Book Description
In his magnificent interpretation of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow s poem, Christopher Bing seamlessly weaves history and imagination into a rich portrait of an American hero. A meticulous researcher, Bing includes material that provides texture to history, maps that follow the British campaign to quell the rebellious citizenry, as well as the patriot s ride into the Massachusetts night of April, 1775. Documents firmly affixed into the book, including the British general s orders to his troops and Revere s own deposition relating the events, give the reader not only a visual experience but a tactile one as well. Far more than a brilliantly presented history lesson, this book represents a tour de force of coherent artistic vision. In an extraordinary series of rich and moody engravings, from the mysteriously shimmering rigging of the British sloop, The Somerset, looming in a moonlit Boston harbor to the taut urgency of a man and his horse galloping at a combustible moment in the American experience, this book illuminates our country s past unlike any other.
Customer Reviews:
Brought the poem to life.......2006-04-14
This is my child's oppinion of the book."I recently memorized this poem for school and found it quite boring and I did not want to learn it at all. But then after I learned it I read this book and saw all the pictures and I really started to appreciate that I learned it. The pictures really made the poem come to life and I really wish I had the book while learning it. Now I have it memorized and I am hoping to get a copy of the book!"
Makes History Fun!.......2005-09-24
This book is a gift for a home schooling mom like me, who frequently fell asleep in my history classes in school! It really evokes the excitement, mixed with fear that must have been present at that time in history. Longfellow perfectly captures the passion and determination that gripped these "patriots". In addition, the illustrations are fantastic - true art.
An amazingly beautiful and creative book........2004-01-03
This book comes alive when you open it and are allowed to step back in time with the wonderful backbeat of Longfellow's great American poem about the "the British are coming", and awakening of the people from Boston to Concord by Paul Revere. This is the beginning of America! Right before the "shot heard round the world" folks. A poem that shaped America not only in the eyes of Americans, but the rest of the world. Longfellow's poetry was simple genius. The art of Christopher Bing is outstanding. This exceptional book has the kind of creativity I would like to see more of in Children's Literature. A unique book that can be found on adult bookshelves as well.
What a treasure!.......2003-02-20
You know this book is special as soon as you touch it. You realize that the look of leather on the cover is just that, a look. You flip through the pages and find a scrapbook, complete with worn and mildewed pages, enhanced with token mementos that look so three-dimensional you must trace them with a tentative finger. A letter from Thomas Gage to Lieutenant Colonel Smith is tucked inside the front cover; the Deposition of Paul Revere is stuck in the back. We find a map of the British plan and a corresponding map of the Middlesex Alarm, including Revere's actual route. This is *not* just a casual recitation of the classic poem. The words proceed on faded sheets while Bing's illustrations hint at period woodcuts. No explanations are necessary within the text. Notes are saved for the end, and they reveal the minor inaccuracies in the Longfellow version (one of the biggest being that Paul Revere was captured outside of Lexington and that his companion Dr. Samuel Prescott was the one who made it all the way to Concord). A gift for any age ... especially for those of us who can chime off part of the rhyme but forget the whole story.
My four-year-old son loves this book!.......2003-02-01
Despite the "age" recommendation, I purchased this book for my four-year-old son. We've been reading it outloud for almost a year. He absolutely loves it! It's so hard to find books for children with classic authors' words presented, without apology, in their original form. And the drawings and details in this book are outstanding. My son loves to open and refold the reproductions of letter and newspaper in the front and back, and he loves to trace Paul Revere's ride on the map with his finger. A beautiful book, with much to teach any reader, of any age. This book should be declared a national treasure.
Book Description
Using a unique age-specific organization, this book discusses all aspects of pediatric dentistry from infancy through adolescence. Each age-specific section covers the physical, cognitive, emotional, and social changes that children experience, as well as the epidemiology of dental disease at that age. Other chapters explore the examination, treatment planning, radiographic concerns, prevention, trauma, restorative dentistry, pulp therapy, orthodontics, and behavior management of each age range.
Customer Reviews:
Easy to be read.......2006-07-31
This a complete book which is very easy to be read. It presents nice visuals as well as very useful summary boxes.
An easy to use, comprehensive text........1999-11-18
As a general practitioner who uses this book to answer fairly routine questions about care and treatment of children, I recommend it highly. It is easy to read and well organized. It openly acknowledges areas of ambiguity or controversy in the field and gives what appears to be a balanced view of the issues. I feel very comfortable relying on this text for most of my pedodontic questions.
