Book Description
This digital document, covering the life and work of Rupert (Chawner) Brooke, is an entry from Contemporary Authors, a reference volume published by Thompson Gale. The length of the entry is 2911 words. The page length listed above is based on a typical 300-word page. Although the exact content of each entry from this volume can vary, typical entries include the following information:

• Place and date of birth and death (if deceased)
• Family members
• Education
• Professional associations and honors
• Employment
• Writings, including books and periodicals
• A description of the author's work
• References to further readings about the author

Book Description
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.Download Description
Yet Boston is alive. It sits, in comfortable middle-age, on the ruins of its glory. But it is not buried beneath them. It used to lead America in Literature, Thought, Art, everything. The years have passed. It is remarkable how nearly now Boston is to New York what Munich is to Berlin. Boston and Munich were the leaders forty years ago. They can't quite make out that they aren't now. It is too incredible that Art should leave her goose-feather bed and away to the wraggle-taggle business-men. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

More people should know Brooke for his prose; it is elegant.
Although "Letters From America" was actually a series of articles that represents the only time in Rupert Brooke's life when he had a paying job,they work well as a book. Written at a juncture in the poet's life when he suffered from considerable emotional strain in his personal relationships, "Letters" is his record of the world beyond England.It is perceptive, elegant writing. Very personal, very interesting (not only for its picture of North America in the early part of this century, but also for its picture of Brooke, with all of his foibles and prejudices).Had he lived through WWI, Rupert Brooke could have been an outstanding prose writer, as "Letters" suggests. Unfortunately, it was not to be. ... Read more

Book Description
Strikingly handsome, charming, and gifted, the English poetRupert Brooke was the embodiment of a generation that was all butdestroyed between 1914 and 1918. In Forever England, Brooke'sexceptional body of work emerges dramatically from a colorful andtangled life. 256 pp 6 x 9 80 b/w photos ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Excellent book
I've read almost every book written by or about Rupert Brooke and this is the best one. There are a lot of poems that aren't in the Collected Poems and can only be found in this book. It's gives the most complete look intohis life as more things about him become available over the years.

more of a query
wish this WAS a review......i can't get hold of the book,its presently out of stock...i'm an avid lover of anything to do with rupert brooke..and would love to hear anyones review on the mike read book...to appease mewhile i wait for it to come back!:)

A great source of information on a priorly scarce subject.
Rupert Brooke has been an infatuation of mine for several years. I have searched for information to little avail, running into a mere paragraph here or there on my favorite poet. I can't describe my enjoyment of havingan entire book devoted to him! I couldn't put it down, and if anything,Brooke has only grown in my favor. Amazon's service was incredible, and Ilook forward to more purchases in the future. If you haven't read Brooke orordered from Amazon, it is my suggestion you do!

Another time, another place...
A very interesting biography, well researched andproviding an insightinto a different time.What afascinating time to have lived before suchchanges in the World.Mike Read allows us to feel thisfree spiritedlifestyle of Brookes and Read's passion for the subject comes through inthis which is more than just a biography but a record of events and changes in the lives of those associated with Brooke. Well researched andhighly recommended.

For a minor poet, Rupert Brooke still fascinates.
Rupert Brooke has been dead for 83 years and in his lifetime, only published one (slim) book of poetry. But the man was fascinating, no question about it, and is still the subject of biographies. This latest, by Mike Read, was a delightful surprise, not only in that it exists at all, but also that it brings new facts to light.Read traveled to the places Brooke knew which gives an added perspective to the story. In some cases, we read Brooke's own descriptions and then learn how the places fared over the years. It's a nice touch.Clearly, Read is much impressed and enamoured by Brooke -- more so than some other biographers. Sometimes, this gets in the way. For example, in dealing with Brooke's sexual identity and experiences, the author makes assumptions that are based on hope but not fact. Also, he never mentions any of Brooke's prejudices which feature so largely in his prose (Letters From America, for example) and even some of the poetry. They are glaring omissions.The photographs are very nice, some I don't think I have ever seen except in the Modern Archives at King's College, Cambridge. The most eye-catching one, however, is of a woman Read describes as Brooke's daughter. Not only is this an amazing photo, but it's a pretty amazing fact as well--one based on the most tenuous of circumstantial evidence. To my knowledge, neither the existence of Brooke's "daughter" nor her photo has ever been presented asfact before. I, for one, would like to have seen more of the background evidence, as this is quite an extraordinary suggestion.I enjoyed Forever England and am grateful to Amazon for locating it when other booksellers could not. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Rare insight into unrequited love
Some of the most beautiful & heart felt love letters. The letters do become sad & painful as you go along. There are some superb examples of true passion in this book(provided you can find one!!!). The only copy that I had gone thru is now missing from the local library:(

