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Epic

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Epic
poem/translation/alighieri

Beatrice and the Ineffable Smile: Canto XXIII of Paradise by Dante Alighieri, Translated by Stephen Binns

The Society
May 24, 2023
Beauty, Dante, Epic, Poetry, Translation
6 Comments
. Beatrice and the Ineffable Smile: Canto XXIII of Paradise by Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) translated by Stephen Binns Just as a bird that stands watch to ensure __the safety of her brood, beside the...
poem/benson brown/epic

‘The Devil Comes to Buckingham’ from Legends of Liberty: Volume 2, by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
May 12, 2023
Epic, Poetry, Satire
14 Comments
. The Devil Comes to Buckingham from Legends of Liberty: Volume 2 One day as Britons cheered their sovereign’s sight, The devil crawled into his servant’s brain. He entered through the ear as a termite And...
poem/sale/epic

DoorWay Canto 2 Extract from James Sales’ Epic Poem

The Society
May 6, 2023
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
16 Comments
. DoorWay Canto 2, Extract The Poet has gone through the ‘DoorWay’ and entered heaven. Here in the second Canto and in the constellation of Libra he meets his dead grandfather (who was a Libran: 30/7) and...
poem/alighieri/paradise

Beatrice Does Not Smile: Canto XXI of Paradise by Dante Alighieri, Translated by Stephen Binns

The Society
April 24, 2023
Beauty, Dante, Epic, Poetry, Translation
6 Comments
. Beatrice Does Not Smile: Canto XXI of Paradise by Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) translated by Stephen Binns And now my eyes were fastened once again __upon my lady’s face, and all the while __Beatrice __my...
poem/alighieri/beatrice

Beatrice Smiles: Canto XXXI of Purgatory by Dante Alighieri, Translated by Stephen Binns

The Society
March 15, 2023
Beauty, Dante, Epic, Poetry, Translation
7 Comments
. Beatrice Smiles: Canto XXXI of Purgatory by Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) translated by Stephen Binns “You, on the other side of the sacred river,” __Lethe __she called to me, and sharply to the point,...
poem/dante/inferno/paolo and francesca

Dante Meets Paolo and Francesca: Canto V of Inferno by Dante Alighieri, Translated by Stephen Binns

The Society
February 15, 2023
Dante, Epic, Poetry, Translation
12 Comments
. Dante Meets Paolo and Francesca: Canto V of Inferno by Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) translated by Stephen Binns And so from that first circle I went down __into the second, where there is less space __and...
poem/covid/James Sale/church closed

StairWell Canto 8: ‘Covid-Priest’ by James Sale

The Society
January 28, 2023
Covid-19, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
30 Comments
. Canto 8: Covid-Priest from The English Cantos Volume 2: StairWell StairWell is the Poet’s Purgatory, and as in HellWard where we met with contemporary challenges such as Brexit, so here in StairWell the...

“John Adams in Heaven,” from Legends of Liberty by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
January 22, 2023
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Poetry
18 Comments
. John Adams in Heaven John and Abigail Adams are being guided through heaven by John Milton. He takes them to a villa in the Elysian Fields, where they meet a famous Roman who shows them a vision of their...

‘Moments from Dante’s Inferno’ by Paul Buchheit

The Society
January 20, 2023
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
14 Comments
. Moments from Dante’s Inferno Prepared to travel, if the gods allowed, I saw the woods were dreary, dark as death. I chose to heed a blessing there endowed, before emerging spirits took a breath. And that...

Legends of Liberty, Volume 2: ‘Lightning Ben’ by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
December 1, 2022
Culture, Epic, Humor, Poetry
31 Comments
. Lightning Ben an excerpt from Legends of Liberty, Volume 2 Sing, muse! Bestow your gifts on—blah blah blah. I opened my first book with that. You get The point. Obliging poets need to draw The paths of...

StairWell Canto 10 Extract 2 by James Sale

The Society
September 19, 2022
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
44 Comments
. StairWell Canto 10 extract 2 Context: In the 10th Canto of HellWard we met 4 poets condemned to Hell. Now in the 10th Canto of StairWell, we meet another 4 poets stuck in Purgatory. This extract takes us to...

Athena Emboldens Telemachus: Book 1 of The Odyssey Complete Text, Translated by Mike Solot

The Society
September 15, 2022
Culture, Epic, Poetry, Translation
6 Comments
. The Odyssey Translator's Note: The Odyssey, Book 1, which exemplifies an essential feature of Homer's art as a storyteller, the way he composes the books of his epics as wholes, each with its own beginning,...

StairWell Canto 10 Extract by James Sale

The Society
September 5, 2022
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
55 Comments
. StairWell Canto 10 extract Context: In the 10th Canto of HellWard we met 4 poets condemned to Hell. Now in the 10th Canto of StairWell, we meet another 4 poets stuck in Purgatory. This extract takes us to...

Persia, Ferdowsi, and the Shahnameh: An Essay by Adam Sedia

The Society
August 17, 2022
Culture, Epic, Essays, Poetry
3 Comments
. POEMS THAT BUILT A NATION PART II. Persia, Ferdowsi, and the Shahnameh by Adam Sedia A previous essay highlighted how the Finnish national epic poem, the Kalevala, spurred the development of Finnish culture...

