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Wikipedia / Harvard Classics

The Harvard Classics, originally marketed as Dr. Eliot's Five-Foot Shelf of Books, is a 50-volume series of classic works of world literature, important speeches, and historical documents compiled and edited by Harvard University President Charles W. Eliot. Eliot believed that a careful reading of the series and following the eleven reading plans included in Volume 50 would offer a reader, in the comfort of the home, the benefits of a liberal education, entertainment and counsel of history's greatest creative minds. The initial success of The Harvard Classics was due, in part, to the branding offered by Eliot and Harvard University. Buyers of these sets were apparently attracted to Eliot's claims. The General Index contains upwards of 76,000 subject references.

The first 25 volumes were published in 1909 followed by the next 25 volumes in 1910. The collection was enhanced when the Lectures on The Harvard Classics was added in 1914 and Fifteen Minutes a Day - The Reading Guide in 1916. The Lectures on The Harvard Classics was edited by Willam A. Neilson, who had assisted Eliot in the selection and design of the works in Volumes 1–49. Neilson also wrote the introductions and notes for the selections in Volumes 1–49. The Harvard Classics is often described as a "51 volume" set, however, P.F. Collier & Son consistently marketed the Harvard Classics as 50 volumes plus Lectures and a Daily Reading Guide. Both The Harvard Classics and The Five-Foot Shelf of Books are registered trademarks of P.F. Collier & Son for a series of books used since 1909.

Collier advertised The Harvard Classics in U.S. magazines including Collier's and McClure's, offering to send a pamphlet to prospective buyers. The pamphlet, entitled Fifteen Minutes a Day - A Reading Plan, is a 64-page booklet that describes the benefits of reading, gives the background on the book series, and includes many statements by Eliot about why he undertook the project. In the pamphlet, Eliot states:

Dr. Eliot's Five-Foot Shelf of Books

The idea of the Harvard Classics was presented in speeches by then President Charles W. Eliot of Harvard University. Several years prior to 1909, Eliot gave a speech in which he remarked that a three-foot shelf would be sufficient to hold enough books to give a liberal education to anyone who would read them with devotion. He was inundated with requests for the list of those book titles that would fill the three-foot shelf. After many attempts to support his initial claim, he decided that the shelf would need to be lengthened to five feet - but a definitive list of works was not declared. A well-known publisher, Peter Fenelon Collier and his son, Robert J. Collier, saw a financial opportunity and asked that Eliot make good on his statement by selecting 50 volumes (400 to 500 pages each). Collier representatives proposed the name for the series as either "The Harvard Library" or "The Harvard Classics" pending approval by Harvard University. The proposal, presented to the President and Fellows of Harvard College, was unanimously approved as a useful undertaking from an educational point of view.

In February 1909 with his approaching retirement as President of Harvard University, Eliot accepted the proposal of P.F. Collier & Son. The agreement allowed Eliot to engage an assistant. He chose William A. Neilson, Professor of English at Harvard University. The English Bible was excluded because Eliot and Neilson felt that almost every household would already possess at least one copy. The contributions of living authors (other than scientific contributions) were excluded because Eliot and Neilson considered the "verdict of the educated world" was not yet final. Works of modern fiction were felt to be readily accessible and thus excluded. English and American literature as well as documents related to American social and political ideas were more likely to be selected because the Harvard Classics were intended primarily for American readers.

Eliot retired as President of Harvard University in May 1909 and devoted much of the next year to organizing the 50 volumes and selecting the list of included works. The first half of the included works was provided to P.F. Collier & Son in 1909. However, Eliot and Neilson did not make the remaining selections, write the introductions for each selection, and finish the general index until 1910. Consequently, P.F. Collier & Son printed volumes 1 to 25 in 1909 and volumes 26 to 50 in 1910. An advertisement for The Harvard Classics appeared in Collier's on April 30, 1909, stating the "Complete Official Contents Now Ready." With the help of more than 50 Harvard professors and instructors and the general library of Harvard University and its department libraries, Eliot and Neilson believed that the title "The Harvard Classics" was well deserved.

Release and marketing

In a June 1909 issue of Collier's Weekly, P.F. Collier & Son announced it would publish a series of books selected by Eliot, without disclosing the list of included works, that would be approximately five feet in length and would supply the readers a liberal education. A few days after the announced intent to publish Dr. Eliot's Five-Foot Shelf of Books, several newspapers published an incomplete list of selected works to be included. Eliot felt the publications were unauthorized and asked Collier's Weekly publishers to publish his letter to the editors explaining the initial list and selection process in the July 24, 1909, edition of Collier's. Eliot describes his goal in helping publish The Harvard Classics as motivated by an educational purpose and he explains why the English Bible was not selected. In January 1910, P.F. Collier & Son announced in a "Publishers' Statement" that the 50 volumes were almost complete and offered a "Statement from the Editor" (Eliot) describing the origins of process resulting in the first sets of The Harvard Classics. The first editions printed by P.F. Collier & Son in three separate styles of bindings were first offered for sale on October 13, 1909.

The collection was marketed so as to advertise in all the principal magazines published in the United States resulting in a combined circulation of almost 3,000,000 for the initial marketing effort. The sales were initiated using 3,000 agents who were supplied a prospectus or "Announcement of The Harvard Classics" so that leads could be followed up by the agents. Most advertisements encouraged an interest notice be mailed back to the publisher offering a targeted and highly successful marketing campaign for the series. The intent by the publisher was to offer The Harvard Classics as a subscription with only some of the volumes being sent initially and the remaining to follow in subsequent shipment. This was strategic since the complete 50 volumes had not yet been supplied by Eliot and Neilson to the publisher and would not be supplied until late in 1910.

