Wide Courses

Connolly, James B. (James Brendan), 1868-1957Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.3

Word count: 397K words
Chapters: 40

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.Wide Courses by James B. ConnollyAuthor: Connolly, James B. (James Brendan), 1868-1957,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Oct 22, 2004

Editor's review

Wide Courses is a sea-themed work by James B. Connolly, whose own experience as a sailor lends the book the salt-air atmosphere and dockside feel that runs through his writing. Belonging to the American literature category, the book carries a narrative style of the early twentieth century, with characters drawn mostly from maritime laborers and ordinary port folk, and its plot advances through dialogue and scene, giving it a strong sense of immediacy. Its value lies in preserving the details and colloquial flavor of seafaring life of that era, making it useful to readers studying American maritime literature and stories of sailors. As a public-domain ebook, it is easily accessible and suits short reading sessions or thematic excerpting. Note that the text is quite old, and some nautical terms and dialectal expressions may hinder comprehension; reading alongside background material is advised, without pressing for speed.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who enjoy sea themes and stories of seafaring life
Students, teachers, and enthusiasts of American literature or maritime literature
Readers interested in early twentieth-century English narrative language
Intermediate to advanced learners who want to practice extensive reading with original English short pieces

Not a good fit for

Readers who prefer contemporary fast-paced plots or strongly suspense-driven structures
Beginners with little patience for nautical terms and old-fashioned English expressions

Reading tips

Read one or two pieces first to get a feel for the language rhythm before deciding whether to read the whole book.
Don't get bogged down in every nautical term; grasp the character relationships and scene atmosphere first.
Supplementary material on early twentieth-century American ports and shipping can aid understanding.
English learners may benefit from excerpt-based reading to build maritime vocabulary and colloquial expressions.

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 related to the author's experience as a sailor?

Connolly did have a background in sailing and seafaring life, and his works often draw on experiences at sea and in port. But this book is literary creation and should not be read directly as a personal memoir. Readers can regard it as fictional narrative grounded in lived experience rather than strict documentary.

Can I understand it without nautical knowledge?

You can understand it basically. The core of the stories is still characters and situations; nautical terms mainly create atmosphere and do not affect comprehension of the main thread. When proper nouns recur, you can skip them at first or check a concise maritime dictionary; don't give up on the book because of the terminology.

Is it suitable as English learning material?

It suits intermediate and advanced learners for extensive reading. The text has considerable dialogue and colloquial expression, offering exposure to old-fashioned English and dialect coloring, but it is quite dated and some expressions are no longer common. It is best used mainly for grasping the gist and accumulating expressions; there is no need to imitate all of its usage.

Comments

Find this book

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

Connolly, James B. (James Brendan), 1868-1957 Author

James B. Connolly (1868–1957) was an American writer whose work centered on the sea and seafaring life. Public information about him is limited, and few details of his biography survive, but the seven works held in the collection show his lasting interest in maritime labor and nautical experience. Books such as The Deep Sea's Toll, The Trawler, and The Seiners focus on the daily lives of fishing-boat crews, trawlermen, and purse-seine fishermen, portraying the hardships of work at sea and the harshness of the ocean environment. The U-boat hunters deals with submarine hunting at sea, while Running Free, Wide Courses, and Sonnie-Boy's People continue the themes of voyaging and the open ocean. His style is plain and vigorous, with attention to scene and action, and his characters are mostly ordinary sailors and fishermen. These works offer readers a valuable body of early twentieth-century sea writing and a window on the life of fishing communities.