Updated: Dec. 11/04

PRESENTING
A Repertory of Spirited Writings and Esteemed Literary Sources.















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You don't have to be rich, or smart, or good-looking - It's already yours. Tap into it. More than a place, a person, an idea, Passion is a State of Mind.

"Miguel de Cervantes: ...When life itself seems lunatic, who knows where madness lies? Too much sanity may be madness! To surrender dreams---this may be madness; to seek treasure where there is only trash! And maddest of all---to see life as it is and not as it should be!"

- Man of La Mancha (1972).
Image: Picasso's Don Quixote

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The most vivid account we have of the death throes of a society-Invaluable


Plays exploring human passion. Outstanding 2-vol. series to own, to treasure.

Masterwork of historical fiction; monumental scope. A delicious read.

If every historian wrote like Bruce Catton, no one would read fiction.

The unsurpassed modern masterpiece of romantic suspense.

This comedy of manners is a pure pleasure.


Favorite Links

"The South has produced writers as the Dark Ages produced saints."
- Alfred Kazin

Peruse this compilation of artists and commentary, by no means comprehensive, and you'll be struck by Southern culture's outstanding contribution to North American and world literature. The South's great gift to us all.
Bound to whet your appetite.
"A story with ghosts, murder, sex, humor, mystery, assassinations, double-crossing and suicide. Interested?
....If you're like me, however, the first time you read Shakespeare you were so confused you were ready to chuck
the play off the nearest bridge and pick up the TV Guide. But, also, if you're like me, you had to read it for class."
- Katie Sullivan
I read this version of Hamlet and almost fell off my chair laughing. Based on the literal translation into everyday English I tend to think Shakespeare's Hamet was not pure tragedy, as so long interpreted, but rather a mocking tragicomedy (black comedy) about the human condition.
"It is said that every male reader of Pride and Prejudice falls in love with Elizabeth Bennet. I believe that must be true.
It is also said that Elizabeth Bennet is Jane Austen...."
"While this [site] is organized primarily to encourage men, women are most welcome, and have participated here
as full and equal partners. Most women will find the male perspective quite a bit different than that displayed at
the other Jane-Austen forums on the web...not a university or a coffee house...a bit of a locker-room
atmosphere prevailed—raucous and incautious at times if always gentlemanly."
- Ashton Dennis
A Posting of What Men Have Said About Jane Austen AND a Link to What Some Women Should Not Have Said...

"An ideal unachieved...like leaving an unconquered fortress in the rear. No woman later has captured the
complete common sense of Jane Austen. She could keep her head, while all the after women went looking for their
brains. She could describe a man coolly..."
- G.K. Chesterton (1913)

The Life of Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, Courtly Love, and more...everything you want to know, at your fingertips.
The Canterbury Tales: Still great after 700 years. A must for all lovers of great literature. Chaucer presents one of the motliest crews in English literature, entertains with stories; bawdy, raucous tale, morally sound fable.

What will citizens of the 22nd century see as the great art of the 20th? I think it will mostly be movies...
But it will be thought of as a very sad time for separate, standalone works of visual art, music, and poetry.

Warning: This is NOT a "family" site, and Sophocles is NOT "family entertainment".
"Oedipus the King" is a monument to Sophocles's dramatic genius, and to the freedom of Athenian thought.
It develops a shocking, profoundly immoral idea about a human being's ultimate relationship to the universe.
Thankfully, there is no reason to think that Sophocles's idea is true, or that Sophocles really believed it.
Commentators on Sophocles, beginning with Aristotle, have tried to cover over the obvious.
This explains the nonsense about "tragic flaws" and "hybris".
Excerpts from the Preface by AB:
Begun in a weekly paper in 1881, continued in a desultory way at long intervals until 1906.
A large part of it was published in covers with the title, The Cynic's Word Book, a name which the author
had not the power to reject or happiness to approve...[By] this explanation the author
hopes to be held guiltless by those to whom the work is addressed --enlightened souls who prefer
dry wines to sweet, sense to sentiment, wit to humor and clean English to slang.
An excellent, well-organized, comprehensive resource which includes International poetry,
for both pure reading pleasure and for research.
Recommended by the British Broadcasting Corporation
Britannia Internet Guide Award
From the ancient classics up to the masterpieces of the mid-20th century, (per international copyright law),
the Great Books are all the introduction you’ll ever need to the ideas, stories and discoveries
that have shaped modern civilization. An online compilation of over 240 great authors and their works...
unrivaled in its organizational structure, background, and biographical content on the authors listed.
Part I of Poems, Plays, and Prose: A Guide to the Theory of Literary Genres. English Department, University of Cologne, Manfred Jahn, PhD. PPP (Poems, Plays, and Prose) is a work-in-progress website.
An excellent literary resource.
The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam is among the few masterpieces that has been translated into most languages, including English, French, German, Italian, Russian, Chinese, Hindi, Arabic, and Urdu. The most famous translation from Farsi into English was undertaken in 1859 by Edward J. Fitzgerald. This source includes Omar Khayyam's poetry in its original language as well as in English, in literal translation, and free translation, including Fitzgerald's. Also the poet's Bio and beautiful picture gallery.