Authors+(Compilation)+Do+Not+Delete!

__CP Brit Poetry__
=Authors=

Algernon Henry Blackwood toc

 * Born March 14, 1869 died December 10, 1951.
 * English Writer of Ghost stories and Supernatural fiction.
 * Son of a preacher
 * Always fasinated about the supernatural, mysticism, occult, and pshychic belief.
 * Became a journalist in New York
 * Had a tv show on the BBC
 * He read ghost stories on his show.
 * In 1906 he published his first book of short stories called //The Empty House.// He also published //John Silence// in 1908, and //Tales of the Uncanny and Supernatural// in 1949. //[|The Kit-Bag]//, published in 1908, is another famous fiction short story by Blackwood.

**D. H. Lawrence**
 * Born September 11, 1885 in Nottinghamshire, England and died March 2, 1930.
 * Fourth Child of John and Lydia Lawrence.
 * Spent most of his younger years in a coal mine.
 * Attended Beauvale Board __School__ (Later called Beauvale D.H. Lawrence Primary School)
 * First student to recieve a __scholarship__ to Nottingham Highschool
 * While working as a Junior Clerk for Haywood Surgical Appliances Factory, Lawrence contracted pneumonia Becoming a __student__ teacher with Chambers, Lawrence went on to achieve full teaching status UCN (University __College__ of Nottingham
 * While sick he often conversed with Jesse Chambers
 * They shared a love for books
 * Writing throughout his entire teaching career, Lawrence never sent in his writings to a publisher.
 * Lawrence's friend Jesse Chambers sent his works to the //English Review// who started to publish his works.
 * One of his more famous works is [|The Rocking-Horse Winner]
 * One of his more famous works is [|The Rocking-Horse Winner]



media type="file" key="the snake.mp3" width="240" height="20" Snake A snake came to my water-trough On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat, To drink there. In the deep, strange-scented shade of the great dark carob-tree I came down the steps with my pitcher And must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough before me. He reached down from a fissure in the earth-wall in the gloom And trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over the edge of the stone trough And rested his throat upon the stone bottom, i o And where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness, He sipped with his straight mouth, Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body, Silently. Someone was before me at my water-trough, And I, like a second comer, waiting. He lifted his head from his drinking, as cattle do, And looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do, And flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused a moment, And stooped and drank a little more, Being earth-brown, earth-golden from the burning bowels of the earth On the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking. The voice of my __education__ said to me He must be killed, For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are venomous. And voices in me said, If you were a man You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off. But must I confess how I liked him, How glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my water-trough And depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless, Into the burning bowels of this earth? Was it cowardice, that I dared not kill him? Was it perversity, that I longed to talk to him? Was it humility, to feel so honoured? I felt so honoured. And yet those voices: //If you were not afraid,// //you would kill him!// And truly I was afraid, I was most afraid, But even so, honoured still more That he should seek my hospitality From out the dark door of the secret earth. He drank enough And lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken, And flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black, Seeming to lick his lips, And looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air, And slowly turned his head, And slowly, very slowly, as if thrice adream, Proceeded to draw his slow length curving round And climb again the broken bank of my wall-face. And as he put his head into that dreadful hole, And as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered farther, A sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that horrid black hole, Deliberately going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after, Overcame me now his back was turned. I looked round, I put down my pitcher, I picked up a clumsy log And threw it at the water-trough with a clatter. I think it did not hit him, But suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed in undignified haste. Writhed like lightning, and was gone Into the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front, At which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination. And immediately I regretted it. I thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act! I despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education. And I thought of the albatross And I wished he would come back, my snake. For he seemed to me again like a king, Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld, Now due to be  crowned again. And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords Of life. And I have something to expiate: A pettiness.

What does the snake represent? How does the author fell about "human education" What does the water trough represent?

James Augustine Aloysius Joyce
Born February 2, 1882, died January 13, 1941. He is known for his experimental language and exploration of new literary methods, such as stream of thought. Stream of thought is a literary form that displays the thought process of the character by given to the reader through an inner monologue. James Joyce wrote often about characters that resembled family members, and most of his stories were based in Dublin, even though he lived many places, including Zurich, Paris, and Trieste. His major works consist of: [|Ulysses] (1922), [|Araby], and //Finnegans Wake// (1939).