A look at Rupert Brooke
I have always found Rupert Brooke to be a fascinating poet, so when I was in York and discovered this little treasure (for sale, no less) I bought it.I'd started it a couple of times but never got around to completing the book.Then, I resolutely decided to read it, and I found it completely entrancing.You get something from this book about Brooke that you could never get from a biography: his yearning, passion, anger.... all in his very own words.It was hard for me to put down, and any fan of Brooke's should most definitely look into it.

Great book
This book is fantastic and gives a good look into Rupert's relationship with Noel. The incite into Rupert's love life and his feeling for Noel and his friends is worth getting the book alone. ... Read more

Book Description
A brief and vivid study of 'imagination' in the work of Rupert Brooke.

THIS TITLE IS CITED AND RECOMMENDED BY:Books for College Libraries. ... Read more

Book Description
Rupert Brooke's short life was filled to brimming with drama and romance. Today he is the best known of that extraordinary collection of British Poets of the Great War. Tragically his life was cut short but not before he produced arguably the finest poetry of the 20th Century, the best examples of which are in this book.

... Read more

Amazon.com
Rupert Brooke is one of the 20th century's best examples of image management. After he died of blood poisoning en route to Gallipoli in 1915, the poet's valor and godlike good looks were soon immortalized. He never had the chance to prove the former save in a handful of verses that are far from his finest, but photographic proof of the latter was unassailable. When Brooke's letters were originally published in 1968, his executor and editor, Geoffrey Keynes, kept well clear of his extensive correspondence with James Strachey (brother of Lyttonand now best remembered for his translations of Freud). Keynes went so far as to claim that they would appear in print "over my dead body." Nothing less than homosexual panic was at the heart of such hysteria: Brooke was to be forever deified, not damned as a sodomite.

Now Keith Hale has whittled down Brooke and Strachey's letters and postcards between 1905 and 1914 into a volume in which the inconsequential ("Thursday lunch will be admirably suitable") bumps up against history, emotion, and desire. The last few years of their friendship were decidedly rocky, and Strachey's final words on his complex friend are apposite: "Rupert wasn't nearly so nice as people now imagine; but he was a great deal cleverer." Whether you read their correspondence as proof positive of Brooke's bi- or homosexuality will depend on your views of theconstruction of sexual identity. But it must be said that the poet's account of one schoolboy seduction is written with an icy objectivity that even Edmund White would envy. These letters remain a fascinating record of longtime companionship--no matter how you use that term. --Kerry FriedBook Description
The correspondence between the English poet Rupert Brooke and his close friend James Strachey here appears in print for the first time. The letters reveal much about the lives and interests of these two gifted young men, the nature of their relationship, and the activities of many illustrious friends such as Lytton Strachey (James's brother), J.M. Keynes, Virginia Woolf, and Bertrand Russell. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Epistles of Unrequited Love:'Friends and Apostles'
Brooke's heart-stopping good looks are the essence of this epistolatory account of the romantic friendship between James Strachey and England's eternal Golden boy. He who penned the heroically mawkish yet strangely thrilling:'If I should die/ Think only this of me/That there is some corner of a foreign field/ That is forever England' is here revealed through Strachey's eyes in the guise of romantic muse, love object, sex god. Unfortunately for Strachey, his passion was unrequited.

Strachey is be-dazzled by Brooke during their first year at Cambridge, and the subsequent correspondence betrays all the hallmarks of adolescent infatuation: in turns importunate, with Strachey's 'declaration' early in 1906; adulatory:'You were so beautiful tonight';desperate: 'I suppose you know what's wrong with me...I'm in love with you'; ever hopeful: 'Why not come quietly to bed with me instead?' in response to Brooke's request for contraceptive information; finally hopeless: 'The sudden sight of him across a room made my heart...bound ... it's no use...' But it is with a start that one realises that this is no adolescent, but rather a scion of the Stracheys - long time members of the intelligentsia, darlings of the Bloomsbury set - assistant editor of 'the Spectator', putative translator of Freud.

