Podcasts about Cowper

Today's poem owes a strong debt to Cowper's “The Poplar Field” but also features a few stylistic echoes of Poe's “Annabel Lee,” all while achieving a (superior?) effect of its own. Happy reading. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

“As for man, his days are like grass.” It isn't much of a stretch, then, when Cowper sees his own mortality in a grove of felled poplars. Happy reading.William Cowper (1731-1800) was a renowned 18th century poet, hymnographer, and translator of Homer. His most famous works include his 5000-line poem ‘The Task' and some charming and light-hearted verses, not least ‘The Diverting History of John Gilpin'. Phrases he coined such as ‘Variety is the spice of life' are still in popular use today. While living in Olney he collaborated on ‘The Olney Hymns' with his friend John Newton. -bio via the Cowper and Newton Museum This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit dailypoempod.substack.com/subscribe

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Billabong & Sun Bum Presents... Crunch Time! ATS Live from Surfaris in Crescent Head with Matt Wilko, Gosford Grug Wade Carmichael and Independent Candidate for Cowper Caz Heise The Federal Election is upon us and we're touring the country whacking on town hall style meetings with legends, corelords, activists and independent MP's who are willing to stand up and demand the best out of this reptile influenced democracy for the sake of a better future for ALL SWELLIANS! Surf banter with a side of truth speak for those of you who actually wanna use your vote to instigate positive change.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

00:00 34. Дженинз (Jenyns) 13:41 35. Галлер (Haller) 17:23 36. Кокки (Cocchi) 24:06 37. Руссо (Rousseau) 44:05 38. Линней (Linne) 50:28 39. Бюффон (Buffon) 1:00:58 40. Хоксуэрт (Hawkesworth) 1:06:27 41. Пэли (Paley) 1:25:50 42. Прессавен (Pressavin) 1:33:44 43. Бернарден де Сен-Пиерр (Bernardin de St. Pierre) 1:46:13 44. Франклин, Говард, Сведенборг, Веслей и Гиббон (Franklin, Howard, Swedenborg, Wesley, Gibbon) 1:56:48 45. Купер (Cowper) 2:04:11 46. Освальд (Oswald) 2:25:37 47. Шиллер (Shiller) 2:31:09 48. Бентам (Bentham) 2:40:40 49. Синклер (Sinclair) 2:45:56 50. Гуфеланд (Hufeland) 2:50:26 51. Ритсон (Ritson) 3:16:20 52. Никольсон (Nicolson) 3:45:53 53. Абернети (Abernethy) 3:56:31 54. Ламбе (Laambe) 4:29:05 55. Ньютон (Newton) 4:42:12 56. Глейзе (Gleizes) 5:25:30 57. Шелли (Shelley) 6:37:37 58. Байрон (Byron) 6:47:59 59. Филлипс (Phillips) 7:21:24 60. Ламартин (Lamartine) ▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀▀

