Lite Literature on the Web

The Chomskybot. I used to use this as my load-on-startup page for Netscape, until it became too much like talking to myself.

The Word Detective, home page of Evan Morris (where I borrowed the graphics on this page). As well as his columns on unusual words and phrases, he has a page of links to loads of pages on words and language, including the wonderful alt.usage.english FAQ (240K text file).

For a most bounteous cornucopia of literary dates and information, with links to many more excellent sites, visit a Literary Calendar. These sites, when they work, are delicious places to spend some time.

I knew I had found a home when I found Ambrose Bierce's The Devil's Dictionary on the web. This link is fast loading and has links to a brief biography and a delightful essay called Forked Tongue: The Language of Serpent in the Enlarged Devil's Dictionary of Ambrose Bierce. But if you can't get in, here's another site with the Devil's Dictionary, and it's in gopherspace as well, for the HTML haters among you.

And speaking of 19th Century world-weariness, here is Fitzgerald's most excellent translation of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam with all the wonderful 1884 illustrations by Elihu Vedder. Very cool. With an introduction, biography of Vedder, and a nice essay called Between Faith & Doubt: Subjects for Meditation for the more serious-minded among ye.

From Vedder it's only the shortest of detours that brings one to The Literary Gothic, a Scout Report selection, the page offers links to primary and secondary texts (including the supernatural and with a cut-off date of the mid-20th century), illustrations, discussion groups, research sources, and more.

Alan Gullette has an ideosyncratic selection and presentation of original and classic author pages, mostly in the supernatural, absurd, and surrealist genres.

And last, but certainly not least for all you children of the 60s, here's a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy page. I can't find the full text (I'm sure there's a copyright problem) but there are links to the alt.fan.douglas-adams newsgroup and FAQ, and a bunch more pages on and about Douglas Adams and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Back to the Reading Room foyer or a poetry pantry, or try some gophering via the Wiretap Online Library review. And please don't hesitate to send me your suggestions for the Reading Room. E-mail penn@att.net