Chapters into Verse: Poetry in English Inspired by the Bible: Volume 1: Genesis to Malachi

Front Cover
Robert Atwan, Laurance Wieder
Oxford University Press, 1993 M05 6 - 512 pages
For generations, poets have turned to the Bible for insight and inspiration. What did so many creative minds find in scripture? Is the Bible still a vital source of poetic inspirations? Chapters Into Verse is the first comprehensive collection ever made of poems written in English inspired by the Bible. A groundbreaking anthology, it introduces readers to a distinct heritage of English poetry: the scriptural tradition. Though frequently ignored and sometimes suppressed, this tradition rivals the classical and is every bit as venerable. Drawing a unique map of the history of English poetry, the two volumes of Chapters Into Verse survey and define the literary legacy of the Scriptures from the fourteenth century to the present. Each volume is arranged in scriptural order, and each poem is preceded by the biblical passage that inspired it. Thus readers can conveniently witness the various ways sacred text has sparked the imagination of poets throughout the ages. In Volume I, which covers Genesis to Malachi, almost every book of the Old Testament is represented. The collection features verses both famous and unfamiliar, from Milton's Paradise Lost and Lord Byron's Hebrew Melodies to Christopher Smart's hymns and Mary Herbert's psalms. The editors have included poems by virtually all the prominent religious poets--among them, John Donne, George Herbert, Henry Vaughan, Edward Taylor, and Gerard Manley Hopkins. Included, too, are devotional and visionary works from a wide range of vintage poets--Robert Burns, William Blake, Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, Christina Rossetti, Alfred Tennyson, and Robert Browning. Proving that the Bible is just as powerful a source of inspiration today as it was in the past, the collection assembles a mixed congregation of modern and contemporary poets, such as Marianne Moore, Delmore Schwartz, Dylan Thomas, Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, Countee Cullen, e.e. cummings, William Butler Yeats, Robert Lowell, Hugh McDiarmid, Laura (Riding) Jackson, Charles Reznikoff, A.D. Hope, Geoffrey Hill, Denise Levertov, Philip Levine, John Ashbery, and Derek Walcott. Of enduring interest to readers of both scripture and literature, this anthology illuminates key passages of the Old Testament. The measured speech and inspired leaps of poetry offer a spirited alternative to the textual exegesis usually supplied by prose commentary. As such, Chapters Into Verse is truly a poets' Bible. In selection after selection, readers will encounter an astonishing variety of religious experiences, as a host of poets from many eras and many backgrounds respond to Holy Scripture spiritually, profoundly, and imaginatively.
 

Contents

The Bible is an antique Volume Emily Dickinson
3
There Is No Land Yet Laura Riding Jackson
9
A Divine Image William Blake
15
A Negro Sermon James Weldon Johnson
19
Naming the Animals Anthony Hecht
25
Eve Ralph Hodgson
33
Original Sequence Philip Booth
39
Imperial Adam A D Hope
45
Sion Lies Waste Fulke Greville Lord Brooke
259
THE BOOK OF NEHEMIAH
266
From Life to Love Countee Cullen
272
To Brooklyn Bridge Hart Crane
273
A Dialogue Henry Vaughan
279
Hath the rain a father? Jones Very
285
Blessed is the man Marianne Moore
291
Psalm XXIII P Hately Waddell
297

Ancient History Siegfried Sassoon
52
Authors Prologue Dylan Thomas
57
Oaks and Squirrels Anne Porter
70
Isaacs Marriage Henry Vaughan
83
Jacob Wrestling with the Angel Jones Very
96
On Dinah Francis Quarles
97
from The Maidens Blush or Joseph Joshua Sylvester
103
Israel II Charles Reznikoff
109
The Midwives Celia Gilbert
115
On Gods Law Francis Quarles
123
Sound the Loud Timbrel Thomas Moore
129
The Jew Isaac Rosenberg
137
The Book of the World William Drummond of Hawthornden
139
Day of Atonement Charles Reznikoff
146
Lines Written Under the Influence of Delirium William
153
THE FIFTH BOOK OF MOSES CALLED DEUTERONOMY
159
It always felt to me a wrong Emily Dickinson
165
II Robert Browning
166
THE BOOK OF JOSHUA
173
The Stone Henry Vaughan
179
Angry Samson Robert Graves
185
THE BOOK OF RUTH
191
The Pebble Elinor Wylie
197
took my Power in my Hand Emily Dickinson
199
In Which Roosevelt Is Compared to Saul Vachel Lindsay
205
Davids Peccavi Robert Southwell
212
The Rabbis Song Rudyard Kipling
220
David in the Cave of Adullam Charles Lamb
226
The Harp the Monarch Minstrel Swept George Noel Gordon
233
Solomon and Balkis Robert Browning
240
Naamans Song Rudyard Kipling
247
Hymn to the Supreme Being Christopher Smart
253
When Israel of the Lord beloved Sir Walter Scott
303
Hexameters Samuel Taylor Coleridge
305
The First Six Verses of the Ninetieth Psalm Robert Burns
311
Praise II George Herbert
317
The Sleep Elizabeth Barrett Browning
323
Along the Banks Joel Barlow
329
from A Pindaric Poem Anne Finch Countess of Winchilsea
335
Wisdom William Cowper
340
On Woman William Butler Yeats
349
A Spirit Appeared to Me Herman Melville
355
In Ecclesiastes I Read J P White
362
The Conclusion of the Matter Christopher Smart
368
from The Most Excellent Song which was Solomons Michael
375
6 c Elizabeth Singer
381
A Sacred Eclogue Alexander Pope
387
Chapter of the Prophet Isaiah Abraham Cowley
393
The Steed Bit his Master Anonymous
400
On Falling Asleep by Firelight William Meredith
406
Israel Carl Rakosi
410
In Time of The Breaking of Nations Thomas Hardy
416
The Burning Wheel Aldous Huxley
423
Ezekiel John Greenleaf Whittier
429
Nebuchadnezzar Elinor Wylie
435
A Vision of Beasts John HeathStubbs
441
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge Jones Very
443
A Dream Question Thomas Hardy MICAH
451
Haggai John Chagy HAGGAI
457
Easter Wings George Herbert MALACHI
463
Index of First Lines
471
Index of Poets
479
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About the author (1993)

Robert Atwan is founder and series editor of the annual Best American Essays. The editor of numerous anthologies, he has written on the ancient literature of the Near East and his critical essays and poetry reviews have appeared in many national periodicals. Laurance Wieder is the author of several volumes of poetry, including The Coronet of Tours; No Harm Done; The Last Century: Selected Poems; and One Hundred Fifty Psalms, a complete psalter. He has taught Bible and Ancient Authors at Cornell University.

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