Poetry Books - Page 3

Tao Te Ching: A New English Version (Perennial Classics)

Lao Tzu

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 178 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

BEWARE OF CLUELESS REVIEWERS! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The naysaying reviewers did not bother to read this book through. Nowhere does it claim to be a literal translation, and following the lessons are the author's notes, explaining exactly what he did or didn't add, and why, as well as references to what was replaced from the original -- much of which is as wonderful as the lessons themselves. There is so much beauty and depth in this "new version" that this reviewer can see no reason for the downright fury it seems to provoke in these other readers. Perhaps they should keep reading the Tao -- ANY version.

Great living literature opens you up...this is one of those. 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

This book has true value...unlike most books the Tao Te Ching can help you find meaning and truth in life.

Editorial Review:

In eighty-one brief chapters, Lao-tzu's Tao Te Ching, or Book of the Way, provides advice that imparts balance and perspective, a serene and generous spirit, and teaches us how to work for the good with the effortless skill that comes from being in accord with the Tao—the basic principle of the universe.

Stephen Mitchell's bestselling version has been widely acclaimed as a gift to contemporary culture.

The Sermon on the Mount: The Key to Success in Life

Emmet Fox

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 78 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

The only spiritual book you'll ever need. 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Emmet Fox once paid Florence Scoville Schinn (see "The Game of Life and How to Play It") a great compliment by writing that her works were accessible even to those who did not wish to devote their attention to deeper study. I believe that's true also of "The Sermon on the Mount."

For Christians seeking deeper faith and understanding without committing years to reading the Bible, attending weekly church services, or joining a Bible study group, try this book. Since I was little, I've felt strongly that Jesus is my link to joy and knowing. I've been drawn to the Book of Matthew as the story of Jesus that most resonates with me, and to the Sermon on the Mount as the essence of the teachings of Jesus.

Fox's treatment of the Sermon on the Mount, section by section, provides the key to understanding the entire Bible. It's easy to read and, more importantly, every paragraph and every sentence stands alone as a complete message about what's facing me today.

For those of a metaphysical bent, you can hardly find a more complete, more accurate, simpler statement of truth. My dowsing rates this book higher on the Hawkins scale than any book I've ever encountered.

For those emersed in "A Course in Miracles," Fox has written the pocket version - easy to carry and study - and the perfect introduction to those with whom we'd like to share The Course.

For those working the twelve steps, know that Fox's writings inspired Bill Wilson. Read "The Sermon on the Mount" as a loving companion to the Big Book.

You can read other books by Fox if you'd like, or other great works by other inspired spiritual writers, but you only NEED this one.

Editorial Review:

Fresh with contemporary relevance, this classic of positive thinking from one of the world's great motivational writers offers galvanizing insights on self-transformation. Based on Emmet Fox's simple message that "thoughts are things" and all potential lies in their creative and constructive use, these thirty-one inspiring essays how to have it all -- health, healing, happiness, and a liberated spirit -- through the power of constructive though. First published in 1940, Power Through Constructive Thinking has been a never-failing source of strength and renewal for generations of readers.

The Practice of the Presence of God

Brother Lawrence

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 87 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Radical...not necessarily practical 3 out of 5 stars.
0 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Brother Lawrence's spiritual classic can be summarized in a few short steps:

1. Have a mystical vision of the divine love of God. (Unfortunately, no hint of how this can be accomplished is given.)

2. Renounce the world and everything in it. (Larry Bro apparently had no family, career, or other extenuating circumstances, so he joined a monastery as a lay brother and cook.)

3. Pray ceaselessly, even while you're asleep. Don't worry about temptation, your neighbor, suffering, mortification, responsibility, complications, penance, formality, growth, doctrine, vocation, redemption, and anything else you can think of.

After around four to ten years of tormenting doubt and fear (by his accounts) you'll be ready to bask in the warm glow of grace!

The message of complete faith in God is indeed a great one. But the line between self-sacrifice and self-indulgence sometimes gets blurred. We are not given an account of any works of charity, love, or mercy that Brother Lawrence may have accomplished. Only that he went around happy all day. Somtimes he was so giddy with God's love that he would have to pinch himself to keep from giggling in front of other people. Then he derides normal people for not being drunk all day on spiritual consolations.

