The site has received
a Visionary Design Award for accessibility to visually impaired
user and there is a demonstration which illustrates how to use the
service.
"She hurries from
the house, wearing a coat too heavy for the weather. It is 1941.
Another war has begun. She has left a note for Leonard, and another
for Vanessa. She walks purposefully toward the river, certain
of what she'll do, but even now she is almost distracted by the
sight of the downs, the church, and a scattering of sheep, incandescent,
tinged with a faint hint of sulfur, grazing under a darkening
sky. She pauses, watching the sheep and the sky, then walks on.
The voices murmur behind her; bombers drone in the sky, though
she looks for the planes and can't see them. She walks past one
of the farm workers (is his name John?), a robust, small-headed
man wearing a potato-colored vest, cleaning the ditch that runs
through the osier bed. He looks up at her, nods, looks down again
into the brown water. As she passes him on her way to the river
she thinks of how successful he is, how fortunate, to be cleaning
a ditch in an osier bed. She herself has failed. She is not a
writer at all, really; she is merely a gifted eccentric."
Read the entire excerpt
from The Hours by Michael Cunningham at the Bookbrowse
site
Read Daisy
Miller, Part 1 by Henry James at Page
by Page Books
Read the Joyce Carol
Oates story, The Fruit Cellar from The Ontario Review Inc.,
in the New
Statesman
-
Bartleby
- Literature, Verse and reference - This site, in addition to
hosting The Oxford Book of English Verse, has added the Yale
Book of American Verse, Modern British Poetry, Modern American
Poetry, Metaphysical Lyrics and Poems of the 17th Century and
the Golden Treasury. Searchable by keyword of browsable by author,
title or even by the first line of a poem. Quotations, Encyclopaedias,
King James Bible and more in addition to Gray's Anatomy, Strunk's
Elements of Style and the Oxford Shakespeare.
-
Bas
Bleu Bookseller by Post - A collection of carefully chosen
books from an Atlanta- based small bookseller. As they proclaim:
"Our selections
are eclectic — and rarely do any of them appear on bestseller
lists. Our
travel books offer more than lists of hotels and restaurants;
they’re the stories of gifted writers. Our
books for children celebrate imagination and humor rather than
cautionary tales." Bas
bleu from the French means blue stocking; a literary woman.
We received their catalog in the mail and thought that you'd
enjoy their choices. There are also related products such as
book darts, cds, scarves and men's ties, notecards, a booklover's
repair kit, tote bags and the like.
-
Book
Arts Web - If you love books and, in particular, handmade
books, read these descriptions of their work by two artists
at AbeCedarium An Exhibit of Alphabet Books: William Laufer,
The Woodlands, TX, P: An Excursus into Liminal Space, 10 x 11
x 1 3/4 inches. "A binding of three sections is sewn to an unsupported
concertina, with covers of Rising Stonehenge and endpapers of
red, tobacco and deep yellow Fabriano Ingres Cover. Text papers
are Rives Lightweight with illustrations in encaustic, pochoir,
photoengraving and woodcuts on hand-cast paper and papyrus.
Edition of 5. 1998." "Nancy Ruth Leavitt, Stillwater, ME, A
Light Alphabet, The world of light from A - Z, 8 3/4 x 9 x 1
1/4 inches. The book has covers of plexiglas, a vellum concertina
spine and coptic sewing with waxed linen thread. The endpapers
and text are paste papers of Arches Text Wove with one sheet
of mould-made Bodleian. The painting and lettering are of gouache
and glair, crayons and colored pencil. The text is from the
annals of physics as a journey into and realization of my obsession
with light, color and the alphabet.' 1998." Lose yourself in
observing a different kind of jewel.
-
BookSpotCom
- A central hub for links to other book-related sites, reviews,
reading lists and stores including: children, young adult, antique,
science fiction and such mystery sites with the intriguing name
of 'Bloodstained Bookshelf'. Resources for writers, include
The Writer's Guild, SPAWN (Small Publishers, Authors and Writers),
African-American writers, romance writers and a glossary of
poetic terms. For the writer's classic resource this site has:
William Strunk's Elements of Style, a part of the Bartleby Archive.
-
Bibliofind
- Their income is derived solely from fees which booksellers
pay this site to list their books on Bibliofind. Old, used and
rare books can be found readily, but more current ones can be
ordered on-line.
-
Book
TV.org: C-Span's source of nonfiction book information on
the web and a complement to Book TV's weekend programming on
C-Span2. Children's books are also a significant part of the
TV schedule.
-
Book
Wire - The parent company of Publisher's Weekly has a selection
of their products, including an authoritative best-seller list
and a wonderful resource: listings by author, title, publisher,
state, bookstore and events including TV programs to find appearances,
lectures and signings by your favorite author.
-
Britfilms
- The British Council's Film and Television Department producers
two publications for film makers and fans. The Catalogue, which
is a yearly magazine about films in the Empire offers synopses
of films, shorts and documentaries during the year. There is
also a QuickSearch feature on every page which will scan the
database for Titles, Directors and Leading Players. The Directory
of International Film and Video Festivals is just that, giving
details on how and when to attend.
- Culture
Finder - A database of 300,000 performing arts events in 1,300
cities and a weekly newsletter for leads on discount seats in
12 major cities. Purchasing tickets on-line is a plus.
-
DiscoveryCom
- The same sources behind the Discovery and Learning Channel
television programs have a site that includes guides from ancient
history to space, travel and expeditions.
