81 Famous Poems: An Audio Companion to the Norton Anthology of Poetry

by Alexander Scourby (Narrator), Nancy Wickwire (Narrator), Bramwell Fletcher (Narrator)

Listen to the sound of English as it was meant to be heard. The only authorized audio companion to the widely respected Norton Anthology of Poetry, Third Edition, this audio collection includes the greatest poems of the English language, ranging from the writings of Shakespeare, Milton, Blake, and Wordsworth, to the best-loved verse of Whitman, Dickinson, the Brownings, and Yeats. Thirty-nine poets in all. The readings by brilliant classic actors Alexander Scourby, Nancy Wickwire, and Bramwell Fletcher are presented in the order they appear in Norton and are selected for their ability to delight. It is simply a collection of the best.

Genres: Poetry, Audiobook, Classics, Fiction

1 pages, Audio CD

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Actor, voice actor

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexand...

Reviews

[J9]

A beautiful collection of poems from throughout the ages. I only had planned on writing a review for a few of them, but found myself enjoying this collection more than I thought I would. Other reviews say this older poetry is too flowery, but I see these authors as all very distinct. It was my first time reading many of these authors and others I greeted again like old friends. A wonderful collection to give you a taste of some of the greats so you can decide which ones you'd like to read more of.

Also, I didn't find a list of these poems anywhere for this book, so hopefully this list will help someone.


The Cuckoo Song by Anonymous


Whoso List to Hunt by Thomas Wyatt


The Nymph’s Reply to the Shepherd By Sir Walter Raleigh


The Passionate Man’s Pilgrimage By Sir Walter Raleigh


Sonnet 1 By Sir Philip Sidney


The Passionate Shepherd to His Love By Christopher Marlowe


Sonnet 18 By Williams Shakespeare


Sonnet 29 By Williams Shakespeare


Sonnet 116 By Williams Shakespeare


Sonnet 129 By Williams Shakespeare

When to Her Lute Corinna Sings by Thomas Campion

Rose-Cheeked Laura by Thomas Campion

There Is A Garden In Her Face by Thomas Campion

Song: Go and catch a falling star by John Donne

The Sun Rising by John Donne

Holy Sonnets: Death, be not proud by John Donne

Song to Celia by Ben Jonson

The Argument of His Book by Robert Herrick

Delight and Disorder by Robert Herrick

To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time by Robert Herrick


upon julia's clothes by Robert Herrick

The Collar by George Herbert

The Pully by George Herbert

Love by George Herbert

When I Consider how my Life is Spent/Sonnet 19: On his Blindess by John Milton

Song: Why so pale and wan fond lover? By Sir John Suckling

Song: Out upon it, I have lov’d By Sir John Suckling

To Althea, from Prison By Richard Lovelace

To His Coy Mistress By Andrew Marvell

The Definition of Love By Andrew Marvell

The Retreat By Henry Vaughan

A Song for St. Cecilia's Day, 1687 By John Dryden

Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard By Thomas Gray

From poetical sketches: Song by Williams Blake

From songs of Innocence: Introduction by William Blake

From songs of Innocense: The Lamb by William Blake

From songs of Experience: The Tiger by Williams Blake

To a Mouse by Robert Burns

A red, red, rose by Robert Burns

She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways By William Wordsworth

Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802 By William Wordsworth

My Heart Leaps Up By William Wordsworth

The World Is Too Much With Us By William Wordsworth

Kubla Khan By Samuel Taylor Coleridge

She Walks in Beauty By Lord Byron (George Gordon)

When We Two Parted George Gordon Byron

Ozymandias By Percy Bysshe Shelley

Ode to the West Wind By Percy Bysshe Shelley

To a Skylark By Percy Bysshe Shelley

Adonais: An Elegy on the Death of John Keats By Percy Bysshe Shelley

On First Looking into Chapman's Homer By John Keats

Ode on a Grecian Urn By John Keats

Bright Star by John Keats

Concord Hymn By Ralph Waldo Emerson


The Rhodora by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Sonnets from the Portuguese 1: I thought once how Theocritus had sung By Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Sonnet 43 (How Do I Love Thee?) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

