With A Boat And Some Help, You Can Read Moby Dick In A Day
'All my means are sane, my motive and my object mad'
By Riley MacLeod
https://aftermath.site/moby-dick-marathon-mystic
Moby Dick at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2701
literature
#OTD in 1889.
Arthur Conan Doyle and Oscar Wilde are entertained together at dinner at the Langham Hotel, London, by the American Joseph Marshall Stoddart of Lippincott's Monthly Magazine, who commissions from them respectively the stories The Sign of the Four and The Picture of Dorian Gray, which appear next year in the magazine.
The Sign of the Four at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/2097
The Picture of Dorian Gray at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/4078
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/174
English poet Agnes Bulmer was born #OTD in 1775.
Bulmer’s most famous work is Messiah's Kingdom, an epic poem consisting of 14 books and over 14,000 lines, written in blank verse. The poem, which took over 9 years to complete, was published in 1833. It is is is probably the longest work in verse ever composed by a woman.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agnes_Bulmer#
Messiah's Kindgdom is available at @internetarchive:
https://archive.org/details/messiahskingdomp00bulm
American author Gertrude Chandler Warner died #OTD in 1970.
She is best known for creating The Boxcar Children series, a popular series of children's books. The book was well-received, and Warner later revised it in 1942, making it more accessible to younger readers. This revised version became a classic, and Warner went on to write 18 more books in the series.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gertrude_Chandler_Warner
Books by Gertrude Chandler Warner at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/41863
English novelist and playwright Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was born #OTD in 1797.
She wrote the Gothic novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction. She also contributed five volumes of Lives of Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and French authors to Dionysius Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopaedia.
Books by Mary Shelley at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/61
Edited 2y ago
John Maclean: All that life can give us
19 Nov, University of Stirling – free
Author & poet Henry Bell will discuss his creative & historical work around Scottish socialist John Maclean, followed by an open archive and poetry reading
#Scottish #literature #poetry #history #Labourhistory #socialism #RedClydeside #JohnMaclean
"I am nothing but a bundle of nerves dressed up to look like a man."
Epoch 2, Frederick Fairlie
#OTD in 1860.
Wilkie Collins' sensation novel The Woman in White, an early example of mystery fiction, completes its serialization in All the Year Round. It appears in book form in London around August 15.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Woman_in_White_(novel)#
Original file available here:
https://www.djo.org.uk/all-the-year-round/volume-iii/page-1.html
The Woman in White at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/583
Edited 2y ago
"To Sarraguce I go, and know full well
Who thither goes, may ne'er return."
Chanson de Roland
French literary historian Léon Gautier died #OTD in 1897.
Gautier rendered great services to the study of early French literature, the most important of his numerous works on medieval subjects being a critical text with translation and introduction of the Chanson de Roland, and Les Épopées françaises.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%C3%A9on_Gautier_(historian)
La Chanson de Roland at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/23819
Edited 2y ago
Dutch poet and novelist Jacob van Lennep died #OTD in 1868.
He wrote in various genres, including historical novels, poetry, and plays. Among his most famous works is the novel "De Lotgevallen van Ferdinand Huyck" (The Adventures of Ferdinand Huyck), which remains a classic in Dutch literature.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_van_Lennep
Books by Jacob van Lennep at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/8513
Irish novelist, journalist, and literary hostess Marguerite Blessington was born #OTD in 1789.
Her most famous work, Conversations with Lord Byron, published posthumously in 1834, documented her interactions with the famous poet during her time in Italy. She was renowned for hosting one of the most famous literary salons in London, attracting leading figures such as Lord Byron, Charles Dickens, and Benjamin Disraeli.
Marguerite Blessington at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/4797
Edited 2y ago
‘A girl of genius’: archives unsealed of Amy Levy, queer Jewish writer admired by Oscar Wilde
Levy’s work was ‘ahead of her time’ and speaks to current debate around feminism, LGBTQ+ literature and Jewish identity, say researchers
By Nadia Khomami
Amy Levy at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/49112
A birthday 🧵 for Violet Jacob (1863–1946) – poet, novelist, short story writer, & key figure in the 20th-century Scottish renaissance & #Scots language revival – born #OTD, 1 September
#Scottish #literature #Scotslanguage #19thCentury #20thcentury #WomenWriters
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https://www.scottishwomenwritersontheweb.net/writers-a-to-z/violet-jacob
How a Book Marketing Ploy Almost Ruined Edgar Wallace, Literature’s “King of Thrillers”
Edgar Wallace wanted to promote his first novel with more than just traditional ads—but his brilliant idea almost became his downfall.
