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The Masque of Anarchy was Shelley's response to the Peterloo massacre at St Peter's Fields, Manchester, where 18 died and hundreds were injured, after Hussars charged into a rally for parliamentary reform. Written in Italy in 1819, the poem was not published until 1832, ten years after Shelley's death. This reading is from the first published edition with the addition of three words that were inserted in full only in later additions ('Eldon' in Stanza IV and 'Bible' and 'Sidmouth' in Stanza VI). The poem is preceded by Leigh Hunt's preface to the 1932 edition and followed by Harry Buxton Forman's 1887 lecture on the poem to the Shelley Society. (Summary by Phil Benson)...

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Poetry, Politics

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A collection of children's alphabet rhymes including Footsteps On the Road to Learning - a short text from 1850 which teaches children the English alphabet in rime--so that a child may not become a dunce! The Anti Slavery Alphabet - a book prepared to encourage young children to speak against the institution of slavery in 19th century United States. The method used is an alphabetical listing of the evils of slavery. The Peter Pan Alphabet and The Alphabet of Celebrities - Oliver Herford's teaching guides to the English alphabet--using Peter Pan and famous names! (Summary by Sam Stinson and Wikipedia)...

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Children, Instruction, Poetry

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Originally modeled on the Psalms and other poetic passages (commonly referred to as canticles) in the Scriptures, Christian hymns are generally directed as praise and worship to the monotheistic God. Many refer to Jesus Christ either directly or indirectly. Since the earliest times, Christians have sung psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, both in private devotions and in corporate worship (Matthew 26:30; 1 Cor 14:26; Ephesians 5:19; Colossians 3:16; James 5:13; cf. Revelation 5:8-10; Revelation 14:1-5). One definition of a hymn is ...a lyric poem, reverently and devotionally conceived, which is designed to be sung and which expresses the worshipper's attitude toward God or God's purposes in human life. It should be simple and metrical in form, genuinely emotional, poetic and literary in style, spiritual in quality, and in its ideas so direct and so immediately apparent as to unify a congregation while singing it. (Summary by Wikipedia)...

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Music, Poetry

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The Thousand Character Classic (千字文) is a Chinese poem used as a primer for teaching Chinese characters to children. It contains exactly one thousand unique characters. It is said that Emperor Wu of the Liang Dynasty (r. 502-549) made Zhou Xingsi (周興嗣) compose this poem for his prince to practice calligraphy. The original title of the poem was 《次韻王羲之書千字》 and it is sung in the same way in which children learning Latin alphabet writing do with the alphabet song. 《千字文》是用來教授兒童基本漢字的一首長韻文。它是一篇由一千個不重複的漢字組成的文章。據說是南朝梁（502年─549年）的梁武帝為其公主練習書法，而委託周興嗣（470年─521年）創作的。原名為《次韻王羲之書千字》。...

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Essay/Short nonfiction, Poetry, Literature

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This third stove-top full of Alphabet Soups --again-- runs the fullest gamut! It ranges from country scenes (Alphabets of Fruits, Birds, Animals and Country Scenes), to just plain silliness (Absurd ABCs and Lear's Nonsense Alphabet #5), and finally, topical subjects (the Anti-Slavery Alphabet, the Alphabet of Celebrities --a list quite different when compared to our current crew-- and an Alphabet of Old Testament History). Have fun, and be sure to tune in for the fourth volume, which promises to break new ground in Alphabet Books! (Summary by Denny Sayers)...

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Children, Instruction, Poetry

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...15 minute or less readings) works in English suitable for a coffee break at work or a short commuter ride. The theme for this collection is Nature in various genres -- fiction and non-fiction. Botany, geology, biology, astronomy; flowers, (meteor) showers, bugs, slugs, frogs, dogs, cats, bats -- you name it, as long as it's public domain and between 3 and 15 minutes long.(...

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Animals, Essay/Short nonfiction, Nature, Short stories

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...This collection is part of an initiative to create a language learning resource at . The Language Learning Collections contain readings from various language learning books, grammars, primers, phrasebooks, dictionaries, readers and even other works which contain information on various languages, recount experiences of language learning and encountering new languag...

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Instruction, Languages

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18 works -- two non-fic articles & one short fiction or poetry each -- from issues March, April, May, June, July, & August 1906 of The Scrap Book, Volume 1, edited by Frank Munsey. As he states in the editorial of the April 1906 issue (Vol 1, Iss 2) this was a sort of supplement to the editor's popular monthly, Munsey's Magazine http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munsey's_Magazine. The Scrap Book is very like an American version of Punch with many short, often humorous articles interspersed with at least one short story, some poetry, and several longer non-fic pieces. The Scrap Book ran up to 1912.(Summary by BellonaTimes)...

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History, Essay/Short nonfiction

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This is a collection of short poems and readings, both religious and secular, on death and bereavement. (Summary by Ruth Golding)

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Poetry, Philosophy, Religion

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The Tang Dynasty (618 to 907) was a golden age of Chinese culture: religion and philosophy, painting and calligraphy, sculpture, architecture and music all reached peaks of perfection. Poetry was the epitome of the arts: a scholastic requirement, a route to fame, a moulder of character. Nearly 50,000 poems of the Tang have survived. The collection 'Three Hundred Tang Poems' was compiled around 1763. It comprises six volumes, with poems grouped by verse form. Volume 1 covers the 'ancient verse' style in five-character lines (poems 1 to 35), and 'folk song style verse' (36 to 45). The masters Li Bai, Du Fu and Wang Wei are well represented here. Recordings in this volume are in Cantonese, Hokkien, Mandarin and Taiwanese, as indicated in the titles; some are spoken, others are sung. (Summary by David Barnes)...

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Poetry

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The Nobel Prizes are international awards bestowed once a year by Scandinavian committees for cultural and scientific advances. They were established in 1895 by the Swedish chemist Alfred Nobel, the inventor of dynamite. The prizes in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature, and Peace were first awarded in 1901. The Laureats of 1904 were: in Physics: Lord Rayleigh (John William Strutt, 1842 - 1919), for his investigations of the densities of the most important gases and for his discovery of argon in connection with these studies; in Chemistry: Sir William Ramsay (1852 - 1916), for his discovery of the inert gaseous elements in air, and his determination of their place in the periodic system; in Physiology or Medicine: Ivan Petrovich Pawlow (1849 - 1936), in recognition of his work on the physiology of digestion, through which knowledge on vital aspects of the subject has been transformed and enlarged; in Literature: Frédéric Mistral (one half, 1830 - 1914), in recognition of the fresh originality and true inspiration of his poetic production, which faithfully reflects the natural scenery and native spirit of his peopl...

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Science, Biography

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This anthology of poetry, published in 1904, contains such favorites as The Raven, My Shadow, and The Village Blacksmith, as well as many lovely poems that may be unfamiliar. Most of the poems in this collection are short enough for children to memorize....

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Children, Humour, Fantasy, Adventure, Animals, Poetry