Darkness
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5 minutes, 19 seconds
Unabridged Narrative Poem
1816
In which our hero, the most Romantic of all the Romantic poets, takes on the end of the world.
Written in Geneva, Switzerland in the summer of 1816, when Byron, Mary Shelley, Percy Shelley, and John Polidori spent their evenings telling each other ghost stories. The resulting tales included Shelley's Frankenstein, Polidori's creation of the vampire/vampyre genre (based on a novel fragment of Byron's), and this gloomy, speculative verse.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Posted by alex at 11:02 AM
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22 minutes
Unabridged Longform Narrative Poem
1816
The story of Francois Bonivard, a 16th century monk imprisoned in the Chateau de Chillon.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Prisoner of Chillon"
Posted by alex at 1:49 PM
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2 minutes, 5 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1920
The classic war poem written by a British soldier during World War I. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Dulce et Decorum Est"
Posted by alex at 2:44 PM
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58 minutes, 39 seconds
Unabridged Free and Formal Verse Poetry Collection
1918
The 1918 "New Poems" collection by the ever controversial (sometimes-deemed "pornographic," but this collection contains only a smattering of his erotica) English writer. Includes 42 poems:
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Apprehension Coming Awake From a College Window Flapper Birdcage Walk Letter from Town: The Almond Tree Flat Suburbs, SW, in the Morning Thief in the Night Letter from Town: On a Grey Evening in March Suburbs on a Hazy Day Hyde Park at Night: Clerks Gipsy Two-Fold Under the Oak Sigh No More Love Storm Parliament Hill in the Evening Piccadilly Circus at Night: Street-Walkers Tarantella In Church Piano |
Embankment at Night: Charity Phantasmagoria Next Morning Palimpsest of Twilight Embankment at Night: Outcasts Winter in the Boulevard School on the Outskirts Sickness Everlasting Flowers The North Country Bitterness of Death Seven Seals Reading a Letter Twenty Years Ago Intime Two Wives Heimweh Debacle Narcissus Autumn Sunshine On That Day |
Read by Alex Wilson.
Posted by alex at 12:01 AM
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6 minutes, 58 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1816
Two poems by one of the founders of the Romantic Movement.
Coleridge claimed that "Kubla Khan," one of his most famous works, came to him in an opium-inspired dream. Coleridge's symbolic pleasure-dome of Xanadu in this poem is referenced and even built in Orson Well's classic film, Citizen Kane. The full title of the poem is "Kubla Khan Or, a Vision in a Dream. A Fragment."
"The Pains of Sleep" by contrast is a more conversational and emotional piece, dealing with nightmares instead of utopian fantasies, but it is very likely that this poem, too, was inspired by Coleridge's continued opium use.
Though both poems were first published at the same time in 1816, Coleridge wrote "Kubla Khan" a good 6 years before 1803's "The Pains of Sleep," revealing very different mental reactions to his continued drug use. 1816 was also the year when Coleridge finally sought help for his addiction.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Kubla Khan & The Pains of Sleep"
Posted by alex at 11:46 AM
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34 minutes, 25 seconds
Unabridged Epic SF Poem
1798
The classic longform adventure poem in seven parts. MP3 Sample below includes the entire first part.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner"
Posted by alex at 8:25 AM
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43 minutes, 21 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poem
1820
Shelley at his most playful (starting with the dedication to his wife, Frankenstein author Mary Shelley: "On her objecting to the following poem, upon the score of its containing no human interest."), combining Greek and Egyptian myths into a fanciful meditation on creativity. A longform poem of the fantastic, read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Witch of Atlas"
Posted by alex at 6:24 PM
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45 minutes, 56 seconds
Unabridged Lyrical Poetry Collection
1913
A Boy's Will is the first poetry collection by Robert Frost. Includes 32 poems, painting pictures of New England and tackling Frost's famously grand themes of isolation, death, coming of age (in literature and in life), and the world's natural spirituality.
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Part I: Into My Own Ghost House My November Guest Love and a Question A Late Walk Stars Storm Fear Wind and Window Flower To a Thawing Wind A Prayer in Spring Flower-Gathering Rose Pagonias Asking for Rosas Waiting--Afield at Dusk In a Vale A Dream Pang In Neglect The Vantage Point Mowing Going for Water |
Part II Revelation The Trial by Existence In Equal Sacrifice The Tuft of Flowers Spoils of the Dead Pan with Us The Demiurge's Laugh Part III Now Close the Windows A Line-Storm Song October My Butterfly Reluctance |
Read by Alex Wilson. Free MP3 Sample below includes full recording of "My November Guest."
Continue reading "A Boy's Will"
Posted by alex at 1:15 AM
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2 hours, 40 minutes
Unabridged Formal Verse Poetry
1609
A complete reading of Shakespeare's 154 timeless sonnets, composed between 1593 and 1601. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Complete Sonnets"
Posted by alex at 9:51 PM
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2 minutes, 21 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1798
A poem by one of the founders of the Romantic Movement.
Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "The Dungeon"
Posted by alex at 9:28 AM
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5 minutes, 30 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1798
A quiet, conversational poem by one of the founders of the Romantic Movement. The frost is both harsh like reality and comforting like the speaker's imagination, and the poem deals with the juxtaposition of being present and of longing.
The University of Alberta offers an in-depth examination of this poem as a joint project between the Department of Psychology and Department of English. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Frost at Midnight"
Posted by alex at 9:43 PM
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6 minutes
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1846
Two poems based on the Arthurian legend, written by the founder of trancendentalism. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Merlin & Merlin II"
Posted by alex at 8:49 PM
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5 minutes, 13 seconds
Unabridged Formal Poetry
1816
A confessional poem by Shelley, written during the summer he spent on the shores of Lake Geneva. Read by Alex Wilson.
Continue reading "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty"
Posted by alex at 8:47 PM
