Ocean State Libraries

In this volume, first published in 1947, Pulitzer Prize winning author Van Wyck Brooks gives a superb recreation of a segment of American literary history, namely the period from approximately the 1840's through to the 1890's. Those were the days of Melville, Whitman, Mark Twain, Lanier, Bret Harte, Audubon, John Muir and a host of other major and minor writers. No other American critic quite possesses Brooks' gift for making you see and feel and...

Noam Chomsky has written some 30 books, he is one of the most-quoted authors on Earth, The New York Times calls him "arguably the most important intellectual alive" - yet most people have no idea who he is or what he's about. Chomsky For Beginners tells you what he's about: Chomsky is known for his work in two distinct areas - Linguistics and... "Gadflying." ("Gadfly," the word applied to Socrates, comes closest to the constant social irritant that...