Helen Keller (1880-1968) was an American author, lecturer, and political activist. At nineteen months, she suffered an illness that left her deaf, blind, and eventually mute. Helen remained in a lonely state of sensory deprivation until she reached the age of six, when Anne Sullivan (also visually impaired) was employed by the Keller family to tutor her. As a member of the Socialist Party of America and the Wobblies, Helen campaigned for women&a ...
G. B. Shaw (1856-1950) wrote «The Perfect Wagnerite» as a philosophical examination of Richard Wagner's epic four-opera cycle, «Der Ring des Nibelungen» («The Ring of the Nibelung»). A tremendously accomplished dramatist himself, Shaw seemed perfectly poised to turn his critical eye on Wagner's 19th century masterpiece. Wagner completed «The Ring» in 1853, after decades of effort. A work of such ambition takes much unpacking, and so Sh ...
As a poet, essayist, moralist, literary critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer, Samuel Johnson's contributions to English literature cannot be understated. His single greatest achievement is widely considered to be his «Dictionary of the English Language,» which after nine years of research was first published in 1755. Until the publication of the «Oxford English Dictionary» over a century and a half later it was widely considered to ...
Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915) was an American writer, philosopher, publisher and artist, who founded the Roycroft Arts and Crafts community in East Aurora, New York. Hubbard set up a small printing shop next to his family home, where he began printing «The Philistine» magazine. The publication, quite popular in its time, was filled with Hubbard's sardonic wit, satire and often controversial commentary. An 1899 edition of the magazine included ...
Aphra Behn (1640-1689) is historically recognized as the first woman to make a living through writing; her plays, novels, poems and pamphlets have met with fresh notoriety since the 20th Century. Her work was particularly significant to a group of contemporary writers known as The Female Wits, as well as to later feminist writers like Virginia Woolf. Stories of comedy and intrigue, complete with masks, mistaken identities, visual deceptions, and ...
Renowned steel magnate and philanthropist, Andrew Carnegie, immigrated to America from Scotland as a boy in 1848, and at the age of thirteen began his first job as a bobbin boy, earning $1.20 a week. By the 1870s, the successful entrepreneur had founded the Carnegie Steel Company, later U.S. Steel, which would eventually establish Carnegie as the second wealthiest man in history, after John D. Rockefeller. He published «The Gospel of Wealth» in ...
Aphra Behn (1640-1689) is historically recognized as the first woman to make a living through writing; her plays, novels, poems and pamphlets have met with fresh notoriety since the 20th Century. Her work was particularly significant to a group of contemporary writers known as The Female Wits, as well as to later feminist writers like Virginia Woolf. Stories of comedy and intrigue, complete with and masks, mistaken identities, visual deceptions, ...
"The Essential Tales and Poems" is a large, yet thorough, collection of the poems and stories written by horror master Edgar Allen Poe. Admirers will be happy to see Poe's most famous works present in the collection: «The Fall of the House of Usher,» «The Pit and the Pendulum,» «The Tell-Tale Heart,» and «The Cask of Amontillado.» These works have struck fear in audiences for generations, solidifying Poe's place in the American li ...
Civil Disobedience and Other Essays is a collection of some of Henry David Thoreau's most important essays. Contained in this volume are the following essays: Civil Disobedience, Natural History of Massachusetts, A Walk to Wachusett, The Landlord, A Winter Walk, The Succession of Forest Trees, Walking, Autumnal Tints, Wild Apples, Night and Moonlight, Aulus Persius Flaccus, Herald of Freedom, Life Without Principle, Paradise (to be) Regaine ...
