Bizarre

Mackall, Lawton, 1888-1968Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.1

Word count: 170K words
Chapters: 17

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.Bizarre by Lawton MackallAuthor: Mackall, Lawton, 1888-1968,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: May 13, 2013

Editor's review

Lawton Mackall's (1888–1968) Bizarre has been made available again as a free ebook prepared by Project Gutenberg, appearing under the category of American and Canadian literature. Judging from the title and the author's active years, it reflects the popular American literary taste of the early twentieth century, suited to readers interested in English-language short fiction and curious narratives of that period. The edition's greatest value lies in its low barrier to access, complete text, and freedom to circulate, making it easy for readers to enter the original text quickly on an electronic device. It may best be read as a small window onto the popular English-language writing of an earlier age: note the narrative rhythm, the characters' voices, and the social vocabulary of the time, without demanding profound meaning by the standards of classic literature. For researchers, it can serve as supplementary material on peripheral texts of early twentieth-century American literature; for general readers, it is better suited to casual browsing in short intervals during a commute or before bed, offering a reading pleasure somewhat distant from the contemporary.

Who it's for

A good fit for

English-language readers interested in early twentieth-century American popular literature and curious narratives
English learners seeking free public-domain ebooks for reading practice
Light academic readers studying peripheral texts of American and Canadian literature
Casual readers who enjoy dipping into old short fiction in fragmented time

Not a good fit for

Serious readers expecting deep social critique or the weight of classic literature
Beginners with weak English reading skills who need Chinese annotations
Researchers seeking detailed biographical and textual scholarship on the author and work

Reading tips

Read through once to grasp the overall flavor, then revisit the passages and wording that interest you.
Keep a vocabulary notebook of old-fashioned English expressions and slang to build a feel for the language.
Treat it as short-interval reading, taking one small section at a time rather than pushing through continuously.
After reading, you may check the Project Gutenberg page for edition information, but external background is not required.

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

Is this book suitable for English learners?

It can serve as extensive reading material, but it is an early twentieth-century English text whose vocabulary and syntax bear the marks of its era; it was not written for language teaching. Readers with intermediate or higher English reading ability are advised to try it, guessing unfamiliar words first and looking them up afterward to preserve reading rhythm.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition?

Project Gutenberg offers free ebooks, and this edition is its prepared English public-domain text, freely downloadable and readable. Its value lies in convenient access and a complete text, but it usually includes no detailed annotations or introduction, so readers must grasp the background on their own.

Do I need to know the author's biography to read this book?

Not necessarily. The available information provides only the author's birth and death years and the work's attribution, with no detailed biography. Readers can begin directly with the text to appreciate its narrative interest and look further on their own if curious; the author's life need not be a prerequisite for reading.

Comments

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About the author

Mackall, Lawton, 1888-1968 Author

Lawton Mackall (1888–1968) was an English-language author about whom little is known; publicly available information is limited, and his nationality, education, and personal history cannot be reliably confirmed. The library holds only one work by him, Bizarre. Judging from the title and the scant clues available, his writing may lean toward the strange, the grotesque, or the exotic, but the genre, publication context, and actual contents of the work lack reliable documentation and should not be guessed at. On the present evidence, Mackall appears to be a minor author obscured by time, whose significance awaits further bibliographical and textual research. This note is based solely on in-house facts and verifiable public knowledge; anything unconfirmed has been omitted to avoid passing on error.