The panel discusses four poems from Edwin Muir's collection The Narrow Place (1943), with a focus on their formal features, their connexion to a version of Nietzsche's philosophy, and their opposed characterisation of the civilised and natural worlds.Continue reading
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1:20:33
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1:20:33
CR Episode 287: The Beginnings of English Poetry
The panel discusses two of the earliest examples of English poetry—Caedmon's Hymn and The Dream of the Rood (sometimes attributed to Cynewulf)—with a discussion of translation theory, Saxon influence, and the development of English poetry and language.Continue reading
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1:16:16
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1:16:16
CR Episode 286: The Rape of the Lock, Part II
The panel discusses the concluding three cantos, with attention to Pope's heroi-comic satire of epic in both content and form, and his use of references to his own involvement in the real-life events enacted by the poem's fictional protagonists.Continue reading
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1:16:51
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1:16:51
CR Episode 285: The Rape of the Lock, Part I
The panel discusses the first two cantos of Alexander Pope's heroi-comical peacemaker poem, with special attention to its use of foreshadowing, the style and tenor of its dialogue, and its allegedly Rosicrucian spiritology (and its textual origins).Continue reading
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1:20:30
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1:20:30
CR Episode 284: Poetry and Music
The panel is joined by the novelist H.S. Cross to discuss three poems that have been famously set to music: "The Lark Ascending" by George Meredith, "Most Glorious Lord of Life" by Edmund Spenser, and "Three Songs for St. Cecilia's Day" by W.H. Auden.Continue reading
Critical Readings examines key literary texts using close reading and critical analysis, and explains these approaches in discussion. Listeners will learn about the texts themselves and about how to approach a text for critical analysis.