Henry orders his troops to invade French lands and begin another violent and costly war. Thus ensues one of ...

The Rape of Lucrece (1594) is a narrative poem by William Shakespeare about the legendary Lucretia. Lucrece draws on the story described in both Ovid's Fasti and Livy's history of Rome. In 509 BC, Sextus Tarquinius, son of Tarquin, the king of Rome, raped Lucretia (Lucrece), wife of Collatinus, one of the king's aristocratic retainers. As a result, Lucrece committed suicide. Her body was paraded in the Roman Forum by the king's nephew. This incited a full-scale revolt against the Tarquins led by Lucius Junius Brutus, the banishment of the royal family, and the founding of the Roman republic. (...

Richard II by William Shakespeare is the first of eight plays that portray a historically-informed version of the War of the Roses - beginning in about 1365 and ending with Richard III's death in 1485.(Summary by Cori)Edited by J. M. Smallheer and John Gonzalez.Characters:Narration, Keeper, and Lord - read by Annie ColemanKing Richard II and First Servant - read by Peter YearsleyNorthumberland and Gaunt - read by ChipBolingbroke - read by Kayvan SylvanAumerle - read by John GonzalezHenry Percy - read by Michael SiroisYork - read by Martin CliftonMowbray - read by Mark F. SmithSurrey ...

Shakespeare’s sonnets comprise a collection of 154 poems in sonnet form that deal with such themes as love, beauty, politics, and mortality. (Summary from wikipedia.org)

Henry VI, Part 1 or The First Part of Henry the Sixth (often written as 1 Henry VI) is a history play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1591, and set during the lifetime of King Henry VI of England. Whereas 2 Henry VI deals with the King's inability to quell the bickering of his nobles, and the inevitability of armed conflict, and 3 Henry VI deals with the horrors of that conflict, 1 Henry VI deals with the loss of England's French territories and the political machinations leading up to the Wars of the Roses, as the English political system is torn apart by personal ...

Both Ovid and Spenser also treat this ancient myth, but Spenser alters the ending, converting the tale into an archetype of fulfilled love, whereas Ovid, like Shakespeare, combines humor with pathos as a buffer against sentimentality. Ovid’s Venus behaves absurdly out of character, becoming a huntress to keep her lover company in the woods. Shakespeare, however, preserves decorum; his Venus remains at all times the queen of love. The humor arises rather from the fact that the would-be paramour isn’t interested. This endows the goddess’s wooing with nearly slapstick over-exertion, and yet...

King Henry IV, Part 1 is the second of Shakespeare’s eight Wars of the Roses history plays, with events following those of King Richard II. As the play opens, King Henry IV (formerly Henry Bolingbroke) and Henry Percy (Hotspur) argue over the disposition of prisoners from the Battle of Holmedon. The King’s attitude toward Mortimer and the Percy family prompts them to plot rebellion. In the meantime, his son Prince Hal is living the low life in the company of Sir John Falstaff. As the time of battle nears, Prince Hal joins his father and is given a high command. The play’s climax is the ...

Robert Herrick had been apprenticed to a goldsmith before entering holy orders. This early training has been credited with influencing his metrical precision and his success with short poems. A still more important influence was Ben Jonson, for he was a member of the "sons of Ben," the coterie of younger poets that surrounded that great dramatist, Shakespeare's rival and friend. He even addresses a poem to Jonson addressing him as his "saint."As a country parson, far from the bustle of London and his poetic peers, Herrick found inspiration in the beauties of nature, but loneliness may have ...

Twelfth Night, or What You Wil is a comedy by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written around 1601–02 as a Twelfth Night's entertainment for the close of the Christmas season. The play centres on the twins Viola and Sebastian, who are separated in a shipwreck. Viola (who is disguised as a boy) falls in love with Duke Orsino, who in turn is in love with the Countess Olivia. Upon meeting Viola, Countess Olivia falls in love with her thinking she is a man. The play expanded on the musical interludes and riotous disorder expected of the occasion, with plot elements drawn from the short...

The Life and Death of King John, a history play by William Shakespeare, dramatises the reign of John, King of England (ruled 1199–1216), son of Henry II of England and Eleanor of Aquitaine and father of Henry III of England. It is believed to have been written in the mid-1590s but was not published until it appeared in the First Folio in 1623.John (24 December 1166 – 19 October 1216), also known as John Lackland or Softsword, was King of England from 6 April 1199 until his death. His reign saw the loss of the duchy of Normandy to the French king Philip II in 1204, resulting in the collapse...