Book Description
Photos and stories from the world-famous store where The Beatles, Hendrix and The Who bought gear. Even before the popularity of the electric guitar or the invention of the wah-wah pedal, Manny's Music in New York City was providing the hardware for swing stars and big bands, and establishing itself as the place to go for musicians in the know. This book is not only for anyone who has ever bought a guitar or played in a band, but also for fans and music history buffs who want insight into a side of the music world hardly ever seen by non-musicians. It's also for anyone whoever wondered where Buddy Holly got his Stratocaster ... or where Jimi Hendrix got his. - Manny's Music is quite literally "the store heard 'round the world." Turning the pages of this book, you'll enter a world of Strats and Les Pauls, of Dyna-Sonic snare drums, fuzz boxes, wah-wahs and much more. - A lavishly produced must-have book that includes testimonials and anecdotes from music's biggest stars, and the participation of every major musical instrument company.
Customer Reviews:
Any definitive music collection whether it be at the college or general lending library levels needs WALL OF FAME........2007-08-09
THE WALL OF FAME: NEW YORK CITY'S LEGENDARY MANNY'S MUSIC recalls a New York institution with a guide to one of the most important music instrument stores of the swing, big band and electric eras. Manny's was the music store of choice for musicians ranging from Kiss to Chet Atkins, Chet Baker and Dizzy Gillespie: THE WALL OF FAME is a rock celebration of these musicians, offers a gorgeous blend of a concert diary and rarely-seen souvenir photos, and reproduces nearly 200 autographed photos from the store's walls. Any definitive music collection whether it be at the college or general lending library levels needs WALL OF FAME.
Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch
Manny is My Man!!!.......2007-03-17
I wish I was in there shoes growing up. Meeting the stars that are in this book, words can't express. Jimmy, Janis, Paul and Bob to name a few bring goose bumps to my arms. I would rather be in there shoes than to hit the lotto. They rocked!!!!!!
Average customer rating:
- Beautifully Illustrated
- It DOES contain the whole thing...
- Great for Kids
- Great book for teaching history to young children
- used it for a report
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Paul Revere's Ride
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Manufacturer: Puffin
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ASIN: 0140556125 |
Amazon.com
"Listen, my children, and you shall hear/Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere ..." So begins one of the most stirring poems in American literature. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote "Paul Revere's Ride" in 1861, nearly 100 years after the actual midnight ride that began on April 18, in 1775. The poem creates a suspenseful story as American colonist Paul Revere decides with his friend Robert Newman and others to avert a British attack on Concord, Massachusetts. The British had come from Boston in search of the colonists' arms supply. What Revere and his friends didn't know was whether the Redcoats would come by land (around the mouth of the Charles River) or by sea (across the river). Newman spotted the British "by sea" and signaled from the Old North Church tower to Revere, who was "Ready to ride and spread the alarm/Through every Middlesex village and farm,/For the country folk to be up and to arm." And, by morning, the country folk were ready, indeed. "Chasing the red-coats down the lane,/Then crossing the fields to emerge again/Under the trees at the turn of the road,/And only pausing to fire and load." This battle, the first of the American Revolution, drove the British back to Boston.
Ted Rand--well-loved illustrator of The Hullabaloo ABC, Mailing May, Knots on a Counting Rope, and many other critically acclaimed titles--masters the mood and movement of the famous midnight ride, and children will love the power and drama of this historic American event. (Great read-aloud, ages 4 to 8)
Customer Reviews:
Beautifully Illustrated.......2007-03-09
The text is the classic Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem, and the paintings give it new life for the visually-oriented kids of today. This book will help them visualize what the poem is talking about, which becomes more important as time passes and kids are less accustomed to reading the words of older poems. If you want kids to really appreciate this famous poem, this book should help them connect with it.
It DOES contain the whole thing..........2003-12-07
Just a point of correction on the review given by Seidur above--the Ted Rand illustrated edition not only contains the complete Longfellow poem, it is also correctly titled (contrary to two erroneous criticism made by Seidur). It is, I think, the best edition of this wonderful poem.
Great for Kids.......2003-11-15
A great introduction to Longfellow and the roots of this great Country. The artwork is beautiful. A good book for young children learning to read.