In this episode, James Marriott and I discuss who we think are the best twenty English poets. This is not the best poets who wrote in English, but the best British poets (though James snuck Sylvia Plath onto his list…). We did it like that to make it easier, not least so we could base a lot of our discussion on extracts in The Oxford Book of English Verse (Ricks edition). Most of what we read out is from there. We read Wordsworth, Keats, Hardy, Milton, and Pope. We both love Pope! (He should be regarded as one of the very best English poets, like Milton.) There are also readings of Herrick, Bronte, Cowper, and MacNiece. I plan to record the whole of ‘The Eve of St. Agnes' at some point soon.Here are our lists and below is the transcript (which may have more errors than usual, sorry!)HOGod Tier* Shakespeare“if not first, in the very first line”* Chaucer* Spenser* Milton* Wordsworth* Eliot—argue for Pope here, not usually includedSecond Tier* Donne* Herbert* Keats* Dryden* Gawain poet* Tom O'Bedlam poetThird Tier* Yeats* Tennyson* Hopkins* Coleridge* Auden* Shelley* MarvellJMShakespeareTier* ShakespeareTier 1* Chaucer* Milton* WordsworthTier 2* Donne* Eliot* Keats* Tennyson* Spencer* Marvell* PopeTier 3* Yeats* Hopkins* Blake* Coleridge* Auden* Shelley* Thomas Hardy* Larkin* PlathHenry: Today I'm talking to James Marriott, Times columnist, and more importantly, the writer of the Substack Cultural Capital. And we are going to argue about who are the best poets in the English language. James, welcome.James: Thanks very much for having me. I feel I should preface my appearance so that I don't bring your podcast and disrepute saying that I'm maybe here less as an expert of poetry and more as somebody who's willing to have strong and potentially species opinions. I'm more of a lover of poetry than I would claim to be any kind of academic expert, just in case anybody thinks that I'm trying to produce any definitive answer to the question that we're tackling.Henry: Yeah, no, I mean that's the same for me. We're not professors, we're just very opinionated boys. So we have lists.James: We do.Henry: And we're going to debate our lists, but what we do agree is that if we're having a top 20 English poets, Shakespeare is automatically in the God Tier and there's nothing to discuss.James: Yeah, he's in a category of his own. I think the way of, because I guess the plan we've gone for is to rather than to rank them 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 into sort of, what is it, three or four broad categories that we're competing over.Henry: Yes, yes. TiersJames: I think is a more kind of reasonable way to approach it rather than trying to argue exactly why it should be one place above Shelly or I don't know, whatever.Henry: It's also just an excuse to talk about poets.James: Yes.Henry: Good. So then we have a sort of top tier, if not the first, in the very first line as it were, and you've got different people. To me, you've got Chaucer, Milton, and Wordsworth. I would also add Spenser and T.S. Eliot. So what's your problem with Spenser?James: Well, my problem is ignorance in that it's a while since I've read the Fairy Queen, which I did at university. Partly is just that looking back through it now and from what I remember of university, I mean it is not so much that I have anything against Spenser. It's quite how much I have in favour of Milton and Wordsworth and Chaucer, and I'm totally willing to be argued against on this, but I just can't think that Spenser is in quite the same league as lovely as many passages of the Fairy Queen are.Henry: So my case for Spenser is firstly, if you go through something like the Oxford Book of English Verse or some other comparable anthology, he's getting a similar page count to Shakespeare and Milton, he is important in that way. Second, it's not just the fairy queen, there's the Shepherd's Calendar, the sonnets, the wedding poems, and they're all highly accomplished. The Shepherd's Calendar particularly is really, really brilliant work. I think I enjoyed that more as an undergraduate, actually, much as I love the Fairy Queen. And the third thing is that the Fairy Queen is a very, very great epic. I mean, it's a tremendous accomplishment. There were lots of other epics knocking around in the 16th century that nobody wants to read now or I mean, obviously specialists want to read, but if we could persuade a few more people, a few more ordinary readers to pick up the fairy queen, they would love it.James: Yes, and I was rereading before he came on air, the Bower of Bliss episode, which I think is from the second book, which is just a beautifully lush passage, passage of writing. It was really, I mean, you can see why Keats was so much influenced by it. The point about Spenser's breadth is an interesting one because Milton is in my top category below Shakespeare, but I think I'm placing him there pretty much only on the basis of Paradise Lost. I think if we didn't have Paradise Lost, Milton may not even be in this competition at all for me, very little. I know. I don't know if this is a heresy, I've got much less time for Milton's minor works. There's Samuel Johnson pretty much summed up my feelings on Lycidas when he said there was nothing new. Whatever images it can supply are long ago, exhausted, and I do feel there's a certain sort of dryness to Milton's minor stuff. I mean, I can find things like Il Penseroso and L'Allegro pretty enough, but I mean, I think really the central achievement is Paradise Lost, whereas Spenser might be in contention, as you say, from if you didn't have the Fairy Queen, you've got Shepherd's Calendar, and all this other sort of other stuff, but Paradise Lost is just so massive for me.Henry: But if someone just tomorrow came out and said, oh, we found a whole book of minor poetry by Virgil and it's all pretty average, you wouldn't say, oh, well Virgil's less of a great poet.James: No, absolutely, and that's why I've stuck Milton right at the top. It's just sort of interesting how unbelievably good Paradise Lost is and how, in my opinion, how much less inspiring the stuff that comes after it is Samson Agonistes and Paradise Regained I really much pleasure out of at all and how, I mean the early I think slightly dry Milton is unbelievably accomplished, but Samuel Johnson seems to say in that quote is a very accomplished use of ancient slightly worn out tropes, and he's of putting together these old ideas in a brilliant manner and he has this sort of, I mean I guess he's one of your late bloomers. I can't quite remember how old he is when he publishes Paradise Lost.Henry: Oh, he is. Oh, writing it in his fifties. Yeah.James: Yeah, this just extraordinary thing that's totally unlike anything else in English literature and of all the poems that we're going to talk about, I think is the one that has probably given me most pleasure in my life and the one that I probably return to most often if not to read all the way through then to just go over my favourite bits and pieces of it.Henry: A lot of people will think Milton is heavy and full of weird references to the ancient world and learned and biblical and not very readable for want of a better word. Can you talk us out of that? To be one of the great poets, they do have to have some readability, right?James: Yeah, I think so, and it's certainly how I felt. I mean I think it's not a trivial objection to have to Milton. It's certainly how I found him. He was my special author paper at university and I totally didn't get on with him. There was something about his massive brilliance that I felt. I remember feeling like trying to write about Paradise Lost was trying to kind of scratch a huge block of marble with your nails. There's no way to get a handle on it. I just couldn't work out what to get ahold of, and it's only I think later in adulthood maybe reading him under a little less pressure that I've come to really love him. I mean, the thing I would always say to people to look out for in Milton, but it's his most immediate pleasure and the thing that still is what sends shivers done my spine about him is the kind of cosmic scale of Paradise Lost, and it's almost got this sort of sci-fi massiveness to it. One of my very favourite passages, which I may inflict on you, we did agree that we could inflict poetry on one another.Henry: Please, pleaseJames: It's a detail from the first book of Paradise Lost. Milton's talking about Satan's architect in hell Mulciber, and this is a little explanation of who or part of his explanation of who Mulciber is, and he says, Nor was his name unheard or unadoredIn ancient Greece; and in Ausonian landMen called him Mulciber; and how he fellFrom Heaven they fabled, thrown by angry JoveSheer o'er the crystal battlements: from mornTo noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve,A summer's day, and with the setting sunDropt from the zenith, like a falling star,On Lemnos, th' Aegaean isle. Thus they relate,ErringI just think it's the sort of total massiveness of that universe that “from the zenith to like a falling star”. I just can't think of any other poet in English or that I've ever read in any language, frankly, even in translation, who has that sort of scale about it, and I think that's what can most give immediate pleasure. The other thing I love about that passage is this is part of the kind of grandeur of Milton is that you get this extraordinary passage about an angel falling from heaven down to th' Aegean Isle who's then going to go to hell and the little parenthetic remark at the end, the perm just rolls on, thus they relate erring and paradise lost is such this massive grand thing that it can contain this enormous cosmic tragedy as a kind of little parenthetical thing. I also think the crystal battlements are lovely, so wonderful kind of sci-fi detail.Henry: Yes, I think that's right, and I think it's under appreciated that Milton was a hugely important influence on Charles Darwin who was a bit like you always rereading it when he was young, especially on the beagle voyage. He took it with him and quotes it in his letters sometimes, and it is not insignificant the way that paradise loss affects him in terms of when he writes his own epic thinking at this level, thinking at this scale, thinking at the level of the whole universe, how does the whole thing fit together? What's the order behind the little movements of everything? So Milton's reach I think is actually quite far into the culture even beyond the poets.James: That's fascinating. Do you have a particular favourite bit of Paradise Lost?Henry: I do, but I don't have it with me because I disorganised and couldn't find my copy.James: That's fair.Henry: What I want to do is to read one of the sonnets because I do think he's a very, very good sonnet writer, even if I'm going to let the Lycidas thing go, because I'm not going to publicly argue against Samuel Johnson.When I consider how my light is spent,Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,And that one Talent which is death to hideLodged with me useless, though my Soul more bentTo serve therewith my Maker, and presentMy true account, lest he returning chide;“Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?”I fondly ask. But patience, to preventThat murmur, soon replies, “God doth not needEither man's work or his own gifts; who bestBear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His stateIs Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speedAnd post o'er Land and Ocean without rest:They also serve who only stand and wait.”I think that's great.James: Yeah. Okay. It is good.Henry: Yeah. I think the minor poems are very uneven, but there are lots of gems.James: Yeah, I mean he is a genius. It would be very weird if all the minor poems were s**t, which is not really what I'm trying… I guess I have a sort of slightly austere category too. I just do Chaucer, Milton, Wordsworth, but we are agreed on Wordsworth, aren't we? That he belongs here.Henry: So my feeling is that the story of English poetry is something like Chaucer Spenser, Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth, T.S. Eliot create a kind of spine. These are the great innovators. They're writing the major works, they're the most influential. All the cliches are true. Chaucer invented iambic pentameter. Shakespeare didn't single handedly invent modern English, but he did more than all the rest of them put together. Milton is the English Homer. Wordsworth is the English Homer, but of the speech of the ordinary man. All these old things, these are all true and these are all colossal achievements and I don't really feel that we should be picking between them. I think Spenser wrote an epic that stands alongside the works of Shakespeare and Milton in words with T.S. Eliot whose poetry, frankly I do not love in the way that I love some of the other great English writers cannot be denied his position as one of the great inventors.James: Yeah, I completely agree. It's funny, I think, I mean I really do love T.S. Eliot. Someone else had spent a lot of time rereading. I'm not quite sure why he hasn't gone into quite my top category, but I think I had this—Henry: Is it because he didn't like Milton and you're not having it?James: Maybe that's part of it. I think my thought something went more along the lines of if I cut, I don't quite feel like I'm going to put John Donne in the same league as Milton, but then it seems weird to put Eliot above Donne and then I don't know that, I mean there's not a very particularly fleshed out thought, but on Wordsworth, why is Wordsworth there for you? What do you think, what do you think are the perms that make the argument for Wordsworth having his place at the very top?Henry: Well, I think the Lyrical Ballads, Poems in Two Volumes and the Prelude are all of it, aren't they? I'm not a lover of the rest, and I think the preface to the Lyrical Ballads is one of the great works of literary criticism, which is another coin in his jar if you like, but in a funny way, he's much more revolutionary than T.S. Eliot. We think of modernism as the great revolution and the great sort of bringing of all the newness, but modernism relies on Wordsworth so much, relies on the idea that tradition can be subsumed into ordinary voice, ordinary speech, the passage in the Wasteland where he has all of them talking in the bar. Closing time please, closing time please. You can't have that without Wordsworth and—James: I think I completely agree with what you're saying.Henry: Yeah, so I think that's for me is the basis of it that he might be the great innovator of English poetry.James: Yeah, I think you're right because I've got, I mean again, waiting someone out of my depth here, but I can't think of anybody else who had sort of specifically and perhaps even ideologically set out to write a kind of high poetry that sounded like ordinary speech, I guess. I mean, Wordsworth again is somebody who I didn't particularly like at university and I think it's precisely about plainness that can make him initially off-putting. There's a Matthew Arnold quote where he says of Wordsworth something like He has no style. Henry: Such a Matthew Arnold thing to say.James: I mean think it's the beginning of an appreciation, but there's a real blankness to words with I think again can almost mislead you into thinking there's nothing there when you first encounter him. But yeah, I think for me, Tintern Abbey is maybe the best poem in the English language.Henry: Tintern Abbey is great. The Intimations of Immortality Ode is superb. Again, I don't have it with me, but the Poems in Two Volumes. There are so many wonderful things in there. I had a real, when I was an undergraduate, I had read some Wordsworth, but I hadn't really read a lot and I thought of I as you do as the daffodils poet, and so I read Lyrical Ballads and Poems in Two Volumes, and I had one of these electrical conversion moments like, oh, the daffodils, that is nothing. The worst possible thing for Wordsworth is that he's remembered as this daffodils poet. When you read the Intimations of Immortality, do you just think of all the things he could have been remembered for? It's diminishing.James: It's so easy to get into him wrong because the other slightly wrong way in is through, I mean maybe this is a prejudice that isn't widely shared, but the stuff that I've never particularly managed to really enjoy is all the slightly worthy stuff about beggars and deformed people and maimed soldiers. Wandering around on roads in the lake district has always been less appealing to me, and that was maybe why I didn't totally get on with 'em at first, and I mean, there's some bad words with poetry. I was looking up the infamous lines from the form that were mocked even at the time where you know the lines that go, You see a little muddy pond Of water never dry. I've measured it from side to side, 'Tis three feet long and two feet wide, and the sort of plainness condescend into banality at Wordsworth's worst moments, which come more frequently later in his career.Henry: Yes, yes. I'm going to read a little bit of the Intimations ode because I want to share some of this so-called plainness at its best. This is the third section. They're all very short Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,And while the young lambs boundAs to the tabor's sound,To me alone there came a thought of grief:A timely utterance gave that thought relief,And I again am strong:The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng,The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep,And all the earth is gay;Land and seaGive themselves up to jollity,And with the heart of MayDoth every Beast keep holiday;—Thou Child of Joy,Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy.And I think it's unthinkable that someone would write like this today. It would be cringe, but we're going to have a new sincerity. It's coming. It's in some ways it's already here and I think Wordsworth will maybe get a different sort of attention when that happens because that's a really high level of writing to be able to do that without it descending into what you just read. In the late Wordsworth there's a lot of that really bad stuff.James: Yeah, I mean the fact that he wrote some of that bad stuff I guess is a sign of quite how carefully the early stuff is treading that knife edge of tripping into banality. Can I read you my favourite bit of Tintern Abbey?Henry: Oh yes. That is one of the great poems.James: Yeah, I just think one of mean I, the most profound poem ever, probably for me. So this is him looking out over the landscape of Tinton Abbey. I mean these are unbelievably famous lines, so I'm sure everybody listening will know them, but they are so good And I have feltA presence that disturbs me with the joyOf elevated thoughts; a sense sublimeOf something far more deeply interfused,Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,And the round ocean and the living air,And the blue sky, and in the mind of man:A motion and a spirit, that impelsAll thinking things, all objects of all thought,And rolls through all things. Therefore am I stillA lover of the meadows and the woodsAnd mountains; and of all that we beholdFrom this green earth; of all the mighty worldOf eye, and ear,—both what they half create,And what perceive; well pleased to recogniseIn nature and the language of the senseThe anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soulOf all my moral being.I mean in a poem, it's just that is mind blowingly good to me?Henry: Yeah. I'm going to look up another section from the Prelude, which used to be in the Oxford Book, but it isn't in the Ricks edition and I don't really know whyJames: He doesn't have much of the Prelude does he?Henry: I don't think he has any…James: Yeah.Henry: So this is from an early section when the young Wordsworth is a young boy and he's going off, I think he's sneaking out at night to row on the lake as you do when you with Wordsworth, and the initial description is of a mountain. She was an elfin pinnace; lustilyI dipped my oars into the silent lake,And, as I rose upon the stroke, my boatWent heaving through the water like a swan;When, from behind that craggy steep till thenThe horizon's bound, a huge peak, black and huge,As if with voluntary power instinct,Upreared its head. I struck and struck again,And growing still in stature the grim shapeTowered up between me and the stars, and still,For so it seemed, with purpose of its ownAnd measured motion like a living thing,Strode after me. With trembling oars I turned,And through the silent water stole my wayBack to the covert of the willow tree;It's so much like that in Wordsworth. It's just,James: Yeah, I mean, yeah, the Prelude is full of things like that. I think that is probably one of the best moments, possibly the best moments of the prelude. But yeah, I mean it's just total genius isn't it?Henry: I think he's very, very important and yeah, much more important than T.S. Eliot who is, I put him in the same category, but I can see why you didn't.James: You do have a little note saying Pope, question mark or something I think, don't you, in the document.Henry: So the six I gave as the spine of English literature and everything, that's an uncontroversial view. I think Pope should be one of those people. I think we should see Pope as being on a level with Milton and Wordsworth, and I think he's got a very mixed reputation, but I think he was just as inventive, just as important. I think you are a Pope fan, just as clever, just as moving, and it baffles me that he's not more commonly regarded as part of this great spine running through the history of English literature and between Milton and Wordsworth. If you don't have Pope, I think it's a missing link if you like.James: I mean, I wouldn't maybe go as far as you, I love Pope. Pope was really the first perch I ever loved. I remember finding a little volume of Pope in a box of books. My school library was chucking out, and that was the first book of poetry I read and took seriously. I guess he sort of suffers by the fact that we are seeing all of this through the lens of the romantics. All our taste about Shakespeare and Milton and Spenser has been formed by the romantics and hope's way of writing the Satires. This sort of society poetry I think is just totally doesn't conform to our idea of what poetry should be doing or what poetry is. Is there absolutely or virtually nobody reads Dryden nowadays. It's just not what we think poetry is for that whole Augustine 18th century idea that poetry is for writing epistles to people to explain philosophical concepts to them or to diss your enemies and rivals or to write a kind of Duncia explaining why everyone you know is a moron. That's just really, I guess Byron is the last major, is the only of figure who is in that tradition who would be a popular figure nowadays with things like English bards and scotch reviewers. But that whole idea of poetry I think was really alien to us. And I mean I'm probably formed by that prejudice because I really do love Pope, but I don't love him as much as the other people we've discussed.Henry: I think part of his problem is that he's clever and rational and we want our poems always to be about moods, which may be, I think why George Herbert, who we've both got reasonably high is also quite underrated. He's very clever. He's always think George Herbert's always thinking, and when someone like Shakespeare or Milton is thinking, they do it in such a way that you might not notice and that you might just carry on with the story. And if you do see that they're thinking you can enjoy that as well. Whereas Pope is just explicitly always thinking and maybe lecturing, hectoring, being very grand with you and as you say, calling you an idiot. But there are so many excellent bits of Pope and I just think technically he can sustain a thought or an argument over half a dozen or a dozen lines and keep the rhyme scheme moving and it's never forced, and he never has to do that thing where he puts the words in a stupid order just to make the rhyme work. He's got such an elegance and a balance of composition, which again, as you say, we live under romantic ideals, not classical ones. But that doesn't mean we should be blind to the level of his accomplishment, which is really, really very high. I mean, Samuel Johnson basically thought that Alexander Pope had finished English poetry. We have the end of history. He had the end of English poetry. Pope, he's brought us to the mightiest of the heroic couplers and he's done it. It's all over.James: The other thing about Pope that I think makes us underrate him is that he's very charming. And I think charm is a quality we're not big on is that sort of, but I think some of Pope's charm is so moving. One of my favourite poems of his is, do you know the Epistle to Miss Blount on going into the country? The poem to the young girl who's been having a fashionable season in London then is sent to the boring countryside to stay with an aunt. And it's this, it's not like a romantic love poem, it's not distraught or hectic. It's just a sort of wonderful act of sympathy with this potentially slightly airheaded young girl who's been sent to the countryside, which you'd rather go to operas and plays and flirt with people. And there's a real sort of delicate in it that isn't overblown and isn't dramatic, but is extremely charming. And I think that's again, another quality that perhaps we're prone not to totally appreciate in the 21st century. It's almost the kind of highest form of politeness and sympathyHenry: And the prevailing quality in Pope is wit: “True wit is nature to advantage dressed/ What often was thought, but ne'er so well expressed”. And I think wit can be quite alienating for an audience because it is a kind of superior form of literary art. This is why people don't read as much Swift as he deserves because he's so witty and so scornful that a lot of people will read him and think, well, I don't like you.James: And that point about what oft was thought and ne'er so well expressed again, is a very classical idea. The poet who puts not quite conventional wisdom, but something that's been thought before in the best possible words, really suffers with the romantic idea of originality. The poet has to say something utterly new. Whereas for Pope, the sort of ideas that he express, some of the philosophical ideas are not as profound in original perhaps as words with, but he's very elegant proponent of them.Henry: And we love b******g people in our culture, and I feel like the Dunciad should be more popular because it is just, I can't remember who said this, but someone said it's probably the most under appreciated great poem in English, and that's got to be true. It's full of absolute zingers. There's one moment where he's described the whole crowd of them or all these poets who he considers to be deeply inferior, and it turns out he was right because no one reads them anymore. And you need footnotes to know who they are. I mean, no one cares. And he says, “equal your merits, equal is your din”. This kind of abuse is a really high art, and we ought to love that. We love that on Twitter. And I think things like the Rape of the Lock also could be more popular.James: I love the Rape of the Lock . I mean, I think anybody is not reading Pope and is looking for a way in, I think the Rape of the Lock is the way in, isn't it? Because it's just such a charming, lovely, funny poem.Henry: It is. And probably it suffers because the whole idea of mock heroic now is lost to us. But it's a bit like it's the literary equivalent of people writing a sort of mini epic about someone like Elon Musk or some other very prominent figure in the culture and using lots of heroic imagery from the great epics of Homer and Virgil and from the Bible and all these things, but putting them into a very diminished state. So instead of being grand, it becomes comic. It's like turning a God into a cartoon. And Pope is easily the best writer that we have for that kind of thing. Dryden, but he's the genius on it.James: Yeah, no, he totally is. I guess it's another reason he's under appreciated is that our culture is just much less worshipful of epic than the 18th century culture was. The 18th century was obsessed with trying to write epics and trying to imitate epics. I mean, I think to a lot of Pope's contemporaries, the achievement they might've been expecting people to talk about in 300 years time would be his translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey and the other stuff might've seen more minor in comparison, whereas it's the mock epic that we're remembering him for, which again is perhaps another symptom of our sort of post romantic perspective.Henry: I think this is why Spenser suffers as well, because everything in Spenser is magical. The knights are fairies, not the little fairies that live in buttercups, but big human sized fairies or even bigger than that. And there are magical women and saucers and the whole thing is a sort of hodgepodge of romance and fairy tale and legend and all this stuff. And it's often said, oh, he was old fashioned in his own time. But those things still had a lot of currency in the 16th century. And a lot of those things are in Shakespeare, for example.But to us, that's like a fantasy novel. Now, I love fantasy and I read fantasy, and I think some of it's a very high accomplishment, but to a lot of people, fantasy just means kind of trash. Why am I going to read something with fairies and a wizard? And I think a lot of people just see Spenser and they're like, what is this? This is so weird. They don't realise how Protestant they're being, but they're like, this is so weird.James: And Pope has a little, I mean, the Rape of the Lock even has a little of the same because the rape of the lock has this attendant army of good spirits called selfs and evil spirits called gnomes. I mean, I find that just totally funny and charming. I really love it.Henry: I'm going to read, there's an extract from the Rape of the Lock in the Oxford Book, and I'm going to read a few lines to give people an idea of how he can be at once mocking something but also quite charming about it. It's quite a difficult line to draw. The Rape of the Lock is all about a scandalous incident where a young man took a lock of a lady's hair. Rape doesn't mean what we think it means. It means an offence. And so because he stole a lock of her hair, it'd become obviously this huge problem and everyone's in a flurry. And to sort of calm everyone down, Pope took it so seriously that he made it into a tremendous joke. So here he is describing the sort of dressing table if you like.And now, unveil'd, the Toilet stands display'd,Each silver Vase in mystic order laid.First, rob'd in white, the Nymph intent adores,With head uncover'd, the Cosmetic pow'rs.A heav'nly image in the glass appears,To that she bends, to that her eyes she rears;Th' inferior Priestess, at her altar's side,Trembling begins the sacred rites of Pride.What a way to describe someone putting on their makeup. It's fantastic.James: It's funny. I can continue that because the little passage of Pope I picked to read begins exactly where yours ended. It only gets better as it goes on, I think. So after trembling begins the sacred rites of pride, Unnumber'd treasures ope at once, and hereThe various off'rings of the world appear;From each she nicely culls with curious toil,And decks the Goddess with the glitt'ring spoil.This casket India's glowing gems unlocks,And all Arabia breathes from yonder box.The Tortoise here and Elephant unite,Transformed to combs, the speckled, and the white.Here files of pins extend their shining rows,Puffs, Powders, Patches, Bibles, Billet-doux.It's just so lovely. I love a thing about the tortoise and the elephant unite because you've got a tortoise shell and an ivory comb. And the stuff about India's glowing gems and Arabia breathing from yonder box, I mean that's a, realistic is not quite the word, but that's a reference to Milton because Milton is continually having all the stones of Arabia and India's pearls and things all screwed through paradise lost. Yeah, it's just so lovely, isn't it?Henry: And for someone who's so classical and composed and elegant, there's something very Dickensian about things like the toilet, the tortoise and the elephant here unite, transform to combs. There's something a little bit surreal and the puffs, powders, patches, bibles, it has that sort of slightly hectic, frantic,James: That's sort of Victorian