Selected Poems

"The quality which [Andrew] Marvell had," T.S. Eliot remarked, "whether we call it wit or reason or even urbanity.is something precious and needed and apparently extinct." This selection does justice to every aspect of his poetry and demonstrates why he remains one of the best-loved poets in English.

His life spans three ages: the reign of Charles I, the Commonwealth, and the Restoration. But however much his politics altered with history's altering seasons, his poetry is all of a piece, from the bold fairness of "An Horatian Ode Upon Cromwell's Return from Ireland" to the luminous visioni of nature in 'Upon Appleton House'. Philip Larkin admired Marvell's "hallucinatory images" and his "sudden sincerities that are as convincing in our age as his."

As well as twenty-nine selected poems, this volume includes a concise introduction to Marvell and a brief guide to further reading.