The Sheriff's Bluff

Page, Thomas Nelson, 1853-1922Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.7

Word count: 34K words
Chapters: 4

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 Sheriffs Bluff by Thomas Nelson PageAuthor: Page, Thomas Nelson, 1853-1922,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Nov 16, 2007

Editor's review

The Sheriffs Bluff is a short work by Thomas Nelson Page, included in Project Gutenberg's free ebook library. Page is known for depicting Southern American rural life, and this piece continues his characteristic narrative style, centering on local characters and village social relations, with the plot driven by dialogue and detail—brief in length but complete in structure. For readers wanting to understand late nineteenth-century American Southern short fiction, this work serves as a lightweight introductory sample; it is not grand narrative but closer to a sketch-like local story, suitable for fragmented reading time. As a public-domain electronic text, the edition appears in the original English, freely accessible and re-readable for comparison. While reading, note how the author uses dialectal dialogue to shape characters and how a small event reflects community ethics—these are common techniques in Page's short stories.

Who it's for

A good fit for

English readers interested in American Southern regional literature
Learners needing short English originals for extensive reading practice
Readers interested in late nineteenth-century American local narrative
Light readers preferring free public-domain ebooks

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting full-length plots and complex structures
Readers unaccustomed to English originals or dialectal dialogue
Readers seeking detailed historical verification and annotations

Reading tips

Read through once to grasp the plot, then revisit the dialogue to appreciate the characters' tones.
Do not look up every dialect spelling; first infer meaning from context.
Read alongside other Page short stories to observe repetition and variation in his narrative patterns.
After reading, retell the story in your own words to check whether you have grasped the core conflict.

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 work a novel or a short story?

Judging from the length and classification of the Gutenberg entry, it is a short work by Page, not a novel. Do not expect a large multi-threaded structure; it is better read as a sketch of local characters, focusing on dialogue and scene rather than complex plot development.

Can I read this book if my English is not good?

The work is in the original English, and Page often uses dialectal dialogue, which poses some difficulty for beginners. It is advisable to attempt it with intermediate or higher English reading ability, or to read through with a dictionary first, focusing on the gist of the dialogue rather than every dialect spelling.

Why does Project Gutenberg appear in the edition information?

The book is published by Project Gutenberg, a project providing free public-domain ebooks. The year in the entry is the electronic edition's release information, not the work's creation date. Readers can access the text for free, but note that it is the original English version without Chinese translation or annotations.

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About the author

Page, Thomas Nelson, 1853-1922 Author

Thomas Nelson Page (1853–1922) was an American writer. Public information about the details of his life is limited, but the twenty-four works by him held in this collection give a clear sense of his writing. His work is rooted in the American South: the novel Red Rock: A Chronicle of Reconstruction confronts the social changes that followed the Civil War, and Gordon Keith likewise unfolds Southern manners and the upheavals of the era. Short works such as The Burial of the Guns and The Spectre in the Cart often deal with memories of war, rural legends, and stories with a touch of mystery. Page's writing is often nostalgic, attentive to local scenery and human temperament, and his works are an important sample for understanding the literary tastes of the late nineteenth-century American South.