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Arrowhead (Herman Melville)
Arrowhead, also known as the Herman Melville House, is a historic house museum in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. It was the home of American author Herman Melville during his most productive years, 1850–1863. Here, Melville wrote some of his major works: the novels ''Moby-Dick'', ''Pierre'' (dedicated to nearby Mount Greylock), ''The Confidence-Man'', and ''Israel Potter''; ''The Piazza Tales'' (a short story collection named for Arrowhead's porch); and magazine stories such as "I and My Chimney". The house, located at 780 Holmes Road in Pittsfield, was built in the 1780s as a farmhouse and inn. It was adjacent to a property owned by Melville's uncle Thomas, where Melville had developed an attachment to the area through repeated visits. He purchased the property in 1850 with borrowed money and spent the next twelve years farming and writing there. Financial considerations prompted his family's return to New York City in 1863, and Melville sold the property to his brother. The ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pittsfield, Massachusetts
Pittsfield is the largest city and the county seat of Berkshire County, Massachusetts, United States. It is the principal city of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area which encompasses all of Berkshire County. Pittsfield’s population was 43,927 at the 2020 census. Although its population has declined in recent decades, Pittsfield remains the third-largest municipality in Western Massachusetts, behind only Springfield and Chicopee. In 2017, the Arts Vibrancy Index compiled by the National Center for Arts Research ranked Pittsfield and Berkshire County as the number-one, medium-sized community in the nation for the arts. History The Mohicans, an Algonquian people, inhabited Pittsfield and the surrounding area until the early 1700s, when the population was greatly reduced by war and disease, and many migrated westward or lived quietly on the fringes of society. In 1738, a wealthy Bostonian named Col. Jacob Wendell bought of land known originally as ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Illinois
Illinois ( ) is a state in the Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolitan areas include, Peoria and Rockford, as well Springfield, its capital. Of the fifty U.S. states, Illinois has the fifth-largest gross domestic product (GDP), the sixth-largest population, and the 25th-largest land area. Illinois has a highly diverse economy, with the global city of Chicago in the northeast, major industrial and agricultural hubs in the north and center, and natural resources such as coal, timber, and petroleum in the south. Owing to its central location and favorable geography, the state is a major transportation hub: the Port of Chicago has access to the Atlantic Ocean through the Great Lakes and Saint Lawrence Seaway and to the Gulf of Mexico from the Mississippi River via the Illinois Waterway. Additionally, the Mississippi, Ohio, and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bartleby, The Scrivener
"Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street" is a short story by the American writer Herman Melville, first serialized anonymously in two parts in the November and December 1853 issues of '' Putnam's Magazine'' and reprinted with minor textual alterations in his ''The Piazza Tales'' in 1856. In the story, a Wall Street lawyer hires a new clerk who, after an initial bout of hard work, refuses to make copies or do any other task required of him, refusing with the words "I would prefer not to." Numerous critical essays have been published about the story, which scholar Robert Milder describes as "unquestionably the masterpiece of the short fiction" in the Melville canon. Plot The narrator is an unnamed elderly lawyer who works with legal documents and has an office on Wall Street. He already employs two scriveners, Turkey and Nippers, to copy documents by hand, but an increase in business leads him to advertise for a third. He hires the forlorn-looking Bartleby in the h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Catharine Maria Sedgwick
Catharine Maria Sedgwick (December 28, 1789 – July 31, 1867) was an American novelist of what is sometimes referred to as " domestic fiction". With her work much in demand, from the 1820s to the 1850s, Sedgwick made a good living writing short stories for a variety of periodicals. She became one of the most notable female novelists of her time. She wrote work in American settings, and combined patriotism with protests against historic Puritan oppressiveness. Her topics contributed to the creation of a national literature, enhanced by her detailed descriptions of nature. Sedgwick created spirited heroines who did not conform to the stereotypical conduct of women at the time. She promoted Republican motherhood. Early life and education Catharine Maria Sedgwick was born December 28, 1789, in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Her mother was Pamela Dwight (1752–1807) of the New England Dwight family, daughter of General Joseph Dwight (1703–1765) and granddaughter of Ephraim Williams, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Putnam's Monthly Magazine
''Putnam's Monthly Magazine of American Literature, Science and Art'' was a monthly periodical published by G. P. Putnam's Sons featuring American literature and articles on science, art, and politics. Series The magazine had three incarnations. Ten semiannual volumes of six issues were published from 1853 to 1857 (vols. 1–10) and six from 1868 to 1870 (vols. 1–6, second series). Cornell University Library numbers them consecutively, vols. 1–16. The 1906–1910 version restarts numbering at Volume 1. 1853–1857 First, it was edited by Charles Frederick Briggs from January 1853 to September 1857 (whereupon it merged with '' Emerson's United States Magazine''); It was founded by George Palmer Putnam, who intended it to be a vehicle for publishing the best of new American writing; a circular that Putnam sent to prospective authors (including Herman Melville) announced that the magazine would be 'as essentially an organ of American thought as possible'. Putnam saw an oppor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A Wonder-Book For Girls And Boys
