The Penguin Book of Elegy

The comprehensive guide to a deeply human tradition of memory, mourning, and consolation through poetry

A Penguin Classic

Elegy is among the world's oldest forms of literature. Born in Ancient Greece, practiced by the Romans, revitalized by the poets of the Renaissance, and continuing down to the present day, it speaks eloquently and affectingly of the experience of loss and the yearning for consolation. It gives shape and meaning to memories too painful to contemplate, and answers our desire to fix in words what would otherwise slip our grasp. In The Penguin Book of Elegy, Andrew Motion and Stephen Regan trace the history of this tradition, from its Classical roots in the work of Theocritus, Virgil, and Ovid down to modern compositions… Keep Reading