English Romantic Poetry

William Collins Books and Decca Records are proud to present ARGO Classics, a historic catalogue of classic fiction read by some of the world’s most renowned voices. Originally released as vinyl records, these expertly abridged and remastered stories are now available to download for the first...

Charged with sensuality and passion, Pablo Neruda's love poems are the most celebrated of the Nobel Prize winner's oeuvre, captivating listeners with earthbound images and reveling in a fiery reimagining of the world. Mostly written on the island paradise of Capri (the idyllic setting of the Oscar-winning movie Il Postino), Love Poems embraces the seascapes surrounding the poet and his love, Matilde Urrutia, their waves and shores saturated with a new, yearning eroticism.

William Collins Books and Decca Records are proud to present ARGO Classics, a historic catalogue of classic prose and verse read by some of the world’s most renowned voices. Originally released as vinyl records, these expertly remastered stories are now available to download for the first time...

The period of English romantic poetry occurred roughly between 1800 and 1850 and was represented by poets such as William Blake, Lord Byron, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and William Wordsworth. All of these poets are featured in this collection of more than 50 poems read by award-winning actors that include Joan Allen, Julie Christie, Stephen Fry, Glenda Jackson, and Jude Law.

A collection of the greatest poetry from the Romantic period, read by some of the 20th century’s most renowned actors. Love, romance and portrayals of nature are played out in these timeless readings of poetry written during the Romantic period. Performed by Richard Burton, Peter Orr, William Squire, Richard Marquand, Peggy Ashcroft, Margaretta Scott, Tony Church, Derek Godfrey, Patrick Garland, Gary Watson and Janette Richer. This collection includes poems from: William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Blake, Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats.

In this volume we listen to the world through the eyes and words of the English Romantics. This very special poetical period is filled with the loving and tender verse of poets who still beguile us all with their beauty.

In her prize-winning fourth collection, Mean Time, Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy dramatizes scenes from childhood, adolescence and adulthood, finding moments of grace or consolation in memory, love and language amid the complexities of life. These are powerful poems of loss, betrayal and desire...

The language of Poetry is an art that most of us attempt at some point in our lives. Although its commonplace exposure has been somewhat marginalised in today's often fast-paced lives we all recognise good verse that can empathise with our thoughts or open us up to experience new things in new ways, to better understand and to enjoy the many strands of our lives.

With a dynamic spirit, these great English poets made a conscious return to nostalgia and spiritual depth. Each chose a different path, but they are united in a love of moods, impressions, scenes, stories, sights and sounds. In this collection of more than forty poems are some of the finest and most memorable works in the English language.

Who was the bestselling English poet of the nineteenth century? No, not Tennyson or Byron or Wordsworth—but Felicia Hemans (1793-1835), “the most considerable woman poet of the Romantic period” and “the most notable British poet flourishing between the death of Byron and the rise of Tennyson and the Brownings” (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2008). With an unfailing and seemingly effortless command of language, she voiced the deepest concerns of ordinary people, especially women, to an extent that no other writer of her time could do.

A selection illustrating the breathtaking variety of Byron’s poetry. Read by Linus Roache, star of the critically acclaimed film Wings of the Dove, this collection includes She Walks in Beauty, The Destruction of Sennacherib, The Vision of Judgment and selections from Childe Harold, The...

From the Booker Prize-winning author of ‘Offshore’ comes this unusual romance between the poet Novalis and his fiancée Sophie, newly introduced by Candia McWilliam. The year is 1794 and Fritz, passionate, idealistic and brilliant, is seeking his father’s permission to announce his...

Sixty-nine poems by six of the most admired women Romantic writers—English, Scottish, Irish, and American: Dorothy Wordsworth (William Wordsworth’s sister), Joanna Baillie, Eliza Townsend, Mary Tighe, Sara Coleridge (Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s daughter), and Caroline Bowles Southey. Each in her own way, they all broke with the poetic conventions of the past, writing in ordinary language about ordinary people, and approaching the traditional subjects of poetry with fresh eyes. Comedy and tragedy, love and hatred, life and death, oppression and freedom—they’re all here.

Lydia Huntley Sigourney (1791-1864) was perhaps the most popular and influential American poet of her time. Deeply concerned with social injustices of all kinds, she was already speaking out against such problems as slavery, war, and the persistent mistreatment of Native Americans as early as the 1820s. She was equally at home in comedy and tragedy, and continued to publish with unabated zest and incisiveness for half a century. In all, she is estimated to have written over 2,000 poems.

L. E. L. was the pen-name of Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802-1838), a “wild and wayward girl” whose outspoken poems about love, hypocrisy, social injustice, religions, and death were discussed and debated avidly during her short life, but lost favor afterwards as Victorian notions of propriety became dominant. This wide-ranging collection includes 60 of her most characteristic poems.

Included in this collection are major works by Matthew Arnold, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Robert Browning, William Blake, Rupert Brooke, Robert Burns, Lord Byron, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Abraham Crowley, William Cooper, John Donne, Michael Drayton, John Dryden, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Oliver Goldsmith, Thomas Hardy, Robert Herrick, Thomas Gray, Ben Johnson, John Keats, John Lyly, Christopher Marlowe, Andrew Marvell, John Milton, Alexander Pope, Sir Walter Raleigh, Christina Rossetti, Sir Walter Scott, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Robert Southey and more!

Not often thought of as a romantic, Poe nonetheless captured the beauty of love in many of his works. In this collection, Poe offers his short poem, aptly titled, "Romance", followed by three short stories, "Morella", "Eleonora", and "Ligeia", ending with the poem, "Annabel Lee".

Romanticism was a new movement in philosophy and the arts that began in the late 18th century when major political events shook the world, such as the French Revolution and American independence. It marked a distinct contrast to the prevailing Enlightenment ideals and in poetry represented a more personal intuitive, emotional and meditative expression with a back-to-nature imperative. It subsequently altered the way in which we perceive poetry and beyond as well as defining our own modern sensibilities to the arts.

This poetic exploration of the subject of love was composed in Italy 1821, and published anonymously, as the poet wished its circulation to be restricted to the "esoteric few." The title means "concerning or about a little soul", the subject, in this case, being Shelley's inamorata of the time, Countess Teresa (designated "Emily" in the poem) Viviani, a young woman who was immured in the Convent of Saint Anna by her father. Shelley had had a number of contacts with her by letter and in person.

Here are some of the finest narrative poems in the English language, dating from an age of rich inspiration.