And herein lies the fascination. Keith Hale's painstakingly edited and annotated edition of the correspondence vividly presents Strachey's personal drama of unstinting adulation of the man seemingly pursued by a host of admirers of both sexes, but also features most of England's literati and glitterati in supporting roles. Here are Vanessa and Clive Bell, Virginia Woolf, Maynard Keynes, society hostess Lady Ottoline Morrell, together with representatives of an older order - Thomas Hardy, not to mention Henry James who, for goodness sake, Brooke cycles off to call on at Lamb House as casually as if he were the man next door! And interspersed with these semi-mythical figures are the domestic details that form an integral part of Brooke and Strachey's lives.The trivia is engrossing, with its train timetables, motorbuses and postal orders: 'I'll enclose the tickets and a postal order for 10/6.'

But we never stray far from the central motif - that of Strachey's heart-sickness for Brooke. Coupled with our fascination, though,is also the uncomfortably voyeuristic sensation of being privy to Strachey's intimate yearnings and his longing makes for painful reading: 'It is You and my love that makes the universe magical....' and one finds oneself wishing that Brooke could have been kinder.

Hence it is with a start that one reads Brooke's own account of his seduction of a former university acquaintance. One wonders what the besotted Strachey could have made of his graphic and lengthy account of the physical details of his night in bed with Denham Russell-Smith. Brooke's literary executor Geoffrey Keynes vowed that the uncensored Brooke letters would be published 'over my dead body.' And such has certainly been the case as it is only since Keynes' death that the letters have been released.

Brooke's image makers certainly knew how to 'spin', and it is really only now, nearly 90 years later, that we have a clearer view of Brooke the man as opposed to the legend. Perhaps Strachey's words on Brooke , many years following his death, are the most revealing: 'He was not nearly as nice as people now believe him, but a great deal cleverer.'

Extremely interesting
This is simply a must-read for Brooke fans and anyone else interested in the aesthetists and their times. It's absolutely fascinating. By the time you finish the introduction, you will be hooked.

Impressive
This is quite an achievement in editing.Brooke and Strachey comment on so many of the prominent figures of their time that, coupled with Hale's impressive footnotes and other editorial material, the book serves as avirtual history of Edwardian England.I personally am not crazy aboutBrooke's poetry, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading this work.

A period piece worth reading
Much is being made about what this book reveals about Brooke's sexuality, but the main reason for reading it is that it is simply very interesting and educational.One learns so much one never knew about so many of themajor literary and political figures in Georgian England.Hale'simpressive footnotes are as enjoyable as the letters themselves.

candid and erotic
This is probably the closest thing to a Brooke autobiography that the world will ever see.Because of Hale's useful editorial material and his thorough annotations, the letters provide as complete a story of Brooke asmost of his biographies.And because Brooke shows sides of himself toStrachey that have been hitherto suppressed by his executors, the bookprovides a more complex, personal view of Brooke than do his previouslypublished letters or his travel journals.Of particular interest are hisgraphic description of seducing the younger brother of one of his friends;Strachey's account of a sexual rendezvous involving Duncan Grant, JohnMaynard Keynes, and a Cockney youth; the account of Strachey being pursuedby the famous mountain climber, George Mallory; and Brooke's insane,vulgar, and disturbing ramblings following his nervous collapse in 1912. It's quite an interesting read, really. ... Read more

Book Description
Though overshadowed by others, Rupert Brooke's gifts as a poet were palpable; Siegfried Sassoon is known as a talented and prolific writer and poet. Learn much more about both poets with this edition of Bloom's Major Poets, which includes critical analyses and biographies of each writer.

This series is edited by Harold Bloom, Sterling Professor of the Humanities, Yale University; Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Professor of English, New York University Graduate School. History's greatest poets are covered in one series with expert analysis by Harold Bloom and other critics. These texts offer a wealth of information on the poets and their works that are most commonly read in high schools, colleges, and universities. ... Read more