The Poetical Dictionary

This application – The Poetical Dictionary – lets you search a database for a set of poems (or parts of poems) associated with a given topic. Thus, for example, you can select the topic “April” and see the related poetical snippets:

Whanne that Aprille with his shoures sote
The droughte of March hath perced to the rote.
CHAUCER: Canterbury Tales, Prologue, Line 1.

April cold with dropping rain
Willows and lilacs brings again,
The whistle of returning birds,
And trumpet-lowing of the herds.
EMERSON: May-day, Line 124.

When aince Aprile has fairly come,
An birds may bigg in winters lum,
An pleisures spreid for a and some
O whatna state,
Love, wi her auld recruitin drum,
Than taks the gate.
ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON: Underwoods, Bk. ii., iii.

This application is based on the book “The Handy Dictionary of Poetical Quotations” compiled by George Powers and published in 1901. The book – and this application – contains poems from 255 authors including Shakespeare, Wordsworth, and Dante. Over 1100 topics are covered – from “Abashed” to “Zeal.” The database contains more than 2100 poems (or snippets of poems) in all. The author and source text of each poem is listed along with the poem itself.

The application allows you to scroll through an alphabetized list of topics or quickly search the database for the topic of your choice. You can also get poems on random topics from the database.

Future Updates:
+Allow the user to search for poems by author as well as topic.

Languages: English

Requirements:
Compatible with iPhone and iPod touch
Requires iPhone 2.2 Software Update