materialism, wealth of material objects,Henry: But also that famous thing that was said of Dickens, that the people are furniture and the furniture's like people. He can bring to life all the little bits and bobs of the ordinary day and turn it into something not quite ridiculous, not quite charming.James: And there is a kind of charm in the fact that it wasn't the sort of thing that poets would necessarily expect to pay attention to the 18th century. I don't think the sort of powders and ointments on a woman's dressing table. And there's something very sort of charming in his condescension to notice or what might've once seemed his condescension to notice those things, to find a new thing to take seriously, which is what poetry or not quite to take seriously, but to pay attention to, which I guess is one of the things that great perch should always be doing.Henry: When Swift, who was Pope's great friend, wrote about this, he wrote a poem called A Beautiful Young Lady Going to Bed, which is not as good, and I would love to claim Swift on our list, but I really can't.James: It's quite a horrible perm as well, that one, isn't it?Henry: It is. But it shows you how other people would treat the idea of the woman in front of her toilet, her mirror. And Swift uses an opportunity, as he said, to “lash the vice” because he hated all this adornment and what he would think of as the fakery of a woman painting herself. And so he talks about Corina pride of Drury Lane, which is obviously an ironic reference to her being a Lady of the Night, coming back and there's no drunken rake with her. Returning at the midnight hour;Four stories climbing to her bow'r;Then, seated on a three-legged chair,Takes off her artificial hair:Now, picking out a crystal eye,She wipes it clean, and lays it by.Her eye-brows from a mouse's hide,Stuck on with art on either side,Pulls off with care, and first displays 'em,Then in a play-book smoothly lays 'em.Now dexterously her plumpers draws,That serve to fill her hollow jaws.And it goes on like this. I mean, line after this is sort of raw doll quality to it, Pope, I think in contrast, it only illuminates him more to see where others are taking this kind of crude, very, very funny and witty, but very crude approach. He's able to really have the classical art of balance.James: Yes. And it's precisely his charm that he can mock it and sympathise and love it at the same time, which I think is just a more sort of complex suite of poetic emotions to have about that thing.Henry: So we want more people to read Pope and to love Pope.James: Yes. Even if I'm not letting him into my top.Henry: You are locking him out of the garden. Now, for the second tier, I want to argue for two anonymous poets. One of the things we did when we were talking about this was we asked chatGPT to see if it could give us a good answer. And if you use o1 or o1 Pro, it gives you a pretty good answer as to who the best poets in English are. But it has to be told that it's forgotten about the anonymous poets. And then it says, oh, that was stupid. There are quite a lot of good anonymous poets in English, but I suspect a lot of us, a lot of non artificial intelligence when thinking about this question overlook the anonymous poets. But I would think the Gawain poet and the Tom O' Bedlam poet deserve to be in here. I don't know what you think about that.James: I'm not competent to provide an opinion. I'm purely here to be educated on the subject of these anonymous poets. Henry: The Gawain poet, he's a mediaeval, assume it's a he, a mediaeval writer, obviously may well not be a man, a mediaeval writer. And he wrote Sir Gawain and The Green Knight, which is, if you haven't read it, you should really read it in translation first, I think because it's written at the same time as Chaucer. But Chaucer was written in a kind of London dialect, which is what became the English we speak. And so you can read quite a lot of Chaucer and the words look pretty similar and sometimes you need the footnotes, but when you read Gawain and The Green Knight, it's in a Northwestern dialect, which very much did not become modern day English. And so it's a bit more baffling, but it is a poem of tremendous imaginative power and weirdness. It's a very compelling story. We have a children's version here written by Selena Hastings who's a very accomplished biographer. And every now and then my son remembers it and he just reads it again and again and again. It's one of the best tales of King Arthur in his knights. And there's a wonderful book by John Burrow. It's a very short book, but that is such a loving piece of criticism that explicates the way in which that poem promotes virtue and all the nightly goodness that you would expect, but also is a very strange and unreal piece of work. And I think it has all the qualities of great poetry, but because it's written in this weird dialect, I remember as an undergraduate thinking, why is this so bloody difficult to read? But it is just marvellous. And I see people on Twitter, the few people who've read it, they read it again and they just say, God, it's so good. And I think there was a film of it a couple of years ago, but we will gloss lightly over that and not encourage you to do the film instead of the book.James: Yeah, you're now triggering a memory that I was at least set to read and perhaps did at least read part of Gawain and the Green Knight at University, but has not stuck to any brain cells at all.Henry: Well, you must try it again and tell me what you think. I mean, I find it easily to be one of the best poems in English.James: Yeah, no, I should. I had a little Chaucer kick recently actually, so maybe I'm prepared to rediscover mediaeval per after years of neglect since my degree,Henry: And it's quite short, which I always think is worth knowing. And then the Tom Bedlam is an anonymous poem from I think the 17th century, and it's one of the mad songs, so it's a bit like the Fool from King Lear. And again, it is a very mysterious, very strange and weird piece of work. Try and find it in and read the first few lines. And I think because it's anonymous, it's got slightly less of a reputation because it can't get picked up with some big name, but it is full of tremendous power. And again, I think it would be sad if it wasn't more well known.From the hag and hungry goblinThat into rags would rend ye,The spirit that stands by the naked manIn the Book of Moons defend ye,That of your five sound sensesYou never be forsaken,Nor wander from your selves with TomAbroad to beg your bacon,While I do sing, Any food, any feeding,Feeding, drink, or clothing;Come dame or maid, be not afraid,Poor Tom will injure nothing.Anyway, so you get the sense of it and it's got many stanzas and it's full of this kind of energy and it's again, very accomplished. It can carry the thought across these long lines and these long stanzas.James: When was it written? I'm aware of only if there's a name in the back of my mind.Henry: Oh, it's from the 17th century. So it's not from such a different time as King Lear, but it's written in the voice of a madman. And again, you think of that as the sort of thing a romantic poet would do. And it's strange to find it almost strange to find it displaced. There were these other mad songs. But I think because it's anonymous, it gets less well known, it gets less attention. It's not part of a bigger body of work, but it's absolutely, I think it's wonderful.James: I shall read it.Henry: So who have you got? Who else? Who are you putting in instead of these two?James: Hang on. So we're down to tier two now.Henry: Tier two.James: Yeah. So my tier two is: Donne, Elliot, Keats, Tennyson. I've put Spenser in tier two, Marvell and Pope, who we've already discussed. I mean, I think Eliot, we've talked about, I mean Donne just speaks for himself and there's probably a case that some people would make to bump him up a tier. Henry: Anybody can read that case in Katherine Rudell's book. We don't need to…James: Yes, exactly. If anybody's punching perhaps in tier two, it's Tennyson who I wasn't totally sure belonged there. Putting Tenon in the same tier as Donne and Spenser and Keets. I wonder if that's a little ambitious. I think that might raise eyebrows because there is a school of thought, which I'm not totally unsympathetic to this. What's the Auden quote about Tennyson? I really like it. I expressed very harshly, but I sort of get what he means. Auden said that Tennyson “had the finest ear perhaps of any English poet who was also undoubtedly the stupidest. There was little that he didn't know. There was little else that he did.” Which is far too harsh. But I mentioned to you earlier that I think was earlier this year, a friend and I had a project where we were going to memorise a perva week was a plan. We ended up basically getting, I think three quarters of the way through.And if there's a criticism of Tennyson that you could make, it's that the word music and the sheer lushness of phrases sometimes becomes its own momentum. And you can end up with these extremely lovely but sometimes slightly empty beautiful phrases, which is what I ended up feeling about Tithonus. And I sort of slightly felt I was memorising this unbelievably beautiful but ever so slightly hollow thing. And that was slightly why the project fell apart, I should say. Of course, they absolutely love Tennyson. He's one of my all time favourite poets, which is why my personal favouritism has bumped him up into that category. But I can see there's a case, and I think to a lot of people, he's just the kind of Victorian establishment gloom man, which is totally unfair, but there's not no case against Tennyson.Henry: Yeah, the common thing is that he has no ideas. I don't know if that's true or not. I'm also, I'm not sure how desperately important it is. It should be possible to be a great poet without ideas being at the centre of your work. If you accept the idea that the essence of poetry is invention, i.e. to say old things in a fantastically new way, then I think he qualifies very well as a great poet.James: Yes..Henry: Well, very well. I think Auden said what he said because he was anxious that it was true of himself.James: Yeah, I mean there's a strong argument that Auden had far too many ideas and the sorts of mad schemes and fantastical theories about history that Auden spent his spare time chasing after is certainly a kind of argument that poets maybe shouldn't have as many ideas, although it's just reading. Seamus Perry's got a very good little book on Tennyson, and the opening chapter is all about arguments about people who have tended to dislike Tennyson. And there are all kinds of embarrassing anecdotes about the elderly Tennyson trying to sort of go around dinner parties saying profound and sage-like things and totally putting his foot in it and saying things are completely banal. I should have made a note that this was sort of slightly, again, intensifying my alarm about is there occasionally a tinsely hollowness about Tennyson. I'm now being way too harsh about one of my favourite poets—Henry: I think it depends what you mean by ideas. He is more than just a poet of moods. He gives great expression, deep and strongly felt expression to a whole way of being and a whole way of conceiving of things. And it really was a huge part of why people became interested in the middle ages in the 19th century. I think there's Walter Scott and there's Tennyson who are really leading that work, and that became a dominant cultural force and it became something that meant a lot to people. And whether or not, I don't know whether it's the sort of idea that we're talking about, but I think that sort of thing, I think that qualifies as having ideas and think again, I think he's one of the best writers about the Arthurian legend. Now that work doesn't get into the Oxford Book of English Verse, maybe that's fair. But I think it was very important and I love it. I love it. And I find Tennyson easy to memorise, which is another point in his favour.James: Yeah.Henry: I'm going to read a little bit of Ulysses, which everyone knows the last five or six lines of that poem because it gets put into James Bond films and other such things. I'm going to read it from a little bit from earlier on. I am become a name;For always roaming with a hungry heartMuch have I seen and known; cities of menAnd manners, climates, councils, governments,Myself not least, but honour'd of them all;And drunk delight of battle with my peers,Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy.I am a part of all that I have met;Yet all experience is an arch wherethro'Gleams that untravell'd world, whose margin fadesFor ever and for ever when I move.I think that's amazing. And he can do that. He can do lots and lots and lots of that.James: Yeah, he really can. It's stunning. “Far on the ringing planes of windy Troy” is such an unbelievably evocative phrase.Henry: And that's what I mean. He's got this ability to bring back a sort of a whole mood of history. It's not just personal mood poetry. He can take you into these places and that is in the space of a line. In the space of a line. I think Matthew Arnold said of the last bit of what I just read is that he had this ability in Ulysses to make the lines seem very long and slow and to give them this kind of epic quality that far goes far beyond the actual length of that poem. Ulysses feels like this huge poem that's capturing so much of Homer and it's a few dozen lines.James: Yeah, no, I completely agree. Can I read a little bit of slightly more domestic Tennyson, from In Memoriam, I think his best poem and one of my all time favourite poems and it's got, there are many sort of famous lines on grief and things, but there's little sort of passage of natural description I think quite near the beginning that I've always really loved and I've always just thought was a stunning piece of poetry in terms of its sound and the way that the sound has patented and an unbelievably attentive description natural world, which is kind of the reason that even though I think Keats is a better poet, I do prefer reading Tennyson to Keats, so this is from the beginning of In Memoriam. Calm is the morn without a sound,Calm as to suit a calmer grief,And only thro' the faded leafThe chesnut pattering to the ground:Calm and deep peace on this high wold,And on these dews that drench the furze,And all the silvery gossamersThat twinkle into green and gold:Calm and still light on yon great plainThat sweeps with all its autumn bowers,And crowded farms and lessening towers,To mingle with the bounding main:And I just think that's an amazing piece of writing that takes you from that very close up image that it begins with of the “chestnut patterning to the ground” through the faded leaves of the tree, which is again, a really attentive little bit of natural description. I think anyone can picture the way that a chestnut might fall through the leaves of a chestnut tree, and it's just an amazing thing to notice. And I think the chestnut pattern to the ground does all the kind of wonderful, slightly onomatopoeic, Tennyson stuff so well, but by the end, you're kind of looking out over the English countryside, you've seen dew on the firs, and then you're just looking out across the plane to the sea, and it's this sort of, I just think it's one of those bits of poetry that anybody who stood in a slightly wet and romantic day in the English countryside knows exactly the feeling that he's evoking. And I mean there's no bit of—all of In Memoriam is pretty much that good. That's not a particularly celebrated passage I don't think. It's just wonderful everywhere.Henry: Yes. In Memoriam a bit like the Dunciad—under appreciated relative to its huge merits.James: Yeah, I think it sounds, I mean guess by the end of his life, Tennyson had that reputation as the establishment sage of Victorian England, queen of Victoria's favourite poet, which is a pretty off-putting reputation for to have. And I think In Memoriam is supposed to be this slightly cobwebby, musty masterpiece of Victorian grief. But there was just so much, I mean, gorgeous, beautiful sensuous poetry in it.Henry: Yeah, lots of very intense feelings. No, I agree. I have Tennyson my third tier because I had to have the Gawain poet, but I agree that he's very, very great.James: Yeah, I think the case for third tier is I'm very open to that case for the reasons that I said.Henry: Keats, we both have Keats much higher than Shelly. I think Byron's not on anyone's list because who cares about Byron. Overrated, badly behaved. Terrible jokes. Terrible jokes.James: I think people often think Byron's a better pert without having read an awful lot of the poetry of Byron. But I think anybody who's tried to wade through long swathes of Don Juan or—Henry: My God,James: Childe Harold, has amazing, amazing, beautiful moments. But yeah, there's an awful lot of stuff that you don't enjoy. I think.Henry: So to make the case for Keats, I want to talk about The Eve of St. Agnes, which I don't know about you, but I love The Eve of St. Agnes. I go back to it all the time. I find it absolutely electric.James: I'm going to say that Keats is a poet, which is kind of weird for somebody is sent to us and obviously beautiful as Keats. I sort of feel like I admire more than I love. I get why he's brilliant. It's very hard not to see why he's brilliant, but he's someone I would very rarely sit down and read for fun and somebody got an awful lot of feeling or excitement out of, but that's clearly a me problem, not a Keats problem.Henry: When I was a teenager, I knew so much Keats by heart. I knew the whole of the Ode to a Nightingale. I mean, I was absolutely steeped in it morning, noon and night. I couldn't get over it. And now I don't know if I could get back to that point. He was a very young poet and he writes in a very young way. But I'm going to read—The Eve of St. Agnes is great. It's a narrative poem, which I think is a good way to get into this stuff because the story is fantastic. And he had read Spenser, he was part of this kind of the beginning of this mediaeval revival. And he's very interested in going back to those old images, those old stories. And this is the bit, I think everything we're reading is from the Oxford Book of English Verse, so that if people at home want to read along they can.This is when the heroine of the poem is Madeline is making her escape basically. And I think this is very, very exciting. Her falt'ring hand upon the balustrade,Old Angela was feeling for the stair,When Madeline, St. Agnes' charmed maid,Rose, like a mission'd spirit, unaware:With silver taper's light, and pious care,She turn'd, and down the aged gossip ledTo a safe level matting. Now prepare,Young Porphyro, for gazing on that bed;She comes, she comes again, like ring-dove fray'd and fled.Out went the taper as she hurried in;Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, died:She clos'd the door, she panted, all akinTo spirits of the air, and visions wide:No uttered syllable, or, woe betide!But to her heart, her heart was voluble,Paining with eloquence her balmy side;As though a tongueless nightingale should swellHer throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled, in her dell.A casement high and triple-arch'd there was,All garlanded with carven imag'riesOf fruits, and flowers, and bunches of knot-grass,And diamonded with panes of quaint device,Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes,As are the tiger-moth's deep-damask'd wings;And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries,And twilight saints, and dim emblazonings,A shielded scutcheon blush'd with blood of queens and kings.I mean, so much atmosphere, so much tension, so many wonderful images just coming one after the other. The rapidity of it, the tumbling nature of it. And people often quote the Ode to autumn, which has a lot of that.James: I have to say, I found that totally enchanting. And perhaps my problem is that I need you to read it all to me. You can make an audio book that I can listen to.Henry: I honestly, I actually might read the whole of the E and put it out as audio on Substack becauseJames: I would actually listen to that.Henry: I love it so much. And I feel like it gets, when we talk about Keats, we talk about, On First Looking into Chapman's Homer and Bright Star and La Belle Dame Sans Merci, and these are great, great poems and they're poems that we do at school Ode to a Nightingale because I think The Great Gatsby has a big debt to Ode to a Nightingale, doesn't it? And obviously everyone quotes the Ode to Autumn. I mean, as far as I can tell, the 1st of October every year is the whole world sharing the first stands of the Ode to Autumn.James: Yeah. He may be one of the people who suffers from over familiarity perhaps. And I think also because it sounds so much what poetry is supposed to sound like, because so much of our idea of poetry derives from Keats. Maybe that's something I've slightly need to get past a little bit.Henry: But if you can get into the complete works, there are many, the bit I just read is I think quite representative.James: I loved it. I thought it was completely beautiful and I would never have thought to ever, I probably can't have read that poem for years. I wouldn't have thought to read it. Since university, I don't thinkHenry: He's one of those people. All of my copies of him are sort of frayed and the spines are breaking, but the book is wearing out. I should just commit it to memory and be done. But somehow I love going back to it. So Keats is very high in my estimation, and we've both put him higher than Shelly and Coleridge.James: Yeah.Henry: Tell me why. Because those would typically, I think, be considered the superior poets.James: Do you think Shelly? I think Keats would be considered the superior poetHenry: To Shelly?James: Certainly, yes. I think to Shelly and Coleridge, that's where current fashion would place them. I mean, I have to say Coleridge is one of my all time favourite poets. In terms of people who had just every so often think, I'd love to read a poem, I'd love to read Frost at Midnight. I'd love to read the Aeolian Harp. I'd love to read This Lime Tree Bower, My Prison. I'd love to read Kubla Khan. Outside Milton, Coleridge is probably the person that I read most, but I think, I guess there's a case that Coleridge's output is pretty slight. What his reputation rest on is The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Kubla Khan, the conversation poems, which a lot of people think are kind of plagiarised Wordsworth, at least in their style and tone, and then maybe not much else. Does anybody particularly read Cristabel and get much out of it nowadays? Dejection an Ode people like: it's never done an awful lot for me, so I sort of, in my personal Pantheon Coleridge is at the top and he's such an immensely sympathetic personality as well and such a curious person. But I think he's a little slight, and there's probably nothing in Coleridge that can match that gorgeous passage of Keats that you read. I think.Henry: Yeah, that's probably true. He's got more ideas, I guess. I don't think it matters that he's slight. Robert Frost said something about his ambition had been to lodge five or six poems in the English language, and if he'd done that, he would've achieved greatness. And obviously Frost very much did do that and is probably the most quotable and well-known poet. But I think Coleridge easily meets those criteria with the poems you described. And if all we had was the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, I would think it to be like Tom O' Bedlam, like the Elegy in a Country Churchyard, one of those great, great, great poems that on its own terms, deserves to be on this list.James: Yeah, and I guess another point in his favour is a great poet is they're all pretty unalike. I think if given Rime of the Ancient Mariner, a conversation poem and Kubla Khan and said, guess whether these are three separate poets or the same guy, you would say, oh, there's a totally different poems. They're three different people. One's a kind of creepy gothic horror ballad. Another one is a philosophical reflection. Another is the sort of Mad Opium dream. I mean, Kubla Khan is just without a doubt, one of the top handful of purposes in English language, I think.Henry: Oh yeah, yeah. And it has that quality of the Elegy in a Country Churchyard that so many of the lines are so quotable in the sense that they could be, in the case of the Elegy in a Country Churchyard, a lot of novels did get their titles from it. I think it was James Lees Milne. Every volume of his diaries, which there are obviously quite a few, had its title from Kubla Khan. Ancient as the Hills and so on. It's one of those poems. It just provides us with so much wonderful language in the space of what a page.James: Sort of goes all over the place. Romantic chasms, Abyssinian made with dulcimer, icy pleasure dome with caves of ice. It just such a—it's so mysterious. I mean, there's nothing else remotely like it at all in English literature that I can think of, and its kind strangeness and virtuosity. I really love that poem.Henry: Now, should we say a word for Shelly? Because everyone knows Ozymandias, which is one of those internet poems that goes around a lot, but I don't know how well known the rest of his body of work is beyond that. I fell in love with him when I read a very short lyric called “To—” Music, when soft voices die,Vibrates in the memory—Odours, when sweet violets sicken,Live within the sense they quicken.Rose leaves, when the rose is dead,Are heaped for the belovèd's bed;And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone,Love itself shall slumber on.I found that to be one of those poems that was once read and immediately memorised. But he has this very, again, broad body of work. He can write about philosophical ideas, he can write about moods, he can write narrative. He wrote Julian and Maddalo, which is a dialogue poem about visiting a madman and taking sympathy with him and asking the question, who's really mad here? Very Swiftian question. He can write about the sublime in Mont Blanc. I mean, he has got huge intellectual power along with the beauty. He's what people want Tennyson to be, I guess.James: Yeah. Or what people think Byron might be. I think Shelly is great. I don't quite get that Byron is so much more famous. Shelly has just a dramatic and, well, maybe not quite just as, but an incredibly dramatic and exciting life to go along with it,Henry: I think some of the short lyrics from Byron have got much more purchase in day-to-day life, like She Walks in Beauty.James: Yeah. I think you have to maybe get Shelly a little more length, don't you? I mean, even there's something like Ode to the West Wind is you have to take the whole thing to love it, perhaps.Henry: Yes. And again, I think he's a bit like George Herbert. He's always thinking you really have to pay attention and think with him. Whereas Byron has got lots of lines you can copy out and give to a girl that you like on the bus or something.James: Yes. No, that's true.Henry: I don't mean that in quite as rude a way as it sounds. I do think that's a good thing. But Shelly's, I think, much more of a thinker, and I agree with you Childe Harold and so forth. It's all crashing bore. I might to try it again, but awful.James: I don't want move past Coledridge without inflicting little Coledridge on you. Can I?Henry: Oh, yes. No, sorry. We didn't read Coledridge, right?James: Are just, I mean, what to read from Coledridge? I mean, I could read the whole of Kubla Khan, but that would be maybe a bit boring. I mean, again, these are pretty famous and obvious lines from Frost at Midnight, which is Coledridge sitting up late at night in his cottage with his baby in its cradle, and he sort of addressing it and thinking about it. And I just think these lines are so, well, everything we've said about Coledridge, philosophical, thoughtful, beautiful, in a sort of totally knockout, undeniable way. So it goes, he's talking to his young son, I think. My babe so beautiful! it thrills my heartWith tender gladness, thus to look at thee,And think that thou shalt learn far other lore,And in far other scenes! For I was rearedIn the great city, pent 'mid cloisters dim,And saw nought lovely but the sky and stars.But thou, my babe! shalt wander like a breezeBy lakes and sandy shores, beneath the cragsOf ancient mountain, and beneath the clouds,Which image in their bulk both lakes and shoresAnd mountain crags: so shalt thou see and hearThe lovely shapes and sounds intelligibleOf that eternal language, which thy GodUtters, who from eternity doth teachHimself in all, and all things in himself.Which is just—what aren't those lines of poetry doing? And with such kind of confidence, the way you get from talking to your baby and its cradle about what kind of upbringing you hope it will have to those flashes of, I mean quite Wordsworthian beauty, and then the sort of philosophical tone at the end. It's just such a stunning, lovely poem. Yeah, I love it.Henry: Now we both got Yeats and Hopkins. And Hopkins I think is really, really a tremendous poet, but neither of us has put Browning, which a lot of other people maybe would. Can we have a go at Browning for a minute? Can we leave him in shreds? James: Oh God. I mean, you're going to be a better advocate of Browning than I am. I've never—Henry: Don't advocate for him. No, no, no.James: We we're sticking him out.Henry: We're sticking him.James: I wonder if I even feel qualified to do that. I mean, I read quite a bit of Browning at university, found it hard to get on with sometimes. I think I found a little affected and pretentious about him and a little kind of needlessly difficult in a sort of off-puttingly Victorian way. But then I was reading, I reviewed a couple of years ago, John Carey has an excellent introduction to English poetry. I think it's called A Little History of Poetry in which he described Browning's incredibly long poem, The Ring in the Book as one of the all time wonders of verbal art. This thing is, I think it's like 700 or 800 pages long poem in the Penguin edition, which has always given me pause for thought and made me think that I've dismissed Browning out of hand because if John Carey's telling me that, then I must be wrong.But I think I have had very little pleasure out of Browning, and I mean by the end of the 19th century, there was a bit of a sort of Victorian cult of Browning, which I think was influential. And people liked him because he was a living celebrity who'd been anointed as a great poet, and people liked to go and worship at his feet and stuff. I do kind of wonder whether he's lasted, I don't think many people read him for pleasure, and I wonder if that maybe tells its own story. What's your case against Browning?Henry: No, much the same. I think he's very accomplished and very, he probably, he deserves a place on the list, but I can't enjoy him and I don't really know why. But to me, he's very clever and very good, but as you say, a bit dull.James: Yeah, I totally agree. I'm willing. It must be our failing, I'm sure. Yeah, no, I'm sure. I'm willing to believe they're all, if this podcast is listened to by scholars of Victorian poetry, they're cringing and holding their head in their hands at this—Henry: They've turned off already. Well, if you read The Ring and the Book, you can come back on and tell us about it.James: Oh God, yeah. I mean, in about 20 years time.Henry: I think we both have Auden, but you said something you said, “does Auden have an edge of fraudulence?”James: Yeah, I mean, again, I feel like I'm being really rude about a lot of poets that I really love. I don't really know why doesn't think, realising that people consider to be a little bit weak makes you appreciate their best stuff even more I guess. I mean, it's hard to make that argument without reading a bit of Auden. I wonder what bit gets it across. I haven't gotten any ready. What would you say about Auden?Henry: I love Auden. I think he was the best poet of the 20th century maybe. I mean, I have to sort of begrudgingly accept T.S. Eliot beside, I think he can do everything from, he can do songs, light lyrics, comic verse, he can do occasional poetry, obituaries. He was a political poet. He wrote in every form, I think almost literally that might be true. Every type of stanza, different lines. He was just structurally remarkable. I suspect he'll end up a bit like Pope once the culture has tur