‘Where Your Treasure Is’ and Other Poetry by Brian Yapko

The Society
May 25, 2022
Beauty, Blank Verse, Culture, Epic, Humor, Poetry
20 Comments
. Where Your Treasure Is “Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where...

Winners of the 100 Days of Dante Poetry Contest

The Society
April 18, 2022
Acrostic, Dante, Epic, From the Society, High School Submissions, Poetry, Poetry Contests, Terza Rima
7 Comments
Judges Angela Alaimo O’Donnell James Sale . OVERALL WINNER . Papa’s Commedia by Nicholas Walz That was hellish—the hulking chopper plunging Through the top: the battered fuselage yawed, Dipped, and...

‘The Poem that Built a Nation: Finland and the Kalevala’: An Essay by Adam Sedia

The Society
February 28, 2022
Culture, Epic, Essays, Poetry
13 Comments
. The Poem that Built a Nation: Finland and the Kalevala by Adam Sedia Nowhere perhaps is the power of poetry more apparent than in its ability to unite a culture---literally to build a nation. Homer’s epics...

An Extract from Canto 4 of James Sale’s StairWell

The Society
January 21, 2022
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
13 Comments
. The English Cantos: StairWell Canto 4 Leaving a broken relationship of the past behind in Canto 3, the poet enters a new world of education and what that means. Before entering a specific establishment, the...

‘The Spirit of the Anti-Mary’ by Karen Darantière

The Society
January 14, 2022
Culture, Epic, Poetry
4 Comments
. The Spirit of the Anti-Mary a poem in honor of Our Lady of Gualalupe in reparation for the crime of abortion and abortion-tainted medicines All those who seek me find eternal Life, But those who sin against...

Two Excerpts from Legends of Liberty, Chapter 5, by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
September 29, 2021
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Poetry
11 Comments
. from Legends of Liberty Volume 1 . The Battle of Concord By that rude bridge men formed up double file,The company from Acton in the van.Their bayonets cast beams—reverse sundialsDissecting the empire’s...

Review: Legends of Liberty Volume 1 by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
August 18, 2021
Culture, Epic, Essays, Humor, Poetry, Reviews
3 Comments
Reviewed Book: Legends of Liberty Volume 1, by Andrew Benson Brown, T A J Classics, 2021 by James Sale Legends of Liberty is an important new poem from the American poet, Andrew Benson Brown. The nearest...

‘The English Cantos: Volume 2: StairWell. Canto 3 Ex-Wife’ by James Sale

The Society
August 6, 2021
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
20 Comments
. The Argument: The Poet, with Dante and Virgil, has arrived on the third step of the StairWell, or Purgatory. Dante at the start of Canto 3 has been at pains to explain to the shocked Poet what just has...

‘The English Cantos: Volume 2: StairWell. Canto 1 Ascent’ by James Sale

The Society
March 7, 2021
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry
13 Comments
. The poet has now escaped Hell, and has arrived in Purgatory or what he calls the StairWell. But he seems to have been abandoned by Dante, and has a fresh set of problems to confront. In this first section of...

Five Sonnets from ‘The Gift of Life’ by Amanda Hall

The Society
February 8, 2021
Art, Beauty, Culture, Epic, Poetry
7 Comments
. “The Gift of Life” is a formal epic poem of 600 original Shakespearean sonnets, a tale about a love that existed in life and art with equal force. The heroine of the tale goes to the great war of words...

The Aeneid, Book I, Lines 1-50: A Rhyming Translation by Len Krisak

The Society
November 8, 2020
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Poetry, Translation
3 Comments
The complete new translation can found from Hackett Publishing here. My poem sings of one man forced from Troy by war. Fate harried him to find a home on Latium’s shore— On some Lavinian littoral. By...

‘The American Revolution: An Epic Poem,’ Chapter III, by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
November 3, 2020
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Humor, Poetry
20 Comments
The American Revolution: An Epic Poem Chapter I Chapter II by Andrew Benson Brown   Chapter III: The New-World Mercury The historical source material for the below installment is Paul Revere’s...

The Rebirth of Epic: A Review of James Sale’s HellWard

The Society
August 22, 2020
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Essays, Poetry, Reviews
31 Comments
by Andrew Benson Brown James Sale’s HellWard is the first volume of a planned trilogy entitled The English Cantos. If the quality of the current volume is any indication of the two forthcoming ones, then...

‘The American Revolution: An Epic Poem,’ Chapter II, by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
July 4, 2020
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Humor, Poetry
9 Comments
The American Revolution: An Epic Poem Chapter I by Andrew Benson Brown   Chapter II: Thomas Jefferson in Hell On July Fourth of Eighteen Twenty-Six, Old Thomas Jefferson was sent to Hell In his...

‘HellWard Canto 11: Poetasters,’ From James Sale’s English Cantos

The Society
May 8, 2020
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Humor, Poetry
12 Comments
The Argument: The Poet, having escaped the HellWard of European and corrupt politicians, emerges into the penultimate HellWard depth where he, with his guide, Dante, meets the Poetasters from America and...