Great book for teaching history to young children.......2002-09-20
For the last two days I have read Paul Revere's Ride by Longfellow to my 4 and 7 year old. We have learned the history, vocabulary words, the different methods the artist used to illustrate the poem, and many other interesting facts. They are begging for more! What are great book! Longfellow makes history come to life. You can just feel the night air in Revere's face as he so courageously warns the people.
used it for a report.......2002-06-06
It had good information for my report in the back of the book. It had true history of the ride. I liked the illustrations. My moms friend did the design layout.
Book Description
One of the greatest artists of sixteenth-century Europe, Hans Holbein the younger earned high acclaim for his work both in the city of Basel and in England for Henry VIII and other patrons. This book is the first to explore the full range of the artist’s English body of work as well as the relation of this work to the visual and material culture of Tudor England. Providing a detailed account of the paintings, drawings, and woodcuts that Holbein produced in England, the book demonstrates convincingly that that country was not as remote from a common European culture as is often assumed. Rather, it was an unmistakable part of that culture.
Susan Foister discusses not only Holbein's well-known portraits but also his decorative paintings and murals, now lost, his designs for goldsmiths, and the works that can be associated with the English Reformation. In addition, she considers Holbein's religious and secular images, his techniques and practices, his status as an official court painter, and a variety of other intriguing topics.
Customer Reviews:
Brilliant survey.......2007-03-17
This is an outstanding book by the world's leading expert on Holbein. The plates are superb, the color reproductions remarkably faithful.
Book Description
With the crisp pacing of a suspense novelist, veteran reporter Bill Paul follows five high-school honor students and the dean of admission at Princeton through each step of the college admissions process. As the narrative unfolds, we watch the students' successes and blunders as they ponder where to apply, write and rewrite their essays, endure alumni interviews, agonize over early decision, and anxiously await the April delivery of the hoped-for thick envelope that means acceptance, or the dreaded thin envelope that contains a curt rejection. What emerges is the clearest picture ever of this complex, frustrating, and highly imperfect process, and how it truly works.
Customer Reviews:
What the Admissions Office Did With Your Application.......2000-08-26
While not exactly a guide to getting into a good school, this book is full of insight on the admissions process.
There are lots of useful tips to be gleaned from the author's true stories of five students (names changed) applying to Princeton.
For example, there's sometimes an enormous difference a good letter of recommendation can make in an applicant's file. Last summer, a student tour guide and Admissions Office volunteer at a prestigious Massachusetts college said that every letter of recommendation is basically the same, glowing text, and so these are given little consideration by the Admissions people. After reading Paul's book, I am convinced that that student was mistaken; I see now how incredibly important a very well-written letter can be. And Paul tells why, in perfect, practical detail.
This page-turner is a great book; it clears up the mysteries, identifies the vagaries, and reveals the sheer humanity of the admissions process. Satisfying reading for the burnt-out parent who needs a break from the Peterson Guide... and a "must" for every high school guidance counsellor.
Excellent insights into the admission process........1999-04-26
Getting your kid into a good college is a nerve-racking process for most parents. It certainly has been for us. We have found the customer reviews in Amazon very helpful. That prompts us to distill our ratings of the various guidebooks.
The best short reference on each college is the Princeton Review of The Best (311) Colleges. It gives ratings of academic quality, difficulty of admission, percentage admitted, etc. There is also a brief summary of college life and what each place might be looking for.
Peterson Guide is comprehensive, and has long write-ups for each school. There is a front section for each school, listed alphabetically within each state, and a back section with detailed profiles of selected institutions.
Fiske's guide is interesting, but he basically has something good to say for each school, so careful reading between the lines and for "damning with faint praise" is called for.
The Yale Insider's Guide is extremely subjective, with different students writing various reviews. We did not find it too reliable, except in conjunction with other books.
Likewise for Barrron's Guide to the Most Competitive Colleges. Recent alumni write of their (invariably positive) experiences. Take it with a grain of salt, or read carefully between the lines.
Choosing the Right College by ISN was extremely helpful. Some readers criticized it for being allegedly right wing. We did not find it so. Rather, knowing the point of view of the authors helped us evaluate their observations. Other books do not make their biases explicit. A feature of the book we found particularly helpful was the naming of excellent professors and departments in each college.
Antonoff's College Finder was interesting only in conjunction with other books.
