Poetry

Puede considerarse como la obra poética más importante del siglo XX. El mismo Federico la definía como “mi obra más popular” y él la llamaba gitana, “porque el gitano es el alfabeto de la verdad andaluza y universal”....

You learn how drama makes visible the conflicts and wars of culture in ways other forms cannot manage....

The Inferno is the first part of The Divine Comedy, Dante’s epic poem describing man's progress from hell to paradise. In it, the author is threatened by beasts and unable to find the path to salvation. The poem illustrates the poetic justice of punishments faced by sinners....

The Odyssey is the greatest adventure story ever written, and one of the great epic masterpieces of Western literature....

Gibran considered The Prophet his greatest achievement....

Ranier Maria Rilke challenges you, "...to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then..."

The Song of Roland is acknowledged today as the first masterpiece of French vernacular literature and one of the world’s greatest epic poems....

Heaney's performance reminds us that Beowulf was intended to be heard not read....

An undeniable masterpiece of Western Civilization, The Metamorphoses is a continuous narrative that covers all the Olympian legends....

A group of nine long Arabic poems or qasida that have come down from the time before Islam.....

John Milton's Paradise Lost is one of the greatest epic poems in the English language....

The first of Homer's great epic poems, the Iliad portrays the final days of the Trojan war....

Whether it's friendship, beauty, love, or something more saucy, the Bard of Avon has a sonnet for every occasion. Learn what the sonnets mean and hear fun facts about the poet, witches, Elizabethan life, and the unfortunate hygiene habits of the 16th century. Despite being written 400 years ago, the sonnets speak to the eternal ups and downs of anyone in love and the struggle to fight our mortality with art. Many centuries later, we have something else in common with Elizabethans: We find kittens to be utterly adorable.

"Drum-Taps" is the next collection of poems published by Walt Whitman after his famous "Leaves of Grass". This collection is a direct response to Whitman's personal observations of the Civil War, many of which come from his volunteer efforts in wartime hospitals. Despite the miseries of war described, Whitman's poems in "Drum-Taps" assert a steady patriotism in favor of Lincoln's war effort.

Here is Oscar Wilde's most brilliant tour de force, a witty and buoyant comedy of manners that has delighted millions in countless productions since its first performance in London's St. James' Theatre on February 14, 1895. "The Importance of Being Earnest" is celebrated not only for the lighthearted ingenuity of its plot, but for its inspired dialogue, rich with scintillating epigrams still savored by all who enjoy artful conversation.

This revised and expanded edition of The Essential Rumi includes a new introduction by Coleman Barks and more than 80 never-before-published poems. Through his lyrical translations, Coleman Barks has been instrumental in bringing this exquisite literature to a remarkably wide range of listeners, making the ecstatic, spiritual poetry of 13th-century Sufi mystic Rumi more popular than ever. 

Beowulf, a sprawling, fantastical tale of bravery, heroism, and Anglo-Saxon heraldry, is the most celebrated epic poem in the English language. The story of the great Geatish fighter Beowulf, who comes to the aid of the beleagued Hrothgar and his men, relates three epic battles: Beowulf's fight with the monster Grendel, his face-off with Grendel's vengeful mother and, after serving as King for 50 years, Beowulf's fateful clash with a fire-breathing dragon.

Purgatorio is the second part of The Divine Comedy, Dante's epic poem describing man's progress from hell to paradise. Having escaped the Inferno, Dante and his guide, the classical Roman poet Virgil, ascend out of the underworld to the Mountain of Purgatory on an island on the far side of the world. The mountain has nine terraces, seven of which correspond to the seven deadly sins, and two of which constitute an Ante-Purgatory with the Garden of Eden at the summit.