Books Should Be Free Loyal Books Free Public Domain Audiobooks & eBook Downloads |
|
Books on Languages |
---|
Book type:
Sort by:
View by:
|
By: Aristophanes (446-389 BCE) | |
---|---|
Frogs
Athens is in a sorry state of affairs. The great tragedian, Euripides, is dead, and Dionysus, the god of the theater, has to listen to third-rate poetry. So, he determines to pack his belongings onto his trusty slave, Xanthias, and journey to the underworld to bring back Euripides! Hi-jinks ensue. |
By: Unknown (65 BC - 8 BC) | |
---|---|
The Satires, Epistles, and Art of Poetry | |
C. Sallusti Crispi De Bello Catilinario Et Jugurthino | |
Conspiracy of Catiline and the Jurgurthine War |
By: Virgil (70 BC - 19 BC) | |
---|---|
Aeneid, prose translation
The Aeneid is the most famous Latin epic poem, written by Virgil in the 1st century BC. The story revolves around the legendary hero Aeneas, a Trojan prince who left behind the ruins of his city and led his fellow citizens to Italy, where he became the ancestor of the Romans. The first six of the poem’s twelve books tell the story of Aeneas’ wanderings from Troy to Italy, while the poem’s second half treats the Trojans’ victorious war upon the Latins. This is the recording of J.W.MacKail's prose translation. |
By: Unknown (427? BC - 347? BC) | |
---|---|
Statesman
Statesman (Ancient Greek: Πολιτικός) discusses God's role in maintaining the universe and describes the statesman as a good shepherd who promotes intermarriage between the orderly and courageous. | |
Sophist
Sophist (Ancient Greek: Σοφιστής) discusses being and not-being while drawing a distinction between the philosopher and the sophist. | |
Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám and Salámán and Absál Together With A Life Of Edward Fitzgerald And An Essay On Persian Poetry By Ralph Waldo Emerson |
By: Plato (Πλάτων) (c. 428 BC - c. 347 BC) | |
---|---|
Critias
This is an incomplete dialogue from the late period of Plato's life. Plato most likely created it after Republic and it contains the famous story of Atlantis, that Plato tells with such skill that many have believed the story to be true. Critias, a friend of Socrates, and uncle of Plato was infamous as one of the bloody thirty tyrants. |
By: Unknown (427? BC - 347? BC) | |
---|---|
Cratylus
Cratylus (ΚΡΑΤΥΛΟΣ) discusses whether things have names by mere convention or have true names which can only be correctly applied to the object named and may have originated from God. | |
The Works of Horace | |
Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3: Essays and Miscellanies | |
Charmides
Charmides (Χαρμίδης) discusses the virtue of temperance. | |
Book of illustrations : ancient tragedy | |
The Metamorphoses of Publius Ovidus Naso in English blank verse Vols. I & II | |
Agesilaus | |
The Apology | |
Laches
Laches (Λάχης) discusses examples of courage including weapons masters, soldiers who stand firm in battle, ferocious animals and the wise person who endures evils. | |
The Electra of Euripides Translated into English rhyming verse |
By: Plato (Πλάτων) (c. 428 BC - c. 347 BC) | |
---|---|
Alcibiades I
As Jowett relates in his brilliant introduction, 95% of Plato's writing is certain and his reputation rests soundly on this foundation. The Alcibiades 1 appears to be a short work by Plato with only two characters: Socrates and Alcibiades. This dialogue has little dramatic verisimilitude but centres on the question of what knowledge one needs for political life. Like the early dialogues, the question is on whether the virtues needed by a statesman can be taught, on the importance of self-knowledge as a starting point for any leader... |
By: Unknown (427? BC - 347? BC) | |
---|---|
Philebus
Philebus (ΦΙΛΗΒΟΣ) discusses pleasure, wisdom, soul and God. | |
Lysis
Lysis (Λύσις) discusses friendship and love between the good and bad. | |
Menexenus
Menexenus (ΜΕΝΕΞΕΝΟΣ) is thought to have been written by Plato (ΠΛΑΤΩΝ). The dialogue consists of Socrates (ΣΩΚΡΑΤΗΣ) recounting a funeral oration he claims to have learned from the female philosopher Aspasia (ΑΣΠΑΣΙΑ) who may have been wealthy, a courtesan or both. | |
Euthydemus
Euthydemus (Εὐθύδημος) and Dionysodorus the sophists discuss the meaning of words with Socrates. | |
Hiero | |
The Acharnians | |
The Hymns of Prudentius |
By: Euripides (484 BC - 406 BC) | |
---|---|
Iphigenia in Tauris (Murray Translation)