Three books written from the perspective of college admissions officers were very interesting and helpful. They are The College Admissions Mystique, by Mayher, Getting In, by Bill Paul, and most of all A is for Admission by Michelle Hernandez. We strongly recommend that parents and the kids who are the applicants read at least one of these.
Another very helpful book was You're Gonna Love This College Guide, by Marty Nemko. It takes the student through the decision process of big vs. small, urban vs. country, elite vs. the level just below, geography, and so forth. That really got our daughter unstuck in her thinking process.
Loren Pope is another helpful author for those who think that not getting into Harvard is the end of the world.
Three books we did not find to be particularly helpful are Getting Into Any College, by Jim Good and Lisa Lee, The National Review College Guide, by Charles Sykes and Brad Miner (too out of date), and The Real Freshman Handbook, by Jennifer Hanson.
One book we found to be unexpectedly useful was Getting Into Medical School Today, by Scott Plantz, et. al. Even if your child is not interested in medical school, this book puts college in perspective for any post-college program.
We hope readers find our review helpful.
An even-handed look into the alchemy of college admissions.......1999-03-18
I read this book when it came out 3 years ago and I was directing the college placement efforts of an independent boarding school. I was impressed enough by the depth of Bill Paul's research and analysis of the admissions process at Princeton that I not only invited Bill to speak at a parents' day presentation at the school but ordered 30 copies of the book and put them up for sale after the event. Within ten minutes after Bill spoke, every copy-- including mine-- was gone.
Getting In follows a handful of accomplished high school seniors through the admissions process, offering examples of their essays, snippets of conversations and interviews, and other illuminating vignettes of senior year. At the same time, Bill shadows Fred Hargadon, the Princeton admissions dean, as he attempts to read all the applications and make what would seem to even well seasoned admissions professionals some extremely tough decisions.
The worth of this book lies in its accurate reflection of reality; it suggests that admission to one of the most selective (1 of every 11 applicants) schools is determined not only by academic excellence and extracurricular entrepreneurialism, but by the luck of the draw as well. Indeed, at one point in the book, Hargadon admits-- as I've heard him do on other occasions-- that if the admitted Princeton freshman class were somehow eliminated, he could fashion a statistically identical class from the rejected applicants.
This is not a how-to book; rather, it is a book that gives students with high admissions aspirations-- and their parents-- a context that will prepare them well for realities of the admissions game.
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A Bibliography of Henry James (St. Paul's Bibliographies)
Leon Edel ,
Dan H. Laurence , and
James Rambeau
Manufacturer: Oak Knoll Press
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ASIN: 1584560053 |
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What Maisie Knew (1897) represents one of James's finest reflections on the rites of passage from wonder to knowledge, and the question of their finality. Neglected and exploited by everyone around her, Maisie inspired James to dwell with extraordinary acuteness on the things that may pass
between adult and child. In addition to a new Introduction, this edition of the novel offers particularly detailed notes, bibliography, and a list of additional readings.
Download Description
There was visibly, however, an influence that made Ida consider; she glanced at the gentleman she had left, who, having strolled with his hands in his pockets to some distance, stood there with unembarrassed vagueness. She directed to him the face that was like an illuminated garden, turnstile and all, for the frequentation of which he had his season-ticket; then she looked again at Sir Claude. "I've given her up to her father to KEEP-- not to get rid of by sending about the town either with you or with any one else.
Customer Reviews:
Maisie, light of my life, fire of my loins.......2007-06-16
Doh! I meant Lolita. Well, I think that Maisie is a protyope for Lolita. She adapts to being shifted around by her parents and their various lovers by becoming something of a nymphette herself with Daddy Claude. This is a must read for all of us Nabakov fans. I'm quite sure he read it too.
The Corruption of Maisie.......2006-08-15
WHAT MAISIE KNEW is probably the weirdest novel by Henry James. He had already written of seamy themes before this, but now he writes a variation of one of his favorite themes--that of the corruption of the innocent. Maisie is a young female child, perhaps six years old whose parents are getting divorced. In the best of situations divorce hits hard, and this was far from the best. Maisie's parents, Beale and Ida Farange are morally depraved and care not a whit for the welfare of their daughter. Maisie is a good-natured child who wants only to be loved by the parents she loves. Maisie is the prototypical Jamesian innocent about to be plunged into a maelstrom of decay.
