Thomas A. Copeland
Hero and Leander (version 2)
Two young people, the epitome of young masculine and feminine beauty, fall in love at first sight, but their union is forbidden by the tyran…
Monsieur Beaucaire
A madcap Frenchman posing as an ambassador's barber blackmails a dishonest duke to introduce him as a nobleman to a wealthy belle of Bath. S…
Orlando Furioso
Charlemagne's nephew Orlando (AKA Roland) is driven insane by the infidelity of his beloved Angelica. Angelica's relationship with him and o…
Balder Dead (version 2)
The poem begins with the beloved god Balder, thought to be invulnerable, dead at the hands of the inoffensive blind god Hoder, in a game. L…
The Man in the Moone
A self-serving Spaniard discovers a means of traveling to the moon, describing his sensations in transit in terms remarkably consistent with…
John Donne's Satires
Donne’s StyleIn John Donne’s day, a satire was such a poem as a satyr might compose. Satyrs were rough, savage creatures in Greek mythology…
Of Education
A well educated population is the cornerstone of a strong society. On the personal level, education contributes to virtue and self-knowledge…
Black Amazon of Mars (Version 3)
In his final adventure on Mars, Eric John Stark acquires a relic of an ancient Martian hero, a gem or lens which is believed to be the key t…
Joseph and His Friend: A Story of Pennsylvania
The protagonist in Joseph and His Friend: A Story of Pennsylvania, by Bayard Taylor, is an intelligent and educated young farmer who has led…
Rosalynde or, Euphues' Golden Legacie
This novel, which Shakespeare adapted in his pastoral comedy As You Like It, is the archetypal pastoral adventure. Two young persons of high…
Amoretti and Epithalamion
"These Sonnets furnish us with a circumstantial and very interesting history of Spenser's second courtship, which, after many repulses,…
Sohrab and Rustum: An Episode
A young soldier born among Tartars but sired by the mighty Persian lord Rustum, serves in the Tartar army, seeking his great father. To this…
The Shadow Flies
The title of the original, British release of this novel was They Were Defeated, referring, among other matters, to the English Civil War, 1…
A Selection from the Lyrical Poems of Robert Herrick
Robert Herrick had been apprenticed to a goldsmith before entering holy orders. This early training has been credited with influencing his m…
Milton's Minor Poems
“On Shakespear 1630” typifies much of Milton’s poetry. By some miracle never yet explained, at age 24 he managed to get a 16-line encomium i…
The Anniversary Poems
Elizabeth Drury, daughter of Donne's patron, Sir Robert Drury, died in 1610. A year later Donne laments her hyperbolically as the soul of th…
The Tables of the Law and The Adoration of the Magi
The first two tales involve the persona's relationship with a certain Aherne, who has come into possession of a beautiful book by Joachim of…
Venus and Adonis (Version 2)
Both Ovid and Spenser also treat this ancient myth, but Spenser alters the ending, converting the tale into an archetype of fulfilled love, …
A High Wind in Jamaica
Childhood and piracy: an unlikely pairing, in a tragi-comic adventure. Neither Treasure Island nor Peter Pan prepares one for the kind of de…
Four Hymns
Spenser explains in the dedication of this volume that the hymns to love and to beauty were written early in his career and their "heav…