Showing results by narrator "John Burlinson" in All Categories

Moby Dick, which has been considered the great American novel, was first published in 1851. For material, Melville drew on his experience on whaling ships between 1841 and 1844, the sinking of the whaling vessel Essex in 1820, and extensive perusal of literature on whaling and many other subjects.

Queen Marguerite de Navarre was one of the most powerful women of her age. Her masterpiece, The Heptameron, is a collection of some 72 stories told by five gentlemen and five ladies who find themselves stranded in an abbey. Proposed as an edifying way of passing the time while a bridge is being repaired, the tale-telling - as well as the conversations that follow each story - quickly becomes a battle of wits between the sexes, with tales concerning illicit lovers, romantic conquests, lecherous monks, manly honor, and women's virtue.

Bernard Shaw based his "religious pantomime" Androcles and the Lion on the ancient fable of the runaway slave who pulls a painful thorn from a lion's paw, thereby making a lifelong friend. This tale of a puny Greek tailor triumphing over the Roman emperor is, as always with Shaw, a commentary on the politics of his time, with the emperor standing in for the British government and, indeed, all repressive regimes.

As the generating force of its plot, Twelfth Night uses a device which has since become a staple in comedy: gender confusion. Viola and her twin brother Sebastian, are shipwrecked on the coast of Illyria, a country ruled by the melancholy Duke Orsino. The twins are separated and Viola is led to believe that her brother has perished. She disguises herself as a male under the name of Cesario and makes her way to the ducal court, where Orsino employs her as a messenger, to communicate his love to the reclusive lady, Olivia—who is not willing to return his affection.

This play is the sequel to "Earth Spirit", in which the adventurous and manipulative Lulu marries and rids herself of three husbands, only to be arrested for the murder of the third. In "Pandora’s Box", Lulu escapes from prison only to be forced in the life of a courtesan. Reduced to desperate poverty, she meets her end at the hands of murderous customer in London. In Wedekind’s sordid morality tale, all Lulu’s main associates suffer premature and unnatural deaths, except for the degenerate Schigolch, who is one of the most unpleasant characters in the European drama.

This play is a dramatization of Boccaccio’s story of Gillette of Narbonne. Only the comic parts were of Shakespeare’s invention; he added the characters of the pusillanimous Parolles, the lofty courtier Lafew, the Clown Lavatch, and the long suffering Countess. He gave new depth and vitality to the leading characters, who are mere outlines in Boccaccio’s tale.

Of all the Texas feuds, the one between the Sutton and Taylor forces lasted longer and covered more ground than any other. The Sutton-Taylor Feud in Texas began shortly after the Civil War ended, and continued into the 1890s. William E. Sutton was the only Sutton involved, but he had many friends to wage warfare against the large Taylor family.

This collection contains a mixture of stories about ghosts and contacts from spirits, some by celebrated authors, together with essays on psychical research. As Joseph French notes in the preface, even for the skeptic, tales of ghostly activity retain a distinct fascination. The widespread interest in psychic phenomena in the early twentieth century proved to be a significant stimulus to literary production.

In 1870, a 26-year-old Paiute, Sarah Winnemucca, wrote to an army officer requesting that Paiutes be given a chance to settle and farm their ancestral land. The eloquence of her letter was such that it made its way into Harper’s Weekly. Ten years later, as her people languished in confinement as a result of the Bannock War, she convinced Secretary of the Interior Carl Schurz to grant the requests in her letter and free the Paiutes as well.

This collection presents eleven of Dreiser’s best tales, ranging from trenchant social analysis to penetrating character study.

This book examines the hearings that followed Mormon apostle Reed Smoot’s 1903 election to the US Senate and the subsequent protests and petitioning efforts from mainstream Christian ministries disputing Smoot’s right to serve as a senator. Exploring how religious and political institutions adapted and shapeshifted in response to larger societal and ecclesiastical trends, The Reed Smoot Hearings offers a broader exploration of secularism during the Progressive Era and puts the Smoot hearings in context with the ongoing debate about the constitutional definition of marriage.

In Dying to Learn, Michael Hunzeker develops a novel theory to explain how wartime militaries learn. He focuses on the Western Front, which witnessed three great-power armies struggle to cope with deadlock throughout the First World War. Through careful study of the British, French, and German experiences, the book provides a model that shows how a resolute focus on analysis, command, and training can help prepare modern militaries for adapting amidst high-intensity warfare in an age of revolutionary technological change.

Any of us could receive a diagnosis - a curable sickness, chronic disease, serious condition, or a terminal illness. Today, dying is usually an elongated process. So, how can we live well while suffering, and avoid being bullied by the obsessive inner voices of anxiety that leave us disconnected from the very life we hope to save? Instead, we can learn to embrace mystery, to understand that all of life’s suffering can be transformative, leaving behind a legacy of pure, powerful, and eternal love.

A Gallery of Children is A. A. Milne's first published book of prose. It was released after his poetry collection, When We Were Very Young, and prior to Winnie the Pooh. With his characteristic blend of nonsense, wit and warmth, Milne offers 12 short stories of childish endeavour and mishap. They will delight and amuse listeners both young and not-so-young.

As with many of Ostrovsky's plays, the target of the author's satire is the merchant class and the inevitable corruption associated with mercantile endeavors. In Ostrovsky's bitterly realistic world, all personal encounters end in transactions, some humourous and some tragic.

The belief that Native Americans might belong to the fabled “lost tribes of Israel” - Israelites driven from their homeland around 740 BCE - took hold among Anglo-Americans and Indigenous peoples in the United States during its first half century. In Lost Tribes Found, Matthew W. Dougherty explores what this idea can tell us about religious nationalism in early America.

This translation, by an unknown hand, of D'Aurevilly's salacious miscellany, which consists of six novellas, was published in 1900 under the title Weird Women and is in the public domain. When the collection was first published in France in 1874, it caused up an uproar; it was declared a danger to public morality and the prosecutor issued orders for its seizure on the grounds of blasphemy and obscenity.

Leonid Andreyev was one of the major literary artists at the turn of the 20th century and is widely regarded as perhaps the most talented and prolific representative of the "Silver Age" period of Russian literature. The Seven Who Were Hanged is considered by many to be his masterpiece.

Pull up a chair, snuggle under your favorite blanket, gather the kids, and enjoy the charming stories you know and love. This multicast production brings to life all your favorites!

In a public debate held at the Manhattan Opera House, Clarence Darrow argued that not one of the 19 men under sentence of death at Sing Sing Prison would have been convicted if they could have afforded good attorneys. He was opposed by Judge Alfred J. Talley of General Sessions, who argued for the retention of the death penalty for murder. The debate commenced with an address by Lewis Lawes, who was the warden at Sing Sing.