What is truly ironic is that Brother Lawrence's path was, at the time, thought to be a great shortcut. Compared to the discipline required of monks in those days, I'm sure it was. Nowadays, Deepak Chopra Winfrey would probably be unimpressed. The great Saints would probably recommend that you pick up your cross and eschew the easy path.

Editorial Review:

The Practice of the Presence of God is among the most enduringly popular of all Christian devotional works. It is a collection of conversations with a simple seventeenth-century French Carmelite monk who, through the simplest of everyday activities, was able to achieve a profound intimacy with God. Brother Lawrence's teaching has resonated with Christians for more than three hundred years, and it is fitting that it is now available in this beautiful edition with a fine full-cloth cover, a sewn binding, and a ribbon marker.

Odyssey

Homer

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 140 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

DON'T buy into the Fagles "hype"! 1 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

Although I respect Fagles as a modern translator, I cannot recommend his translations of Homer...I would probably only recommend his translations of Sophocles's 3 Theban Plays.

Homer's Iliad and Odyssey don't sound like Epics anymore under Fagles...they are turned into mild nice sounding children stories! He tones down Homer to the point that I feel that Fagels wants his personality to shine NOT Homer's! I am gravely disappointed by this.

I also find that he not only forces beauty into the text but adds too much of his personal warmth that gets in the way of the texts and creates a vision of Homer's epics that is truly unsound to the original.

Not only that but the font and design of the print is an eye sore, I don't like the choice the publishers and Fagles gave to the works. It doesn't make for easy reading...

Stanley Lombardo's translations are unparalleled in their print layout, design and font...not to say vivid and powerful evocative translation.

I continue to find Richmond Lattimore's facinating translations the most accurate to how the Ancient Greek language sounds to English ears. I would buy Lattimore over Fagles (and Fitzgerald).

And I still think Rieu's famous Prose version from 1946 is hard to beat for it's modernity and readibility.

...Find out for yourself by comparing a few versions but don't be duped into this mysterious "Fagles hype"!

Editorial Review:

If The Iliad is the world's greatest war epic, then The Odyssey is literature's grandest evocation of everyman's journey though life. Odysseus's reliance on his wit and wiliness for survival in his encounters with divine and natural forces during his ten-year voyage home to Ithaca after the Trojan War is at once a timeless human story and an individual test of moral endurance.

Translated by Robert Fagles
Introduction and Notes by Bernard Knox

Rebecca's Reward (Daughters of Blessing #4)

Lauraine Snelling

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

Very good for the most part 4 out of 5 stars.
6 of 6 people found this review helpful.

NOTE: The review on the Amazon webpage is clearly NOT about this book, there is no "Thomas Ollenburger" or any other Mennonite characters, nor does any part of the story take place in Kansas or Boston.

Now for the real plot: Rebecca Baard wants to start an ice cream/soda shop in the town of Blessing, but her brother thinks it's nothing but a foolish dream. She travels to Bismarck to visit her cousin Penny and has the chance to visit an ice cream parlor and learn how to run it, and meets a nice young man after a skating mishap - he encourages her to stay in Bismarck longer but she insists on returning to Blessing as planned. Upon her return to Blessing, she is shocked to learn that Mr. Jeffers, the despicable new owner of Penny's former store in Blessing, has been telling everyone that he and Rebecca are engaged because her brothers gave him permission to court her. The brothers refuse to take responsibility for their actions and force her to confront Mr. Jeffries to say she's not interested, but he turns on her (thankfully, a friend hears Rebecca scream and stops him in time). Most of her family and friends know it's not Rebecca's fault and are ready to defender her, but Mrs. Valders, the town gossip, tries to put all the blame on her.

My favorite parts of this story is are Mrs. Valders' adopted son Gerald, who dislikes confrontation, willingly stands up to his mother after she publicly declares falsehoods about Rebecca, and Gerald's brother Toby, previously the school bully, is instrumental in making everything work out right in the end.

Editorial Review:

Nineteen-year-old Rebecca Baard has experienced more than her share of sorrow, and now she is afraid to open her heart to love. Besides, no man has ever shown enough interest in her to come courting. So Rebecca's friends set out to remedy the situation, concocting social events to attract all the eligible bachelors in Blessing and advising her in the use of feminine wiles. When none of these efforts seem to work, Rebecca tries yet another tack, only to discover that even the best of intentions can't keep events from taking a surprising turn.

