Ambiguity involves "any verbal nuance, however slight, which gives room for alternative reactions to the same piece of langauge." The authors discusses seven classifications of differing complexity and depth of well-known literary works

William Logan reconciles history and poetry to provide new ways of reading poets ranging from Shakespeare and Shelley to Lowell and Heaney. In these striking essays, Logan presents the poetry of the past through the lens of the past, attempting to bring poems back to the world in which they were made.

George Puttenham's Art of English Poesy is a foundational work of English Renaissance criticism and literary theory. Rich in detail about the nature, purpose, and functions of poetry as well as the poet's character and goals, it is also a valuable historical document, offering generous insight into Elizabethan court culture, implicitly on display in the attitudes and values of the writer. His illustrative anecdotes enable us to watch European courtiers...