Shelley

Attacked by T.S. Eliot and F.R. Leavis, Shelley's poetry has, over the last few decades, enjoyed a revival of critical interest. His radical politics and arrestingly original poetic strategies have been studied from a variety of perspectives - formalist, deconstructionist, new historicist, feminist and others. Of all the Romantics, Shelly has benefited most from the so-called 'theoretical revolution', as is borne out by the wide range of recent critical work represented in this volume. The 134 essays selected analyse many of Shelley's finest poems, including Alastor, Julian and Maddalo, Prometheus Unbound, Adonais and The Triumph of Life. Michael O'Neill's informed Introduction explores the contours of this debate. Detailed headnotes to the individual essays, explanations of difficult terms, and a further reading section provide invaluable guides to the reader. This collection illuminates the enduring and contemporary significance of the work of a major poet.

Michael O'Neill is Professor of Ensligh at the University of Durham, UK.

General Editors' Preface, Michael O'neill; Chapter 1 Introduction, Michael O'neill; Chapter 2 Destructive Creativity: Alastor (1815), Timothy Clark; Chapter 3, Frances Ferguson; Chapter 4 Shelley's Doubles: An Approach to Julian and Maddalo, Kelvin Everest; Chapter 5 Unchaining Mythography: Prometheus Unbound, Jerrold E. Hogle; Chapter 6 Shelley's Perplexity, Prometheus Unbound, Isobel Armstrong; Chapter 7 The Politics of Reception, The Cenci, William A. Ulmer; Chapter 8 The Exoteric Political Poems, Stephen C. Behrendt; Chapter 9 The Dramatic Lyric, 'Ode to the West Wind', Ronald Tetreault; Chapter 10 Love's Universe: Epipsychidion, Stuart M. Sperry; Chapter 11, Peter Sacks; Chapter 12 Shelley's Last Lyrics, William Keach; Chapter 13 Shelley's 'The Triumph of Life', J. Hillis Miller; Chapter 14 Idealism and Skepticism in Shelley's Poetry, The Triumph of Life and Alastor, Tllottama Rajan;