I first met Ben Cowper in Berlin at the Hypersoft party and it was no-brainer to ask him for a mix after hearing his superb b2b set DJ Teeth Ben, who goes by Cowper, is a DJ, record collector, and the mind behind Between Stations, a radio show that's grown into a party and now […] Whole Entry: https://deeprhythms.com/guest_mixes/144_cowper_for_deeprhythms/

Leitura bíblica do dia: 1 Samuel 20:26-34 Plano de leitura anual:Amós 1-3, Apocalipse 6 Já fez seu devocional hoje? Aproveite e marque um amigo para fazer junto com você! Confira: William Cowper (1731-1800), poeta inglês, tornou-se amigo do seu pastor, John Newton (1725-1807), o ex-traficante de escravos. Cowper sofria de depressão e ansiedade, e tentou suicidar-se mais de uma vez. Quando Newton o visitava, eles faziam longas caminhadas e falavam de Deus. Pensando que Cowper se beneficiaria em se envolver criativamente e ter uma razão para escrever sua poesia, o pastor teve a ideia de compilar um hinário. Cowper contribuiu com muitas canções, incluindo “Misterioso é o nosso Deus”. Quando Newton mudou-se para outra igreja, ele e Cowper permaneceram amigos e trocaram cartas regularmente. Vejo paralelos entre a amizade de Cowper e Newton com a de Davi e Jônatas no Antigo Testamento. Após Davi derrotar Golias, “formou-se um forte laço de amizade entre ele e Jônatas” (1 Samuel 18:1). Embora Jônatas fosse filho do rei Saul, ele defendeu Davi contra o ciúme e a raiva do rei, questionando-o por que Davi deveria ser morto. Mas “Saul atirou sua lança contra Jônatas, com a intenção de matá-lo” (20:33). Jônatas se esquivou e frustrou-se pelo modo como seu pai desonrou o seu amigo (v.34). Para as duplas de amigos, o vínculo deles era vivificante enquanto estimulavam um ao outro a servir e amar a Deus. Como você poderia, da mesma forma, encorajar um amigo hoje? Por: Amy Boucher Pye

