Description Details
Apollonius of Tyre is the subject of an ancient short novella, popular during medieval times. Existing in numerous forms in many languages, the text is thought to be translated from an ancient Greek manuscript, now lost. The earliest manuscripts of the tale, in a Latin version, date from the 9th or 10th century; the most widespread Latin versions are those of Gottfried von Viterbo, who incorporated it into his Pantheon of 1185 as if it were actual history, and a version in the Gesta Romanorum. Shakespeare's play Pericles, Prince of Tyre was based in part on Gower's version, with the change of name probably inspired by Philip Sidney's Arcadia. Apollonius of Tyre was also a source for his plays Twelfth Night and The Comedy of Errors....

Excerpt Details
Humor, Historical Fiction

Description Details
2 Chronicles was purportedly written by Ezra the scribe. It expounds the history of King Solomon and the kings came after him. It is very similar to 1 and 2 Kings, but centers primarily on the Temple as the Presence of God among the people. It is a history of the Kings of Israel. (Summary by Sundiata)...

Excerpt Details
Religion

Description Details
volunteers bring you 15 recordings of The Legend of Heinz von Stein by Charles Godfrey Leland. This was the Weekly Poetry project for November 11, 2012. Charles Godfrey Leland was an American humorist who traveled extensively throughout Europe and the US. Leland worked in journalism, and became interested in folklore and folk linguistics, publishing books and articles on American and European languages and folk traditions. He worked in a wide variety of trades, achieved recognition as the author of the comic Hans Breitmann’s Ballads, fought in two conflicts, and wrote what was to become a primary source text for Neopaganism half a century later, Aradia, or the Gospel of the Witches. ( Summary from Wikipedia )...

Excerpt Details
Adventure, Humor, Romance, Poetry

Description Details
Tom Swift Jr. and his associates at Swift Enterprises wait breathlessly for what may well be the most important scientific event in history—the arrival of the visitor from Planet X—a visitor in the form of energy. But there are factions at work determined to snatch the energy, which Tom has named Exman, from the young scientist-inventor's grasp. First, a series of unexplainable, devastating earthquakes threaten to destroy a good portion of the earth, and Tom suspects the Brungarian rebels who obviously would like to capture Exman and use the space visitor to further their own evil purposes. With the security of Enterprises and Exman at stake, Tom creates two of his greatest inventions—a Quakelizor to counteract the simulated earth tremors, and a container or body to house the energy from outer space. If the earthquakes cannot be stopped, the entire world will be threatened by destruction, and the Brungarian forces will conquer the earth. How Tom utilizes all his scientific knowledge to produce swift-action results and outwit the Brungarians makes one of the most exciting Tom Swift adventures to date. (original book jacket from Guten...

Excerpt Details
Children, Adventure, Teen/Young adult, Science fiction

Description Details
The life and adventures of Honorable William F. Cody--Buffalo Bill--as told by himself, make up a narrative which reads more like romance than reality, and which in many respects will prove a valuable contribution to the records of our Western frontier history. While no literary excellence is claimed for the narrative, it has the greater merit of being truthful, and is verified in such a manner that no one can doubt its veracity. The frequent reference to such military men as Generals Sheridan, Carr, Merritt, Crook, Terry, Colonel Royal, and other officers under whom Mr. Cody served as scout and guide at different times and in various sections of the frontier, during the numerous Indian campaigns of the last ten or twelve years, affords ample proof of his genuineness as a thoroughbred scout. (Summary by the publisher)...

Excerpt Details
Biography

Description Details
Dr. Walsh's Old-Time Makers of Medicine chronicles the history and development of modern medicine from ancient times up to the discovery of America. Throughout this historical guide, Dr. Walsh shows numerous examples of practices thought to be entirely modern that were clearly anticipated hundreds or thousands of years ago. Ancient healers sought to use the body's natural healing ability, rather than rely exclusively on external cures. Physicians even in ancient times relied on what is now recognized as the placebo effect. Dr. Walsh also addresses training and certification in medicine. Medieval universities anticipate our modern medical textbooks with consolidated records of all research and independent investigations, to provide uniform training for students. Likewise, the reader will find that the ancients reacted to unsuccessful treatment in similar degrees to what might now be called medical malpractice suits. The book is organized chronologically, beginning with the fall of the Roman Empire and growth of the early Christian Church. From there, Dr. Walsh details the development of medical knowledge and practice in Arabia, to Me...

