AUTHOR-APPROVED
Reading Guides to Long Poems
Series Editors: Isobel Armstrong & Sally Bushell
The series enables readers to re-engage with the long poem as a vital form. Volumes provide generous extracts, or in some cases complete poems, from significant works combined with a reading guide and teaching tips from enthusiastic lecturers who have taught the poem.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Aurora Leigh: A Reading Guide
Michele C. Martinez
Introduces new readers and students to a celebrated and controversial Victorian novel-poem
Michele C. Martinez guides readers through the poem's major themes and literary and social contexts, introducing a range of interpretive frameworks. Long extracts from the poem are accompanied by helpful commentary. The text's composition history, major influences and modes of poetic expression are also discussed. The teaching and bibliographic chapters offer supplementary materials including print and internet resources.
Key Features
*Ideal guide for readers coming to the text for the first time, or teaching the text at university level
* Fully contextualised and annotated sections of the poem
* Detailed exploration of key themes: poetic vision; love and poetry; epistolary fiction; epic and society; motherhood and sexual transgression; poetry and prophecy
* Innovative teaching suggestions
* Advice and guidance for further reading
Michele C. Martinez is currently a Preceptor in the Harvard College Writing Program. Her publications and current research interests focus on intersections between nineteenth-century poetry, criticism, and the visual arts.

Michele Martinez was born in London, England, and raised in California's San Joaquin Valley. She holds an A.B. from Stanford University and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Yale University. She has taught in the English departments of Trinity College (Hartford) and Harvard University and in the History and Literature program at Harvard. She is currently a Preceptor in the Harvard College Writing Program. Her publications and current research interests focus on intersections between nineteenth-century poetry, criticism, and the visual arts.

List of Illustrations; Chapter 1. Mapping and Making the Long Poem: Aurora Leigh in Its Biographical and Literary Contexts; Chapter 2. Interpreting Aurora Leigh: Text, Commentary, Analysis; i. Poetic Vision; ii. Love and Poetry; iii. Epistolary Fiction; iv. Epic and Society; v. Motherhood and Sexual Transgression; vi. Poetry and Prophecy; Chapter 3. Contexts for Reading Aurora Leigh; Chapter 4. Teaching Aurora Leigh; Chapter 5. Print and Internet Resources; Appendix: Aurora Leigh at a Glance