Robert P. Irvine – författare

'The Poetic Genius of my Country...bade me sing the loves, the joys, the rural scenes and rural pleasures of my natal Soil, in my native tongue.' Many of the poems and songs of Robert Burns (1759-96) are familiar to readers the world over: lyrical, acerbic, comic, bawdy, democratic. They include 'To a Mouse', 'John Anderson my Jo', 'A red red Rose', 'Auld lang syne', 'Tam o 'Shanter' and many more, whose vernacular energy and simple beauty have ensured lasting popularity. This generous new selection offers Burns's work as it was first encountered by contemporary readers, presenting the texts in the contexts in which they were originally published. It reproduces the whole of Poems, chiefly in the Scottish Dialect published at Kilmarnock in 1786, the volume which made Burns famous; and it reunites a generous selection of songs from The Scots Musical Museum and A Select Collection of Scottish Airs with their full scores. Comprehensive notes describe the circumstances in which other poems and songs found their way into print, both before and after the poet's death. The edition also includes some important letters, and a full glossary to explain Scots words. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Jane Austen is one of England's most enduringly popular authors, renowned for her subtle observations of the provincial middle classes of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century England.This guide to Austen's much-loved work offers:an accessible introduction to the contexts and many interpretations of Austen's texts, including film adaptations, from publication to the presentan introduction to key critical texts and perspectives on Austen's life and work, situated within a broader critical historycross-references between sections of the guide, in order to suggest links between texts, contexts and criticismsuggestions for further reading.Part of the Routledge Guides to Literature series, this volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of Jane Austen and seeking not only a guide to her works but also a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds them.

Jane Austen is one of England's most enduringly popular authors, renowned for her subtle observations of the provincial middle classes of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century England.This guide to Austen's much-loved work offers:an accessible introduction to the contexts and many interpretations of Austen's texts, including film adaptations, from publication to the presentan introduction to key critical texts and perspectives on Austen's life and work, situated within a broader critical historycross-references between sections of the guide, in order to suggest links between texts, contexts and criticismsuggestions for further reading.Part of the Routledge Guides to Literature series, this volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of Jane Austen and seeking not only a guide to her works but also a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds them.

A playful, self-reflexive tale of politics and ethics. In Prince Otto, first published in serial form in 1885, Stevenson uses his genius for adventure and romance to explore some decidedly grown-up themes. The tiny German state of Grünewald seems to be a principality of the world of fairy-tale. But its ruler is beset in public by the forces of modern politics, and troubled in private by an unhappy marriage. Ill-prepared to deal with either, Otto is forced to choose between them.Key Features: * This first fully edited edition of the novel will provoke readers to think again about the scope and purpose of Stevenson's brilliant story-telling* Explores the most modern of themes, the moral compromises required by marriage: a romance in which the marriage of the hero and the heroine is not the happy conclusion of the plot, but the problem that the plot has to resolve* A fascinating text for what it tells us about Stevenson's goals and aspirations at this crucial stage of his career, and about the changing nature of the novel in English at the end of the nineteenth-century

Offers Galt’s most successful novel, a microcosm of fifty years of Scottish historyProvides a comprehensive Introduction by the volume editor which tells the story of this novel’s production and reception; describes the literary and intellectual traditions on which it drew; and explains its relation to the social and political turmoil of the years in which it was written and publishedIncludes extensive Explanatory Notes which identify Galt’s biblical allusions, references to historical events, and social and cultural practices of the period in which the novel is setThe appendices identify Galt’s real-life sources for some of his incidents, and explain the history and institutions of the Church of Scotland as relevant to the storyMaps assist the reader to understand the geography on which the novel is acted out: south-west Scotland and its relation to the British IslesJohn Galt’s Annals of the Parish is the first novel of the Industrial Revolution. Narrated by the minister of a rural Scottish parish, it chronicles with humour and pathos the fifty years 1760–1810 from the perspective of ordinary people swept up in social and economic transformation.