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volunteers bring you 14 recordings of Simple Gifts by Anonymous. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for May 17th, 2010. Several Shaker manuscripts indicate that this is a Dancing Song or a Quick Dance. The references to turning in the last two lines have been identified as dance instructions. The melody was used by Aaron Copeland as the basis for Appalachian Spring. (summary by Wikipedia and David Lawrence)...

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Instruction, Religion

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volunteers bring you 18 recordings of Love not me for comely grace by John Wilbye. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for September 30, 2012 John Wilbye was an English madrigal composer, and is probably the most famous of all the English madrigalists; his pieces have long been favourites and are often included in modern collections. His style is characterized by delicate writing for the voice, acute sensitivity to the text and the use of false relations between the major and minor modes....

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Instruction, Romance, Poetry

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English Synonyms and Antonyms is basically a vocabulary builder that students might use as they prepare for entrance or exit exams. Each entry gives a list of synonyms, followed by a paragraph that briefly explains or exemplifies the subtle distinctions between the listed words. The entries sometimes close with a few words on the prepositions that follow selected synonyms, but more often with a list of antonyms. By synonyms we usually understand words that coincide or nearly coincide in some part of their meaning, and may hence within certain limits be used interchangeably, while outside of those limits they may differ very greatly in meaning and use. It is the office of a work on synonyms to point out these correspondences and differences, that language may have the flexibility that comes from freedom of selection within the common limits, with the perspicuity and precision that result from exact choice of the fittest words to express each shade of meaning outside of the common limits. (Summary by DSayers and the author from the entry Synonymous)...

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Languages, Instruction

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Throughout the ages, languages continue to adapt and change. English, being a relatively new language, is a nice example of that. Though the English vocabulary is continually evolving, the system of punctuation has remained constant for the most part. This means that grammar books from 1895 are still applicable today. Therefore, if the following sentence looks correct to you, perhaps listening to Paul Allardyce's Stops, or How to Punctuate would be a good idea. This, is a recording, all recording's are in the public domain. (Summary by Shurtagal)...

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Advice, Instruction, Languages

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Witty, opinionated alphabetical examples of what Bierce considered poor (American) English and advice on alternatives - entertaining, thought-provoking, occasionally outdated but so interesting to see how style and taste have changed....

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Instruction, Humor

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volunteers bring you 13 recordings of The Indian Corn Planter by E. Pauline Johnson. This was the Weekly Poetry project for April 29, 2012. But in the writings of one poet alone I came upon a new note—the note of the Red Man's Canada. This was the poet that most interested me—Pauline Johnson. I quoted her lovely canoe song In the Shadows, which will be found in this volume. I at once sat down and wrote a long article, which could have been ten times as long, upon a subject so suggestive as that of Canadian poetry. (From the Introduction to Flint and Feather, Collected Verse BY E. Pauline Johnson; written by Theodore Watts-Dunton, The Pines, Putney Hill. 20th August, 1913....

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Historical Fiction, Instruction, Nature, Poetry

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The Compleat Angler is a celebration of the art and spirit of fishing in prose and verse. Walton did not profess to be an expert with the fly, but in the use of the live worm, the grasshopper and the frog Piscator could speak as a master. There were originally only two interlocutors in the opening scene, Piscator and Viator; but in the second edition, as if in answer to an objection that Piscator had it too much in his own way in praise of angling, he introduced the falconer, Auceps, changed Viator into Venator and made the new companions each dilate on the joys of his favourite sport....

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Essay/Short nonfiction, Instruction

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volunteers bring you 25 recordings of The Reaper And The Flowers by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for April 8, 2012. Longfellow predominantly wrote lyric poems which are known for their musicality and which often presented stories of mythology and legend. He became the most popular American poet of his day and also had success overseas. He has been criticized, however, for imitating European styles and writing specifically for the masses....

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Fantasy, Instruction, Mystery, Nature, Religion, Poetry

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The Augsburg Confession is the first and most fundamental Confession of the Lutheran Church. It was composed for a public reading at the Diet of Augsburg on June 25, 1530. Although written by Melanchthon, it was presented as the official answer of the undersigned German princes to the summons of Emperor Charles V. Two copies were presented on the same day, one in German, the other in Latin. This work translates a conflation of the German and Latin texts and was prepared for the Concordia Triglotta of 1921. (Introduction by Jonathan Lange)...

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Religion, Instruction

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The Apology of the Augsburg Confession was written by Philip Melanchthon during and after the 1530 Diet of Augsburg as a response to the Pontifical Confutation of the Augsburg Confession, Charles V's commissioned official Roman Catholic response to the Lutheran Augsburg Confession of June 25, 1530. It was intended to be a defense of the Augsburg Confession and a refutation of the Confutation. It was signed as a confession of faith by leading Lutheran magnates and clergy at the meeting of the Smalcald League in February, 1537, and subsequently included in the German [1580] and Latin [1584] Book of Concord. As the longest document in the Book of Concord, it offers the most detailed Lutheran response to the Roman Catholicism of that day as well as an extensive Lutheran exposition of the doctrine of Justification. (By Wikipedia)...