Exploding
Dictionary - "The Internet is Chaos. Chaos populated
with small Shadows of Order...Sometimes you hit the net looking
for a simple piece of Information, only to find page after page
that doesn't answer your question, or contradicts the page you
just visited...My first two projects were a dictionary of the
English language, and a jargon reference. The interface is crude,
but the entries are massively cross-referenced allowing the
reader to reach Understanding in record time." (Explanation
provided by Chris Knight.)
-
Viewers can browse
the dictionary by alphabetical entry or search by keyword. "The
basic idea is to provide a massivly cross-referenced dictionary
system. Hypertext is the researcher's dream come true, allowing
for instant jumps to related or unknown material. The information
is provided twice. First it is displayed 'clean', then below
it is displayed with each individual word hyperlinked. "
-
Female
Detective - A U.K. based site with reviews and mini-biographies,
complete book lists, editor's choice of best novels, links to
forums about mysteries.
- Festival
Finder - An enjoyable, well-designed and kept-up-to-date site
that guides you to 1,500 music festivals in North America. Click
to your favorite type of music, or use the search feature to locate
festivals by date, location, performers or festival name. I plunged
into the zydeco site and was captivated by the poster for the
festival.
- The
Invisible Library - A 'catalog' of books that appear in other
books' as the site terms it: Within the library's catalog you
will find imaginary books, pseudobiblia, artifictions, fabled
tomes, libris phantastica, and all manner of books unwritten,
unread, unpublished, and unfound. Some of the book-within-a-book
pseudo-titles are "Some More of God's Greatest Mistakes,"
"A Phantom Hand," Invisible Worms," "Diary
of a Young Girl's Illness," "Key to All Mythologies,"
"Under a Loggia," "The Shuttered Mind," "Twixt
Cossack and Cannon," All of Them Witches," "Men,
Monks, and Gamekeepers; a Study in Popular Legend," The Maxims
of Marriage or The Duties of a Married Woman, Together with Her
Daily Exercises," Lolita, or the Confession of a White Widowed
Male," "Thoughts on the Prevention of Diseases most
usual among Seamen," "The Lustful Turk," The Bitch
Pack meets on Wednesday" and "Magical Me." Can
you guess the authors and title of the book?
- Language
Sites on the Internet - Part of Richard Lederer's 'verbivorous'
site, this is a collection of links all relating and leading you
to the celebration of words: olde english sayings, word detective,
etymology, grammar and usage, punning, word & letter play. There's
a daily on-line column featuring little known facts about well
known words and phrases, home for abused quote marks, common errors
in usage (ah, so needed), and for all of you who are constantly
asking, 'is it e-mail or email', wired style.
- Literary
Traveler - A casual, gentle site funded by the Nomad Foundation
whose aim is to create a more literate and educated society in
the U.S. and the world. The site lists tour companies that will
take you to the real and imagined haunts mentioned in novels or
frequented by their authors. There are evocative articles about
writers and their settings as well as a section devoted to events
concentrating on authors and a celebration of their works.
- Mastertexts
- Another site (actually, I don't think there can be too many)
with full texts of literary masterpieces: Austen, Baum, Bronte
sisters, Lewis Carrol, Wilkie Collins, Daniel, Defoe, Arthur Conan
Doyle, George Eliot, Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, Thomas Hardy,
Charles Kingsley, Sir Walter Scott, Shakespeare, Mary Shelley,
Robert Louis Stevenson, Bram Stoker, Thackeray, Twain and Verne.
Pull up a chair and enjoy.
-
Orange
Prize for Literature - This prize celebrates novels of excellence
by women writers and helps promote them. The prize was created
by a group of senior women in publishing who wondered why so
few novels by women were making it to the shortlists of the
established literary awards." The site includes: the long
and short list of nominees, the winning books and authors, interviews
with the judging panel, news, reviews and competitions. There's
a newsletter and chatterbooks: aimed at 4 - 12 year olds, Chatterbooks
is a library based scheme, which creates and supports children's
reading groups and their own film awards.
- Oxford
English Dictionary - Their word of the day feature is just
that, with the appropriate pronunciation, etymology, quotations
and date chart that imparts an idea of when the word came into
being. The allusions are literary, the examples delicious. The
OED modestly calls itself, " the accepted authority on the
evolution of the English language over the last millennium."
There.
- Shakespeare
and the Internet - Homage to the Bard: links, scholarly papers,
drama festival, a 'sonnet' quiz and a virtual tour of the Globe,
a Shakespeare timeline, and a Shakespeare genealogy.
- Collection
of Word Oddities and Trivia - Maintained by a high school
teacher in New Port Richey, Florida this site includes examples
of palindromes, French and Italian words and Biblical references.
A separate section is devoted to names of people that became words
(Cesarean section: Gaius Julius Caesar, who according to legend
was born in this manner; dunce: John Duns Scotus (who was actually
very smart); saxophone: Antoine Joseph Sax; eggs benedict: E.
C. Benedict (1834-1920) etc. The site also includes words most
likely to be misspelled, a compilation of last words from several
dictionaries and other reference books and perhaps most important
words to be used in a game of scrabble. There's also a wordplay
answer board.
- World
Wide Words - An English site by Michael Quinion investigating
international English from a British viewpoint and revolving around
the history of words, its quirks, curiosities and evolution. The
site is organized into sections, each with its own index for navigation.
Some examples of the questions posed to the site: Where the name
of that odd comestible the 'curate's egg' comes from; why you
'eighty-six' a thing when you dispose of it; and some thoughts
on the origin of 'spiff'. Investigations into words such as Florilegium,
Emmet and grockle, Tawdry, Bezoar, Semordnilap are displayed.