Selected Poems: Tennyson

As Poet Laureate during much of Queen Victoria''s reign, Alfred Lord Tennyson''s spellbinding poetry epitomized the Victorian age, and Selected Poems is edited with an introduction and notes by Christopher Ricks.

''Into the jaw of Death
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred''

The works in this volume trace nearly sixty years in the literary career of one of the nineteenth century''s greatest poets, and show the wide variety of poetic forms he mastered. This selection gives some of Tennyson''s most famous works in full, including Maud, depicting a tragic love affair, and In Memoriam, a profound tribute to his dearest friend. Excerpts from Idylls of the King show a lifelong passion for Arthurian legend, also seen in the dream-like The Lady of Shalot and in Morte d''Arthur. Other works respond to contemporary events, such as Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington, written in Tennyson''s official role as Poet