Excerpt Details
History, Science

Description Details
The History of the Standard Oil Company is a book written by journalist Ida Tarbell in 1904. It was an exposé of the Standard Oil Company, run at that time by oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller the richest figure in America's history. Originally serialized in 19 parts in McClure's magazine, the book was a seminal example of muckraking, and inspired many other journalists to write about trusts, large businesses that (in the absence of strong antitrust law in the 19th century) attempted to gain monopolies in various industries. The History of the Standard Oil Company was credited with hastening the breakup of Standard Oil, which came about in 1911. ( Summary by Wikipedia ) Note: This reading does not include any of the 36 Appendices....

Excerpt Details
History

Description Details
The History of the Standard Oil Company is a book written by journalist Ida Tarbell in 1904. It was an exposé of the Standard Oil Company, run at that time by oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, the richest figure in America's history. Originally serialized in 19 parts in McClure's magazine, the book was a seminal example of muckraking, and inspired many other journalists to write about trusts, large businesses that (in the absence of strong antitrust law in the 19th century) attempted to gain monopolies in various industries. The History of the Standard Oil Company was credited with hastening the breakup of Standard Oil, which came about in 1911. ( Summary by Wikipedia ) Note: This reading does not include any of the Appendices....

Excerpt Details
History

Description Details
Phoebe Yates Pember served as a matron in the Confederate Chimborazo military hospital in Richmond, Virginia, during the Civil War, overseeing a dietary kitchen serving meals to 300 or more wounded soldiers daily. Reminiscences of a Southern Hospital is her vivid recounting of hospital life and of her tribulations (and personal growth) as a female administrator. To follow her from day one, when she is greeted with “ill-repressed disgust” that “one of them had come,” and she, herself, “could only understand that the position was one which dove-tailed the offices of housekeeper and cook” to the day when she as exerts control over the hospital’s “medicinal whiskey barrel” is to watch a woman find herself. Besides describing “daily scenes of pathos,” Pember gives a horrifying account of the prisoner exchange of November 1864 (“living and dead . . . not distinguishable”), and also of the evacuation and burning of Richmond in 1865. Her memoirs were serialized in Cosmopolite magazine in 1866, then reprinted in book form in 1879 under the title A Southern Woman’s Story. Pember was honored by the US Postal Service with a stamp in 1995. (Summ...

Excerpt Details
Memoirs, History, War stories

Description Details
Anthem is a dystopic science fiction story taking place at some unspecified future date. Mankind has entered another dark age as a result of what Rand saw as the weaknesses of socialistic thinking and economics. Technological advancement is now carefully planned (when it is allowed to occur, if at all) and the concept of individuality has been eliminated (for example, the word I has disappeared from the language). As is common in her work, Rand draws a clear distinction between the socialist/communal values of equality and brotherhood and the productive/capitalist values of achievement and individuality. The story also parallels Stalinist Russia, which was currently going on at the time as the story was published. (Summary from Wikipedia)...

Excerpt Details
Science fiction, Philosophy

Description Details
Roosevelt's popular book Through the Brazilian Wilderness describes his expedition into the Brazilian jungle in 1913 as a member of the Roosevelt-Rondon Scientific Expedition co-named after its leader, Brazilian explorer Cândido Rondon. The book describes all of the scientific discovery, scenic tropical vistas and exotic flora, fauna and wild life experienced on the expedition. One goal of the expedition was to find the headwaters of the Rio da Duvida, the River of Doubt, and trace it north to the Madeira and thence to the Amazon River. It was later renamed Rio Roosevel. Roosevelt's crew consisted of his 24-year-old son Kermit, Colonel Cândido Rondon, a naturalist sent by the American Museum of Natural History named George K. Cherrie, Brazilian Lieutenant Joao Lyra, team physician Dr. José Antonio Cajazeira, and sixteen highly skilled paddlers (called camaradas in Portuguese). The initial expedition started on December 9, 1913, at the height of the rainy season. The trip down the River of Doubt started on February 27, 1914. During the trip down the river, Roosevelt contracted malaria and a serious infection resulting from a minor le...

Excerpt Details
Adventure, History, Memoirs, Nature, Science

Description Details
A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder is the most popular of James De Mille's works. It was serialized posthumously in Harper's Weekly, and published in book form by Harper and Brothers of New York City in 1888. This satiric romance is the story of Adam More, a British sailor. Shipwrecked in Antarctica, he stumbles upon a tropical lost world of prehistoric animals, plants, and a cult of death-worshipping primitives. He also finds a highly developed human society which has reversed the values of Victorian society. Wealth is scorned and poverty revered; death and darkness are preferrable to life and light. Rather than accumulating wealth, the natives seek to divest themselves of it as quickly as possible. At the beginning of each year, the government imposes wealth (the burden of reverse taxation) upon its unfortunate subjects as a form of punishment. A secondary plot about the four yachtsmen who find the manuscript forms a frame for the central narrative. [Condensed from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Strange_Manuscript_Found_in_a_Copper_Cylinder ]...

