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Death is a subject that few of us talk about, but many think about and more than a few of us dread. Whether it is the actual end of our life’s journey or merely a transit point to heavenly glory, its actual point of impact is, obviously, life-changing. But what do poets think of it? How do their minds tangle with the subject and make sense of this? That’s what we wondered too. Poets as rich and diverse as Tennyson, Hardy, Shelley, and Poe here share their words, thoughts and visions with us.

Poetry can sometimes be elusive, the real meaning layered beneath another. In this volume American poets give voice to their nation, their hopes, and their aspirations. Whitman, Emerson, and Dickinson are joined by Poe, Holmes, Dunbar, and others to pleasure our ears and minds with a rambling stroll through their works. It doesn’t define America, but it captures her mood and the flavours of her soul in the early days of the American dream.

Death is a subject that few of us talk about, but many think about and more than a few of us dread. Whether it is the actual end of our life’s journey or merely a transit point to heavenly glory, its actual point of impact is, obviously, life-changing. But what do poets think of it? How do their minds tangle with the subject and make sense of this? That’s what we wondered, too. Poets as rich and diverse as Longfellow, Hood, Bronte, Burns, and Gibran here share their words, thoughts and visions with us.

September - the ninth month of the year in our Gregorian calendar and with it arrives the autumn equinox and the first glimpses of the new season. there is much for our poets, including Browning, Kingsley, Yeats, Lanier, and Lindsay, to say and write about.

May - the fifth month of the year in the Gregorian calendar and popular for May Day and Workers Rights celebrations. for our poets, including Milton, Hopkins, Von Goethe, Wordsworth, and Longfellow, much else is on their minds, and of course, it's beautifully put.

April - the fourth month of the year in the Gregorian calendar heralds spring in earnest and, of course, April showers and perhaps other unsettled weather. For our poets, including Owen, Stevenson, Van Dyke, Hardy, and Shelley, the month provides a rich source for them to muse upon.

August - the eighth month of the year in the Gregorian calendar and the full palette of nature is on glorious display. Our poets, Wordsworth, Swinburne, Alford, Riley, and Hardy, describe and reveal their thoughts on the month and notable dates within it.

Wilkie Collins was a prolific writer of short stories. Always original, his combination of cleverly constructed plots and believable characters has made him one of our most widely read authors.

M R James is widely regarded as THE master of the ghost story. His stories abound with spectres skulking in the shrubbery, in shadowy corners and dark recesses. 'The Mezzotint' is a whimsical and apparently supernatural tale of art on the move; a dying man devises a gruesome plan for testing his heirs in 'The Tractate Middoth', and something is lurking under the bedclothes in 'Rats'.

London. A candidate for global capital. Centre of an empire. The swift-beating heart of culture. A sprawling metropolis of life’s rich tapestry. And a bewildering Escher cityscape of overlapping and colliding forces. People, streets, buildings interweaving and interchanging. And our eminent writers have the talent and focus to reveal the story that lies beneath the words.

The short stories written during and about World War I are often overshadowed by the excellent verse of the War Poets. Yet the short story is perhaps their equal in other ways. Within these succinct little time capsules of words are captured ideas, attitudes, feelings and life that are expressed in a few minutes just as movingly, imaginatively and tellingly as in any other form. Some of these stories will be familiar, but some may not. From Virginia Woolf to Katharine Mansfield and John Buchan to C. E. Montague, various writing styles try to make sense of this world at war.

The short stories written during and about World War I are often overshadowed by the excellent verse of the War Poets. Yet the short story is perhaps their equal in other ways. Within these succinct little time capsules of words are captured ideas, attitudes, feelings and life that are expressed in a few minutes just as movingly, imaginatively and tellingly as in any other form. Some of these stories will be familiar, but some may not. From Virginia Woolf to Katharine Mansfield and John Buchan to C. E. Montague, various writing styles try to make sense of this world at war.

Richard Horatio Edgar Wallace was born on the 1st April 1875 in Greenwich, London. Leaving school at 12 because of truancy, by the age of 15 he had experience selling newspapers, as a worker in a rubber factory, as a shoe shop assistant, as a milk delivery boy and as a ship’s cook. By 1894 he was engaged but broke it off to join the infantry; he was posted to South Africa. He also changed his name to Edgar Wallace, which he took from Lew Wallace, the author of Ben-Hur. In Cape Town in 1898 he met Rudyard Kipling and was inspired to begin writing.

Thomas Burke was born Sydney Thomas Burke on November 29th, 1886 in Eltham, London (at the time it was part of Kent). An author in the early years of the century who brought his skills of pen and eye to parts of London, specifically the Limehouse district of the East End, and wrote with drive and vigour about the characters he met and the places that he knew.

The church building has been pivotal to man’s spiritual and religious life for centuries. For many the interior of a church is literally their one to one with God. The interiors, whether soaring or simple, ornate or minimal, are built for communion, for worship. Outside and surrounding our many churches is the churchyard; the burial ground, the repository for faithful souls. An all-weather idyll of calm around where many a poet has sat and contemplated the surrounding world.

Charles Edward Montague was born in London on New Year’s Day, 1867, and educated at the City of London School and then Balliol College, Oxford. Among those to flow from his pen are the novels A Hind Let Loose and Rough Justice as well as collections of short stories, other essays and a travel book. He finally retired in 1925 and settled down to become a full-time writer in the last years of his life. Charles Edward Montague died in Manchester on May 28th, 1928, at the age of 61.

Night. The day has gone. Departed. And the dark embrace, the inky shadows of night descend. For many a time to unwind and slumber. For some a nagging doubt that all is not well. That some primeval and primordial happening may yet go bump in the night. But for our poets the night is a time of wonder and imagination as well as many other emotions and feelings. Among our ranks of gloried talents are Keats, Coleridge, William Morris, DH Lawrence, Whitman, Longfellow and many more besides. Their descriptions capture what they see and feel as perhaps only a poet can.

Stacy Aumonier was born at Hampstead Road near Regent’s Park, London, on 31st March 1877. He came from a family with a strong and sustained tradition in the visual arts - sculptors and painters. This volume comes to you from Miniature Masterpieces, a specialised imprint from Deadtree Publishing. Our range is large and growing and covers single authors, themes, and many compilations.

Keats. A short life but a legacy of works that few, if any, can rival. And of course his end was to be tragically Romantic. Keats was returning one night to his home in Hampstead when he coughed. He coughed a single drop of blue blood upon his hand and said, ‘I know the colour of that blood, it is arterial blood, it is my death warrant, I must die’. And so it was that tuberculosis took its slow, devastating hold.

In this series we look at short stories from many of our most accomplished writers. Miniature masterpieces with a lot to say. This volume is dedicated to one such recognised master of the short story, namely Katherine Mansfield, whose innovative stream of consciousness and symbolic narrative style profoundly influenced Virginia Woolf. She was born on 14th October 1888 into a prominent family in Wellington, New Zealand, the middle child of five. A gifted cellist who at one point considered taking it up professionally, her first attempts at writing were published in school magazines.