The terms of the divorce allow Maisie to live with each parent at six month intervals, and this she does. It is what she sees and happens to her that begin to cloud Maisie's moral universe. To begin with when she stays with her father, his friends paw her in ways that smack of sexual abuse. Maisie's mother, Ida, hires a governess, Miss Overmore, to care for Maisie. Soon enough Miss Overmore begins an affair with Maisie's father, Beale, ultimately marrying him. Ida follows suit by marrying her lover, Sir Claude. So now Maisie must adjust to a set of step parents. Claude's interest in his step-daughter verges on the incestuous--indeed later on when Maisie is thirteen, she outright propositions him. Ida hires a new governess, Mrs. Wix, to take the place of the erstwhile Miss Overmore. Mrs. Wix is a decent elderly woman who truly loves Maisie and tries to inculcate in her a moral center of goodness. This sense of goodness is put to the test immediately, when Maisie's remarried parents begin a new dance of musical lovers.
As Maisie ages toward young girlhood, she shows signs that she has well learned the lessons of moral depravity that abound. She has no problem adjusting to a series of new adults zipping in and out of her life as parents, step parents, and lovers of parents. Maisie even makes it easy for these newcomers to pull the wool over the eyes of their cuckolded partners by making suggestions to facilitate what is by now a familiar routine or illicit romances. By the end of the novel, a thirteen year old Maisie desires Sir Claude as her own lover. Mrs. Wix, when she hears of this, angrily demands of Maisie what has happened to the sense of moral decorum that she thought was by now firmly instilled in Maisie. The answer, of course, is that the sense of propriety was doomed from the start since Maisie early on learned the difference between words of decorum and deeds of decorum. The Maisie at the end of WHAT MAZIE KNEW suggests that children--or adults for that matter--need a ongoing foundation of goodness to show that the ugliness they may see unfolding around them need not envelop them.
Developing Moral Sense.......2006-07-23
Henry James' 1907 WHAT MAISIE KNEW provides deep psychological insight into a young girl's predicament, as a result of her parents' bitter divorce in Edwardian England. Inspired by a friend's comments on the "shuttlecock" lifestyle of a divorced child in the vicious game of spousal revenge, this novel studies the harmful existence of an innocent victim of a joint custody dispute. Even at the tender age of seven, Maisie realizes the wisdom of playing dumb. Although she reports little back to the opposing sides, Maisie keenly observes and thoughtfully listens to all that occurs in both her uncomfortable biospheres. Eventually she adopts the simple policy of not telling--thus refusing to provide more fuel for animosity on either side.
As in THE GOLDEN BOWL--a lengthy novel dealing with the marital and emotional battles among a very limited cast of characters--this shorter work could easily be adapted for the stage, as the chapters fall naturally into Scenes. James' protracted dialogues between Maisie and the impassioned adults who dispute her parenting rights would be delicious to dramatize, although readers would lose the private psychological depth as Maisie copes with increasingly new information. She reconciles her maturing lucid udnerstanding to the empowered adults in her universe with private schemes to protect one or the other parent and later, step-parent.
These intense colloquies are designed both to elicit information re events which have occurred offstage, and to stir Maisie to the brink of definitive action--which will directly effect the five adults whom we assume are most interested in her welfare: Beale Farange, Ida Farange, Sir Claude, Miss Overton, and Mrs. Wix. Little Maisie unwittingly serves as a catalyst for adult passion, while she secretly exults in bringing her favorite people together. One of the great literary ironies of this novel springs from the unexpected separations which her warm-hearted meddling precipitates. To her childlike logic, being Free is the most desirable status for formerly married persons--free to love and marry whom they choose--free to make a cherished home for her and to ease their own heartache.
Maisie is further isolated from children, even girls her own age; thus she is left to puzzle out the world using only her keen observation of adult interactions. But how can the lonely girl truly develop a sense of morality--at least by Edwardian standards? Is she herself Free to choose her new and permanent step-parents? Does she have the right to demand that the adults who love her make extreme sacrifices--just to retain her presence and loyalty? Does Maisie at 12 know what is best for herself? Which path will she ultimately choose? Her final decision will impact the lives of three far-from-blameless but well-meaning adults. Maise at 12 is too worldy-wise to indulge in Child's Play. This absorbing work is truly Vintage James.
Several Turns of the Screw.......2006-04-07
What hubris to review a work by such a major novelist as Henry James, even though WHAT MAISIE KNEW may not be one of his major novels! All the same, a review can perhaps be useful in two regards: by commenting on this particular edition, and by suggesting how the novel might appeal to those familiar with other James works but not this one.