To Helen By Edgar Allan Poe

The City in the Sea by Edgar Allan Poe


Annabel Lee by Edgar Allan Poe

Break, Break, Break By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

from The Princess: The Splendour Falls on Castle Walls By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

from The Princess: Tears, Idle Tears By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

from The Princess: Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

The Eagle By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Crossing the Bar By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

My Last Duchess By Robert Browning

Home-Thoughts, from Abroad By Robert Browning

Song of Myself by Walt Whitman


Oh Captain! My Captain! by Walt Whitman


Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold

Number 303, also known as The Soul Selects her Own Society by Emily Dickenson

Number 986, also known as A Narrow Fellow in the Grass by Emily Dickenson

Up-Hill By Christina Rossetti


The Garden of Proserpine by Algernon Charles Swinburne


The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy

Pied Beauty By Gerard Manley Hopkins

A Shropshire Lad 2: Loveliest of trees, the cherry now By A. E. Housman

With rue my heart is laden By A. E. Housman

The Lake Isle of Innisfree by W.B. Yeats


The Wild Swans At Coole by W.B. Yeats

[Jimmy]

A trip down memory lane for me. But the reading by Alexander Scourby and others seemed outdated, as did, I hate to say it, some of the poems.

[Jan]

Each one a classic, these poems took me on a journey of memories. Some were first learned in elementary school, and others were part of my high school studies. Come my college years, I didn't learn these for the first time but could instead recognize them in movies and songs. I'll play this over and again as I delight in the words, perhaps again letting the words settle into memory like long ago.

[Andrea Engle]

All the old favourites are here: from Shakespearean sonnets thru Shelley and Keats to finish with William Butler Yeats ... unfortunately it didn’t range further into the modern era ... still, a gracious and eclectic grab-bag of poetry ...

[Brett's Books]

The immortal words of classic poems from several genre’s makes for the perfect antidote to today’s ugliness. Highly recommend.

[Bjennas]

It was frustrating to listen to like 78 poems by men and 3 poems by women, to say nothing of race. I’m not sure who put together the anthology these were taken from but it felt pretty lacking. I hope modern poetry gets more respect in diversity. I recognized just a handful of the poems but it was cool to know where they came from since i just know them from the cultural awareness.

[Raul Pegan]

Not gonna pretend like I know/understand poetry, but this was a good read for an outsider.

I read somewhere that it’s more effective to listen to poetry than it is to read it, I fully agree with that. Got this bad boy as an audiobook.

Not sure where is the next step for my poetry journey, but I’m glad to keep learning about this in a piecemeal way.

[Bruce Cline]

This collection of classic poems explains why poetry is so disfavored by modern readers. There are innumerable great poems, but few of which made it into this volume.

[Cindy (BKind2Books)]

I listened to this because poetry seems to be one area where listening to the work is superior to reading it. One of my groups reads romance, poetry and plays in February. I usually have tons of romance on Mt TBR but the others are not something I routinely read. I must say that listening to this anthology was nice. It included a lot of well-known poems and a few lesser known, so it was a good mix. I was familiar with many of these, but it was still nice to listen to them again.

Some of the included poems:

The Passionate Shepherd to His Love (Come live with me and be my love...)

Shakespeare's Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare thee to a summer's day...)

Shakespeare's Sonnet 116 (Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediments...)

Death Be Not Proud (...we wake eternally and death shall be no more, Death, thou shalt die.)

Song to Celia (Drink to me only with thine eyes...)

To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time (Gather ye rosebuds while ye may...)

When I Consider How My Light is Spent (...they also serve who only stand and wait.)

To Althea, From Prison (...stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage...)

To His Coy Mistress (Had we but world enough and time...)

A Red, Red Rose (O, my love is like a red, red rose that's newly sprung in June...)

