A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 14

Kerr, Robert, 1755-1813Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.5
Word count
1.3M words
Chapters
130

Tags

English Originals Historical GeographyTravel Human GeographyHistorical DocumentsDiscoveryOcean TradeSea AdventureMaritime ExplorationNaturalist RecordTravel CompilationExotic CultureColonial Era

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 General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 14 by Robert KerrAuthor: Kerr, Robert, 1755-1813,Language: English, Class: G: Geography, Anthropology, Recreation, Release Date: Sep 6, 2004

Editor's review

This is Volume 14 of Robert Kerr's A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, one installment of a large eighteenth- to nineteenth-century British compendium of voyage literature. It is not a narrative meant to be read straight through, but a collection of original voyage records, observation reports, and travel accounts. It is valuable for research on oceanic exploration after the Age of Discovery, colonial observations, maritime trade, and exotic ethnography. Its strength lies in the rawness of the documents and the compendium format: readers encounter voyagers' voices, route records, and local descriptions directly and sense the stylistic features of early travel writing. As a public-domain ebook, the text appears in the original English and is suited to research or selective topical reading rather than casual entertainment. It is best read alongside maps and historical background, choosing chapters by theme or voyage segment and using it as a reference work and source collection, which brings out its value more fully.

Who it's for

A good fit for

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Reading tips

  1. Start with the table of contents and introductory notes to identify the voyages and regions covered in this volume, then choose pieces of interest.
  2. Keep a world map or historical atlas at hand and compare routes and place names as you read.
  3. Make brief notes on each account's subject of observation, time, and place for later reference.
  4. There is no need to read page by page; read in thematic groups such as trade, customs, and navigation technology.

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
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  8. 8
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  11. 11
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FAQ

Is this book a complete story or a collection of documents? It is Volume 14 of a large compendium of voyage and travel literature, containing original records and observation reports. It is a source collection rather than a continuous narrative. Read it by chapter or theme rather than expecting a single storyline.
Can I read this book if my English is not good? The original is a public-domain English text with an older style and many long sentences and historical place names. Readers with limited English will find it difficult; a solid reading foundation in English or a comparable Chinese scholarly work for reference is recommended.
What preparation is needed before reading? It helps to first gain a general understanding of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century European oceanic exploration and colonial trade, and to have a world map or historical map ready. This makes it easier to locate and assess old place names and route records and improves research efficiency.

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

Kerr, Robert, 1755-1813 Author

Kerr, Robert (1755-1813) is an author included in the Chinese book database, whose biographical details remain limited in publicly available sources; what can be confirmed is that he left seventeen works. The representative works in the database center on the multi-volume series A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, covering several volumes from Volume 01 to Volume 15 and dealing with compilations of voyages, travel, and geographical exploration. Such works typically organize records of long-distance voyages and accounts of foreign lands across the ages, with narration leaning toward the retelling of historical sources and descriptions of journeys, and they bear a strong documentary and compilatory character. In the database's classification, his works fall under inspirational growth, which may relate to a reading orientation toward exploring the unknown and broadening one's horizons. Overall, he appears more a compiler than an original narrator, and his contribution lies in gathering scattered voyage and travel literature into collected volumes, making it easier for readers to understand early world transport and geographical knowledge.