The Daily Telegraph Book of Hymns

Here are the full original texts of 150 of the best-loved hymns in the English language, from the time of the Early Church to the late 20th century. Each is accompanied by a fascinating commentary, giving biographical details of the author, such as the Calvinist creator of 'Rock of Ages' who once calculated that the average human sins 2,522,880,000 times, notes on the circumstances in which the hymn was written and how it has been used; and variant versions including the parodies of The Church's One Foundation and 'What a friend we have in Jesus' sung by British soldiers in the trenches of Flanders in the First World War. This book should greatly assist all those responsible for choosing hymns in churches and places of worship, provide rich resources for bedside reading and meditation and provide useful background material for the millions who watch Songs of Praise on television every sunday evening.