Episode: 1295 The lowly, but not-so-simple, dressmaker's pin.  Today, let's make pins.

William Cowper's life was marked by deep sorrow, mental illness, and overwhelming despair, yet it was also filled with moments of profound faith, divine deliverance, and beautiful expressions of God's grace. Born in 1731, Cowper was a gifted poet whose hymns continue to touch hearts and point people to the gospel. His life's trajectory was profoundly shaped by personal struggles with depression, as well as by the intervention of friends like John Newton, who guided him through dark times. It was Romans 3:24 that transformed Cowper's heart as he sat in an asylum, broken and lost. Reading about the propitiation of Christ—how Jesus bore the wrath of God on our behalf—Cowper realized the depth of God's grace for sinners like him. The poet who struggled with self-doubt and mental anguish penned some of the most powerful hymns in Christian history, including "There is a Fountain Filled with Blood" and "God Moves in a Mysterious Way." In this episode, we explore how Cowper's life illustrates that God's grace shines brightest in the midst of personal weakness. His story reminds us that even when we struggle with despair, God is faithful to guide us through and use us for His glory. You'll be encouraged by the reminder that God works through every circumstance, weaving together a testimony of His grace, just as He did in William Cowper's life. Scripture Reading: Romans 3:25

William Cowper's life was marked by deep sorrow, mental illness, and overwhelming despair, yet it was also filled with moments of profound faith, divine deliverance, and beautiful expressions of God's grace. Born in 1731, Cowper was a gifted poet whose hymns continue to touch hearts and point people to the gospel. His life's trajectory was profoundly shaped by personal struggles with depression, as well as by the intervention of friends like John Newton, who guided him through dark times. It was Romans 3:24 that transformed Cowper's heart as he sat in an asylum, broken and lost. Reading about the propitiation of Christ—how Jesus bore the wrath of God on our behalf—Cowper realized the depth of God's grace for sinners like him. The poet who struggled with self-doubt and mental anguish penned some of the most powerful hymns in Christian history, including "There is a Fountain Filled with Blood" and "God Moves in a Mysterious Way." In this episode, we explore how Cowper's life illustrates that God's grace shines brightest in the midst of personal weakness. His story reminds us that even when we struggle with despair, God is faithful to guide us through and use us for His glory. You'll be encouraged by the reminder that God works through every circumstance, weaving together a testimony of His grace, just as He did in William Cowper's life. Scripture Reading: Romans 3:25

We can't wait for the confirmed Bridgerton Season 4 with main squeeze Benny Boo Boo and the excitement of who's Sophie!We can't wait for our Season 3 Episode 1 Breakdown to be technically available however Polin-ating season is climbing to be Netflix's most watched show of all time.How many times have you watched the S4 announcement video?  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VGHJPpo2oeUWhat we know so far: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/tv/tv-news/bridgerton-season-4-what-to-expect-benedict-luke-thompson-1235955688/Filming is delayed until the end of this year so maybe a we're getting a 2026 present during the holidays?  Whatever happens, whenever it happens, we're looking forward to the masquerade!Dylan Is In Trouble, with his official Bridgerton outfit, reacts to the first and last episode of Season 3… he's pretty perceptive and hilarious! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvey-kQdqqcWe're wondering what the Cowper family's role in Season 4.  Let us not forget Lady Cowper's first name is Araminta.Join us as we excitedly wait for more S4 Benny Boo Boo news and manifest receiving a premiere invitation!Hosts – Toni Rose  & Wendy WooEmail - bridgerton2000@gmail.comFollow - www.instagram.com/bridgerton2000Shop - www.zazzle.com/store/lit_wallflowers/productsSubscribe - www.youtube.com/channel/UCVbwzumQy5Gx1TKc-O4OCzQWebsite - linktr.ee/bridgerton2000www.juliaquinn.comwww.instagram.com/juliaquinnauthorwww.ubookstore.com/books/collections/julia-quinnwww.shondaland.com

Dominic Coleman Today on the Mighty Dragon podcast, we are thrilled to welcome Dominic Coleman, the talented actor known for his role as Lord Cowper in Bridgerton. Dominic joined the beloved series in its second season, portraying the patriarch of the Cowper family and father to Cressida. Beyond Bridgerton, Dominic has recently appeared in high-profile films such as Wonka and Napoleon. In this exclusive interview, we dive into his experiences on these sets and explore the breadth of his acting career. We discuss his preparation process for various roles and the challenges he has encountered along the way. Dominic also shares invaluable advice for aspiring actors, making this episode a must-listen for anyone interested in the world of acting.

You are cordially invited to join our chat with this week's guest of honour; the Art Director of 'Bridgerton' Season 3, Adam Grant! Adam takes us behind-the-scenes in this episode by talking us through the incredible sets he designed for the hit Netflix show, including the ballrooms, the Cowper residence and that iconic Penelope staircase (IYKYK). He also tells us about his work on other period dramas including 'Victoria' and 'The Irregulars'. Meanwhile, we have another hilarious made up movie plot from a listener in this week's Crew Confessions, and we chat about the new trailer for Laura's most recent film project, 'Paddington in Peru'! LINKS:Adam Grant's websitewww.adamgrantdesign.co.ukSophie Moore's websitewww.sophiemooredesign.comFollow us!INSTAGRAMTIKTOK Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Episode 83 - From Nurse to Nurse Coach – A Journey of Resilience with Ann Cowper In this episode of the Visible Coaches podcast, hosts Angela and Anka interview Anne Cowper, a registered nurse and member of the Visible Club. They discuss the intersection of coaching and healthcare, exploring Anne's journey through her nursing career, overcoming health challenges, and transitioning to a nurse coach during the pandemic. Anne shares her experiences and the importance of community support in evolving her business and personal growth. The conversation highlights the non-linear paths to success and the significance of enjoying the journey while making progress.00:00 Introduction to the Visible Coaches Podcast00:42 Meet Anne Cowper: Nurse and Visible Club Member02:26 Anne's Journey in Healthcare03:13 The Turning Point: Anne's Stroke and Recovery04:48 Transition to Online Coaching07:49 Finding the Visible Club11:46 The Importance of Community and Support22:46 Anne's Current Work and Future Plans25:34 Conclusion and Final ThoughtsJoin us on Monday for the next Message & Momentum Weekly session: https://thevisibleclub.com/messageandmomentumAngela and Anke unpack crucial but often overlooked topics to help you get found and noticed by your ideal clients, AND we open up the floor for hot seat coaching and Q&A, so you get YOUR questions answered.To find out more about us and The Visible Coaches Podcast, visit thevisiblecoachespodcast.com where you'll also hear about free events we offer to help introverted coaches make their mark in an extrovert's world.If you love planning and taking notes to stay organized and make progress, get your copy of our Become More Visible Journal.To get clarity on YOUR next step towards more visibility and business success, book a call with Angela.************

