Barnes Noble: 2826 books

The title of this popular 1920 classic by the eminent naturalist refers to two locales that inspired him to seek out not only their scientific wonders but also the stories behind their tradition and lore. The first, “Dead Man’s Plack,” details the legend behind a memorial cross where Hudson went...

Naturalist W. H. Hudson is renowned for his extraordinary studies of birds and bird behavior as well as for his excellent prose. In Birds and Man, Hudson collects his observations of birds in England into chapters titled “Birds at Their Best,” “Parrot Gossip,” “The Secret of the Willow Wren,” “Ravens in Somerset,” and more.

This 1907 collection of English regional sketches revolves around the native lands of the Quaker leader William Penn. The countryside, monuments, churches, cottages, and burial grounds are landmarks through this charming ramble. Also included are other personalities such as John Milton, Edmund Burke, the Disraelis, Lord Grenville, and Frances Cromwell, Lady Russell.

This 1910 volume contains chapters on William Hazlitt, Charles Lamb, Thomas De Quincey, and others. Winchester set about this volume with the intent to “[attend] the informal discussion of a group of familiar and delightful English prose-writers.”

The author presents book-collecting as a pastime and a sport here. A bestseller in its day, this 1918 work considers prices, catalogs, book-collecting at home and abroad, and first editions, as well as offering essays on some of Newton’s favorite authors: James Boswell, Samuel Johnson, Charles Lamb, Anthony Trollope, and Oscar Wilde.

By 1898, books had become more affordable than they had been in the past, leading to greater literacy and a barometer of society’s cultural and intellectual status. Using price points to trace the history of publishing and reading, the author considers manuscript prices, booksellers, auctions throughout the centuries, and prices of the earliest printed books.

Published in 1871, Democratic Vistas is perhaps Walt Whitman’s most important prose work. Disenchanted with the pervasive corruption during the period of Reconstruction, he examines democracy and its problems during this era, arguing for a balance between individualism and democracy, and ultimately expressing his belief in the triumph of the democratic ideal.

Anne Gilchrist was a British woman of letters. Upon reading Walt Whitman’s poems for the first time, she immediately wrote to the author to let him know her delight in the poems and to thank him for publishing them. Eventually she began corresponding with Whitman—this collection of letters is a captivating look at an unusual friendship.

Hailed by The New York Times as “a well-written and comprehensive survey of the whole field of American literature,” this invaluable volume is an excellent resource on the subject. The author presents detailed biographical sketches of each writer—Emerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau, and James, among other greats—along with a critical assessment of the writer’s work.

In this 1910 publication, Payne provides a general overview of the essay in America and offers incisive biographies of Washington Irving, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and George William Curtis. Readable and informative, Leading American Essayists is a useful resource for students and those interested in learning more about these preeminent writers. 

Van Doren published this 1922 book on the American novel as it had developed in the past twenty years. He says of his book, “While criticism pauses to take stock, creation steadily goes on.” Here, he studies the style, argument, and art of Winston Churchill, Upton Sinclair, Edith Wharton, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Theodore Dreiser, and many other authors.

In this 1921 critical study, Van Doren examines the historical evolution of the American novel and the idea of the "Great American Novel."  His essay on Melville argued forcefully and successfully for that then-neglected author's literary rehabilitation. Also studied here are Mark Twain, Henry James, James Fenimore Cooper, and others.

This 1898 collection of the militant abolitionist’s essays and sketches includes “A Cambridge Boyhood,” “A Child of the College,” “The Rearing of a Reformer,” “The Fugitive Slave Epoch,” “Kansas and John Brown,” “Civil War,” “Literary London Twenty Years Ago,” and “On the Outskirts of Public Life,” among others.

Published in 1900, this volume contains Howells' personal reminiscences of a number of the most celebrated American writers, including Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Walt Whitman, James Russell Lowell, and others.