The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction

VariousProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 2.4

Word count: 85K words
Chapters: 9

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 Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction by VariousAuthor: Various,Language: English, Class: AP: General Works: Periodicals, Release Date: Mar 1, 2004

Editor's review

This version also comes from Project Gutenberg and is an electronic text of The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, sharing the same source as the other entry but with a different release record. As a public-domain ebook, its chief significance is to bring a nineteenth-century popular periodical to ordinary readers at no cost. The periodical itself combines literature, amusement, and practical knowledge in a mixture of columns, reflecting the reading expectations of the time, when readers sought both entertainment and instruction. Editorially, treat it as a slice of its age rather than a classic anthology: individual pieces vary in value, but together they present a vivid ecology of everyday knowledge. It suits researchers examining periodical history and reading culture, and English readers who want to browse and build a feel for the language. Note that the electronic text has no modern annotations; for version information, rely on the notes within the file.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Scholars studying the history of popular periodicals and nineteenth-century reading culture
General readers who want low-cost access to old English periodicals
Learners who need short English pieces for extensive reading practice

Not a good fit for

Rigorous researchers seeking an authoritative critical edition or full annotation
Readers expecting in-depth treatment of a single subject

Reading tips

Read the version and copyright notes in the file first to establish the source of the text.
Read two or three short pieces at a time to avoid fatigue from the jump between subjects.
Compare with the other version and note differences and omissions in the electronic transcription.

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.

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About the author

Various Author

Various is not a real person but a collective attribution used in book cataloging and databases for works with multiple authors, commonly applied to anthologies, compilations, or publications with too many contributors to list individually. On this Chinese book site, this attribution covers as many as 3,387 titles, spanning encyclopedic entries, historical documents, and trial records. Representative works include several volumes of the 11th edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica and the record of the trial of the major war criminals before the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. Available public information is limited: nationality, birth and death dates, and common categories are not clearly recorded, making it difficult to summarize a unified writing style or personal biography. Readers should understand it as a cataloging convention rather than a single author.