William Butler Yeats
Podcast: [|The Second Coming] by William Butler Yeats media type="file" key="Second Coming.m4a" width="300" height="50" Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.
 * Born June 13, 1865 died January 28, 1939.
 * He is considered one of the greatest English-language poets of the 20th century.
 * In 1923 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature. He is known for his volumes of poetry like:
 * //Poems// (1895),
 * //The Wind Among the Reeds//(1899),
 * [|The Tower](1928),
 * //[|The Winding Stair]// (1929).
 * [|The Second Coming]
 * to see more, [|click here]

Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: a waste of desert sand; A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Wind shadows of the indignant desert birds.

The darkness drops again but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Katherine Mansfield

 * Born October 14, 1888 died January 9, 1923.
 * Her stories focused upon psychological conflicts.
 * She had a great influence on the developement of the short story as its own form of literature.
 * She published works such as:
 * //In a German Pension// (1911),
 * //Prelude// (1918), and //Bliss// (1920).
 * //**The Garden Party// (1922). [|A Cup of Tea]

Although Bertha Young was thirty she still had moments like this when she wanted to run instead of walk, to take dancing steps on and off the pavement, to bowl a hoop, to throw something up in the air and catch it again, or to stand still and laugh at–nothing–at nothing, simply. What can you do if you are thirty and, turning the corner of your own street, you are overcome, suddenly by a feeling of bliss–absolute bliss!–as though you'd suddenly swallowed a bright piece of that late afternoon sun and it burned in your bosom, sending out a little shower of sparks into every particle, into every finger and toe? . . . Oh, is there no way you can express it without being "drunk  and disorderly" ? How idiotic civilisation is! Why be given a body if you have to keep it shut up in a case like a rare, rare fiddle? "No, that about the fiddle is not quite what I mean," she thought, running up the steps and feeling in her bag for the key–she'd forgotten it, as usual–and rattling the letter-box. "It's not what I mean, because–Thank you, Mary"–she went into the hall. "Is nurse back?" //[Page 117]// "Yes, M'm." "And has the fruit come?" "Yes, M'm. Everything's come." "Bring the fruit up to the dining-room, will you? I'll arrange it before I go upstairs." It was dusky in the dining-room and quite chilly. But all the same Bertha threw off her coat; she could not bear the tight clasp of it another moment, and the cold air fell on her arms. But in her bosom there was still that bright glowing place–that shower of little sparks coming from it. It was almost unbearable. She hardly dared to breathe for fear of fanning it higher, and yet she breathed deeply, deeply. She hardly dared to look into the cold mirror–but she did look, and it gave her back a woman, radiant, with smiling, trembling lips, with big, dark eyes and an air of listening, waiting for something. . . divine to happen. . . that she knew must happen. . . infallibly. Mary brought in the fruit on a tray and with it a glass bowl, and a blue dish, very lovely, with a strange sheen on it as though it  had been dipped in milk. "Shall I turn on the light, M'm?" "No, thank you. I can see quite well." There were tangerines and apples stained with strawberry pink. Some yellow pears, smooth as silk, some white grapes covered with a silver bloom and a big cluster of purple ones. These last she had //[Page 118]// bought to tone in with the new dining-room carpet. Yes, that did sound rather far-fetched and absurd, but it was really why she had bought them. She had thought in the shop: "I must have some purple ones to bring the carpet up to the table." And it had seemed quite sense at the time. When she had finished with them and had made two pyramids of these bright round shapes, she stood away from the table to get the effect–and it really was most curious. For the dark table seemed to melt into the dusky light and the glass dish and the blue bowl to float in the air. This, of course, in her present mood, was so incredibly beautiful. . . . She began to laugh. "No, no. I'm getting hysterical." And she seized her bag and coat and ran upstairs to the nursery. Nurse sat at a low table giving Little B her supper after her bath. The baby had on a white flannel gown and a blue woollen jacket, and her dark, fine hair was brushed up into a funny little peak. She looked up when she saw her mother and began to jump. "Now, my lovey, eat it up like a good girl," said nurse, setting her lips in a way that Bertha knew, and that meant she had come into the nursery at another wrong moment. "Has she been good, Nanny?" "She's been a little sweet all the afternoon," //[Page 119]// whispered Nanny. "We went to the park and I sat down on a chair and took her out of the pram and a big dog came along and put its head on my  knee and she clutched its ear, tugged it. Oh, you should have seen  her." Bertha wanted to ask if it wasn't rather dangerous to let her clutch at a strange dog's ear. But she did not dare to. She stood watching them, her hands by her side, like the poor little girl in front of the rich girl with the doll. The baby looked up at her again, stared, and then smiled so charmingly that Bertha couldn't help crying: "Oh, Nanny, do let me finish giving her her supper while you put the bath things away.  "Well, M'm, she oughtn't to be changed hands while she's eating," said  Nanny, still whispering. "It unsettles her; it's very likely to upset her."  How absurd it was. Why have a baby if it has to be kept–not in a case  like a rare, rare fiddle–but in another woman's arms?  "Oh, I must!" said she.  Very offended, Nanny handed her over.  "Now, don't excite her after her supper. You know you do, M'm. And I have such a time with her after!"  Thank heaven! Nanny went out of the room with the bath towels.  "Now I've got you to myself, my little precious," said Bertha, as the baby  leaned against her.