Will Rebecca overcome her fears, or will she settle for something less than love?

Amazing Peace: A Christmas Poem

Maya Angelou

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 13 Average rating: 3.5 of 5

A Scandalous, Shameless Marketing Scam and a Terrible Poem 1 out of 5 stars.
3 of 8 people found this review helpful.

We all have very strong feelings about peace. Throughout human history, peace has always been lacking. We live in a time when our country is run by corrupt criminals who attack other countries for corporate profiteering. We also continue to live in a world where the three major religions all proclaim they are the one true religion and war on the other two. So, it is definitely a good time for a message of peace!

But this beautifully bound little book containing a cliche'd, trite, and just plain bad poem comes up empty. A message of peace is not sold in a one-poem book for $9.99 as an impulse-buy merchandising scam at Christmas. If Maya Angelou had printed this poem in newspapers, or sent out postcards to the world on her own dime with this poem, I would have more respect for her intentions. But this book is the worst scam, one that plays upon our hearts and souls to milk our pocketbooks. I received this book as a gift from a friend who had bought it for everyone she knew. Her intentions were beautiful: a message of peace.

The end of organized religion will bring us one step closer to a world where the are no wars in the name of God. For those of you who don't know, Christianity was created by the Romans as a method of controlling people. If you have to go through the priest to reach the divine "God", and the priest can tell you what "God" orders you to do, then the priest (the Church) has control over you. The truth is, the divine nature of this universe is inside all of us. We are all made of cosmic stardust, literally, because all matter on this planet was made from exploding stars. We are all sacred. All you have to do to reach the divine is sit quietly and reflect upon your own beautiful luminous nature.

So if you want to give a beautiful message of peace, don't give $9.99 plus tax to Angelou and Random House. Just reach out with your own beautiful nature to those you love (and those you don't). Write your own poem, your own song, whatever. Make your own little book, and make it real. Work for peace. Volunteer. Get involved. It will mean so much more than Angelou's scandalous, commercialized marketing scam of a Christmas Poem.

And if you want to read some real poetry, try Charles Bukowski. His stuff is infinitely better and you'll get hundreds of great poems for the price of one bad one from Angelou.

Editorial Review:

“ANGELS AND Mortals, Believers and Nonbelievers, look heavenward,” Maya Angelou writes, “and speak the word aloud. Peace.” Angelou’s moving poem is a radiant affirmation of the goodness of humanity. First read at the 2005 White House tree-lighting ceremony, it comes alive again as a fully illustrated children’s book, celebrating the promise of peace in the holiday season. In this simple story, a family joins with their community—rich and poor, black and white, Muslim and Jew—to celebrate the holidays.

Say Uncle: Poems

Kay Ryan

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 8 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

"uncle!" 5 out of 5 stars.
5 of 6 people found this review helpful.

lyrics of moral turpitude and musical agility (the brief lines of Kay Ryan maintain their integrity), and therein lies their beauty.

Editorial Review:

Filled with wry logic and a magical, unpredictable musicality, Kay Ryan's poems continue to generate excitement with their frequent appearances in The New Yorker and other leading periodicals. Say Uncle, Ryan's fifth collection, is filled with the same hidden connections, the same slyness and almost gleeful detachment that has delighted readers of her earlier books. Compact, searching, and oddly beautiful, these poems, in the words of Dana Gioia, "take the shape of an idea clarifying itself." "A poetry collection that marries wit and wisdom more brilliantly than any I know.... Poetry as statement and aphorism is rarely heartbreaking, but reading these poems I find myself continually ambushed by a fundamental sorrow, one that hides behind a surface that interweaves sound and sense in immaculately interesting ways." -- Jane Hirshfield, Common Boundary; "The first thing you notice about her poems is an elbow-to-the-ribs playfulness." -- Patricia Holt, San Francisco Chronicle.

The Niagara River: Poems (Grove Press Poetry)

Kay Ryan

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 2 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Sublime 4 out of 5 stars.
29 of 30 people found this review helpful.