By Jane Alexander
https://www.mentalfloss.com/literature/authors/edgar-wallace-four-just-men-contest-financial-ruin
Edgar Wallace at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/999
8 Times Scientists and Inventors Tragically Died for Their Experiments
Innovation can be deadly.
By Gayoung Lee
Science at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/subject/51
The Man Who Gave Away His Birthday – a Useless Information podcast
Robert Louis Stevenson was born #OTD, 13 November – but it’s not, strictly speaking, his birthday: in 1891 he gave the day to Annie Ide, the 14-year-old daughter of the US Commissioner to Samoa, who was unfortunate enough to have been born on Christmas Day
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https://uselessinformation.org/annie-louisa-ide-cockran/
#Scottish #literature #19thCentury #Victorian #RobertLouisStevenson #RLSDay
"Sunlight is the life-blood of Nature."
Ch. 19.
#OTD in 1889.
Jerome K. Jerome's comic fictional English travelogue set on the River Thames, Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog), is published in Bristol. Its sequel is Three Men on the Bummel (also known as Three Men on Wheels, 1900).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Men_in_a_Boat
Three Men in a Boat at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/308
#OTD in 1944 Ida Tarbell died. She "was an American writer, investigative journalist, biographer, and lecturer. She was one of the leading muckrakers and reformers of the Progressive Era of the late 19th and early 20th centuries and was a pioneer of investigative journalism"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ida_Tarbell
Books by Tarbell at PG:
"I am not keeping back facts. Every fact that I know is in your possession. You can draw your own deductions from them."
Hercule Poirot
In October 1920.
Agatha Christie's first novel, The Mysterious Affair at Styles, appears in the U.S., introducing her long-running Belgian detective Hercule Poirot in the setting of an English country house.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mysterious_Affair_at_Styles
The Mysterious Affair at Styles at PG:
https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/863
Edited 2y ago
Tales of a Grandmother: Female Literary Agency & its Echoes in Scotland’s Cultural Memory in the Age of Scott
25 Nov, Glasgow University & online. Free
Walter Scott’s shadow eclipsed most of his contemporary writers in Scotland’s cultural memory of the early 19th century. Leonie Jungen investigates CLAN-ALBIN by Christian Isobel Johnstone (1781–1857), published one year after Scott’s WAVERLEY
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/leonie-jungen-tales-of-a-grandmother-tickets-1700991755129
#Scottish #literature #19thcentury #WalterScott #womenwriters
Edited 360d ago
Exploring the World of Japanese Literature in 8 Must-Reads
"Japanese literature is rich and complex, with a unique style that endears it to many literary enthusiasts."
https://www.thecollector.com/exploring-japanese-literature-must-reads/
"The Tale of Genji" at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/66057
"The Pillow Book" at PG:
Medieval Friendships: No Girls Allowed
Medieval European elites inherited the classical concept of friendship as something possible only for men. Christine de Pizan and Margery Kempe beg to differ.
By: Livia Gershon
Christine de Pizan & Margery Kempe
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/4613
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/search/?query=Margery+Kempe
Look now, look quick – a shooting star!
Make your wish! It’s very far
From here to where the active light
Set out and streaked across a night
In Glasgow’s greatly dark November…
—Edwin Morgan, “Leonids”
in the London Review of Books, June 2000
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v22/n12/edwin-morgan/four-poems
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #astronomy #leonids #meteor #EdwinMorgan
The Far Side of Disaster: On Virginia Woolf’s Unacknowledged Plague Novel To the Lighthouse
Colin Dickey: “It reminds me that others have struggled with how to write through the end of the world.”
Woolf at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/89
In September 1922.
Marcel Proust's sequence À la Recherche du temps perdu begins to appear in English in a translation by C. K. Scott Moncrieff of Swann's Way, as the first volume of Remembrance of Things Past. This occurs two months before the author's death.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_Search_of_Lost_Time
Books by Marcel Proust at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/987
Books by Scott-Moncrieff at PG:
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/217
#OTD in 1914.
Charles Masterman invites 25 "eminent literary men" to Wellington House in London to form a secret British War Propaganda Bureau. Those who attend include William Archer, Arnold Bennett, Hall Caine, G. K. Chesterton, Arthur Conan Doyle, Ford Madox Hueffer, John Galsworthy, Thomas Hardy, Rudyard Kipling, John Masefield, Henry Newbolt, Gilbert Parker, G. M. Trevelyan and H. G. Wells.
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