20/09/2024
Among the Night People
No need to be afraid of the dark – here is a wonderful collection of stories about the creatures and personalities who live at night and sleep in the day. – Summary by Jude Somers [chương_files]
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20/09/2024
Whilomville Stories
This collection consists of thirteen stories. The stories are set in the mythical town of Whilomville used by Stephen Crane for many of his best stories. They appeared in Harper’s New Monthly Magazine between 1899 and 1900. The writing is crisp, the stories are poignant and funny (usually) and always tell us something about our quirky human nature. – Summary by Phil chenevert [chương_files]
19/09/2024
Mobilizing Woman-Power
Harriot Stanton Blatch, a suffragist in her own right, was the daughter of Elizabeth Cady Stanton who was one of the champions of women’s rights and a force in the suffragist movement. In this volume, Blatch focuses on the mobilization of women during World War I, both in Europe and American. These courageous women stepped into roles formerly the domain of men and provided the essential services crucial to the success of the outcome of the war. – Summary by Larry Wilson [chương_files]
19/09/2024
19/09/2024
Salem Witchcraft, the Planchette Mystery, and Modern Spiritualism
The object in reprinting this most interesting review is simply to show the progress made in moral, intellectual, and physical science. The reader will go back with us to a time—not very remote—when nothing was known of Phrenology and Psychology; when men and women were persecuted, and even put to death, through the baldest ignorance and the most pitiable superstition. If we were to go back still farther, to the Holy Wars, we should find cities and nations drenched in human blood through religious bigotry and intolerance. Let us thank God that our lot is cast in a more fortunate age, when the light of revelation, rightly interpreted by the aid of Science, points to the Source of all knowledge, all truth, all light. When we know more of Anatomy, Physiology, Physiognomy, and the Natural Sciences generally, there will be a spirit of broader liberality, religious tolerance, and individual freedom. Then all men will hold themselves accountable to God, rather than to popes, priests, or parsons. Our progenitors lived in a time that tried men’s souls, as the following lucid review most painfully shows. (Summary by Samuel Robert Wells) [chương_files]
19/09/2024
Dubliners
Masterful short stories about life in Dublin at the turn of the century, by James Joyce. (Summary by Hugh McGuire) [chương_files]
19/09/2024
Tales of Men and Ghosts
Tales of Men and Ghosts was published as a collection in 1910, though the first eight of the stories had earlier appeared in Scribner’s and the last two in the Century Magazine. Despite the title, the men outnumber the ghosts, since only “The Eyes” and “Afterward” actually call on the supernatural. In only two of the stories are women the central characters, though elsewhere they play important roles. Wharton enjoys subjecting her subjects — all of them American gentlemen and gentlewomen, in the conventional senses of the word — to various moral tests and sometimes ironic tests. Some of the stories deal with the intellectual fashions of the day — “The Blond Beast” basing itself, to some degree, on Nietzsche, and “The Debt” on variants of Darwinism. Though “Afterward” is set in England, and “The Letters” in France, the rest of the stories are squarely in Wharton’s own New York city, rather than (say) in what she calls “the soul-deadening ugliness of the Middle West,” thus avoiding the need to come to terms with what fashion-conscious New Yorkers still today call “fly-over country” for everything that lies between the west bank of the Hudson River and San Francisco Bay. (Summary by Nicholas Clifford) [chương_files]
19/09/2024
Bear Creek Collection Volume 1
Breckinridge Elkins is the roughest, toughest, fastest-shootin’, hardest-fightin’ feller in the Bear Creek settlement, and probably in the entire Humbolt Mountains. As he travels further from home, he single-handedly takes on outlaws, settles (and starts) feuds and tries his hand at romancing the girls. He also discovers a lot of strange customs among other folks, such as building houses out of boards and wearing clothes that ain’t buckskins. Set in Nevada during the late 1800’s, this collection of stories is a great rollicking romp through the American frontier as seen through the eyes of one of the most enjoyable characters created in the history of tall tales. (Summary by RK Wilcox) [chương_files]
19/09/2024
Lady With the Dog and Other Stories
Anton Chekhov was a Russian physician, dramatist and author who is considered to be among the greatest writers of short stories in history. His career as a dramatist produced four classics and his best short stories are held in high esteem by writers and critics. Chekhov practiced as a doctor throughout most of his literary career: “Medicine is my lawful wife”, he once said, “and literature is my mistress.” Chekhov had at first written stories only for financial gain, but as his artistic ambition grew, he made formal innovations which have influenced the evolution of the modern short story. His originality consists in an early use of the stream-of-consciousness technique, later adopted by James Joyce and other modernists, combined with a disavowal of the moral finality of traditional story structure. He made no apologies for the difficulties this posed to readers, insisting that the role of an artist was to ask questions, not to answer them. This is a collection of 7 of his insightful short stories about the human condition and include, beside the title story, A Doctor’s Visit; An Upheaval; Ionitch; and The Husband which are best known. (Summary by Wikipedia and Phil Chenevert) [chương_files]
19/09/2024
Luck Of Roaring Camp And Other Sketches
Bret Harte (1836 – 1902) was an American author and poet, best remembered for his accounts of pioneering life in California…. He moved to California in 1853, later working there in a number of capacities, including miner, teacher, messenger, and journalist. He spent part of his life in the northern California coastal town of Union (now known as Arcata), a settlement on Humboldt Bay that was established as a provisioning center for mining camps in the interior…. In 1868 he became editor of The Overland Monthly, another new literary magazine, but this one more in tune with the pioneering spirit of excitement in California. His story, “The Luck of Roaring Camp”, appeared in the magazine’s second issue, propelling Harte to nationwide fame. “Luck…” appeared in this first book along with other stories and sketches, especially “The Outcasts of Poker Flats,” of which several movies were made. (Summary by Wikipedia and David Wales) [chương_files]