The Task

The Task
Author: William Cowper
Publisher:
Total Pages: 212
Release: 1810
Genre: English poetry
ISBN:

The Pen and the People

The Pen and the People
Author: Susan Whyman
Publisher: OUP Oxford
Total Pages: 368
Release: 2011-03-31
Genre: History
ISBN: 0191615854

Susan Whyman draws on a hidden world of previously unknown letter writers to explore bold new ideas about the history of writing, reading and the novel. Capturing actual dialogues of people discussing subjects as diverse as marriage, poverty, poetry, and the emotional lives of servants, The Pen and the People will be enjoyed by everyone interested in history, literature, and the intimate experiences of ordinary people. Based on over thirty-five previously unknown letter collections, it tells the stories of workers and the middling sort - a Yorkshire bridle maker, a female domestic servant, a Derbyshire wheelwright, an untrained woman writing poetry and short stories, as well as merchants and their families. Their ordinary backgrounds and extraordinary writings challenge accepted views that popular literacy was rare in England before 1800. This democratization of letter writing could never have occurred without the development of the Royal Mail. Drawing on new information gleaned from personal letters, Whyman reveals how the Post Office had altered the rhythms of daily life long before the nineteenth century. As the pen, the post, and the people became increasingly connected, so too were eighteenth-century society and culture slowly and subtly transformed.

The City

The City
Author: James A. Clapp
Publisher: Transaction Publishers
Total Pages: 459
Release: 2014-01-31
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1412850703

The City is the best, funniest, saddest, and most thought-provoking compilation ever assembled on the urban scene. James A. Clapp has arranged more than three thousand quotations—epigrams, epithets, verses, proverbs, scriptural references, witticisms, lyrics, literary references, and historical observations—on urban life from antiquity until the present. These quotes are drawn from the written and spoken words of more than one thousand writers throughout history. This volume, with contributions from speakers, poets, song writers, politicians philosophers, scientists, religious leaders, historians, social scientists, humorists, architects, journalists, and travelers from and to many lands is designed to be used by writers, speechmakers, students, and scholars on cities and urban life. Clapp’s text is striking for its sharp contrasts of urban and rural life and the urbanization process in different historical times and geographical areas. This second edition includes four hundred new entries, updated birth dates and occupations of quoted authors, and an expanded and updated introduction and preface. Clapp also added new introduction pages for each section containing pictures and unique quotations. The indexes have also been expanded to include more subjects and cities. The scope of this book is international, including entries on most major and many minor cities of the world. It is noteworthy for its pleasures as well as its insights.

Cowper's 'Task'

Cowper's 'Task'
Author: Martin Priestman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 226
Release: 1983-07-28
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0521236436

Originally published in 1983, this book is the first complete critical study of The Task, by William Cowper (1731-1800).