Excerpt Details
Adventure, Satire

Description Details
This short Old Testament book tells the story of Naomi and Ruth, Naomi's daughter-in-law and great-grandmother of King David. (Summary by TriciaG)

Excerpt Details
Religion, History

Description Details
The Agricola (Latin: De vita et moribus Iulii Agricolae, lit. On the life and character of Julius Agricola) is a book by the Roman historian Tacitus, written c 98, which recounts the life of his father-in-law Gnaeus Julius Agricola, an eminent Roman general. It also covers, briefly, the geography and ethnography of ancient Britain. As in the Germania, Tacitus favorably contrasts the liberty of the native Britons to the corruption and tyranny of the Empire; the book also contains eloquent and vicious polemics against the rapacity and greed of Rome. This translation by Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb, was first published in 1877. (Summary from Wikipedia.)...

Excerpt Details
History, Biography

Description Details
Fortress-walled Saint Catherine's monastery on the Sinai peninsula has been a pilgrimage site since its founding by the Byzantine Emperor Justinian in the 6th century. According to tradition, the monastery sits at the base of the mountain where Moses received the Tablets of the Law. Set in rugged country, accessible in times past only by a many days journey by camel across barren desert, the monastery survived intact through the centuries, and, as a result, became a rich repository of religious history—told through its icons, mosaics, and the books and manuscripts in the monastery library. Our Journey to Sinai by Agnes Bensly is the story of a visit to Saint Catherine's by a group of British scholars in the 1890's, who were drawn there in quest of manuscripts from early Christian times. The group had one particular prize in their sights. It was a second century translation of the Gospels from Greek into an Aramaic dialect called Syriac. This was a rare find indeed. One of the group, Agnes Smith Lewis, an accomplished linguist, had been to the monastery once before. On that visit, she had spotted a “palimpsest of most venerable appea...

Excerpt Details
Memoirs, History, Travel

Description Details
This book describes the return of Israelites from exile in Babylon. One group returns to rebuild the Temple and restore the worship of The LORD, while the second group, led by the priest and scribe Ezra, returns to re-establish Mosaic law to the Israelite community. The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah were once considered one book. (Introduction by Mark Penfold)...

Excerpt Details
History, Religion

Description Details
In chapter 11 William and Mary have been crowned and settle down to the task of ruling England. An endless succession of British noblemen jockey for position and all feel frustration at Williams’ preference for his own countrymen in positions of resonsibility in the British government and armed forces....

Excerpt Details
History

Description Details
This is the autobiography of Elizabeth Keckley, a former slave who bought her freedom with the money she earned as a seamstress. She eventually worked for Mary Lincoln. It is a fascinating book, filled with many recollections of her own life and her interactions with the Lincolns and other members of the government elite. (summary by Guero)...

Excerpt Details
History, Memoirs, Biography

Description Details
The Histories of Herodotus of Halicarnassus is considered the first work of history in Western literature. Written about 440 BC, the Histories tell the story of the war between the Persian Empire and the Greek city-states in the 5th century BC. Herodotus traveled extensively around the ancient world, conducting interviews and collecting stories for his book. The rise of the Persian Empire is chronicled, and the causes for the conflict with Greece. Herodotus treats the conflict as an ideological one, frequently contrasting the absolute power of the Persian king with the democratic government of the Greeks. (Summary adapted from Wikipedia.)...

Excerpt Details
History

Description Details
“He had faith in his good fortune, in that power of attraction which he felt within him - a power so irresistible that all women yielded to it.” Though firmly set in 1880s Paris, Maupassant's gripping story of an amoral journalist on the make could, with only slight modifications of detail, be updated to the 1960s, to the Reagan-Thatcher years, or maybe to the present day. Anti-hero Georges Duroy is a down-at-heel ex-soldier of no particular talent. Good-looking but somewhat lacking in self-confidence, he discovers an ability to control and exploit women - whereupon his career in journalism takes off, fuelled by the corruption of colleagues and government arrivistes. He may be a provincial Don Juan, but he is neither accident-prone nor heading for a fall... A Hollywood screen adaptation is in preparation at the time of recording. (Summary by Martin Geeson)...

Excerpt Details
Fiction