Take not his name, who made thy mouth, in vain:It gets thee nothing, and hath no excuse.Lust and wine plead a pleasure, avarice gain:But the cheap swearer through his open sluceLets his soul runne for nought, as little fearing.Were I…
Category: Library
See, old; Love, life; Day, long; Soul, earth
The most frequently used words and their frequencies in Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass: 0.348 see0.224 old0.222 love0.216 life0.214 day0.204 long0.200 soul0.198 earth0.196 man0.182 night0.160 men0.155 sea0.153 death0.141 know0.139 time0.138 come0.131 great0.123 world0.114 good0.110 hear To explore the content word…
Zamyatin and Huxley through Orwell’s eyes
In Freedom and Happiness (The Orwell Foundation), Orwell writes about Zamyatin‘s We and Huxley’s Brave New World. Orwell finds that Huxley’s novel must have been “derived” from Zamyatin’s and that Zamyatin’s view is more pertinent to our times. We is…
War, Folk, Lord or Men, Hall, Battle?
Beowulf is one of the most important works of Old English literature. Maria Dahvana Headley, translator of Beowulf, tells us that it is both prudent and enjoyable to read more than one translation of the poem, for when it comes…
Salem Witch Trials in Beaumont’s Historical, Physiological and Theological Treatise of Spirits, Apparitions, Witchcrafts, and other Magical Practices, 1705
John Beaumont, a physician and geologist with an interest in the occult and witchcraft, published An Historical, Physiological and Theological Treatise of Spirits, Apparitions, Witchcrafts, and other Magical Practices in 1705. Explore his account of the events in Salem through…
Old man see day; heart said come night
We ordered all the words in The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow by their frequency of occurrence (the content word vector). The first eight words are: 0.207 old0.174 man0.171 see0.168 day0.165 heart0.164 said0.160 come0.157 night Find the text…
Definitions of Love, Corinthians 13
Passage N 91 in “How Many of the 100 Most Famous Passages in Literature Can You Identify?” (LITERARY HUB, February 24, 2021) is from the Bible. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast,…
The Kings last wife contrived to survive him, but with difficulty effected it.
In her book “How to Suppress Women’s Writing” (https://utpress.utexas.edu/books/russ-how-to-suppress-womens-writing), Joanna Russ discusses methods that society uses to undermine the work of women writers. The excerpts that follow below describe “some unpleasant possibilities” (Joanna Russ’ words) of the kinds of treatment…
Give me a Quill Pulled from that Eagles Wing!
Our Recent Additions Jesus Praefigured; Abbot, George (Literature of the Sacred) 1623 An Historical, Physiological and Theological Treatise of Spirits, Apparitions, Witchcrafts, and other Magical Practices; Beaumont, John 1705 The Castle of Otranto; Walpole, Horace 1764 From an Anthology, Some…
John Maynard Keynes: Thoughts with Wings
We added to our Library a number of works by John Maynard Keynes, a brilliant economist and a brilliant writer: Note: “…thought had wings” are Keynes’s words from his introduction to the textbook Supply and Demand; they are part of…