'This Complete Sonnets and Poems is a distinguished addition to a distinguished series. It will repay continuing study, and act as a valuable point of reference for readers concerned more generally with Shakespeare's art and language. Colin Burrow's good sense, tact and balance as aneditor are deeply impressive.' -H. R. Woudhuysen, Times Literary SupplementThis is the only fully annotated and modernized edition to bring together Shakespeare's Sonnets as well as all his poems (including those attributed to him after his death). A full introduction discusses his development as a poet, and how the poems relate to his plays; detailed notes explain the language and allusions in clear modern English. While accessibly written, the edition takes account of the most recent scholarship and criticism.

The greatest sonnets ever written, by the greatest poet and playwright in the English language

"The Sonnets and Narrative Poems" collects together all the non-dramatic poetry of William Shakespeare. While Shakespeare is known best for his plays he also wrote numerous love sonnets and a handful of narrative poems which are excellent literary works in their own right. The narrative poems include two erotically themed works, "Venus and Adonis" and "The Rape of Lucrece" as well as the romantic narratives of "A Lover's Complaint" and "The Phoenix and the Turtle". Shakespeare also wrote a collection of 154 love sonnets. Believed to be written throughout his lifetime there is some dispute as to the intended order of "The Sonnets". It is thought that he planned two contrasting series for the poems. The first is of the desire for a married woman of dark complexion, the so-called "dark lady", and the other about the conflicted love of a fair young man, the "fair youth". This classic collection of non-dramatic poetry shows Shakespeare in a different light than his dramatic works and helps to exemplify the full breadth of his immense literary talents.

"The volume contains the complete Sonnets and poems with a full commentary. An extensive and lively introduction explores Shakespeare's poetic development, and shows how the poems relate to each other and to his dramatic works."--BOOK JACKET.