Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books: Part 39 Harvard Classics

by Charles William Eliot (Editor)

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Genres: Classics, Anthologies, Nonfiction, Essays

468 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1909

About the author

Charles William Eliot was an American academic who was selected as Harvard's president in 1869. He transformed the provincial college into the preeminent American research university. Eliot served the longest term as president in the university's history.

Reviews

[Ixby Wuff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excerpt from The Harvard Classics, Vol. 39: Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books; With Introduction and Notes

No part of a book is so intimate as the Preface. Here, after the long labor of the work is over, the author descends from his platform, and speaks with his reader as man to man, disclosing his hopes and fears, seeking sympathy for his difficulties, offering defence or defiance, accord ing to his temper, against the criticisms which he anticipates. It thus happens that a personality which has been veiled by a formal method throughout many chapters, is suddenly seen face to face in the Preface; and this alone, if there were no other reason, would justify a volume of Prefaces.

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This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

[adri · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love the remake of this book the fact it talked about the novum organum was Insane to me the perfect collation between science and Shakespeare was a different level of thinking, making the book a perfect example of comparison I would have never thought of the two brought together in any way but it broke it down so well.

[Kari · Rating 4 out of 5]

You guys! Some of these prefaces are my favorite book! (Yes, that makes no sense) The one from the dictionary is probably the best. But some of the others are pretty perfect. And others aren't so perfect, so this book gets 4 stars. And some are a bit boring, and sometimes the authors have these ideas I don't know that anyone hasn't "proved wrong" these days.

But I should reread it now because it's been at least two years, I think, since I was reading the majority of it. The Lord's had other things in mind than having me speed through this great book, so this got put down for a long time. But I finished it! And it's one of the few books from the 5-foot shelf that I know I'm going to buy and enjoy many times.

[Nathan · Rating 2 out of 5]

For being the prefaces of some great works, I was disappointed at how many of the authors chose to write a book preface. Some of the authors thought highly of themselves or their profession. I preferred those who were shorter and concise in their reasons for writing. I could deal with up to about ten pages, in most cases, but became quite bored beyond that.

[Craig]

I'm finding it hard to get into this book.

[Ragtimes · Rating 4 out of 5]

Historical insights from noted writers flattering noteworthy contemporaries with a panorama of notable intentions. Amusing and illuminating.

[11us · Rating 4 out of 5]

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