My Buried Treasure

Davis, Richard Harding, 1864-1916Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.3

Word count: 76K words
Chapters: 8

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.My Buried Treasure by Richard Harding DavisAuthor: Davis, Richard Harding, 1864-1916,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: May 1, 1999

Editor's review

My Buried Treasure is likewise a public-domain e-book from Project Gutenberg and a short story by Richard Harding Davis. Davis drew on his reporting experience and favoured adventure subjects; from title to content this piece offers the pleasures of treasure hunting, secrecy and personal narration, making it a light sample of early twentieth-century American magazine short fiction. It is brief, and the narrative usually turns on a secret or a single enterprise: accessible, yet showing how popular literature of the period valued suspense and a strong storytelling voice. As an English-language electronic text, it also suits learners who want to feel the narrative rhythm and colloquial turns of a short story. Note that this public-domain edition has no modern annotations, so period background and occasional usages may need checking. On the whole it works better as light recreational reading or English extensive reading than as a classic requiring deep interpretation.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Casual readers who enjoy short stories about treasure hunting and secrets
Learners using short fiction for English extensive reading and building narrative vocabulary
Readers interested in early twentieth-century American popular magazine fiction

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting tightly constructed mystery plots or intricate suspense
Beginners who need modern annotations and introductions to read the English original
Readers who prefer long, slow-paced literary works

Reading tips

On the first pass, follow only the story line and do not stop for every unfamiliar word.
After finishing, revisit the title and the narrator's tone, and consider how the secret is gradually revealed.
For English study, copy out short narrative sentences and imitate their rhythm in retelling practice.

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 suitable for English beginners?

Its brevity helps, but the original is early twentieth-century English with no modern annotations. Beginners would do best with a dictionary, or by reading a plot summary before the original; it is not for complete beginners to read cold.

How does it relate to The Man Who Could Not Lose?

Both are short stories by Richard Harding Davis, both from public-domain Project Gutenberg e-books. They are similar in subject and length and can be read together as paired short fiction, but they are independent works.

Does this electronic edition include annotations or an introduction?

From the available information, this is a public-domain electronic text from Project Gutenberg with no modern annotations or introduction mentioned. Readers who want background notes will need to consult sources on the author and the period separately.

Comments

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About the author

Davis, Richard Harding, 1864-1916 Author

Richard Harding Davis (1864–1916) was an American writer and war correspondent, with 49 works held in this collection. Public information is limited, yet the range of his writing can be seen from the titles listed here: he wrote both war reportage and fiction and character sketches. Notes of a War Correspondent records a reporter's firsthand experiences in the field, Real Soldiers of Fortune tells of adventurous soldiers, while Gallegher and Other Stories and Van Bibber and Others show his skill in the short story, with a light touch and a gift for portraying city life and a variety of characters. His works are often classed as inspirational coming-of-age reading and have circulated among young readers, combining the immediacy of journalism with the readability of fiction; they have influenced later war reporting and popular narrative.