From My Life

Johan Louis UssingProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.7

Word count: 414K words
Chapters: 42

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.Af mit Levned by Johan Louis UssingAuthor: Ussing, Johan Louis, 1820-1905,Language: Danish, Class: DL: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: Northern Europe, Scandinavia, Release Date: Jun 15, 2011

Editor's review

Af mit Levned is an autobiographical work by the Danish scholar Johan Louis Ussing, originally written in Danish and made available by Project Gutenberg. Ussing spent his career in classical philology and archaeology, and this memoir uses his personal experience as a thread to record several facets of nineteenth-century Danish academic life, covering education, research, and social interaction. For Chinese readers its value lies mainly in historical material and perspective: it offers a view of how a nineteenth-century Nordic intellectual took shape, and a sense of the standing and everyday texture of classical scholarship at the time. The text is chiefly narrative and plain in tone, suitable as supporting material for the study of Nordic cultural and academic history. Note that the original is in Danish and is not a popular work for a general audience, so the barrier to entry is high; the memoir also carries a personal perspective, and the specific people and events it mentions need to be checked against other sources. Readers without preparation in Danish or in the nineteenth-century Nordic academic environment may find it heavy going, and are advised to learn about the author's background and the period before starting the main text.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Specialist readers studying nineteenth-century Nordic academic history and classical scholarship
Learners with Danish reading ability who follow Nordic cultural history
University teachers and students needing memoir-type primary material for research
Advanced readers interested in the European tradition of intellectual autobiography

Not a good fit for

General Chinese readers with no Danish and no available translation
Casual readers looking for a strongly plotted biographical narrative
Beginners who want only a general outline of Danish history and need a systematic textbook

Reading tips

First look up the author's life and scholarly background to establish the basic context needed for reading
Read through in chronological order, noting the key turning points in his education and research
Where specific people and institutions appear, keep a separate index for later verification
Reading the Danish original is slow; proceed in small portions and record unfamiliar words

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.

FAQ

What is the main obstacle for Chinese readers?

The most direct obstacle is language: the book is originally in Danish, and the available information shows no Chinese translation. Next is background knowledge; the book involves nineteenth-century Danish academic institutions, figures, and traditions of classical scholarship, and a lack of familiarity with these affects comprehension. Readers with Danish reading ability, or who can read with the aid of reference works, are advised to attempt it.

What research value does this memoir offer?

It offers a record of academic life from the personal perspective of a nineteenth-century Danish scholar, useful for observing the everyday forms of classical and archaeological research at the time, the making of an intellectual, and modes of social interaction. As a memoir it is subjective, and is best used alongside other sources rather than as historical evidence on its own.

Is this book suitable as an introduction to Danish history?

Not really. It is a personal memoir focused on the author's own experience and what he saw in academic circles, not a systematic general history of Denmark. Those new to Danish history should first choose a general history to build a framework, then use this book as supplementary material to sense the concrete lived experience of intellectuals in a particular era.

Comments

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About the author

Johan Louis Ussing Author · Danish · 1820–1905

Johan Louis Ussing (1820–1905) was a Danish classical scholar and archaeologist who devoted himself to the study of ancient Greek and Roman antiquities. His scholarly interests centred on the mutual illumination of ancient material remains and written sources, and he holds a recognized place in Danish classical scholarship and archaeology. One work by him is held in this collection, Af mit Levned, a memoir that traces his personal life while also touching on the scholarly environment and academic experiences of his time. Because public information is limited, the details of his life, education and appointments cannot be reliably established; yet from the surviving work his writing appears plain and严谨, grounded in factual statement and first-hand observation, offering later readers a primary source for understanding the development of nineteenth-century Danish classical studies.