uthenticity helps us discover what is going on inside. Where am I on the self-reliant or shame scale? Matthew 12:34 For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. Our inner parts/ inner beliefs determine our behaviors, and emotions. It’s why we do what we do. Psalm 51:6 Behold, You desire truth in the inward parts, – God cares about our inward parts We keep trying to change our behavior and our emotions – but both of those are a result of what we believe inside – MOST of the time we are not aware We bring everything into His light - what we think is “good” and - what we think is “not good.” Then we let God show us what is true. Psalm 51:6 And in the hidden part You will make me to know wisdom. So what is truth? In Christ, we have been given new hearts (Ezekiel 36:26-27) and are new creations (2 Corinthians 5:17). It’s in God’s truth, His light, we see self-reliance and shame are BOTH focused on self! 2 Peter 1:3 His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. 5 For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 1 – Where I the storyline? New Covenant. Things are not just promised – but fulfilled and given. 2 – Original audience? What it meant to the people at the time it was written - someone pointed out that the original audience had the advantage of the original language 1. The word ADD can trip us up because we feel like there is something we need to create or increase. It can lead to feeling we need to get busy, try harder and get better at all these qualities … 2. Scholars agree that the word translated ADD – is misleading 1. NASB more accurate - 5 Now for this very reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith minister moral excellence, and in your moral excellence, knowledge... Greek word is used epichorégeó (ep-ee-khor-ayg-eh'-o) – meaning what is supplied - it was a classical Greek term used for performances, It’s like bringing all the actors out on the stage for the final bow. You are not adding or creating – but acknowledging and accepting. You are believing what has been given to you. 3. There is a huge gap between being diligent to embrace what God has given us and feeling we have to add something of our own creation. The key is in the Supplier. Our faith in what He has supplied is to increase and as a result: goodness, knowledge, self-control etc. grow. 2 Peter 1:9 But the verse goes on - SOLUTION 9 But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins. – This is the solution – when we feel those qualities are not evident in our lives – we turn our focus back to Him -the Supplier with thanksgiving and praise. that is how these qualities become visible. These verses are descriptive – who we are – not just what we do. ‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬‬3) Is this consistent? And the discussion took off in high gear with questions, confessions, doubts… This is the second way God helps us see our inner thoughts and beliefs – through discussion – we start to see clearer • one person said: Gal 5:22-23 gives the same qualities, kindness, faithfulness, self-control - they are FRUIT of Holy Spirit – not fruit of us. • “I’ve been trying to use my willpower to grow those qualities …” • Another person said, “me too, but then we are still focused on ourselves.” • We try to create something we weren’t meant to create. • When we see a godly life primarily as moral behavior, we may not recognize how much we need grace because we are doing okay checking off the boxes! • And the other extreme - we may not recognize how the enemy lulls us into comparison – they are both as bad - pride or shame it’s all focused on SELF Philippians 3:3 Put no confidence in the flesh it's more than our salvation. Col 2:6 – just as you received - continuing a lot so then just as you continued to receive. Until we see God as our Source -- we reduce Him to a little above a coach. I need to love more, and then we tack on “with God’s help.” Many people in the group asked for prayer to stop striving and to stop judging themselves and others.

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Poet William Cowper struggled with depression much of his life. After a suicide attempt, he was committed to an asylum. But it was there through the care of a Christian physician that Cowper came to a warm, vital faith in Jesus. Soon afterwards Cowper became acquainted with pastor and hymnwriter John Newton, who encouraged him to collaborate on a hymnal for their church. Among the hymns Cowper wrote was “God Moves in a Mysterious Way,” which contains these words pressed from the crucible of experience: “You fearful saints, fresh courage take; the clouds you so much dread, are big with mercy and shall break in blessings on your head.” Like Cowper, the people of Judah also met God’s kindness unexpectedly. As an alliance of armies invaded their nation, King Jehoshaphat gathered the people for prayer. As Judah’s army marched out, men in the front ranks praised God (2 Chronicles 20:21). The invading armies turned on themselves, and “no one . . . escaped. . . . There was so much plunder that it took three days to collect it” (vv. 24-25). On the fourth day, the very place where a hostile invading force gathered against God’s people was dubbed the Valley of Berakah—literally, “the valley of praise or blessing.” (v. 26). What a change! God’s mercy can turn even our most difficult valleys into places of praise as we give them to Him.

In today's episode of the 2X eCommerce Podcast, we dive into the nuanced world of eCommerce pricing strategies with Aaron Cowper, the mastermind behind ShopGrok. Host Kunle Campbell engages Aaron in a deep discussion on his evolution from a strategy consultant for global giants like PwC and McKinsey to founding ShopGrok, a pivotal force in shaping retail pricing strategies. Aaron's journey from consulting to entrepreneurship showcases a dedicated pursuit of optimizing pricing strategies to bolster eCommerce growth and market presence.Aaron delves into his initial forays into the pricing arena, highlighting his strategic moves and the insights gained from managing pricing at Woolworths, Australia's retail behemoth, during its crucial turnaround phase. This conversation unravels the complexity of pricing in the retail sector, emphasizing the dynamic interplay between online flexibility and brick-and-mortar challenges.A key moment unfolds as Aaron discusses ShopGrok's mission to democratize advanced pricing strategies for eCommerce businesses, spotlighting the critical role of data-driven decision-making in today's competitive landscape. Through detailed examples and personal anecdotes, Aaron illustrates the transformative impact of effective pricing strategies on customer perception, market positioning, and long-term business viability.Listeners are invited to journey with Aaron through the intricacies of eCommerce pricing, uncovering the strategic frameworks that empower businesses to navigate market complexities, optimize profitability, and enhance customer engagement. This episode is an essential listen for eCommerce entrepreneurs, marketing professionals, and anyone interested in the art and science of pricing strategy.

Elizabeth Cowper has over 20 years of HR leadership experience and is a working mother of 3 and Founder of Ludo.  Ludo provides multi-award-winning tech for inclusion in the workplace.  Elizabeth spent her HR career working for brands such as Planet Organic, Harvey Nichols, LVMH, and Tapestry.  Tapestry is the umbrella company for Coach, Kate Spade, and Stuart Weitzman where Elizabeth was VP HR Europe, Global Head of Wellbeing, and part of the Global DEI Committee.  Elizabeth has been described as the ‘Culture Adjuster' and has been listed in the HR Most Influential Awards for 5 years straight.  Elizabeth understands how to engage talent and drive wellbeing in the workplace.  It's her thing.  In 2022 Ludo won Inclusion Initiative of the Year by Corporate Livewire and Rising Stars in Corporate Wellbeing.  Elizabeth has been listed as one of the 10 Most Futuristic Business Women Pioneering Innovation 2022 and Top Five Unstoppable Women Leaders to Watch 2023.   ---- SOCIALS: Website: https://weareludo.com/ Instagram: @we_are_ludo LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/weareludo/?viewAsMember=true 

In today's episode we offer you a profound understanding of why the resurrection of Jesus Christ is not just a historical event, but the bedrock of our faith, as Paul explains in 1 Corinthians 15. We pay tribute to the enduring legacy of William Cowper, delving into his classic hymn "There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood," and uncovering the depths of its theological richness. We take a look at both Cowper's personal struggles, and the pastoral support and comfort he received from the Unwin family and Rev. John Newton. We learn a little about how the Cowper's words have had various music settings and get to hear various takes on the most popular tune used today. Reawaken Hymn's moving rendition of this hymn bring home the episode's message of hope and the enduring promise of the gospel.As we reflect on themes of atonement and the free gift of salvation, the life-changing impact of this sacred song becomes clear. Cowper's song  journeys from the somber reflection of Good Friday to the triumph of Easter Sunday.  We explore the vivid imagery of the dying thief and the infinite mercy of God, challenging us to live as "resurrection people," filled with the transformative power of Jesus' resurrection in our daily lives. This episode is not merely a listening experience but an invitation to embrace the boundless grace and redemption that define our lives and our worship. Join us and be inspired by the power of this phenomenal hymn to articulate our deepest desires for redemption and ignite a renewed sense of hope in the finished work of Jesus Christ.A huge thank you again to Doug Johnson for "There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood" arranged and performed for solo violin.SHOW LINKS:"There is a Fountain" performed by Nathan Drake of Reawaken Hymns with chord charts and many other church music resources."There is a Fountain" appears on the album Hymns of the Son available here.Excerpt from Alistair Begg – “The Man on the Middle Cross Said I Could Come” "Let Me Sing" by Andrew Peterson from the Album Clear to Venus"There is a Fountain" by Tim Harvey and The Bethlehem Baptist Praise BandSupport the show www.thebrightforever.comAll songs used by permission.

En el momento más agudo de su depresión, John Newton acompañó a William Cowper, siendo muestra de la gracia de Dios para con él. Este es un ejemplo de cómo una amistad fundamentada en la fe puede perseverar en medio del valle de sombra de muerte. SÍGUENOS Sitio web: https://volvamosalevangelio.org/ X: https://twitter.com/volvamosevg TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@volvamos_al_evangelio Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/volvamosalevangelio/ Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/volvamosevangelio/ Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/volvamosevangelio/

In this episode of Add To Cart, we checkout Aaron Cowper, founder and CEO of ShopGrok, a pricing and range analytics platform for retail and consumer brands. Aaron was formerly Head of Price Strategy and Analytics at Woolworths, and while he was there the idea to develop an alternative to sending humans out to gather data on competitors pricing began to take root…in 2018 he set up ShopGrok. The business has worked with clients such as KFC, Super Cheap Auto and Oroton. Links from the episode:Mastering Your Ecommerce Pricing Strategy with ShopGrok | #374Questions answered in the podcast:What is the weirdest thing you've ever bought online? Who is your favourite retailer? Which retail fad do you wish was history?Can you recommend a book or podcast that our listeners should immediately get into? Finish this sentence. The future of retail is… About your co-host: Aaron Cowper from ShopGrokAaron is the founder and CEO of ShopGrok - one of Australia's leading retail analytics software companies. As the former Head of Price Strategy at Woolworths Supermarkets and previously a retail-focused management consultant at McKinsey & Company, Aaron has been instrumental in helping businesses optimise their strategies for revenue management, pricing, and promotional effectiveness for over a decade. He is passionate about using big data in an agile manner to make fact-based decisions.You can contact Aaron at LinkedInAbout your host: Nathan Bush from Add To CartNathan Bush is a director, strategist and advisor. He has led eCommerce for businesses with revenue $100m+ and has been recognised as one of Australia's Top 50 People in eCommerce four years in a row. You can contact Nathan on LinkedIn, Twitter or via email.Please contact us if you: Want to come on board as an Add To Cart sponsor Are interested in joining Add To Cart as a co-host Have any feedback or suggestions on how to make Add To Cart betterEmail hello@addtocart.com.au We look forward to hearing from you! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When I first started working in elite sport I believed that not only did the best athletes have natural talent and a good work ethic, but that they also had a life which was completely under control. From the outside looking in, many armchair fans think that elite athletes, in any sport, have it all. Nothing could be further from the truth, as you'll hear in this week's podcast. It's a very open and honest conversation with elite female fell runner, Emily Cowper-Coles. During the chat we explore: Whether a person's ability to push themselves to their physical and mental limit is nature or nurture The domino effects of a sudden traumatic family death when she was 13 Dealing with chronic stress fatigue, and why it's a mental and physical illness How and why to seek help early, and be kind to yourself Learning through mistakes and experience The benefits of yoga for relaxation Competing at a national level as a fell runner, and setting records Why the athletes who can perform to their potential are the ones balancing everything sustainably I hope that you find this conversation as inspiring as I did. If you or anyone you know is affected by any of the issues we discuss, please check out the links below to seek help or guidance. Red Cross - If you are lonely or want to be kind to yourself Young Minds - Fighting for young peoples mental health Assist Trauma Care - If you are the victim of a traumatic bereavement   If you want to find out more about Emily and her adventures, please check out these links: Facebook - 3 wheeling cycle 3 women, 3 peaks, 1 world record Emily's 3 peaks solo record attempt If you'd like to help with Emily's fundraising this is her JustGiving page.   Favourite Motivational Songs Coldplay - Sky full of stars Self esteem boost:  The Greatest Showman - This is Me!    Favourite Book - Make Your Bed - Admiral William McRaven   To contact Beth regarding Life Coaching, please email her at Info@BethanyWardLifeCoaching.uk.   To leave a review of the podcast on Apple podcasts CLICK HERE.   Sports Nutrition questions - if you have a sports nutrition question that you would like answered on the podcast, please email it to me via Beth@TheTriathlonCoach.com.   Join our SWAT/High Performance Human tribe using this link, with a happiness guarantee! You can watch a brief video about the group by going to our website here, and join our SWAT High Performance Human tribe here. Purchase a copy of my High Performance Human e-book featuring more than 30 top tips on how to upgrade your life. If you would like to help offset the cost of our podcast production, we would be so grateful. Please click here to support the HPH podcast. Thank you! Visit Simon's website for more information about his coaching programmes. Links to all of Simon's social media channels can be found here.  For any questions please email Beth@TheTriathlonCoach.com.

Political strategist Wade Cowper, managing partner for Hidden Gems Public Relations talks with journalist Josh Molina about public relations, local journalism and social media. Cowper has advised a variety of elected officials, including Kate Ford, Meagan Harmon, Alejandra Gutierrez, Gabe Escobedo and Virginia Alvarez. He was also managed James Joyce III's campaign that saw him surpass the incumbent mayor and land in second place for the mayoral seat. Cowper earlier this year branched off to form Hidden Gems Public Relations, where he advises nonprofit organizations on how to get their messages out. This is podcast full of humor, jokes and insider stories. Check it out. Make a contribution to support this podcast series by visiting www.santabarbaratalks.com. Molina writes for Noozhawk.com and teachers journalism part-time at Santa Barbara City College.

