The Book of Friendship: A Little Manual of Comradeship

Project GutenbergProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.0
Word count
32K words
Chapters
4

Tags

English Originals Moments of FriendshipInterpersonal WisdomSpiritual ComfortEmotional ExpressionDaily ReflectionsAphorismsLife WisdomLittle ManualHeartwarming NarrativeBeautiful Essays

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.The Book of Friendship: A Little Manual of Comradeship by Reginald Wright KauffmanAuthor: ,Language: English, Class: BJ: Philosophy, Psychology, Religion: Ethics, Social usages, Etiquette, Religion, Release Date: Jun 27, 2018

Editor's review

This is a short manual on friendship and comradeship, a public-domain ebook in the ethics and social etiquette category. Its value lies not in systematic theory but in concise, aphoristic reflections on trust, loyalty, tact, and the upkeep of friendship between friends—suitable for light, occasional reading. The contents bear clear marks of their era, and some ideas and modes of expression are remote from contemporary social contexts; precisely for that reason, the book offers a small window onto how notions of friendship have changed. It need not be read in one sitting; a few pages at a time, using its entries to reflect on one's own experience of friendship, suits it better. For readers who like to excerpt aphorisms, ponder interpersonal ethics, or encounter a public-domain booklet in the original English, this little volume has easy referential value; those expecting rigorous argument or a modern psychological perspective should adjust their expectations.

Who it's for

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Reading tips

  1. Dip into the entries at random, a few pages at a time; no need to read straight through in order.
  2. When a sentence resonates, write down a friendship experience of your own for comparison.
  3. If reading the original English, first get the gist, then revisit unfamiliar words and old-fashioned expressions.
  4. Read it with a friend and exchange views on one of the book's points.

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

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a theoretical work? Neither. It is a short manual on friendship and comradeship, a public-domain work in the ethics and social etiquette category that discusses the conduct of friendship in concise entries and aphoristic form; it is closer to a collection of aphorisms for light reading than to a systematic theoretical work or a narrative novel.
Can I read it with only basic English? You can try, but a certain vocabulary is needed. The book is in the original English, short in length and simple in sentence structure, and is suitable as light reading material; when you meet old-fashioned expressions and uncommon words, read slowly with a dictionary and don't insist on understanding everything at once.
Can the book's views be applied directly today? They should not be applied directly. The book bears clear marks of its era, and some social ideas and modes of expression are remote from contemporary contexts. A better approach is to treat it as a window onto how notions of friendship have changed and to use its entries to reflect on your own experience of friendship, rather than as a modern guide to making friends.
Should I read it straight through or pick and choose? Picking and choosing, dipping in at random, suits it better. The book consists of short entries and lacks an argumentative thread that must be followed in order. Reading a few pages at a time in spare moments and pausing to think when a sentence resonates is more enjoyable than reading it from cover to cover in one go.

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

Project Gutenberg Author

Project Gutenberg is not a single author but a nonprofit digital library founded by Michael Hart in 1971 and one of the world's earliest free ebook platforms. It relies on volunteers to digitize, proofread, and freely distribute public-domain works and is now operated by the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Its collection contains 2,692 works, mainly religious texts, epics, and story collections, including the King James Bible and the Douay-Rheims volumes, the epic Mahabharata, a literal translation of the Arabian Nights, and Danish editions of the Old and New Testaments. Public information is limited, and its nature is closer to a public-interest compiling and dissemination body; these texts are open to the public, easy to consult and circulate, and have had a profound influence on the spread of ebooks and the preservation of public-domain resources.