Reader's guide series

About Author

Martin Roger Seymour-Smith (24 April 1928 – 1 July 1998) was a British poet, literary critic, and biographer.: Celebrated for his broad range of intellectual interests, his grace as a poet and his sharpness as a critic, Mr. Seymour-Smith was perhaps best known for his ''Guide to Modern World Literature,'' which was published in 1973 and revised and expanded in 1986 as ''The Macmillan Guide to Modern World Literature.'' The book was such a thorough study of 20th-century poetry, drama and fiction that some critics doubted it was the work of one person -- until they read it and found Mr. Seymour-Smith's distinctive voice and deeply felt opinions in every entry. Mr. Seymour-Smith's whimsical sensibility and relish in not pulling his critical punches could be seen, too, in books like ''Who's Who in 20th-Century Literature'' (1976), in which he offered succinct, pungent analyses of various literary figures. Of Ayn Rand, for example, he said, ''Her crypto-totalitarian and ultra-simplistic ideas have had some influence on the conservatively bred young, since they allow people to be ruthless without a bad conscience.''

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Books in this Series

A reader's guide to fifty European novels

Martin Seymour-Smith

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A reader's guide to Herman Melville

James Edwin Miller

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This guide contains a comprehensive study of Melville's fiction and poetry. James E. Miller, Jr. in addition to analyzing each of Melville's works, traces this author's principal themes and shows how his art and thought developed. A Reader's Guide to Herman Melville also includes a brief note on Melville's life, an evaluative bibliography, and an index.

A reader's guide to John Milton

Nicolson, Marjorie Hope

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Marjorie Hope Nicolson - one of the world's foremost authorities on Milton - examines Milton's work beginning with the juvenalia, the famous Minor Poems, "L'Allegro," "Il Penseroso," "Comus" (and "Arcades"), and "Lycidas." She explores Milton's middle years, when he was diverted from poetry to become Latin Secretary under Oliver Cromwell. Examining the sonnets he composed during this time, she also scrutinizes the many prose-pamphlets and tracts that Milton said he "wrote with his left hand." Finally, Nicolson looks at the great poems, including a book-by-book analysis of Paradise Lost and a careful reading of Samson Agonistes, Milton's poetic "closet drama."

The Yogi and the Commissar

Arthur Koestler

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The Yogi and the Commissar (1945) is a collection of essays of Arthur Koestler, divided in three parts: Meanderings, Exhortations and Explorations. In the first two parts he has collected essays written from 1942 to 1945 and the third part was written especially for this book. In the title essay, Koestler proposes a continuum of philosophies for achieving "heaven on earth", from the Commissar at the materialist, scientific end of the spectrum, to the Yogi at the spiritual, metaphysical end. The Commissar wants to change society using any means necessary, while the Yogi wants to change the individual, with an emphasis on ethical purity instead of on results. (Source: [Wikipedia](

A reader's guide to Dylan Thomas

William York Tindall

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