Who is Jo?Jo Cowper is a business strategist who specializes in helping entrepreneurs and business owners achieve their goals. With a focus on those who have big ideas and dreams but feel stuck in their current situation, Jo provides structured guidance and a proven system to help them overcome obstacles and make significant progress. By helping her clients navigate the challenging journey from where they are to where they want to be, Jo empowers them to take the next steps and reach their true potential. With Jo's expertise, business owners no longer have to dwell on "if only" and can instead turn their aspirations into reality.Key Takeaways[00:02:39] Two common challenges when pursuing ideas.[00:05:01] "Workbook for success: find encouragement and clarity."[00:09:10] Three steps to turn big vision into reality: clarity, mindset, community support.[00:13:09] Sign up for the email newsletter at thecompleteapproach.co.uk[00:14:20] Joe discusses clarity and show link. Good luck!Valuable Free Resource or ActionA video version of this podcast is available on YouTube :_________________________________________________________________________________________________Subscribe to our newsletter and get details of when we are doing these interviews live at https://TCA.fyi/newsletterFind out more about being a guest at : link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/beaguestSubscribe to the podcast at https://link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/podcastHelp us get this podcast in front of as many people as possible. Leave a nice five-star review at apple podcasts : https://link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/apple-podcasts and on YouTube : https://link.thecompleteapproach.co.uk/Itsnotrocketscienceatyt!Here's how you can bring your business to THE next level:If you are a business owner currently turning over £/$10K - £/$50K per month and want to grow to £/$100K - £/$500k per month download my free resource on everything you need to grow your business on a single page :It's a detailed breakdown of how you can grow your business to 7-figures in a smart and sustainable way————————————————————————————————————————————-TranscriptNote, this was transcribed using a transcription software and may not reflect the exact words used in the podcast)SUMMARY KEYWORDSbig vision, turning vision into reality, clarity, writing it down, mindset, conviction, goals, trusted individuals, encouragement, support, supportive community, significant difference, big vision workbook, exercises, finding energy, messages, encouragement, clarity, printing out workbook, generating ideas, free workbook, own pace, backward planning, end goal, necessary steps, series of questions, smaller goals, creating a clear path, strategy, accountabilitySPEAKERSStuart Webb, Jo CowperStuart Webb [00:00:24]:Hello again, and welcome to It's Not Rocket Science five Questions Over Coffee. I'm delighted to be here with both my coffee, which I probably should be stopping drinking.This is about the 6th one so far today. Joe, I believe you've got something more like tea in front of you, by the looks of things, which is excellent news. So welcome to the podcast, Joe. Joe is a vision coach. She helps people to take the business they have and transform it to the business they really wanted to have, which I think is a wonderful subject for discussion. Joe, I'm really looking forward to this conversation. Welcome to the podcast. I hope you're going to enjoy it and please tell us what it is you do. Let's start with my first question. Who do you help and and how do you help them?Jo Cowper [00:01:12]:Thanks, Stuart. Well, thank you very much for having me. It's great to be here today. I help business owners, founders, people who have got small businesses and big ideas, people who have really got a big picture of what they'd like to achieve in their business. But perhaps they've had this vision for years, perhaps for a long time, they've been thinking, I could do more than I'm doing right now. I wish I could just take this next step, I wish I could be just serving these slightly different customers. I wish I could be doing these slightly different things. But these ideas haven't yet come to anything because it's hard. There's a long way to go from where they are to where they want to be. There are lots of what, unforeseen stumbling blocks along the way. There's lots of distraction. You're running a business, you're already working flat out and somehow this stuff never comes to fruition. And I help people make that jump in a way that is structured and to follow a system that means that you can actually get where you want to be from where you are to where you want to be, rather than staying stuck where you were in the first place for an endless amount of time thinking, if only. I wish.Stuart Webb [00:02:16]:I love it. I love it. Tell me, you often must come across people that have been trying to do this for years. You said that people are stuck because they can't quite make the lead. You've come across those people that are somehow not quite getting there. What is it that you find that they've done that tries to get them out of that position and move forward, which you can help them to overcome?Jo Cowper [00:02:39]:Sure. There are two things that can really often happen when you try and do this yourself. And I know I've experienced these two things myself. It's totally normal. One of them is that you just keep on having ideas after ideas after ideas, but you don't actually make the time and space that it's going to take to transform those ideas into anything more solid than that. And so you have all of the excitement. You've got all the vision, you've got this really clear sense, I could definitely do this. But you don't actually ever take that step. Or you start trying to take some step, but then real life comes in, work takes over, you don't get there. And then a couple of years down the line, nothing has happened. That's the first common thing that can happen. And then the second common thing that can happen is you think, yes, I've got this brilliant, great idea, I'm going to do it straight away. And you set off. But you haven't actually done the thinking that needs to be done along the way and so you're throwing yourself a million miles now into this thing and for whatever reason, perhaps you haven't thought it all through fully. Perhaps it doesn't really quite stack up. Perhaps once you get it out of your head and put it into reality it doesn't quite make sense. I mean, I think there's something that you'll find. One thing that I'll do with my clients all the time is get them to really write down stuff about their vision, about their customers, about where they are now, ask them to really tough questions and these are often things that you think you already knew. It's easy to tell yourself when you're doing all in the privacy of your own head, I know this, this is easy, I can answer this question. When you come to actually try to make sense of it, you say there's a gaps in here. Actually it doesn't make quite as much sense as I thought it did. And so what I'll do is pose these questions in the right order and insist on filling the gaps so that instead of wasting off 1000 miles an hour, you can actually tackle it in a way that's systematic and that you can see is turning your big vision into a real reality.Stuart Webb [00:04:26]:I love it. I absolutely love it. Joe, I hope I've got this right. You've got some great ideas, I think, on your website that can help people with this sort of visioning. What can you tell us about how you can help them? And I'm going to put up the link that you showed us or you told me about before we started. So I hope that I've got the right link and you're about to tell us about what you can get from your website which can help people with this first steppers as they start this journey.Jo Cowper [00:04:55]:Good, I hope it's the right link too.Stuart Webb [00:04:56]:I believe it is technology, Joe. We'll get there, we'll get there.Jo Cowper [00:05:01]:Well look, there's something there, right there. There's an incentive. Go there and see what you find. Now what I've created actually is what I've called a big vision workbook and this is about giving yourself a support kit for success because having the big idea isn't hard. Anybody can have a big idea, right? We've all had dozens of big ideas, I'm sure. But the tricky bit is going through the tough moments that come between having the great idea and feeling totally discouraged after guardian know, this is too hard, I can't do this. I don't know why do they ever think I could in the first place? I feel so alone, all of this stuff. So I've created this workbook so that you can, from where you are right now, prepare your own toolkit for success, the stuff that's going to support you when it gets hard. And so in this workbook, you're going to work through seven different exercises, all about finding the energy, the messages, the encouragement and clarity that's going to keep you going all the way towards that vision and starting to put in place an action plan that will help you to get from where you are to where you want to be. It's totally free. It's something you can do in your own time. Totally recommend that you print it out because that goes back to what I was speaking about before. That when you actually put pen to paper and you write stuff down. I'm looking around myself with all the paper where I've written stuff down, the ideas will flow more freely.Stuart Webb [00:06:18]:I tell you the other point about what you've just said about writing it down, and that is when you've got those ideas, I find it really helpful to stick them on the walls around me because they're very visual reminders. You cannot have things just put away in a drawer. They have to be out around you so that you can see it. So having something written down so that once you've written it, you sort of put it on a wall or put it on your desk or whatever, it's so much more useful to you than just leaving it in a drawer and going, well, that's great, I've done all that. I can get back on with the day job now. You've got to have these things in front of you, haven't you Joe?Jo Cowper [00:06:51]:I couldn't agree more. Yeah, I really couldn't agree more. And that's actually in my full program. That the paid for program as opposed to the freebie. That's one of the important things that you get to at the end. That you'll literally have a one pager of all the stuff that you know that you need to commit to and do. So that whenever the next opportunity, the next distraction comes along, you've got this one pager which printed out, you stick it on your wall. No, that's where I'm going. Okay, that's why I'm going there. So important.Stuart Webb [00:07:18]:I love it. Was there a particular book or course or time in your life which helped you to sort of make the realization that you have to have these visions and you have to sort of move towards these things on the journey that you've just spoken about?Jo Cowper [00:07:36]:Well, the system that for me has been transformational in this is a system called backward planning and I learned about this on Gosh, I think on a border way day several jobs ago and it really stuck with me. And it's this idea that you start with the end in sight. You don't start by thinking, right, kind of going roughly over there what should we do now? Now you get really clear on the destination and then you work back. I can't get another image sorted out to get my hand in the screen but you work back and so you ask yourself a series of questions to always frame this. In order to do this I will need first to have achieved blah. In order to achieve that I will need first to have achieved blah. And what you do that is you reliably come back to an action that you can take, you follow it down to its conclusion, you'll come to an action that you can take right now or a goal that's small enough for you to work towards today. Today like now. Now that you know is leading you all the way to where you want to go and then you just keep on following that. You've retrofitted your path and you follow it brilliant.Stuart Webb [00:08:37]:Love it. Love it. Joe, I've spent the last ten minutes sort of asking you a bunch of questions and there must be one, I suspect that you're thinking when's he ever going to get to the really important question? So here is my opening to you. There must be a question I haven't asked. There must be a way that you are wanting to express something but I haven't yet asked it. Please tell me what is the question that I should have asked you by now? And obviously once you've told me the question you have to answer it because I don't know the answer. What is the question I should have asked you? What is the answer to that question?Jo Cowper [00:09:10]:Okay, so I think that the kind of burning question is what does it take to go from being somebody who's got a big vision? We've all got a big vision. What do I have to do? What can I do right now? If I really want to turn that into something real and I want to do it this year. I want not to be sitting here in twelve months time still thinking I've got all these great ideas, I've got these great ideas. What can I do straight away without having to pay anything to anybody, without having to buy any service, without having to take a massive leap and change my website, change my direction? What can I do easily now? What could anybody do? And the answer to that yes. Well, there are three things that anybody, anybody could do right now. First one is get really clear on that vision. So write it down and the work I've spoken to about will help with that. The second thing is your mindset. It's also well, jumping into this is what I'll have to do, this is the strategy I'll have to enact and I have to say for years in my career and in my business, I honestly fell into this trap of thinking, strategy is enough, I know what to do, I'm going to do it. It's not without that mindset, things will get hard. You really need to work on this conviction. What's going to keep you going? What do you really believe in? What is it to you? So mindset. The third thing that you can put in place for yourself right now, that will be a game changer, is tell people who you trust, people who will encourage you about what you're trying to do, because they will encourage you. They will get your back. They will give you a kick when you need it and say, look, hey, didn't you say that you were going to do this thing? Didn't you convince me of that last week when didn't believe you? Didn't you just tell me it was going to be great? So come on. And so having the clarity, the mindset and the people, the community around you is what will make the difference between you still sitting in the same place in a year's time thinking, wouldn't it be great, wouldn't it be great if I was working differently, living differently, helping different people make it happen?Stuart Webb [00:11:10]:Brilliant. I do absolutely buy in. And you're absolutely right, strategy is great, but implementation is better and accountability is the key to making those things happen. Because if you keep it in your head, once again we go back to the sort of it's in your head, nobody is going to turn around and go, whatever happened. And then you feel that, oh yeah, I should go on with it, shouldn't I? Having somebody who's just going to hold you to account is so valuable. It doesn't need to be anything more than just a two minute sort of reminder that that's where you were supposed to be going to kick you back into action. It's the most valuable thing in the world, isn't it? Everybody needs to have some form of accountability to make sure that they're delivering on the promise that they set themselves.Jo Cowper [00:11:56]:I think so. And having people who get it, they understand that you want to do this crazy thing, so why don't you just go and get yourself a job like everybody else? They understand that you've got a drive, you've got a vision, you really want to make a difference, get people around you like that and you'll support each other. It doesn't have to be a lonely business.Stuart Webb [00:12:17]:Love it. Love it. Joe, it's been an absolute delight having you here listening to this because I think what you're talking about is the thing that just about every business owner needs to have in their life. They need that vision. They need the transformation from where they are into what they really actually set out and wanted. So thank you for coming on and describing it. Thank you for giving us this free tip and for telling us about how you can help them get there.Jo Cowper [00:12:46]:Thank you, Stuart, for having me. It's been an absolute pleasure. It's my first ever LinkedIn life experience as well, so I'm excited to go back and see what I've done to my LinkedIn feast.Stuart Webb [00:12:56]:And you got through without actually sort of collapsing and the whole world ending as you expected, didn't it?Jo Cowper [00:13:03]:Yeah, and I didn't even touch my tea, so I feel should have made a coffee, shouldn't I?Stuart Webb [00:13:09]:So, listen, everybody, thank you so much. If you would like to get onto our email list so that you receive an email pretty much every week which says who's going to be on the podcast. Sort of interesting people that are going to be coming on so that you too can get brilliant advice like Joe has been giving us today, go to this link, which is link thecompleetproach Co UK. That's link thecompleetproach Co UK newsletter. That's link the completeaproach Co UK newsletter. That will take you to the newsletter sign up page. You just get a simple email from me, basically saying who's on what they're going to be talking about. Please come and ask whatever questions you want. Joe, thank you so much for coming on and allowing us to listen to your wonderful vision stuff. I do encourage people to go back to Joe's website, six Degrees East Co UK home hashtag vision. That's home hashtag vision. That's where you'll find that free booklet, seven Steps, seven pages, something like that.Jo Cowper [00:14:16]:Joe seven Steps.Stuart Webb [00:14:20]:Getting your clarity. That link will be in the show notes as well. So thank you, Joe, so much for coming along and talking to us, really appreciate it and good luck with the rest of the afternoon.Jo Cowper [00:14:32]:Thank you, Stuart. Been a real pleasure. Thank you much for having me. Have a great afternoon. Please. Get full access to It's Not Rocket Science! at thecompleteapproach.substack.com/subscribe

How does suffering separate the person going through it from their friends and loved ones? Priscilla Gilman joins the podcast to talk about a poem that takes on that question in literal terms—it tells the tragic story of a sailor who drowns as his shipmates are forced to sail away—and that sees it, at the same time, as a question we all have to face, William Cowper's "The Castaway."Priscilla Gilman is the author of two books: The Anti-Romantic Child: A Memoir of Unexpected Joy (Harper, 2011) and The Critic's Daughter: A Memoir (Norton, 2023). She's a former English professor, first at Yale University and then at Vassar College, during which time she published an important article on Cowper's letters in ELH. You can follow Priscilla on Twitter.Please follow, rate, and review the podcast if you like what you hear, and share an episode with a friend. You can also subscribe to my newsletter, where you'll get occasional updates on the podcast.

