English Literature - Read Mode
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‘The Rape of the Lock’ is a mock-heroic narrative poem. Pope treats a trivial social incident (the cutting of a lock of hair) with the elaborate style and machinery of a classical epic to create satire.
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W. B. Yeats (William Butler Yeats) was an Irish poet and one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson, and Langston Hughes were all famous American poets.
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William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-upon-Avon, England, in 1564. He was baptized on April 26, 1564, and his birthday is traditionally celebrated on April 23.
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‘In Memoriam A.H.H.’ is a poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, written to mourn the death of his close friend Arthur Henry Hallam. It explores the poet's struggle with hope and faith after his loss.
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This line is from Christopher Marlowe's play ‘Doctor Faustus’. Faustus speaks it when he summons the spirit of Helen of Troy, seeking in her beauty a replacement for the salvation he has lost.
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Juliet speaks these famous lines in Shakespeare's ‘Romeo and Juliet’ (Act 2, Scene 2). She argues that Romeo's family name (Montague) is meaningless and shouldn't prevent their love.
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This stanza appears in Lord Byron's ‘Don Juan’. It contrasts the different roles love plays in the lives of men and women in the 19th century, suggesting it is a distraction for men but everything for women.
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Edward FitzGerald produced the most famous English translation (or adaptation) of ‘The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam’ in 1859. His version introduced the Persian poet's philosophy to the Western world.
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‘Ulysses’ is a landmark modernist novel by James Joyce, published in 1922. It parallels Homer's Odyssey, chronicling the appointments and encounters of Leopold Bloom in Dublin in a single day.
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‘The Diamond Necklace’ (La Parure) is a short story by Guy de Maupassant. It is famous for its ironic twist ending, where a character ruins her life to replace a lost necklace that turns out to be fake.