‘The Unknown Circle of Hell’ by Joseph S. Salemi

The Society
April 8, 2020
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Humor, Poetry
28 Comments
  Personae and scene: Vergil and Dante, somewhere in the mid-region of Hell. Dante: Honored Vergil, tell me where we’re going— It’s hard for me to take in what you’re showing Without some...

‘The American Revolution: An Epic Poem,’ Chapter I, by Andrew Benson Brown

The Society
April 5, 2020
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Humor, Poetry
12 Comments
  Chapter I Who sings of arms these days? Or even men? The seed of Adam’s tucked inside Eve’s apple, And sits not taking root—his defect’s been Apparent since equality’s long grapple. Poor...

What Happened to Narrative Poetry?—An Opinion Piece by James A. Tweedie

The Society
March 5, 2020
Culture, Epic, Essays, Poetry, Short Stories
26 Comments
This isn’t so much an essay as it is an opinion piece where I shoot off a few words in praise of narrative poetry or, in other words, poetry that tells a story. From Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, to...

A Poem for Black History Month: Excerpts from Two Mistakes, by Martin Hill Ortiz

The Society
February 3, 2020
Culture, Epic, Poetry
4 Comments
  Two Mistakes is a drama-length poem in metered verse for which I won second place in the Tom Howard / Margaret Reid Poetry Prize. The full work is posted here. It is based on Shakespeare's A...

Poetry, Beauty and the Modern Era: Essay by James Sale

The Society
August 12, 2019
Beauty, Culture, Epic, Essays, Poetry
20 Comments
  One interesting question is ‘why poetry, specifically?’ I am currently writing an ‘epic’ called The English Cantos, and I have chosen to write my epic in terza rima. There are many forms of...

Five Clerihews for the Iliad, by Raymond C. Roy

The Society
August 5, 2019
Clerihew, Epic, Poetry
9 Comments
A Clerihew is a four-line comic poem with a rigid rhyming scheme, aabb, but no metric requirements. It stands in stark contrast to the strict metric requirements with no rhyming scheme in the Iliad. This...

Rediscovering Homer’s ‘Odyssey’

The Society
October 24, 2018
Beauty, Culture, Education, Epic, Essays, Poetry
27 Comments
by Evan Mantyk Where is Homer? The epic poems of the famous Greek bard were the cornerstone of education for young Socrates, Alexander the Great, Roman emperors, William Shakespeare, and every serious...

Translation of the Iliad’s Beginning by J. Simon Harris

The Society
January 21, 2018
Culture, Education, Epic, Poetry, Translation
7 Comments
Homer’s Iliad I.1-47. Translation in the epic hexameter, the meter of the Greek. Sing of the wrath, my goddess, of Peleus’ son Achilles, doomed and destructive, which gave the Achaeans numberless...

10 Greatest Poems Written by John Milton

The Society
November 7, 2017
Best Poems, Culture, Epic, Essays, Poetry
8 Comments
John Milton (Born December 9, 1608 – died November 8, 1674) was an English poet of the late Renaissance period. He is most noted for his epic poem on the fall of Satan and Adam and Eve’s ejection from the...

Translation of Dante’s Inferno, Canto I and Poetry by J. Simon Harris

The Society
July 14, 2017
Beauty, Culture, Dante, Epic, Poetry, Terza Rima, Translation
10 Comments
Dante’s Inferno, Canto I (Poem by Dante Alighieri / translation by J. Simon Harris in terza rima) In the middle of the journey of our life I found myself again in a dark forest, for I had lost the pathway...

Review: Apocalypse by Frederick Turner, Ilium Press, 2016

The Society
March 19, 2017
Epic, Essays, Poetry, Reviews
30 Comments
By James Sale There are nine Muses of poetry, daughters of Zeus or some say Apollo, and the Titaness, Mnenosyne, goddess of memory, past and future. And of these nine the most important is Kalliope, she of...
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  1. ABB on ‘The Devil Comes to Buckingham’ from Legends of Liberty: Volume 2, by Andrew Benson BrownMay 28, 2023

    I think when writing historical fiction, as this is, there needs to be a certain amount of made-up stuff to…

  2. Shaun C. Duncan on A Poem on Target’s Transgender Clothing for Youth, and Other Poetry by Susan Jarvis BryantMay 28, 2023

    The most intriguing theory I've heard on the matter is that it's the overlords driving the stock price down so…

  3. Paul W Erlandson on ‘For My Grandfather’: A Poem by Amadeus V.May 28, 2023

    I think this is very well done. Bravo, Amadeus V!

  4. Susan Jarvis Bryant on A Poem on Target’s Transgender Clothing for Youth, and Other Poetry by Susan Jarvis BryantMay 28, 2023

    Cheryl, thank you. I'm glad you liked the triolet... the form allowed me to pack a powerful punch in its…

  5. Susan Jarvis Bryant on A Poem on Target’s Transgender Clothing for Youth, and Other Poetry by Susan Jarvis BryantMay 28, 2023

    Mark, thank you very much indeed for your generous and kind comments. You're spot on when you say, many poets…

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