The Penguin Classics paperback is crisply printed, comfortable in the hand, and well annotated. There is also an excellent essay by Paul Theroux. It gives too much away, I think, to be read as an introduction, but it does make a helpful afterword. If you do read the essay first, which is how it is printed, it may seem that Theroux has revealed virtually the entire plot, but in fact this is not so. James's narrative exposition is unusually swift in this book, and a lot happens very quickly, but his main interest lies in exploring the psychological depths of the situation that he has established; there is a distinct change of gear at roughly the halfway point of the book.
As Theroux points out, the novel is generally considered a transitional work between James's earlier style and his later one. Theroux also locates this gear-change at the point where James ceased writing in longhand and started dictating his novels to a stenographer -- a crisis described so well by Colm Toibin in his biographical novel, THE MASTER. The first half of the book shows a leanness of style and also a great sense of humor not often associated with the author. But the book's premise is intrinsically comic: Maisie, a five-year-old girl, observes the doings of the adults around her as she is shipped from household to household in consequence of her parents' divorce, as the parents take lovers and remarry, and then as virtually everybody else in the story take other lovers. The humor comes from the fact that while Maisie understands so little at first, the adult reader quickly picks up what is going on. The spider symmetries of the expanding web of sex make a formal pattern as clear and intricate as a dance, illuminated by James's dry wit and his beautiful ability to see through childish eyes.
Several things change at the half-way point. Maisie becomes old enough to understand a little more. The adults whom she had previously observed from below now become more conscious of her as a potential ally and start using her unscrupulously to further their own ends. Twists of the plot which had at first seemed only amusing now appear as quite nasty turns of the screw, as Maisie's affections and loyalties are forced into the vise. Questions of morality come to the fore, and eventually dominate the action. The narrative tone also changes; although Maisie's knowledge and moral awareness develops considerably, James is forced into using his own voice to describe it, as though Maisie herself has lost the words to follow her own farewell to childhood.
The reference above to THE TURN OF THE SCREW is deliberate, for WHAT MAISIE KNEW (1897) seems almost like a preliminary draft for the more famous story, published in the following year. Yes, there are differences: this is comic rather than tragic, complicit rather than mysterious, and much less hermetic. The child heroine appears to come through with more wisdom and less trauma than the situation might have caused. But the final scene is astonishingly close to the ending of the later story: a struggle for control of a once-innocent child waged between a humble governess and two charismatic figures who exert a powerful hold both on the child and on each other. Only the ending is different, though no less worth waiting for.
What Maisie Knew.....Do I Really Care?.......2005-02-03
I am not a Henry James fanatic, as a matter of fact, this is the first work of his that I have read, and with that I must say that this novel is horribly written and completely unrealistic in it's portrayal of the child, Maisie and especially her dialogue. I have been assigned to read this for an english class as an undergrad and I have tolerated many a badly executed idea...but never like this. Boring, boring, and more boring. And as a result, I am comnpletely turned off to James other works. I hear his other works are great.....read those first, you may fair better.
Average customer rating:
- BEST EDITION AVAILABLE, BY FAR
- A Cape Cod Walk with Thoreau
- Great Humor
- Leave your brain at the door.
- Cape Cod is the ultimate desert island beach book.
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Cape Cod (Nature Library, Penguin)
Henry David Thoreau
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The Outermost House: A Year of Life On The Great Beach of Cape Cod
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The Enduring Shore: A History of Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket
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The Salt House: A Summer on the Dunes of Cape Cod
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The Maine Woods (Penguin Nature Library)
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The Nature of Cape Cod
ASIN: 0140170022 |
Book Description
Thoreau's compelling account of Cape Cod is here presented in the complete and definitive text. His trips to the Cape, he wrote, were intended to afford "a better view than I had yet had of the ocean." In the plants, animals, topography, weather, people, and human works of Massachusetts' long projection into the Atlantic, he finds "another world." Encounters with the ocean dominate the book, from the fatal shipwreck of the opening episode to the late reflections on the Pilgrims' Cape Cod landing and reconnaissance. Along the way, Thoreau relates the experiences of fishermen and oystermen, farmers and salvagers, lighthouse-keepers and ship-captains, as well as his own intense confrontations with the sea as he travels the land's outermost margins. Chronicles of exploration, settlement, and survival on the Cape lead Thoreau to reconceive the history of New England and to recognize the parochialism of history itself.
