Showing results by narrator "Mitchley Richard" in All Categories

'You'll be sorry when I'm dead.' That's what Harry said to his sister, before the incident with the lorry. And now he is just that - dead. And he wishes more than anything that he hadn't said it. He wishes he could say sorry. And say goodbye to everyone he left behind - his mum, his dad, his best friend Pete, even Jelly Donkins, the class bully. Now he's on the Other Side, waiting to move on to the Great Blue Yonder. But he doesn't know how to get there - until he meets Arthur.

It is often said that two things are unavoidable: death and taxes. Certainly the latter is a common thorn in adult life, but as to the former it seems that for many people it is merely a hiccup in life’s journey. A journey they wish, if being of good deed and character, to share at the eternity of heaven’s largesse, a reward for faith and the obligations of religion. Of course for those not so fortunate an altogether different experience was prepared for them: hell. Its nightmare visions are so terrifying, conjured up by Dante, Milton, Blake, Baudelaire and many others.

Across fifty poems our classic poets including Christina Georgina Rossetti, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Thomas Hardy & Dante Gabriel Rossetti find verse and tender words to match the occasion. Their descriptions of nature’s ever-evolving landscape and humanity’s ever-changing lives emblazon the page with the lively ink that shapes us all.

Do men need poems? Is the gender of brawn and ‘can-do’ really a candidate for honeyed verse? Obviously yes. Through the centuries men seem to dominate the writing of poetry. From books of epics to quatrains of love poetry it seemed to be a man’s world. His domain. A volume purely for men, to show other facets of their personalities and characters seems to be an obvious choice. One verse fits all is, in fact, far removed from the truth. Men needs words. They need support, understanding as well as goals, ambition and structure. They need purpose, desire; the need to love and be loved.

Alexander Pope was born on May 21st, 1688 into a Catholic family in London. Over the years and centuries since his death, Pope’s work has been in and out of favour, but with this distance he is now truly recognised as one of England’s greatest poets. This volume comes to you from Portable Poetry, a specialised imprint from Deadtree Publishing. Our range is large and growing and covers single poets, themes, and many compilations.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born on October 21st, 1772, in Ottery St Mary in Devon. As a child he was an early and devoted reader, and after being schooled at Christ's Hospital, a charity school, he attended, from 1791, Jesus College, Cambridge, and the following year won the Browne Gold Medal for an ode on the slave trade. This volume comes to you from Portable Poetry, a specialised imprint from Deadtree Publishing. Our range is large and growing and covers single poets, themes, and many compilations.

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.

Rudyard Kipling was one of the most popular writers of prose and poetry in the late 19th and 20th century, and awarded the Noble Prize for Literature in 1907. Born in Bombay on 30 December 1865, as was the custom in those days, he and his sister were sent back to England when he was 5. The ill-treatment and cruelty by the couple who they boarded with in Portsmouth, Kipling himself suggested, contributed to the onset of his literary life

In this volume we gather together verse from lesbian poets that is deeply personal and at times overwhelming. It is not just a search for physical love but a journey through the spiritual to completeness, to becoming whole. However we recognise that the label lesbian might be anachronistic and so also include those who stand by their sides or who have a view in verse that helps us to revel in their love. For in the end that is all our journey is about.

Paul Laurence Dunbar was born on 27th June 1872 in Dayton, Ohio. His parents had been slaves in Kentucky before the Civil War. Dunbar wrote his first poem at age six and gave his first public recital at age nine. By 16, he was already published as a poet in The Herald, a local newspaper. After completing his formal schooling in 1891, Dunbar was employed as an elevator operator, at four dollars a week. His hopes of a legal career floundered on a lack of funds and racial discrimination. However, he wrote his poetry and took every opportunity to publish.

Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant was born on August 5th, 1850 near Dieppe in France. Maupassant’s early life was badly torn when at age 11 (his younger brother Hervé was then five) his mother, Laure, a headstrong and independent-minded woman, risked social disgrace in order to obtain a legal separation from her husband. After the separation, Laure kept custody of her two boys. With the father now forcibly absent, Laure became the most influential and important figure in the young boy's life.

Anne Bradstreet was born in 1612 in Northampton, England. Her parents' position allowed them to educate Anne across many subjects, which was unusual for its day. She married and had eight children. She and her family emigrated to America, where they moved often from place to place. She wrote some beautiful poetry in 1650; the publication of her collection of verse The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America made her the first female poet ever published in England and the New World.

John Clare was born on 13th July, 1793 in Helpston, a few miles north of Peterborough. Schooled only until the age of 12, his early career was that of agricultural labourer, pot boy, gardener and lime burner. His early life of hardship and frequent malnutrition led to his diminutive stature of five feet and contributed to his later health problems. In 1820 his first poems were published and began to earn him a reputation as the 'Northamptonshire Peasant Poet'. His poetry sold well, but only occasionally did that and other incomes keep his head above water.

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. They can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that are difficult to achieve elsewhere. The City of Lights may be one of the glories of the world but for those whose three score and ten have passed it is the final resting place for some of the very finest of literary talents.

Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart. Whether they hail from the Lowlands or the Highlands, to be a Scottish author is to part of a quite an extraordinary band of authors and its literary traditions. These beguiling stories example the full range and majesty of their talents and the subjects they explore.

AD 1136. Across a barren battlefield in the shadows of Kidwelly Castle, the bodies of a defeated army lay abandoned, left to rot as a warning to all who dare rebel against the authority of the English crown. Throughout the kingdom, the people are subjected to a renewed campaign of brutality from the victorious castellans, and any thoughts of freedom are abandoned as they struggle simply to survive each passing day. However, deep beneath the Cathedral of Saint David, in a cold and damp cell that has been his home for many years, an old monk kneels in prayer.

The Man Who Would Be King. This rich wonderfully written classic features two opportunists who venture into remote Central Asia with the intention of acquiring a country to rule. Their adventures meet with surprising initial success but then.....

Listen to master storyteller Joseph Conrad's The Brute, a terrifying tale of a cursed ship on a harrowing sea vogage.

This proud nation with its long history - sometimes rough, hewn from bleak landscapes, and sometimes gently soft from its comforting voices - has produced a long succession of artists and poets.

In the latter category, Louis MacNeice most probably stands pre-eminent; his words and phrasing are on a plane few can equal and most are in awe of. But in this volume we do put forward others who have their own words and voice to add to this rich tapestry.

Many giants of literature originate from the shores of the emerald isles: Shakespeare, Dickens, Chaucer, the Brontes, and Austen, to which most people would willingly add the name Thomas Hardy. Far from the Madding Crowd, Tess of the D’Urbervilles, and The Mayor of Casterbridge are but three of his literary masterpieces. But let us go further and add to his canon his poems....