FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31  
32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   >>   >|  
e unsatisfying and the better they are the more unsatisfying they become. But this is in reality their great merit. They have much beauty in themselves, they awaken pleasant memories, they revive old delights, but, above all, if rightly read they open the gates to the illimitable gardens whence all the flowers which have here been gathered may be found blooming in radiance, unplucked and unbroken and rooted in their native soil. The most important part of the collection is that which gives selections from those writers whose native tongue is English. No translation even of prose can ever quite reproduce its original, and as a rule can not hope to equal it. There are many translations, notably the Elizabethan, which are extremely fine in themselves and memorable examples of English prose. Still they are not the original writings. Something escapes in the translation into another tongue, an impalpable something which can not be held or transmitted. The Bible stands alone, a great literary monument of the noblest and most beautiful English, which has formed English speech and become a part of the language as it is of the thought and emotion of the people who read "King James'" version in all parts of the globe. Yet we know that the version which the people, so fortunate in its possession, wisely and absolutely decline to give up in exchange for any revision is neither an accurate nor a faithful reproduction of its original. Therefore, putting aside the English Bible as wholly by itself, it may be safely said that the soul of a language and the beauties of style which it is capable of exhibiting can only be found and studied in the productions of writers who not only think in the language in which they write, but to whom that speech is native, the inalienable birthright and heritage of their race or country. In such writers we get not only the thought, the humor, or the pathos, all that can be transferred in a translation, but also the pleasure to the ear akin to music, the sense of form, the artistic gratification which form brings, all those attributes which are possible in the highest degree to those only to whom the language is native. For these reasons, as will be readily understood, in making selections from those writers whose native tongue is English, specimens have been given of all periods from the earliest time and occasionally of authors who would not otherwise find a place in such a collection, for the pur
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   15   16   17   18   19   20   21   22   23   24   25   26   27   28   29   30   31  
32   33   34   35   36   37   38   39   40   41   42   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

English

 

native

 
writers
 
language
 

original

 

translation

 
tongue
 

speech

 

thought

 
collection

selections
 

unsatisfying

 

version

 

people

 

studied

 

exhibiting

 

wholly

 

beauties

 

safely

 

capable


faithful

 
exchange
 
decline
 

possession

 

wisely

 
absolutely
 

revision

 

Therefore

 

putting

 
reproduction

productions
 
accurate
 

authors

 
understood
 

artistic

 

making

 
pleasure
 

readily

 

gratification

 

degree


highest

 

brings

 
attributes
 

transferred

 

specimens

 

reasons

 

country

 
heritage
 

inalienable

 

birthright