This edition brings together Shakespeare's incomparable sonnets and his major long poems, Venus and Adonis, The Rape of Lucrece,and The Phonix and the Turtle among them. Shakespeare came to maturity during the peak of the influence of the sonnet--an Italian import--on English poets. And few would doubt he is the greatest sonneteer the English language has ever produced. In their day both the light Venus and Adonis and the more tragic Rape of Lucrece were popular succeases, delighting both the Earl of Southampton to whom they were dedicated and the public at large. In an era in which plays were not treated seriously, it was these long poems--now considered relatively minor--that first gave Shakespeare claim to being an important poet.