The Lamb Cycle What the Great English Poets Would Have Written About Mary and Her Lamb (Had They Thought of It First)

The rhyme Mary Had a Little Lamb told in the styleand substanceof the great English poets from Edmund Spenser to Stevie Smith. In The Lamb Cycle, David R. Ewbank achieves the unthinkablehe writes so convincingly in the style of the great English poets that one could be lulled into thinking that Shakespeare himself was inspired to muse upon the subject of Mary Had a Little Lamb. Ewbank captures not only the style of each of the poets he chooses, but also their preoccupations and subject matter. So D.H. Lawrences Mary longs for her lamb as any woman longing for her lover, whilst T.S. Eliots Mary is recollected by an old man looking back on his life. Alexander Pope writes an An Essay on Lambs, and Tennysons lotus eaters become The Clover Eater. Brilliantly written, sophisticated, and laugh-out-loud funny, these poems, enhanced by Kate Feiffers charming illustrations, will enchant anyone who has ever read an English poem.