A Dish of Orts: Chiefly Papers on the Imagination, and on Shakespeare

MacDonald, George, 1824-1905Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 4.1
Word count
498K words
Chapters
50

Tags

English Originals Literary Appreciation Drama ArtHumanistic CareWestern ThoughtWriting TheoryAesthetic AppreciationIntellectual CommentaryStudy of ImaginationLiterary EssayShakespeare CriticismTraditional Aesthetics

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.A Dish of Orts : Chiefly Papers on the Imagination, and on Shakespeare by MacDonaldAuthor: MacDonald, George, 1824-1905,Language: English, Class: PR: Language and Literatures: English literature, Release Date: Nov 1, 2005

Editor's review

A Dish of Orts is a collection of essays and reviews by George MacDonald. The title's “Orts” means scattered fragments, and the contents center mainly on the imagination and on Shakespeare. MacDonald is known for his fantasy novels and fairy tales, but he was also a critic who thought about the imagination from the standpoints of faith and literature, and this book shows that side of him: the essays are not distinguished by systematic theoretical construction but read more like the meditations of a learned reader, discussing the place of the imagination in literature and life and also Shakespeare's characters and art. For readers familiar with MacDonald's novels, this book helps explain his creative ideas; for readers studying nineteenth-century English literary criticism and the Romantic tradition, it offers primary texts of reference value. As a public-domain eBook from Project Gutenberg, it is easy to search and to read in excerpts, but it lacks modern annotation, and reading it requires some background in literary history and some patience. Overall, it is better suited to slow reading and repeated pondering than to reading for a continuous plot.

Who it's for

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Reading tips

  1. Begin by reading the table of contents and choosing pieces directly concerned with Shakespeare or the imagination.
  2. Read only one essay at a time and, after reading, summarize its core argument in your own words.
  3. Look up literary-historical and religious references as they come up; there is no need to force your way through the whole book.
  4. Read it alongside MacDonald's novels and observe how his critical ideas echo his creative practice.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35
  36. 36
  37. 37
  38. 38
  39. 39
  40. 40
  41. 41
  42. 42
  43. 43
  44. 44
  45. 45
  46. 46
  47. 47
  48. 48
  49. 49
  50. 50

FAQ

What does “Orts” in the title mean? “Orts” originally means scattered leftovers or fragments, so the title can be understood as “a dish of scattered essays.” This suggests that the book is not a tightly systematic monograph but critical and reflective writing on themes such as the imagination and Shakespeare, suited to reading in excerpts rather than requiring a single straight read from beginning to end.
Can I read this book without having read MacDonald's novels? Yes, but what you gain will vary with your background. This is a collection of critical essays and does not depend on the plots of his novels; still, familiarity with MacDonald's fantasy works and religious thought makes it easier to understand why he valued the imagination. If you know nothing about the author, it is advisable to read one or two essays first to get a sense of the style before deciding whether to go further.
What are the characteristics of the Shakespeare criticism in this book? According to the available information, the book mainly collects papers on the imagination and on Shakespeare. MacDonald's criticism is closer to the meditation and appreciation of a learned reader than to modern academic textual scholarship. In reading, one should focus on his judgments about character, art, and the imagination rather than expect textual criticism or systematic Shakespearean theory.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

MacDonald, George, 1824-1905 Author

George MacDonald (1824–1905) was a Scottish author known for his fairy tales, fantasy novels and religious sermons. This library holds 68 of his works, including The Princess and the Goblin, The Princess and Curdie, At the Back of the North Wind, Phantastes: A Faerie Romance for Men and Women, Sir Gibbie and the three series of Unspoken Sermons. His fairy tales often centre on children, weaving adventure with questions of morality and faith in plain, imaginative prose, while his fantasy works are regarded as forerunners of modern fantasy literature and have influenced later writers of the genre. Public information is limited, so no biographical details are speculated here; his works alone show him to be skilled in both storytelling and spiritual reflection, writing for children and adults alike.