This book provides an introduction to the elements of poetry, formulates a series of contexts for the interpretation of poems, and offers a substantial anthology. Its purpose is to enable students to read poems with understanding and pleasure and to provide them with a basic vocabulary for analysing and talking about poems.

Most people dream of packing in their humdrum city life, selling up and heading off into the unknown for a life of adventure. For Ruth Miller and Alan Davies this dream became a reality, albeit with a twist; they decided to pack in their jobs, sell their house and take on the ultimate birder's challenge - to smash the world record for the number of species seen in one calendar year. This book is the story of their great expedition, searching for birds from Ecuador to Ethiopia via Argentina, Australia and Arizona. We follow this birding odyssey as they rachet up the species and the...