Dreadnought
04-20-2007, 09:21 PM
I have been the recipient of possibly one of the most charitable acts towards a high school student by a teacher!
My Spanish IV teacher had a collection of books, that I found were absolutely amazing, on a shelf in her room. They smelled of wise, empty old libraries.
They are all hardcover, of identical proportion and appearance. On the cover of each one is, simply, the VERITAS shield of Harvard (http://www.hno.harvard.edu/glance/shield.gif , beveled into the page, gilded with gold.
The series is simply called "Harvard Classics", and the particular set of books that I obtained from her were published in 1969. While I was not able to take her complete collection, as some were taken by other students in my class, the books they take being denoted by their personal interest and not mere fancy, I was able to obtain some very worthy specimens of literature.
The following authors are included in these books:
Emerson, Ralph Waldo (Essays and English Traits)
-------------------------------------------------
Bacon, Sir Francis (Essays, Civil and Moral)
Milton, John (Areopagitica and Tractate on Education)
Rowe (Religion Medici)
-------------------------------------------------
Burke, Edmund (The Sublime and Beautiful)
-------------------------------------------------
Virgil (The Aeneid)
-------------------------------------------------
Dana (Two Years Before the Mast, and Twenty-Four Years After)
-------------------------------------------------
Chaucer to Gray (many poets and their works, chronologically, Volume I)
-------------------------------------------------
Collins to Fitzgerald (many poets and their works, chronologically, Volume II)
-------------------------------------------------
Tennyson to Whitman (many poets and the works, chronologically, Volume III)
-------------------------------------------------
Famous Prefaces (including "Preface to the English Dictionary", Copernicus' "Dedication of the Revolutions of the Heavenly Bodies", Newton's "Introduction to the Principia Matematicas", and more)
-------------------------------------------------
Plato (Apology, Phato, Crito)
Epictetus (The Golden Sayings)
Marcus Aurelius (Meditations)
(The ------ seperator denotes different individual books, ie Plato, Epictetus, and Aurelius are all in one book.)
It is hard for me to describe how mystified I am both by the essence of these books, and by their sudden relocation into my hands. They are in perfect condition... the covers are strong, the pages are old and thick.
Anyone else have any such extraordinary experiences concerning the unpredictable acquisition of literature?
My Spanish IV teacher had a collection of books, that I found were absolutely amazing, on a shelf in her room. They smelled of wise, empty old libraries.
They are all hardcover, of identical proportion and appearance. On the cover of each one is, simply, the VERITAS shield of Harvard (http://www.hno.harvard.edu/glance/shield.gif , beveled into the page, gilded with gold.
The series is simply called "Harvard Classics", and the particular set of books that I obtained from her were published in 1969. While I was not able to take her complete collection, as some were taken by other students in my class, the books they take being denoted by their personal interest and not mere fancy, I was able to obtain some very worthy specimens of literature.
The following authors are included in these books:
Emerson, Ralph Waldo (Essays and English Traits)
-------------------------------------------------
Bacon, Sir Francis (Essays, Civil and Moral)
Milton, John (Areopagitica and Tractate on Education)
Rowe (Religion Medici)
-------------------------------------------------
Burke, Edmund (The Sublime and Beautiful)
-------------------------------------------------
Virgil (The Aeneid)
-------------------------------------------------
Dana (Two Years Before the Mast, and Twenty-Four Years After)
-------------------------------------------------
Chaucer to Gray (many poets and their works, chronologically, Volume I)
-------------------------------------------------
Collins to Fitzgerald (many poets and their works, chronologically, Volume II)
-------------------------------------------------
Tennyson to Whitman (many poets and the works, chronologically, Volume III)
-------------------------------------------------
Famous Prefaces (including "Preface to the English Dictionary", Copernicus' "Dedication of the Revolutions of the Heavenly Bodies", Newton's "Introduction to the Principia Matematicas", and more)
-------------------------------------------------
Plato (Apology, Phato, Crito)
Epictetus (The Golden Sayings)
Marcus Aurelius (Meditations)
(The ------ seperator denotes different individual books, ie Plato, Epictetus, and Aurelius are all in one book.)
It is hard for me to describe how mystified I am both by the essence of these books, and by their sudden relocation into my hands. They are in perfect condition... the covers are strong, the pages are old and thick.
Anyone else have any such extraordinary experiences concerning the unpredictable acquisition of literature?