With the Colors

Appleton, Everard Jack, 1872-1931Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

2.8

Word count: 69K words
Chapters: 7

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.With the Colors by Everard Jack AppletonAuthor: Appleton, Everard Jack, 1872-1931,Language: English, Class: PS: Language and Literatures: American and Canadian literature, Release Date: Dec 9, 2006

Editor's review

With the Colors is a poetry collection by the American poet Everard Jack Appleton (1872–1931), released by Project Gutenberg as a public-domain ebook and classified under American and Canadian literature. Judging from the title and the author's background, the work centers on soldiers' experiences and patriotic feeling during wartime, with a rhythm and lyricism characteristic of early twentieth-century American poetry. Its value lies not in grand narrative but in short pieces that capture concrete scenes—marching, parting, longing—with restrained yet sincere emotion, making it a useful sample of popular American poetry around World War I. Readers need not look for plot progression; it can be read as a set of period vignettes, with attention to its colloquial phrasing and handling of meter. As an early electronic text, its formatting and annotations are limited, so pairing it with background material from the period is recommended to better appreciate the social atmosphere behind the lines. For readers studying public-domain literature, war poetry, or the history of English-language poetry, this is a light but vivid supplementary source.

Who it's for

A good fit for

General readers interested in English-language poetry of the World War I era
Readers studying early twentieth-century American popular literature
Readers who want to understand everyday wartime emotions through short poems
Translators or teachers needing public-domain English poetry material

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting a full wartime history or documentary detail
Readers who prefer strong plot and fast-paced reading
Beginners needing detailed annotations and scholarly introductions

Reading tips

Read through once for the overall mood, then pick the most striking poems and read them aloud repeatedly.
Read alongside background material on American society around World War I to understand the scenes in the poems.
Excerpt and categorize themes such as parting, marching, and longing to make thematic notes.
For the English original, pair with audio readings to appreciate the rhythm of early twentieth-century poetry.

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 a novel or a poetry collection?

Judging from the title, the author's identity, and its public-domain classification, it is a work of poetry built around wartime themes, not a novel with a continuous plot. It should be entered poem by poem rather than read for story progression.

Can I understand it without knowledge of World War I history?

You can read it, but some scenes and emotions need background support. It is advisable to first learn about American social atmosphere and the enlistment wave around World War I, then read the parting and marching passages, for smoother understanding.

Does this electronic edition have annotations and an introduction?

The Project Gutenberg edition mainly preserves the public-domain original text and usually does not include detailed annotations or a scholarly introduction. For deeper understanding, read it alongside relevant historical materials or poetry research literature.

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About the author

Appleton, Everard Jack, 1872-1931 Author · American · 1872–1931

Everard Jack Appleton (1872–1931) was an American poet and newspaper columnist. Public information about him is limited, and the details of his life are largely unknown, yet in his day he was known among newspaper readers for humorous verse and essays. He drew light, playful poetry from everyday trifles and ordinary people, with a witty yet gentle touch that let readers savor the flavor of life amid a knowing smile. Such work appeared mostly in newspaper columns, easy to read and easy to set aside, and for that reason his writing stayed close to the taste of ordinary readers rather than pursuing abstruse literary experiment. His representative work, With the Colors, judging by its title, likely relates to military or wartime experience and continues his customary popular style. The library holds one of his works; though few in number, it offers a glimpse of humorous journalism in early twentieth-century America.