Download Description
Our way to the high sand-bank, which I have described as extending all along the coast, led, as usual, through patches of Bayberry bushes, which straggled into the sand. This, next to the Shrub-oak, was perhaps the most common shrub thereabouts. I was much attracted by its odoriferous leaves and small gray berries which are clustered about the short twigs, just below the last year's growth. I know of but two bushes in Concord, and they, being staminate plants, do not bear fruit.
Customer Reviews:
BEST EDITION AVAILABLE, BY FAR.......2007-06-13
This hardcover edition from Peninsula Press is unquestionably the best available edition of Thoreau's Cape Cod, for these reasons:
1) While all other editions are based on Thoreau's journal entries from only his first three visits to the Cape, this edition includes an epilogue compiling Thoreau's notes from his fourth and final visit, in which he traveled south to Chatham and Monomoy.
2) This is the only edition to translate the many, many Greek and Latin phrases Thoreau includes throughout the work, and it is also the only edition to provide illustrations, maps, and sidenotes in-text.
3) This is the only indexed edition ever created.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for fans of both Cape literature and Thoreau in general.
A Cape Cod Walk with Thoreau.......2006-08-05
Thoreau visited Cape Cod in 1849, 1850, and 1853. These trips formed the basis for a series of essays, several of which Thoreau published in magazines. After Thoreau's death, the essays were gathered together and published as "Cape Cod" in 1865.
Thoreau's "Cape Cod" is different in tone in theme from his earlier books. The tone is leisurely and light. Instead of solitude or the wild woods, the picture that remains with me from this book is that of a long walk, or, as Thoreau puts it, a "ramble" through the sand and dunes of Cape Cod. The book is picturesque, full of humor and wry observation. Thoreau unforgettably describes the ocean, in its storms, vicissitudes, and moments of peace, the fish and the fishermen, the sands, birds, plants and lighthouses of Cape Cod, and the people. I have visited portions of the Masachusetts coast, but I have never been to Cape Cod. Thoreau took me there in his book.
The book is arranged into ten chapters. It opens with a description of the shipwreck of the St John on a rock off the Cape. Thoreau then describes a ride by coach across the Cape. But the heart of the book lies in the following chapters in which Thoreau with a companion walks the 30 mile beach from Nauset Harbor to Provincetown with many stops and diversions along the way. I felt the salt air and saw the fishermen and the sandy beach as I walked with Thoreau.
The most vivid characterization in the book is in the chapter "The Wellfleet Oysterman", as Thoreau describes a grizzled, taciturn, and ancient native of Cape Cod and his family who offer him hospitality for the night. Another memorable chapter involves the description of the Highland Lighthouse, no longer standing, and its keeper. The stops with the Oysterman and the Lighthouse punctuate Thoreau's long walks through the day over the beach and his meditiations about and descriptions of what he finds there.
Thoreaus walk ended at Provincetown, on the northernmost portion of Cape Cod, with its wood walkway, shanty houses, and ever-present scenes of fishermen, boats, and drying fish. Thoreau offers what I found an affectionate portrait of these hardy fishermen and their families. Following a description of what he found at Provincetown, Thoreau offers a great deal of historical background on the exploration of the Cape, from the Pilgrims reaching back to earlier French, Icelandic, and English explorers.
Thoreau's "Cape Cod" is a worthy companion to his books describing his experiences inland, on Walden Pond and on the rivers and woods of New England and Maine. It is beautifuly written with unforgettable descriptive passages. It made me want to get up and go from my life in the city, and over 150 years after Thoreau wrote, wander and walk for myself along the dunes and sands of Cape Cod.
Great Humor.......2006-07-18
This book details the flora, fauna and people that Thoreau found in Cape Cod in the 1850s. Thoreau organizes the book around a single trip to Provincetown, although much of the material that he uses in the book came from various visits to the Cape, and to the ocean in general. He starts with a description of a shipwreck at Cohasset, then a stagecoach ride from Plymouth, then a walking trip with a companion along the outer shore to Provincetown. Along the way, he describes not only the plants and animals he encountered, but also the people who he met. The book finishes with a lengthy academic historical account of the discovery and mapping of the Cape.
