Harvard Classics Reading Guide
Bonus:
Summary: In just 15 minutes a day, you can become the equivalent of a 1930s Harvard Sophomore!
Commentary: I've decided to stop dicking around and get back to doing more of the classics stuff on here. I'm going back to the 5FSOB for two reasons. One, I liked most of what I read in it last year and two, it's all public domain and relatively accessible. For tonight, I decided to look at the 15MAD reading guide. Partially, because reading it was a big part of the reasons I started the whole thing (it's a good sales pitch!) and partially because, in the collection I downloaded, it's marked as "Volume 0". I don't think this is accurate, but whatever.
I think the guide does a great job of framing the 5FSOB for someone who isn't necessarily a super educated classicist. Intimidated? That's okay, we'll help you get the most out of it. Bored? Oh boy, you should go read some BURRRRNNNSSS! What do I do with them? Keep a couple next to you, don't let them sit on the shelf like a reference set. Don't know what to read? Relax, we already figured it out for you.
Likewise, I like the repetition of "you will" and similar phrasing. Whoever (some marketing intern?) wrote this totally believes you can read all this stuff and learn from it! And they even quote a woman purchaser! How progressive!
The quote I've pasted in here like 10 times already:
“My aim was not to select the best fifty, or best hundred, books in the world, but to give, in twenty-three thousand pages or thereabouts, a picture of the progress of the human race within historical times, so far as that progress can be depicted in books. The purpose of The Harvard Classics is, therefore, one different from that of collections in which the editor’s aim has been to select a number of best books; it is nothing less than the purpose to present so ample and characteristic a record of the stream of the world’s thought that the observant reader’s mind shall be enriched, refined and fertilized.
Not the the "best". Instead, I'd call it the most significant. And I love that difference. You might not think X is great, but that doesn't mean it isn't important. (Except Burns.)
To the busy man who wants information for a speech, an article, an advertisement, or an editorial, this Index renders a service that cannot be computed in terms of dollars and cents. Long days of search would not bring to hand the wealth of material that can be obtained in a few minutes through this source.
I love the idea of the 5FSOB as a super-encyclopedia. Before you had Wikipedia, Wikiquote, etc., you bought this thing and flipped through the index when you needed to find something.
Back tomorrow with not sure what! CLASSICS HO!
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