The Oxford Book of Comic Verse
Second Edition
ISBN13: 9780199561612ISBN10: 0199561613
Paperback,
558 pages
Apr 2009,
In Stock
Price:
$19.95 (03)See more from the series
Description
From limericks to social satire, The Oxford Book of Comic Verse offers a remarkable collection of outstanding light poetry. John Gross has brought together the finest writers in the history of the English language - from Chaucer and Skelton to Shakespeare and Swift, Lord Byron to Robert Browning, Emily Dickinson to John Updike, as well as witty song lyrics from such artists as Irving Berlin and Cole Porter - offering delightful examples of their comic verse. Drawing on many different types of verse, including epigrams, street ballads, advertising jingles, clerihew, music-hall lyrics, and the doubledactyl of the calypso, this highly entertaining collection offers an exceptionally wide range of comic pleasures. The poems are by turns subtle, down-to-earth, macabre, ingenious, acerbic, ribald, and cheerful. Written to amuse, they call forth laughter and delight in equal measure. Compiled by one of our finest critics and anthologists, this reissue boasts a stylish new design and a fresh contemporary feel.Features
- An attractive new design for an acclaimed anthology of comic verse
- Selected and introduced by one of the nation's favourite literary commentators, John Gross
- Includes American, Australian, Indian, and Caribbean writers
About the Author(s)
John Gross was editor of the Times Literary Supplement from 1974 to 1981, and is currently theatre critic of the Sunday Telegraph .