I am a big fan of poetry and this book did not disappoint me. I live in Australia, and therefore am not exposed to what is au courant in the US anymore [originally from the US]. I saw Kay Ryan on the Lehrer Report which is broadcast over here. She was reading from this book, and I decided to buy a copy.
The poems are earthy and touch places of the heart that elicit a sigh of recognition. It is good to read poetry that is open, uncoded and taps into our everyday experiences with such elegant simplicity.

Editorial Review:

Bafflingly effective, this new collection of poetry from the winner of the 2004 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize seems too brief and blithe to pack so much wallop. Intense and relaxed, buoyant and rueful, the singular music of Kay Ryan's poetry appeals to a wide audience. Her poems, products of an immaculately off-kilter mind, have appeared everywhere from the Sunday funnies to New York subways to the pages of The New Yorker to plaques at the zoo. The Niagara River, her third collection for the Grove Press Poetry Series that began with the publication of Elephant Rocks, promises to offer similar gems of hidden wonder.

All the Kings Men Play (Play Version)

Robert Penn Warren

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Total reviews: 176 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Editorial Review:

One of the great classics of American fiction reissued as it was originally written.

Winner of the 1947 Pulitzer Prize, All the King's Men is one of the most famous and widely read works in American fiction. Its original publication by Harcourt catapulted author Robert Penn Warren to fame and made the novel a bestseller for many seasons. Set in the 1930s, it traces the rise and fall of demagogue Willie Talos, a fictional Southern politician who resembles the real-life Huey "Kingfish" Long of Louisiana. Talos begins his career as an idealistic man of the people, but he soon becomes corrupted by success, caught between dreams of service and a lust for power. All the King's Men is as relevant today as it was fifty years ago.

In a momentous publishing event, Robert Penn Warren's masterpiece has been restored and reintroduced by literary scholar Noel Polk, whose work on the texts of William Faulkner has proved so important to American literature. Polk presents the novel as it was originally written, and without the deletions required by its original editors. The result restores Warren's complexity and subtlety to an already near-perfect work, charging the characters with an energy and a more tangled web of relationships than previously was available. All the King's Men is a landmark in letters. This new edition brings it fully to life.

"The publication of a new, corrected edition of All the King's Men is welcome
news for all who care about American literature. Robert Penn Warren's
prize-winning novel has remained a classic since its publication more than half
a century ago. Editor Noel Polk has studied the manuscript and all other
available versions of Warren's finest novels, eliminating errors and retrieving deleted material. The result has been to enrich the character of narrator
Jack Burden and his protagonist, Willie Talos, in this story of tumultuous Louisiana politics which also has implications for morals and manners in the modern world." -Joseph Blotner, author of Robert Penn Warren: A Biography

Leaves of Grass: The Original 1855 Edition (Thrift Edition)

Walt Whitman

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 5 Average rating: 5.0 of 5

A small part of 'Leaves of Grass' 4 out of 5 stars.
21 of 21 people found this review helpful.

The original edition of 'Leaves of Grass' published in 1855 contained twelve poems only. The subsequent editions beginning in 1856 were to greatly expand the work. Thus I would recommed that anyone who wishes to know the true range of Whitman's work find another selection of his work of which there is a larger share of his great work.
Whitman is the poet who Emerson prophesied, the American visionary poet who sang of the complex greatness of the society, and connected his own soul with its expansive facts of life.

What More Can Be Said? 5 out of 5 stars.
15 of 15 people found this review helpful.

It's difficult to think of something appropriate to say about a man who spent his life trying to express the panorama of humanity through the lense of his own heart. From a drop of blood to the grandeur of a shipyard or a continent, he takes all readers on a journey wild with raving, raging, sorrow, longing, humbleness and pride. At once he is totally modern and yet rife with history.

For readers new to poetry, Walt Whitman is wonderfully accessible. One can pick up Leaves of Grass and virtually start and stop anywhere and pick up something wonderful every time.

Not to be missed.

Editorial Review:

"The most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed." — Ralph Waldo Emerson. Inspired by transcendentalism, Whitman's immortal collection includes some of the greatest poems of modern times, including his masterpiece "Song of Myself." Shattering standard conventions of symbolism and allegory, it stands as an unabashed celebration of body and nature.