《LEAVES O F GRASS(草叶集)》One of the great innovative figures in American letters,Walt Whitman created a daringly new kind of poetry that became a major force in world literature. Leaves of Grass is his one book. First published in 1855 with only twelve poems, it was greeted by Ralph Waldo Emerson as "the wonderful gift.., the most extraordinary piece of wit and wisdom that America has yet contributed."Over the course of Whitman"s life, the book reappeared in many versions, expanded and transformed as the author"s experiences and the nation"s history changed and grew. Whitman"s ambition was to create something uniquely American. In that he succeeded. His poems have been woven into the very fabric of the American character. From his solemn masterpieces "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom"d" and "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking" to the joyous freedom of "Song of Myself," "I Sing the Body Electric," and "Song of the Open Road," Whitman"s work lives on, an inspiration to the poets of later generations.

W. B. Yeats was Romantic and Modernist, mystical dreamer and leader of the Irish Literary Revival, Nobel prizewinner, dramatist and, above all, poet. He began writing with the intention of putting his 'very self' into his poems. T. S. Eliot, one of many who proclaimed the Irishman's greatness, described him as 'one of those few whose history is the history of their own time, who are part of the consciousness of an age which cannot be understood without them'. For anyone interested in the literature of the late nineteenth century and the twentieth century, Yeats's work is essential. This volume gathers the full range of his published poetry, from the hauntingly beautiful early lyrics (by which he is still fondly remembered) to the magnificent later poems which put beyond question his status as major poet of modern times. Paradoxical, proud and passionate, Yeats speaks today as eloquently as ever.