Rating: 
Summary: Shakespeare would be ashamed
Review: So yet another lackluster book has forced me to rant like an idiot.It seems typical academic laziness has prompted many English Professors to assign this bulky book for Intro Lit classes--or maybe because there name happens to be on the "advisory board." So now it's too much of a burden for them to go to the library and find quality texts of novels and poems? I mean--it's impossible to digest all this material even in TWO classes. So why carry around 1,000 pages of which the student is assigned only 200? In addition, the book makes every author, no matter how diverse their material, equally boring. English Professors have said that they want themselves and their classes to be treated more seriously. Publishing and assigning books like this is not going to make that happen.
Rating: 
Summary: Norton is a good resource, but could use improvements.
Review: The Norton Anthologies are excellent resources for anyone taking a literature class at the college or high school level. However, the selections that are placed in the anthologies seem to narrow. For example, in this particular edition, the section on Emily Bronte included only her poetry, and included only a small sentence on Wuthering Heights. If the anthologies would include more of the short story works of the authors and less of the poetry, then I feel these anthologies would prove even more useful.
Rating:
Summary: Volume 1, 7th Edition
Review: This anthology has some great literature contained within its bindings, but I find some of the changes made since the sixth edition to be questionable; I was very disgruntled to see the Shakespearian songs taken out. The index and table of contents also have something to be desired. It was especially frustrating for me, as a college student, to look at a syllabus created by professor who does not provide us with page numbers to look for poems that were in the anthology, but not in the index. It is very annoying to spend more time looking for a peice than I actually do reading it. The translation of Beowolf is very good, and easy to understand; it was well adapted into modern English without losing its rhyme scheme.
Rating: 
Summary: Norton Anthology of English Literature by Abrams et al.
Review: This is an excellent reference guide for the English Literature
of the 1600s and 1700s. There is an exhaustive coverage of
the following works:
o Caedmon's Hymn
o Beowulf
o Geoffrey Chaucer
o Middle Age Lyrics
o Sir Thomas Mallory
o Medieval Attitudes Toward Life on Earth
o Christopher Marlowe
o Sir Thomas Moore
o Shakespeare
o Sir Walter Ralegh
o John Donne
o Robert Herrick
o George Herbert
o John Milton
o Richard Lovelace
o Samuel Butler
o Jonathan Swift
o Alexander Pope
o Samuel Johnson
o James Boswell
o Restoration Literature of the 18th Century Here is a paragraph from "The Wife of Bath's Tale":
"The wise astrologen daun Ptolomce,
That saith this proverbe in his Almageste:
' Of alle men his wisdom is the hyeste
That rekketh nat who hath the world in honde.
By this proverbe thou shalt understonde." This work is perfect for majors of English literature and
college courses in literature. A beauty of the work is that
it is written in the original English dialect of the
centuries represented. Critiques of this work alone could
fill a dozen or so academic dissertations.
Rating: 
Summary: Norton is still the best
Review: This second volume of the NAEL covers the expanse of the Romantic Period, the Victorian Age and the 20th Century (or Modern Period). While I did have to get this book for a survey course, I was pleasantly suprised at the vast range of work represented in the text. Not only does the book include "Cannonical" writers but also more obscure writers that may not be as well known now but were popular during their timeframe. The text has an equal amount of work represented from both women and men and explains the viewpoint of each in relation to what was going on at the time. An example are the women Romantic writers; they viewed things differently than their male counterparts and therefore wrote about different things, had different styles of writing, etc. Of course, as with all Norton books, there are bios of each author before their selections, introductions to each period, apendicies, bibliographies, essays and a section of goegraphic nomenclature. The book is well formated, foot-noted (not end-noted =)), and the selections are marvelous. Anyone well versed in English literature should have this book on their shelves.
Rating:
Summary: A number-one hit compilation!
Review: Very much like a good record compilation of hits, The Norton Anthology of English Literature brings you the best of the best. The big difference between this anthology and others on the market is the comprehensive bibliographical passages and the fact that the works of the authors and poets included are respected in full. Obviously this anthology is at its best in the context of the anthologies in the same series. (i.e American anthology). As a guide to students or anybody eager to broaden their views on english literature no other anthology comes close!
Rating:
Summary: Survey of sixteenth and seventeenth century British Lit.
Review: Volume 1B of the Norton Anthology of English Literature covers much of the Sixteenth Century and the beginning of the Seventeenth Century. Included in this book are works from: John Skelton Sir Thomas More Sir Thomas Wyatt the Elder William Tyndale John Calvin Anne Askew John Foxe Richard Hooker Roger Ascham Henrey Howard, Earl of Surrey Sir Thomas Hoby Queen Elizabeth Arthur Golding George Gascoigne Isabella Whitney Edmund Spenser - The Faerie Queen and the Amoretti Sir Walter Ralegh John Lyly Sir Philip Sidney Fulke Greville, Lord Baron Brooke Robert Southwelle Mary (Sidney) Herbert, Countess of Pembroke Samuel Daniel Michael Drayton Christopher Marlowe - Hero and Leander, The Passionate Sheperd to his Love, and Doctor Faustus William Shakespeare - Twelth Night, King Lear, and selected sonnets Thomas Campion Thomas Nashe John Donne Aemilia Lanyer Ben Johnson - The Masque of Blackness, Volpone or the Fox, and selected poems and prose Mary Wroth John Webster Elizabeth Cary Francis Bacon Martha Moulsworth Rachel Speght Robert Burton Sir Thomas Browne Izaak Walton Thomas Hobbes - Including Leviathan George Herbert Henrey Vaughan Richard Crashaw Robert Herrick Thomas Carew Sir John Suckling Richard Lovelace Edmund Waller Abraham Cowley Katherine Philips Andrew Marvell Lucy Hutchinson Lady Anne Halkett John Lilburne Gerrard Winstanley Anna Trapnel Abiezer Coppe Edward Hyde, Earl of Clarendon Thomas Traherne Margaret Cavendish John Milton - Paradise Lost, selected Poems and Sonnets Alexander Pope - The Rape of the Lock and An Essay on Man Samuel Johnson - The Vanity of Human Wishes Thomas Gray - Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard It is an adequate anthology, with good bindings for a softcover book. The text is small and somewhat cramped and the paper is thin and light, as is the standard for anthologies of this size. If you are looking for a specific work or works, it is probabably more rewarding and convenient to get an individual volume for the specified work. If, however, you need a decent survey of the period's literature (without too much depth concerning any one author) this is a fine, inexpensive volume.
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