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Religion, Instruction

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A Dictionary of English Synonymes and Synonymous or Parallel Expressions, Designed as a Practical Guide to Aptness and Variety of Phraseology is a project for new members to practice recording and using their recording setup....

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Instruction, Languages, Essay/Short nonfiction

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volunteers bring you 11 recordings of Old Chants by Walt Whitman. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for May 15, 2011. Walter Walt Whitman was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse. His work was very controversial in its time, particularly his poetry collection Leaves of Grass, which was described as obscene for its overt sexuality.(summary by Wikipedia) The first edition of Leaves of Grass was very small, collecting only twelve unnamed poems in 95 pages. Whitman continued to expand the editions until the ninth and final edition of almost 400 poems.(summary by David Lawrence)...

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History, Instruction, Poetry

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A second helping of Alphabet Books! This collection has a wide-ranging variety of short books, and not only for younger readers, but also for young and not so young adults. Opening with a book based on the colorful language of London's street vendors, this collection winds its way through a book of tongue-twisters, two primers of nonsense poetry by the inimitable Edward Lear, and early readers from 19th century England. For older readers, there is the biting, sardonic humor of Hilaire Belloc's satirical alphabet verses. There is even a Baseball ABC, a recording which will be released in time for the World Series playoffs! Soup's on! (Summary by Denny Sayers)...

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Children, Instruction, Poetry

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The international language Esperanto was first released to the world in 1887, when L. L. Zamenhof published his first book, Dr. Esperanto's International Language. Since that time, many learning books have been developed to help the beginner attain a proficiency in the language. Helen Fryer's Esperanto Teacher is one of the earliest of these attempts in English. Divided into 45 short and easy lessons and supplemented with sections on joining words, exclamations, compound words, arrangement of words in a sentence, words used with the object, the 16 rules of grammar and list of common useful expressions, as well as a number of translated texts for the new Esperantist to practice his/her skills, this book contains everything one needs to gain a proficiency in the language....

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Languages, Instruction

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The Prince (Italian: Il Principe) is a political treatise by the Italian diplomat, historian and political theorist Niccolò Machiavelli. The descriptions within The Prince have the general theme of accepting that ends of princes, such as glory, and indeed survival, can justify the use of immoral means to achieve those ends....

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Advice, Instruction, Politics

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volunteers bring you 18 recordings of The House by the Side of the Road by Sam Walter Foss. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for January 15, 2012. Sam Walter Foss was an American librarian and poet whose works included The House by the Side of the Road and The Coming American. Foss used to write a poem a day for the newspapers, and his five volumes of collected poetry are of the frank and homely “common man” variety. Longtime baseball announcer Ernie Harwell alluded to one of Foss's poems whenever he described a batter taking a called third strike: He stood there like the house by the side of the road and watched it go by. ( Summary from Wikipedia )...

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Poetry, Instruction, Nature, Philosophy

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volunteers bring you 20 recordings of Best Way to Read a Book by Edgar A. Guest. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for September 12th, 2010.

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Humor, Instruction, Philosophy, Poetry

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volunteers bring you 19 recordings of Tact by Ralph Waldo Emerson. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for April 22, 2012. Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century. He was seen as a champion of individualism and a prescient critic of the countervailing pressures of society, and he disseminated his thoughts through dozens of published essays and more than 1,500 public lectures across the United States. ( Summary by Wikipedia )...

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Advice, Instruction, Politics, Poetry

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Dr. Branner was a recognized authority on the geology of South American republics, especially Brazil, having organized and headed the Stanford Expedition to Brazil in 1911, among others. In 1910 he published this little book, as the author himself calls it, for the use of English-speaking students who needed a fast and practical way of learning Portuguese. Contrary to the belief of many back then, John C. Branner claims that Brazilian Portuguese isn't badly spoken Portuguese, and, even though using examples from both Portuguese and Brazilian writers, seems to give more proeminence to Brazilian Portuguese. (Summary by Leni)...

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Instruction, Languages

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volunteers bring you 23 recordings of An Old Man's Thought of School by Walt Whitman. This was the Fortnightly Poetry project for February 12, 2012. Whitman claimed that after years of competing for the usual rewards, he determined to become a poet. He first experimented with a variety of popular literary genres which appealed to the cultural tastes of the period. As early as 1850, he began writing what would become Leaves of Grass, a collection of poetry which he would continue editing and revising until his death. ( Summary from Wikipedia )...

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Advice, Instruction, Philosophy, Teen/Young adult, Poetry