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LibriVox volunteers bring you 14 different recordings of Saint Distaff's Day, or the Morrow After Twelfth Day, by Robert Herrick. This was the weekly poetry project for the week of January 6th, 2008.<br><br>What is St. Distaff's Day? Historically, it was the day after the Christmas festivals ended (the 12 days of Christmas), and most women went back to work with their spinning… but it was also a day of pranks and horsing around. Additional information can be found in <a href="http://www.thebookofdays.com/months/jan/7.htm">Chambers' Book of Days</a>.

2Hag

By Robert Herrick

A poem for Halloween by the 17th century English author Robert Herrick. His poems were not widely popular at the time they were published. His style was strongly influenced by Ben Jonson, by the classical Roman writers, and by the poems of the late Elizabethan era. This must have seemed quite old-fashioned to an audience whose tastes were tuned to the complexities of the metaphysical poets such as John Donne and Andrew Marvell. His works were rediscovered in the early nineteenth century, and have been regularly printed ever since. (Summary by Wikipedia)

3Delight in Disorder

By Robert Herrick

Robert Herrick (baptised 24 August 1591 – buried 15 October 1674[1]) was a 17th-century English lyric poet and cleric. He is best known for his book of poems, Hesperides. Herrick never married, and none of his love-poems seem to connect directly with any one beloved woman. He loved the richness of sensuality and the variety of life, and this is shown vividly in such poems as Cherry-ripe, Delight in Disorder and Upon Julia’s Clothes. (Summary from Wikipedia)

4Comfort To A Youth That Has Lost His Love

By Robert Herrick

His verse is eminent for sweet and gracious fluency; this is a real note of the 'Elizabethan' poets. His subjects are frequently pastoral, with a classical tinge, more or less slight, infused; his language, though not free from exaggeration, is generally free from intellectual conceits and distortion, and is eminent throughout for a youthful NAIVETE. (From the introduction to FROM THE LYRICAL POEMS OF ROBERT HERRICK by Francis Turner Palgrave; Dec. 1876)

5Chrysomela

By Robert Herrick

This is a volume of poetry by Robert Herrick. The volume "Chrysomela" was arranged by Francis Turner Palgrave. The 17th century English poet is continuing to inspire readers of his poetry. - Summary by Carolin

6Idyllica

By Robert Herrick

This is a volume of poetry by Robert Herrick. The volume "Idyllica" was arranged by Francis Turner Palgrave. The 17th century English poet is continuing to inspire readers of his poetry. - Summary by Carolin

7Ceremonies For Christmas

By Robert Herrick

LibriVox volunteers bring you 11 recordings of Ceremonies For Christmas by Robert Herrick.<br> This was the Weekly Poetry project for December 06, 2020. <br> ------<br> Robert Herrick was a 17th-century English lyric poet and cleric. He is best known for Hesperides, a book of poems. This includes the carpe diem poem "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time", with the first line "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may". Our Weekly poem is taken from Hesperides Volume 2. - Summary by Wikipedia

8Selection from the Lyrical Poems of Robert Herrick

By Robert Herrick

Robert Herrick had been apprenticed to a goldsmith before entering holy orders. This early training has been credited with influencing his metrical precision and his success with short poems. A still more important influence was Ben Jonson, for he was a member of the "sons of Ben," the coterie of younger poets that surrounded that great dramatist, Shakespeare's rival and friend. He even addresses a poem to Jonson addressing him as his "saint." As a country parson, far from the bustle of London and his poetic peers, Herrick found inspiration in the beauties of nature, but loneliness may have skewed his perception toward the melancholy lessons taught by the changing seasons. Still, he remained a social poet, his verses always seeming to require an audience, usually a jolly one; inward meditations are not his style. Herrick has been called pagan in spite of his religious calling, and heaven does always rank as an afterthought in his poetry, while daydreams of the maidens that populate the Latin poets' verses provide him with a rich and sensuous fantasy life. In his lifetime he was seen as an anachronism, a perfect representative of the Elizabethan versifier, highly skilled but not to be taken seriously because, though admittedly as perfect as if they were to be inscribed in marble, his lines lack the arch tone and puzzling wit of the new age. (Summary by Thomas A. Copeland)