By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672) was the first person in America, male or female, to have a volume of poems published. A fascinating figure, she herself wasn’t American and had been born in England, but she was among a group of early English settlers in Massachusetts in the 1630s.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘A Clock stopped’ is not one of Emily Dickinson’s best-known poems, but it uses its central metaphor to explore one of the most salient themes of her poetry: death. Dickinson uses the image of the stopped clock to reflect on the ending of a life and what this means.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘Pike’ is one of the best-known poems by the English poet Ted Hughes (1930-98). Published in his second collection, Lupercal, in 1960, the poem describes the fish known as the pike, which is depicted as deadly and dangerous: a force of nature which obeys its own rules. Like many of Hughes’ poems, ‘Pike’ focuses on the brutality of the natural world.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
Emma Lazarus is most famous for writing one poem, ‘The New Colossus’, which adorns the pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. Written in 1883, the poem helped to shape the popular idea of the Statue of Liberty as a welcoming mother, and of America as the great nation of immigrants.
By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)
‘My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings!’ This proud exclamation is among the most famous lines in nineteenth-century English poetry. But who wrote them, and what exactly does this quotation mean?