The Poetry of Thomas Gray

Thomas Gray published very little in his lifetime, yet a handful of his poems became fixtures of English verse. This collection brings his work together, anchored by the ‘Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard,’ whose quiet reflection on ordinary lives and unmarked graves is among the most quoted poems in the language. Alongside it stand the ‘Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College,’ the Pindaric odes ‘The Progress of Poesy’ and ‘The Bard,’ and lighter pieces such as the ode on a drowned cat. Gray’s careful craftsmanship and melancholy tone helped bridge the formal poetry of the eighteenth century and the feeling that would define Romanticism. Free to download as a PDF and EPUB.