''A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys'' (1851) is a children's book by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne in which he retells several Greek myths. It was followed by a sequel, ''Tanglewood Tales''. Overview The stories in ''A Wonder-Book for Girls and Boys'' are all stories within a story. The frame story is that Eunice Bright, a Williams College student, is telling these tales to a group of children at Tanglewood, an area in Lenox, Massachusetts, where Hawthorne lived for a time. All the tales are modified versions of ancient Greek myths: * " The Gorgon's Head" - recounts the story of Perseus killing Medusa at the request of the king of the island, Polydectes. * " The Golden Touch" - recounts the story of King Midas and his "Golden Touch". * " The Paradise of Children" - recounts the story of Pandora opening the box filled with all of mankind's Troubles. * " The Three Golden Apples" - recounts the story of Heracles procuring the Three Golden Apples from the Hesperides' orchard, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lenox, Massachusetts
Lenox is a town in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, Berkshire County, Massachusetts. The town is based in Western Massachusetts and part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Pittsfield Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 5,095 at the 2020 census. Lenox is the site of Shakespeare & Company (Massachusetts), Shakespeare & Company and Tanglewood Music Center, Tanglewood, summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Lenox includes the villages of New Lenox and Lenox Dale, Massachusetts, Lenoxdale, and is a tourist destination during the summer. History The area was inhabited by Mahicans, Algonquian languages, Algonquian speakers who largely lived along the Hudson and Housatonic Rivers. Hostilities during the French and Indian Wars discouraged settlement by European colonial settlers until 1750, when Jonathan and Sarah Hinsdale from Hartford, Connecticut, established a small inn and general store. The Province of Massachusetts Bay thereupon auctioned large tracts of land for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) is the highest court in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Although the claim is disputed by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, the SJC claims the distinction of being the oldest continuously functioning appellate court in the Americas, with a recognized history dating to the establishment of the Massachusetts Superior Court of Judicature in 1692 under the charter of the Province of Massachusetts Bay. Although it was historically composed of four associate justices and one chief justice, the court is currently composed of six associate justices and one chief justice. History The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court traces its history back to the high court of the British Province of Massachusetts Bay, which was chartered in 1692. Under the terms of that charter, Governor Sir William Phips established the Superior Court of Judicature as the province's local court of last resort (some of the court's decisions could be appealed to c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lemuel Shaw
Lemuel Shaw (January 9, 1781 – March 30, 1861) was an American jurist who served as chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (1830–1860). Prior to his appointment he also served for several years in the Massachusetts House of Representatives and as a state senator. In 1847, Shaw became the father-in-law of author Herman Melville. He ruled on prominent cases involving slavery, segregation, and religion. Early life and education Shaw was born in West Barnstable, Massachusetts, the second son of the Rev. Oakes Shaw and his second wife Susanna, who was a daughter of John H. Hayward of Braintree. The Shaws were descendants of Abraham Shaw (January 2, 1590 – November 2, 1638), who left Halifax, England in 1636 and settled in Dedham. Oakes Shaw, a Congregationalist minister, was pastor of the West Church in Barnstable for forty-seven years. Lemuel was named for his uncle, Dr. Hayward of Boston, father of George Hayward, the surgeon. Educated at home by his f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr
Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. (; August 29, 1809 – October 7, 1894) was an American physician, poet, and polymath based in Boston. Grouped among the fireside poets, he was acclaimed by his peers as one of the best writers of the day. His most famous prose works are the "Breakfast-Table" series, which began with ''The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table'' (1858). He was also an important medical reformer. In addition to his work as an author and poet, Holmes also served as a physician, professor, lecturer, inventor, and, although he never practiced it, he received formal training in law. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Holmes was educated at Phillips Academy and Harvard College. After graduating from Harvard in 1829, he briefly studied law before turning to the medical profession. He began writing poetry at an early age; one of his most famous works, " Old Ironsides", was published in 1830 and was influential in the eventual preservation of the USS ''Constitution''. Following train ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Evert Augustus Duyckinck
Evert Augustus Duyckinck (pronounced DIE-KINK) (November 23, 1816 – August 13, 1878) was an American publisher and biographer. He was associated with the literary side of the Young America movement in New York. Biography He was born on November 23, 1816, in New York City to Evert Duyckinck, a publisher. Evert the younger graduated from Columbia College, where he was a member of the Philolexian Society, in 1835. He then studied law with John Anthon, and was admitted to the bar in 1837. He spent the next year in Europe. Before he went abroad he wrote articles on the poet George Crabbe, the works of George Herbert, and Oliver Goldsmith, for the ''New York Review''. Delbanco, Andrew: ''Melville: His World and Work''. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005: 93. In 1840 he started a monthly magazine with Cornelius Mathews called ''Arcturus'', which ran until 1842. The ''New York Tribune'' commented on the important partnership by referring to Duyckinck and Mathews as "the Castor and Po ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