Cowper

When we learn to wait with a trusting and thankful attitude, we are acquiring the kind of character it takes to survive the promotion He intends for us. Big ministries require big character. No one survives a big ministry without a big character to go with it. Character sustains giftedness, not vice versa. Summary: 1. If a prophetic word does not fit the present circumstances of your life, save it and wait and see later. 2. The fulfillment of a prophetic word almost always involves God’s part and our part. 3. Our reaction to a prophetic word should be in the “middle” - neither entirely passive nor entirely active. 4. Our attitude towards a prophetic word matters – no contempt. 5. We “test” the word by taking baby steps of obedience that move us in the general direction of the fulfillment of the word. Application: Return to what God has said to you in your prophetic word. Now ask God what is the next baby step that will move you in the general direction of the fulfillment of the word?

Prophecy is composed of three aspects: the actual data, the interpretation of the data, and the application of the interpretation of the data. Prophecy is often a means of divine guidance. As a means of guidance, it is subject to the same rules of determining God’s guidance that we face in any decision. 1. Make a decision to obey 2. Know the Bible 3. Use sound judgment, common sense, and clear thinking, in the light of: a) your gifts, abilities, temperament, passions, and energy b) quality counsel c) the desires of your heart d) supernatural revelation

William Cowper (1731–1800), the English poet, found a friend in his pastor, John Newton (1725–1807), the former slave trader. Cowper suffered from depression and anxiety, attempting to die by suicide more than once. When Newton visited him, they’d go on long walks together and talk about God. Thinking that Cowper would benefit from engaging creatively and having a reason to write his poetry, the minister had the idea to compile a hymnal. Cowper contributed many songs, including “God Moves in a Mysterious Way.” When Newton moved to another church, he and Cowper remained strong friends and corresponded regularly for the rest of Cowper’s life. I see parallels between the strong friendship of Cowper and Newton with that of David and Jonathan in the Old Testament. After David defeated Goliath, “Jonathan became one in spirit with David,” loving him as himself (1 Samuel 18:1). Although Jonathan was the son of King Saul, he defended David against the king’s jealousy and anger, asking his father why David should be put to death. In response, “Saul hurled his spear at him to kill him” (1 Samuel 20:33). Jonathan dodged the weapon and was grieved at this shameful treatment of his friend (v. 34). For both sets of friends, their bond was life-giving as they spurred on each other to serve and love God. How might you similarly encourage a friend today?

Walking With GodReader: Jon WatsonDate: 3rd November 2022Passage: Genesis 5:24-------------------There is something very appealing about the short story of Enoch. The Bible says that "Enoch walked with God." The word 'walked' means he enjoyed a close relationship with God. Enoch and God were best friends. Best friends enjoy each other's company and always have plenty to talk about.In the book by the prophet Amos there is an interesting little story about two people going on a journey and Amos says, "Can two people walk together without agreeing on the direction?" (Amos 3:3 NLT) Well, God and Enoch certainly agreed on the direction Enoch was taking as he walked right into the presence of God; God took him to his home in heaven.The hymn-writer William Cowper wrote: "Oh for a closer walk with God, a constant heavenly calm. A light to shine upon the road that leads me to the Lamb." That should be the prayer of all of us. Fellowship with God is one of the most precious experiences we could have. But this only comes when we put away actions and thoughts that do not fit into a godly life. Cowper went on to write: "The dearest idol I have known — however much adored — Help me to tear it from your throne, and worship you as Lord." PrayerDear Lord, Please help me to walk closely with you day by day until you take me home with you. Amen

Mental health experts stress the importance of maintaining a strong support system when battling anxiety and depression. The more we feel known, the more we tend to feel loved. It takes courageous transparency to build the depth of relationships our souls crave. What if we share honestly and others judge or reject us or use our weaknesses against us? In this episode, Josh Lillie, an ordained minister with the Christian and Missionary Alliance, the Executive Assistant of one of the largest churches in Omaha, Nebraska, and one of the hosts of the Your Daily Bible Verse podcast shares how he found the courage to openly share his experience with depression, what challenged that courage, and how he received encouragement through the life of an eighteenth century hymn writer who once had considered himself “mad.” (Scroll down to find the group discussion questions)Find Josh Lillie at: https://www.cccomaha.org/staffhttps://www.lifeaudio.com/your-daily-bible-verse/ Find Jennifer at: https://jenniferslatterylivesoutloud.comhttps://www.instagram.com/avapennington3/https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100083247680572Find Wholly Loved Ministries at:WhollyLoved.comJoin the private Faith Over Fear Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/442736966614671Join the Private Wholly Loved Community Group (also on Facebook):https://www.facebook.com/groups/443325386241769Group Discussion Questions:What resonated with you most in today's episode?What are your thoughts regarding Jennifer's statement that one only feels loved to the extent that they feel known? What are some reasons people might feel reluctant to tell others about their mental health challenges?What fears, anxieties, or insecurities most challenge your vulnerability?In what ways can a strong support system help those who suffer from anxiety and depression?What most resonated with you when you heard Joshua and Jennifer discuss Psalm 22?How do you feel knowing that someone so anointed as Charles Spurgeon battled depression?What is one action step God might be asking you to take having listened to this episode?

With their casts of outsiders, deviants and miscreants, the novels of John Cowper Powys explore where meaning can be found in a world without God. Very often, the answer is in semi-mystical communion with nature and landscape. Heir of both Thomas Hardy and Friedrich Nietzsche, Powys was admired by contemporaries like Iris Murdoch, and anticipated lots of the concerns of ecocritical writers and thinkers of today. But few of his books are currently in print. To mark the 150th anniversary of his birth, Matthew Sweet discusses his life and writing with Margaret Drabble, John Gray, Iain Sinclair and Kevan Manwaring. Producer: Luke Mulhall

Mark shares stories from the Bible and his experience regarding the need for God's power to be pursued. 2 Tim. 3:1-5, 1 Cor. 2:1-5, Luke 11:9-13 1. What is God's power? 2. Describe the consequences of denying God’s power? 3. Where have you seen God’s power demonstrated in the last 3 months? 4. What areas of your life are you looking for a display of God’s power? 5. What areas may God want you to be looking for His power? Paul recognized the problem of a powerless religion but fortunately, he also recognized the solution. “Follow the way of love and eagerly desire gifts of the Spirit, especially prophecy.” 1 Cor. 14:1 Paul is telling us to increase our desire for the supernatural power of God to flow in our lives. It is not a desire which sits still, it is a desire that pursues, hunts, longs for. 6. What is one thing you could do to eagerly pursue God’s this week?

Strategic Government Resources, TX | HomeStephen Cowper is the former governor of Alaska with an excellent pedigree and history of outstanding service to both his state and country. Enjoy!

Paul avoids leading from a position of authority. He avoids using a command model of leadership. He is a servant leader who leads through persuasion. This is best illustrated in his letter to Philemon.

Having always been a working mother myself, I was very excited to sit down with Elizabeth Cowper, Founder of WOMO Network-a SaaS platform transforming the world of the working mother. The business is on a mission to improve the retention of female talent whilst providing a wellbeing solution for mothers and supporting those around her. … Continue reading "Elizabeth Cowper, CEO and Founder, WoMO Network and the Ludo Partnership, a woman on a mission to help other women"

I find these words from William Cowper's poem fitting: The dearest idol I have known, Whate'er that idol be, Help me to tear it from Thy throne And worship only Thee. Do you resonate with Cowper? I sure do. His words capture the tension I feel between wanting to be fully devoted to God and yet struggle holding on to idols. Well, if there are days you feel the same tension, then make plans to join us as we study Acts 19. This chapter is not only one of the most interesting in entire New Testament, it's also filled with motivation to guard ourselves from contemporary idols and serve the living God.

Discouragement is one of Satan's most powerful tools against believers and unbelievers alike. This was true of 18th-century English poet and hymnwriter William Cowper, whose life was riddled with bouts of severe depression and asylum stays. But the Lord used one such residency to reveal to Cowper the Truth of the Gospel. His life of struggle demonstrates several valuable truths for us today.

What though my joys and comforts die? The Lord, my Savior, liveth; What though the darkness gather round? Songs in the night He giveth. —Robert Lowry Over the course of the previous two chapters, the prophet Habakkuk has cried out to God in despair over his people's condition. The Lord answers his cry with a vision of judgement, both for the faithless Jews and for those who come to pillage their land. Humbled by this not entirely welcome answer, what does Habakkuk do? He sings. Just as the repentant prophet recounts the great deeds of the Lord (“I have heard the report of You and Your work…”), hymns like God, Thy King, Thy Might Confessing and Great Is Thy Faithfulness help us to confess God's providential hand in history. Like Habakkuk crying “in wrath remember mercy,” so we will give thanks for His compassion with the hymns Jesus, Shepherd Of Thy People and There's A Wideness In God's Mercy. Habakkuk can rejoice even when famine wastes his land and invaders are sure to come (vss. 16-18), because he knows what Cowper says in God Moves In A Mysterious Way is true: “the clouds you so much dread are filled with mercy and shall break with blessing on your head.” In a world that seems ever more filled up with fear, uncertainty, and doubt, I pray that we all follow the prophet's example, taking joy in the God of our Salvation. —Henry C. Haffner Key Words: Heard, Wrath, Mercy, Rode, Marched, Pierced, Rejoice Keystone Verses: O Lord, I have heard the report of You, and Your work, O Lord, do I fear. In the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy. (Habakkuk 3:2) Bulletin Habakkuk 3:1-19 A prayer of Habakkuk the prophet, according to Shigionoth. 2 O Lord, I have heard the report of You, and Your work, O Lord, do I fear. In the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy. 3 God came from Teman, and the Holy One from Mount Paran. Selah His splendor covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise. 4 His brightness was like the light; rays flashed from His hand; and there He veiled His power. 5 Before Him went pestilence, and plague followed at His heels. 6 He stood and measured the earth; He looked and shook the nations; then the eternal mountains were scattered; the everlasting hills sank low. His were the everlasting ways. 7 I saw the tents of Cushan in affliction; the curtains of the land of Midian did tremble. 8 Was Your wrath against the rivers, O Lord? Was Your anger against the rivers, or Your indignation against the sea, when You rode on your horses, on Your chariot of salvation? 9 You stripped the sheath from Your bow, calling for many arrows. Selah You split the earth with rivers. 10 The mountains saw You and writhed; the raging waters swept on; the deep gave forth its voice; it lifted its hands on high. 11 The sun and moon stood still in their place at the light of Your arrows as they sped, at the flash of Your glittering spear.12 You marched through the earth in fury; You threshed the nations in anger. 13 You went out for the salvation of Your people, for the salvation of Your anointed. You crushed the head of the house of the wicked, laying him bare from thigh to neck. Selah 14 You pierced with his own arrows the heads of his warriors, who came like a whirlwind to scatter me, rejoicing as if to devour the poor in secret. 15 You trampled the sea with Your horses, the surging of mighty waters. 16 I hear, and my body trembles; my lips quiver at the sound; rottenness enters into my bones; my legs tremble beneath me. Yet I will quietly wait for the day of trouble to come upon people who invade us. 17 Though the fig tree should not blossom, nor fruit be on the vines, the produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food, the flock be cut off from the fold and there be no herd in the stalls, 18 yet I will rejoice in the Lord; I will take joy in the God of my salvation. 19 God, the Lord, is my strength; He makes my feet like the deer's; He makes me tread on my high places. To the choirmaster: with stringed instruments.