She Walks in Beauty

Ode to the West Wind (...if winter comes, can spring be far behind?)

Sonnets from the Portuguese (How do I love thee? Let me count the ways...)

Annabel Lee (...but the moon never beams without bringing me dreams of beautiful Annabel Lee and the stars never rise but I see the bright eyes of the beautiful Annabel Lee...)

Break, Break, Break (...but O! for the touch of a vanished hand and the sound of a voice that is still...)

Crossing the Bar (...I hope to see my Pilot face to face when I have crossed the bar.)

Song of Myself (I celebrate myself and sing myself...)

The Lake Isle of Innisfree (I will arise and go now and go to Innisfree...)

[Hope]

These poems are all bona fide classics ranging from Milton’s “On His Blindness” to Blake’s “Little Lamb Who Made Thee?” to Robert Burn’s “To a Mouse.” If you want an education on the best-of-the-best, you need go no further.

My enjoyment of the readings was enhanced by the fact that I was already acquainted with most of them. (If you are not familiar with them, it would take several listens to get their gist.) If you already love good poetry, or would like to become more knowledgeable, this is a lovely opportunity to plunge in. Highly recommended.

Wonderful narrators, and absolutely no fluff!

[Rebecca]

Audiobook quality was not the best. The narrators didn't have a crisp sound, and at times, the volume would fluctuate randomly. As for the poetry collection, I can't really speak on the choice of poems, except for Emily Dickinson. I found it strange that the poems chosen weren't as well known as "Hope is a thing with feathers". As for the poets featured, I had heard of most of them, so most of the poets were of literary fame. Not sure if I heard the best of each poet's poems, but I would hope they are reflective of each poet's personal style.

[Jody Kyburz]

My! Got this free from the library in Cody, Wyoming. 2 CD's with 3 readers and 81 poems by British and American authors. Lots of "my heart leapt upward" and "the blushing rose" and "the buds of springtime" or whatever. They were presented in the order they appear in the THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF POETRY, THIRD EDITION.

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?

[Kaitlyn Whitten]

3🌟

It was not perfect, but it was fairly good. The selection was a little skewed, low diversity, and all quite abstract in nature, but it was still an interesting read and a nice little throwback to some classical poetry. I wish some of my favorites had appeared more, but overall it was decent and enjoyable.

[Paul]

Just wanted to learn and experience poetry and this is one of the books recommended by someone in a book reading group that I am in. Nothing specific to say hear other than they were interesting to listen to. A couple of poems I did recognize. I did believe the reading did a good job of reading.

[Laurel Hicks]

A wonderful selection.

[Michael P.]

A great anthology of great poems, beautifully read.

[Karen]

This is a wonderful anthology of famous classic poems. Beautifully read. Great accompaniment to the Norton Anthology.

[Linda]

Some familiar some new .... enjoyed them very much!

[Megan]

Audio

[Steve S]

Audiobook was a bad idea. I couldn't focus on it.

[Cordially Invited]

Lovely to listen to. The men and woman reading these poems have great delivery and annunciation, which makes them very enjoyable. Recommended for folks who appreciate poetry of an older-style.

[Katrina]

A delightful recording! I'll certainly be listening to this more than once.

[Lisa Tangen]

Listened to the audio and fell in love anew with poetry.

[Jules]

Nothing here to surprise or delight. Just a solid collection, solidly delivered.

[Lisa Butterworth]

I want to be a fancy poetry person who gets it. I am not. Sad. Maybe someday.

[Stephen Gatlin]

Some good. Some bad. Some memories of Lit Past.

[Jef Harris]

I listened to them all in one sitting. It was a delightful treat.

[Lynn Lucas]

Ok

[Saara]

Might have been the presenter that turned me off of this one. His voice did nothing for me. The poems ran the gamut from great to ok.

[A.M.]

In my aim to listen to more poetry I found this title in the Audible Plus range. Neat. A lot of the usual poems, and nicely read by a mix of narrators.

3 stars