In this short story, there are a lot of colors that are mentioned. What do you think the colors represent? Have youe ever had a feeling of bliss without even knowing why? all of the sudden you are just smiling?

T.S. Eliot (Thomas Stearns Eliot)
T.S. Eliot reading [|The Waste Land] Podcast: [|Hollow Men] by T.S. Eliot media type="file" key="Hollow Men.m4a" width="300" height="50"
 * Born September 26, 1888 died January 4, 1965.
 * He was an American-English pet, playwright, literary critic, an editor, and he was a leader of the modernist movement in poetry.
 * His modernist movement was displayed in his works
 * //The Waste Land// (1922)
 * and //Four Quartets// (1943).
 * He was awarded the Order of Merit, and the Nobel Prize in 1948. [|Preludes]

**I**

We are the hollow men We are the stuffed men Leaning together Headpiece filled with straw. Alas! Our dried voices, when We whisper together Are quiet and meaningless As wind in dry grass Or rats’ feet over broken glass In our dry cellar

Shape without form, shade without colour, Paralysed force, gesture without motion;

Those who have crossed With direct eyes, to death’s other Kingdom Remember us—if at all—not as lost Violent souls, but only As the hollow men The stuffed men.

**II**

Eyes I dare not meet in dreams In death’s dream kingdom These do not appear: There, the eyes are Sunlight on a broken column There, is a tree swinging And voices are In the wind’s singing More distant and more solemn Than a fading star.

Let me be no nearer In death’s dream kingdom Let me also wear Such deliberate disguises Rat’s coat, crowskin, crossed staves In a field Behaving as the wind behaves No nearer—

Not that final meeting In the twilight kingdom

**III**

This is the dead land This is cactus land Here the stone images Are raised, here they receive The supplication of a dead man’s hand Under the twinkle of a fading star.

Is it like this In death’s other kingdom Waking alone At the hour when we are Trembling with tenderness Lips that would kiss Form prayers to broken stone.

**IV**

The eyes are not here There are no eyes here In this valley of dying stars In this hollow valley This broken jaw of our lost kingdoms

In this last of meeting places We grope together And avoid speech Gathered on this beach of the tumid river

Sightless, unless The eyes reappear As the perpetual star Multifoliate rose Of death’s twilight kingdom The hope only Of empty men.

**V**

//Here we go round the prickly pear// //Prickly pear prickly pear// //Here we go round the prickly pear// //At five o’clock in the morning.//

Between the idea And the reality Between the motion And the act Falls the Shadow

//For Thine is the Kingdom//

Between the conception And the creation Between the emotion And the response Falls the Shadow

//Life is very long//

Between the desire And the spasm Between the potency And the existence Between the essence And the descent Falls the Shadow

//For Thine is the Kingdom//

For Thine is Life is  For Thine is the

//This is the way the world ends// //This is the way the world ends// //This is the way the world ends// //Not with a bang but a whimper.//

**Siegfreid Sassoon**

 * Born September 8, 1886 and died September 1, 1967.
 * He was a poet and novelist who wrote many well known antiwar poetry.
 * Enlisted in World War I and suffered from shell shock (which contributed to him wanting to write antiwar works).
 * He met Wilfred Owen who was also a pacifist poet.

Podcast: [|Base Details] by Siegfreid Sassoon media type="file" key="Base Details.m4a" width="300" height="50" If I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath, I'd live with scarlet Majors at the Base, And speed glum heroes up the line to death. You'd see me with my puffy petulant face, Guzzling and gulping in the best hotel, Reading the Roll of Honour. "Poor young chap," I'd say--"I used to know his father well; Yes, we've lost heavily in this last scrap." And when the war is done and youth stone dead, I'd toddle safely home and die--in bed.