The apparent sacrifice of Iphigenia at Aulis by her own father Agamemnon was forestalled by the godness Artemis, who by an adroit sleight of hand that fooled all participants, substituted a deer for the daughter. Wafted magically away to the “Friendless Shores” of savage Tauris and installed as chief priestess presiding over the human sacrifice of all luckless foreigners, Iphigenia broods over her “murder” by her parents and longs for some Greeks to be shipwrecked on her shores so she can wreak a vicarious vengeance on them... |
By: Unknown (70 BC - 19 BC) | |
---|---|
The Æneids of Virgil Done into English Verse | |
The Cavalry General |
By: Euripides (484 BC - 406 BC) | |
---|---|
Alcestis
Alcestis is the earliest surviving play by Euripides. Alcestis, the devoted wife of King Admetus, has agreed to die in his place, and at the beginning of the play she is close to death. In the first scene, Apollo argues with Thanatos (Death), asking to prolong Alcestis' life, but Thanatos refuses. Apollo leaves, but suggests that a man will come to Pherae who will save Alcestis. Euripides' play is perhaps the most unusual Greek drama ever written: a tragedy that is not a tragedy. |
By: Plato (Πλάτων) (c. 428 BC - c. 347 BC) | |
---|---|
Lesser Hippias
This work may not be by Plato, or his entirely, but Jowett has offered his sublime translation, and seems to lean towards including it in the canon. Socrates tempted by irony to deflate the pretentious know-it-all Hippias, an arrogant polymath, appears to follow humour more than honour in this short dialogue. |
By: Unknown (480? BC - 406 BC) | |
---|---|
The Trojan Women of Euripides | |
Eryxias
Eryxias (ΕΡΥΞΙΑΣ) may not have been written by Plato (ΠΛΑΤΩΝ). The dialogue discusses whether wealth has value and what the aim of philosophy should be. | |
The Fourth Book of Virgil's Aeneid and the Ninth Book of Voltaire's Henriad | |
The Rhesus of Euripides | |
The A, B, C. With the Church of England Catechism | |
Alcibiades II |
By: Frances Jermain | |
---|---|
In the Path of the Alphabet
Language: we all use it and few of us think about the form it takes on the page. But how did the transmittal of ideas in written form evolve from Egyptian hieroglyphics to the ABCs in use in most countries around the world today? This work, written by a librarian and scholar, draws on previously published works and also direct correspondence with archaeologists still uncovering secrets in Egypt and Mesopotamia. Her death left this work unfinished, but others were able to polish it for publication. - Summary by Lynne Thompson |
By: H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) | |
---|---|
American Language
"It was part of my daily work, for a good many years, to read the principal English newspapers and reviews; it has been part of my work, all the time, to read the more important English novels, essays, poetry and criticism. An American born and bred, I early noted, as everyone else in like case must note, certain salient differences between the English of England and the English of America as practically spoken and written—differences in vocabulary, in syntax, in the shades and habits of idiom, and even, coming to the common speech, in grammar... |
By: Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) | |
---|---|
Raven and The Philosophy Of Composition
Poe’s famous narrative poem and the author’s reflections on its composition. |
By: Van Wyck Brooks (1886-1963) | |
---|---|
The Ordeal of Mark Twain (Version 2)
The Ordeal of Mark Twain analyzes the literary progression of Samuel L. Clemens and attributes shortcomings to Clemens' mother and wife. The Encyclopaedia Britannica says, Brooks' work "was a psychological study attempting to show that Twain had crippled himself emotionally and curtailed his genius by repressing his natural artistic bent for the sake of his Calvinist upbringing." Also, Brooks says, his literary spirit was sidelined as "...Mark Twain was inducted into the Gilded Age, launched, in defiance of that instinct which only for a few years was to allow him inner peace, upon the vast welter of a society blind like himself, like him committed to the pursuit of worldly success... |
By: Francis Lister Hawks Pott (1864-1947) | |
---|---|
Lessons in the Shanghai Dialect
A rare textbook on Shanghai dialect by Reverend F. L. H. Pott, an American missionary and educator who lived in China for more than 50 years. - Summary by Xiaoyan Arrowsmith |