The Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Vol. 2 (Volume 2)

Writing to his publisher in 1813, Shelley expressed the hope that two of his major works "should form one volume"; nearly two centuries later, the second volume of the Johns Hopkins edition of __The Complete Poetry__ fulfills that wish for the first time. This volume collects two important pieces: __Queen Mab__ and __The Esdaile Notebook__. Privately issued in 1813, __Queen Mab__ was perhaps Shelley's most intellectually ambitious work, articulating his views of science, politics, history, religion, society, and individual human relations. Subtitled __A Philosophical Poem: With Notes__, it became his most influential―and pirated―poem during much of the nineteenth century, a favorite among reformers and radicals. __The Esdaile Notebook__, a cycle of fifty-eight early poems, exhibits an astonishing range of verse forms. Unpublished until 1964, this sequence is vital in understanding how the poet mastered his craft.As in the acclaimed first volume, these works have been critically edited by Donald H. Reiman and Neil Fraistat. The poems are presented as Shelley intended, with textual variants included in footnotes. Following the poems are extensive discussions of the circumstances of their composition and the influences they reflect; their publication or circulation by other means; their reception at the time of publication and in the decades since; their re-publication, both authorized and unauthorized; and their place in Shelley's intellectual and aesthetic development. A landmark event in literary scholarship, the publication of the Johns Hopkins edition of The Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley makes available for the first time critically edited clear texts of all poems and translations that Shelley published or circulated among friends, as well as diplomatic texts of his significant incomplete poetic drafts and fragments. Edited upon historical principles by Donald H. Reiman and Neil Fraistat, the multi-volume edition will offer more poems and fragments than any previous collective edition, arranged in the order of their first circulation. These texts are followed by the most extensive collations hitherto available and detailed commentaries that describe their contextual origins and subsequent reception. Rejected passages of released poems appear as supplements to those poems, while other poetic drafts that Shelley rejected or left incomplete at his death will be grouped according to either their publication histories or the notebooks in which they survive. Writing to his publisher in 1813, Shelley expressed the hope that two of his major works "should form one volume"; nearly two centuries later, the second volume of the Johns Hopkins edition of The Complete Poetry fulfills that wish for the first time. This volume collects two important pieces: Queen Mab and The Esdaile Notebook. Privately issued in 1813, Queen Mab was perhaps Shelley's most intellectually ambitious work, articulating his views of science, politics, history, religion, society, and individual human relations. Subtitled A Philosophical Poem: With Notes, it became his most influential -- and pirated -- poem during much of the nineteenth century, a favorite among reformers and radicals. The Esdaile Notebook, a cycle of fifty-eight early poems, exhibits an astonishing range of verse forms. Unpublished until 1964, this sequence is vital in understanding how the poet mastered his craft. As in the acclaimed first volume, these works have been critically edited by Donald H. Reiman and Neil Fraistat. The poems are presented as Shelley intended, with textual variants included in footnotes. Following the poems are extensive discussions of the circumstances of their composition and the influences they reflect; their publication or circulation by other means; their reception at the time of publication and in the decades since; their re-publication, both authorized and unauthorized; and their place in Shelley's intellectual and aesthetic development A landmark event in literary scholarship, the publication of the Johns Hopkins edition of The Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley makes available for the first time critically edited clear texts of all poems and translations that Shelley published or circulated among friends, as well as diplomatic texts of his significant incomplete poetic drafts and fragments. Edited upon historical principles by Donald H. Reiman and Neil Fraistat, the multi-volume edition will offer more poems and fragments than any previous collective edition, arranged in the order of their first circulation. These texts are followed by the most extensive collations hitherto available and detailed commentaries that describe their contextual origins and subsequent reception. Rejected passages of released poems appear as supplements to those poems, while other poetic drafts that Shelley rejected or left incomplete at his death will be grouped according to either their publication histories or the notebooks in which they survive.Volume One includes Shelley's first four works containing poetry (all prepared for publication before his expulsion from Oxford), as well as "The Devil's Walk" (circulated in August 1812), a series of short poems that he sent to friends between 1809 and 18l0, including a bawdy satire on his parents and "Oh wretched mortal, " a poem never before published. An appendix discusses poems lost or erroneously attributed to the young Shelley. Percy Bysshe Shelley (PBS) first tried to release to the public some of the poems in the collection now known as The Esdaile Notebook (Esd) during his first visit to Dublin, early in 1812.