PREFACE THIS collection is intended for students of literature rather than for those who are chiefly occupied with the historic changes in the language, with the various forms of prose composition, or with the peculiarities of prose style. The plan and purpose of the book have imposed limitations. which I could not refuse to recognize. A short passage, or even a single paragraph, may be sufficient to illustrate an author's language or style; but such fragmentary passages are almost useless to the student of literature. If we are to enjoy a work as a piece of literature, we must, if possible, read the whole of it; at the least we must read enough of it to enter into the author's purpose, to put ourselves in sympathy with his spirit. My object, then, required selections that should be, so far as possible, complete in themselves, and it involved the assignment of a relatively large amount of space to each writer included. I have accordingly confined myself almost entirely to essays, sketches, and such short forms of composition as could be given without abridgment, and I have reluctantly passed over many writers, in order to gain space for the more adequate representation of a few. To compensate for these omissions, so far as I could, I have added in an appendix short extracts or single paragraphs from a few writers prior to Bacon, as specimens of language and style. One selection in the appendix, however (that from the Morte d'Arthur), has so pronounced a literary value that I have used a modernized version, in which it could be more readily understood and enjoyed. WORKS WRITTEN OR EDITED BY HENRY S. PANCOAST AN INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH LITERATURE With maps, chronological tables, and study lists of representative works for collateral reading. 556 pp. 16mo. $1.25 net. Nation: "It treats the history of English literature as closely connected with general history. The style is interesting, the conception broad and clear, the biographical details nicely subordinated to matters more important not even the dullest pupil can study it without feeling the historical and logical continuity of English literature.' REPRESENTATIVE ENGLISH LITERATURE 514 pp. Large 12mo. $1.60 net. Includes with a briefer and earlier form of the historical and critical matter of the Introduction the following selections (each complete): Chaucer: The Nonne Prestes Tale; Good Counseil. Spenser: Prothalamion. Shakespeare: Merchant of Venice (entire). Bacon: Of Great Place; Five Elizabethan Songs. Milton: L'Allegro; Il Penseroso. Dryden: Song for St. Cecilia's Day. Addison: Ned Softly the Poet; Sir Roger at Church; The Fine Lady's Journal. Pope: The Rape of the Lock. Burns: Poems. Wordsworth: Poems. Coleridge: Ancient Mariner. Scott: Poems. Lamb: Christ's Hospital Five-and-Thirty Years Ago. Byron: Poems. Keats: Poems. Carlyle On Robert Burns. Macaulay: On Samuel Johnson. Browning: Poems. Tennyson Poems, etc. STANDARD ENGLISH POEMS 749 pp. 16mo. $1.50 net. 577 pages of poetry (100 of them devoted to Victorian verse), containing some 250 complete poems besides selections from such longer ones as "The Faerie Queene," "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage," etc. 163 pp. of notes (mainly biographical) and an Index. STANDARD ENGLISH PROSE 550 pp. Large 12mo. About one hundred selections (most of them complete in themselves) from Bacon, Walton, Sir Thomas Browne, Fuller, Milton, Jeremy Taylor, Cowley, Bunyan, Dryden, Defoe, Swift, Addison, Steele, Johnson, Goldsmith, Burke, Coleridge, Southey, Lamb, Landor, Hazlitt, De Quincey, Carlyle, Macaulay, Newman, Froude, Ruskin, Thackeray, Matthew Arnold, Pater, and Stevenson, with introduction and notes. AN INTRODUCTION TO AMERICAN LITERATURE With study lists of works to be read, references, chronological tables, and portraits. 393 Pp. 16mo. $1.00 net. This book follows the main lines of the author's "Introduction to English Literature." The special influence of our history upon our literature is shown, and the attention is chiefly concentrated on a limited number of typical authors and works, treated at some length. HENRY HOLT & CO. New York |