I found this to be the most humorous of all Thoreau's work. The character sketches he provides in this book, sharpened with his trained eye for observation of natural phenomena, are legendary. The cultural description of the Cape and its environment is quite fascinating for those interested in the history of daily life in 19th century Massachusetts. As Thoreau describes the desolate, treeless desert that made up the far reaches of the Cape, one begins to comprehend what it meant for an economy to be based on wood and whale oil for fuels. Thoreau stresses how valued driftwood was for residents of the Cape, as one of their main sources of heating and cooking fuel. Doubtless, he would not recognize the Cape today with its lush new forests. Or its Wal-Marts--switching to an oil economy has brought mixed blessings for the Cape. For those who think Thoreau to be a humorless didactic philosopher, this book shows a very different aspect of Thoreau as a writer.
Leave your brain at the door........1999-06-24
You will forget about the outside world when you read this; nothing but sand, wind, and water. Plus some natural history, local folklore, a few shipwreck tales. Typical Thoreau; he finds beauty, interest, detail in the wilderness. The desolate landscape will help to clear your mind. Highly recommended.
Cape Cod is the ultimate desert island beach book........1997-01-31
Each year, in preparation for a week's retreat to the Outer Banks of North Carolina, I go in search of a book that would be perfect for a sojourn on a desert island. Of course, the Outer Banks are hardly deserted--the locals have printed up Wege's infamous photograph of a packed stretch of Coney Island with the caption "Nags Head, circa 2000 A.D."--but there we are on an island for seven days, my husband experiencing near death in the waves while I read. Sometimes we stop these pursuits and prowl the beach. Mostly we live as if we're the last two people on earth (which is easier in the off-peak season).
I've learned that not every book is right for this way of life. The perfect desert island book has to celebrate the place you are in, not transport you. It should offer a tinge of society, because, after all, a human is a social animal, but it should not make you yearn achingly for what has been left behind nor should you be so repelled by it that you will never fit in again when you leave the island (you always leave the island). It should have some narrative sweep to withstand the competition of the seascape. It should make you think, at least a little: you want the stress to wash out to sea, not the little grey cells.
Cape Cod by Henry David Thoreau is the benchmark by which I've chosen beach material for several years. it is the quintessential celebration of littoral life. If you are on the beach, you appreciate it all the more; if you are not, well, at least you know vividly what you are missing. There is drama, as in the specter of villagers racing to the shore at the news of a shipwreck. There is information, as in what part of the clam not to eat, how the Indians trapped gulls for food, how a lighthouse really works. There is Thoreau's contagious respect for solitude, his occasional crankiness, and that magic trick of his that can suck in high school sophomores and get them through his books without so much as a whimper.
There is one flaw to Cape Cod: brevity. It lasts about a day and a half on the Robinson Crusoe plan. This is not to say that it does not withstand re-reading, it does, but at some point after you have committed it to memory, you may wish for the collected works of Shakespeare and move onto the Bard's beach play, The Tempest.
Book Description
One of Carcassi's (1792-1853) most famous collections of classical guitar music - indispensable for the modern guitarist's musical and technical development. Performed by Paul Henry. 49-minute audio accompaniment.
Customer Reviews:
Guilty Pleasure.......2007-07-27
A decidedly enjoyable romp across the fret board, these 25 Carcassi studies are the epitome of fun. The studies are very lightweight, and are of little practical value in aiding a guitarist's development, but they do make a lovely noise when played well, and are a nice diversion from the more serious, and infinitely more challenging, Sor studies.
not impressed.......2007-05-14
Well, I bought this soley for the CD, and it serves that purpose. However, the book itself is at most mediocre. There are only few left or right hand fingerings. You will need some instruction from your teacher.
Beautiful intermediate guitar music.......2006-11-12
These 25 pieces are beautiful music. They are not for beginners; I am an advanced intermediate amateur player and have been learning these (committed to memory) over the last year (though not exclusively) and am only to #15! They perform well for friends and family and are very expressive and melodic. The Tanenbaum book on these pieces is an excellent accompaniment. Anyone who can roll through all 25 of these pieces, from memory, with grace and expression, has some reasonably serious chops!
Carcassi studies a must for classical student.......2006-08-15
This is a great book for the beginning to intermediary classical guitar student. The lessons were designed to build strength in sight reading, usage of scales, technique, and timing. The CD that accompanies the book allows the student to hear exactly what each piece should sound like when played correctly. Carcassi was an excellent composer and teacher. This book is evidence.
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