Wilfred Owen
Podcast: [|Dulce et Decorum Est] by Wilfred Owen media type="file" key="Dulce et Decorum Est.m4a" width="300" height="50" Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge, Till on the haunting flares(2) we turned our backs And towards our distant rest(3) began to trudge. Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind; Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots(4) Of tired, outstripped(5) Five-Nines(6) that dropped behind. Gas!(7) Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling, Fitting the clumsy helmets(8) just in time; But someone still was yelling out and stumbling, And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime(9). . . Dim, through the misty panes(10) and thick green light, As under a green sea, I saw him drowning. In all my dreams, before my helpless sight, He plunges at me, guttering,(11) choking, drowning. If in some smothering dreams you too could pace Behind the wagon that we flung him in, And watch the white eyes writhing in his face, His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin; If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs, Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud(12) Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, My friend, you would not tell with such high zest(13) To children ardent(14) for some desperate glory, The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est Pro patria mori.(15)
 * Born March 18,1893 died November 4,1918.
 * He was an English poet, a teacher in France at the Berlitz School of English.
 * Enlisted in the Artists’ Rifles group
 * commissioned as a second lieutenant.
 * During his recovery from being wounded in combat in 1917 he wrote many of his most important poems
 * including //Anthem for Doomed Youth// and [|Dulce et Decorum Est].

Saki (H.H. Munro)

 * Saki was born on December 18,1870 in Burma and died November 16,1916 when he was shot by a german sniper in WWI.
 * He used witty, mischievous style of writing to satirize Edwardian social classes.
 * Was criticized his entire life because he was a homosexual
 * His most famous works are:
 * [|Tobermory]
 * The Toys of Peace
 * Reginald
 * When William Came

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A sudden hush of awkwardness and constraint fell on the company. Somehow there seemed an element of embarrassment in addressing on equal terms a domestic cat of acknowledged dental ability. "Will you have some milk, Tobermory?" asked Lady Blemley in a rather strained voice. "I don't mind if I do," was the response, couched in a tone of even indifference. A shiver of suppressed excitement went through the listeners, and Lady Blemley might be excused for pouring out the saucerful of milk rather unsteadily. "I'm afraid I've spilt a good deal of it," she said apologetically. "After all, it's not my Axminster," was Tobermory's rejoinder. Another silence fell on the group, and then Miss Resker, in her best district-visitor manner, asked if the human language had been difficult to learn. Tobermory looked squarely at her for a moment and then fixed his gaze serenely on the middle distance. It was obvious that boring questions lay outside his scheme of life. "What do you think of human intelligence?" asked Mavis Pellington lamely. "Of whose intelligence in particular?" asked Tobermory coldly. "Oh, well, mine for instance," said Mavis with a feeble laugh. "You put me in an embarrassing position," said Tobermory, whose tone and attitude certainly did not suggest a shred of embarrassment. "When your inclusion in this house-party was suggested Sir Wilfrid protested that you were the most brainless woman of his acquaintance, and that there was a wide distinction between hospitality and the care of the feeble-minded. Lady Blemley replied that your lack of brain-power was the precise quality which had earned you your invitation, as you were the only person she could think of who might be idiotic enough to buy their old car. You know, the one they call 'The Envy of Sisyphus,' because it goes quite nicely up-hill if you push it." Lady Blemley's protestations would have had greater effect if she had not casually suggested to Mavis only that morning that the car in question would be just the thing for her down at her Devonshire home. Major Barfield plunged in heavily to effect a diversion. "How about your carryings-on with the tortoise-shell puss up at the stables, eh?" The moment he had said it every one realized the blunder. "One does not usually discuss these matters in public," said Tobermory frigidly. "From a slight observation of your ways since you've been in this house I should imagine you'd find it inconvenient if I were to shift the conversation to your own little affairs." The panic which ensued was not confined to the Major. "Would you like to go and see if cook has got your dinner ready?" suggested Lady Blemley hurriedly, affecting to ignore the fact that it wanted at least two hours to Tobermory's dinner-time. "Thanks," said Tobermory, "not quite so soon after my tea. I don't want to die of indigestion." "Cats have nine lives, you know," said Sir Wilfred heartily. "Possibly," answered Tobermory; "but only one liver."

Due to the personality and snide remarks from Tobermory in this excerpt, what does it tell you of Saki as a person? What from this excerpt exemplifies the qualities of modern literature? How do the many characters that talk to Tobermory reflect the upper class during this period?

Etty Hillesum

 * Born January 15, 1914 in Amsterdam, Netherlands
 * Jewish writer
 * was sent to the westerbork outpost to await transportation to Auschwitz
 * wrote a diary before her stay and letters while at camp westerbork
 * died November 30, 1943



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