Printing history

Volumes 1-49 of The Harvard Classics include reprints of hundreds of authors' works that may have been in the public domain (e.g., because of expired copyrights) or covered by existing copyright holders such as other publishing companies. In either case, Collier filed copyrights for the 49 volumes and for The Harvard Classics complete series in 1909 and 1910 and obtained, when necessary, permission to reprint selected works included in one of the 49 volumes. Collier's copyrighted Volume 50 was in 1910, the Lectures on The Harvard Classics in 1914, and Fifteen Minutes a Day - The Reading Guide in 1916.

P.F. Collier & Son asserts in many early advertisements of The Harvard Classics that 20,000 sets of The Harvard Classics were first printed to offer a "tremendous savings" to buyers and that these first printings include the word "Eliot" as a watermark on every page. To help the chronological obsession about the print runs of The Harvard Classics, clues regarding how many of first edition printings are offered in a trademark dispute case between P.F. Collier and E. Milton Jones in 1909 that was later ruled on in appeal in 1910 (in favor of P.F. Collier & Son). In testimony, Robert J. Collier states that the first sets of The Harvard Classics printed and sold were "bound in full morocco...one set, bound in three-quarters morocco...and the remaining set, bound in buckram...". Advertisements in 1910 also state Collier prepared editions for those who demand luxurious limited editions as well as for the readers who want less expensive sets.

The first editions of The Harvard Classics were known as "De Luxe" sets. Most were limited-quantity print runs and some "autographed" editions (only Volume 1 is autographed) include signatures by Eliot and in some cases Robert J. Collier. The first print runs in 1909 were for volumes 1 to 25. Another print run was needed in 1910 for volumes 26 to 50 because those volumes were not selected and edited by Eliot until the middle of 1910. The first editions include Japanese vellum paper with "Eliot" watermarks (made by S.D. Warren & Co. of Boston), deckled pages, silk moire endpapers, sewn in bookmarks, and top edged gilt pages. Each was appealing to buyers for the elaborate illustrations, frontispieces, plates, portraits, facsimiles, and crimson silk page markers (features unlikely to be found in later printings). The colophon found on the ultimate page of content of first editions notes these sets were "planned and designed by William Patten" (the Book Manager at P.F. Collier & Son).

The exact numbers of each of the three bindings making up the 20,000 first sets are unclear. Four different sets in full morocco leather were printed with raised bands, Harvard University insignia, and volume names in gilt lettering on the spines. The four variations in full leather include: (1) the "Alumni Autograph Edition" limited to 200 numbered sets (Volume 1 is autographed by Eliot), (2) the "Eliot Edition" limited to 1,000 numbered sets (Volume 1 is autographed by Eliot), (3) the "Alumni Edition De Luxe" (unsigned) limited to 1,000 numbered sets, and (4) the "Edition De Luxe" sets that are numbered and stated as being limited editions (but the number printed is not shown). The full morocco sets sold for at least $345. The Edition De Luxe sets in full morocco leather were sold many years (after the limited-quantity runs were sold out) as some include the "Lecture" volume added in 1914.

The second binding type of the first editions of The Harvard Classics were printed in three-quarters morocco leather binding over cloth boards. The first edition three-quarters morocco leather sets have similar variations as the full morocco leather sets including a (1) set limited to 1,000 numbered and autographed "Cambridge Editions" signed by Eliot and, interestingly, the publisher Robert J. Collier also signed the sets numbered from 412 to 973 over mottled cream boards, (2) set limited to 1,000 numbered and autographed "Eliot Edition" books over green cloth boards, and (3) a set limited to 1,000 (unsigned) called the "Alumni Edition" on the spine bound over crimson boards, and (4) a set of unknown number called the "Library Edition" (stated as limited edition, but number of printings is not shown) over crimson boards. The "Library Editions" do not paper with "Eliot" watermarks, but appear to have the same high-quality Japanese vellum paper. Each of these limited-quantity three-quarter morocco sets sold for $195.

The third type of binding of the first editions of The Harvard Classics were printed in fine buckram (green and crimson). The green buckram set of "Alumni Edition" printings is a numbered set limited to 1,000 numbered copies. The green buckram has gilt lettering with crimson and gold Harvard insignia on both the spine and front board. The first editions show "Alumni Edition De Luxe" are numbered and limited to 1,000 sets and include embossed bands on the spine. The remaining first edition set of The Harvard Classics, printed in fine crimson buckram cloth, is another version called the "Eliot Edition" - a limited quantity printing of 1,000. The crimson buckram "Eliot Edition" with Eliot's signature on the front board is printed with raised bands on the spine, "Eliot" watermarked pages, and include illustrations, frontispieces, plates, portraits, and facsimiles. This set does not include page markers. Both buckram first edition sets sold for $100. Another set almost identical to the limited-quantity green buckram sets, is also in green buckram and has "Alumni Edition" on the spine. This set was sold for many years and was limited to 10,000 printings. These second print runs of this set are almost identical to the first editions except the pastedown papers have much more faint printings, the limited edition page shows the editions as "Edition De Luxe," and watermarked "Eliot" pages are not included.

In 1910, Collier began printing The Harvard Classics in a limited quantity set called the Renaissance edition. This beautifully bound set includes 10 different bindings consisting of reproductions of the artistic bindings of Royal Monarchs of Europe from the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries. Collier also began printing the National (1910) and Popular (1912) editions with lower price points in an effort, claimed by Collier in many advertisements, to honor the wishes of Eliot that The Harvard Classics are priced within everybody's reach. An extremely popular crimson-colored silk cloth set similar to the look of the De Luxe Morocco edition began printing in 1914 and was called the Cambridge edition. Variations of the Cambridge edition were printed for over a decade in cloth over hardboards and later (after 1919) in an imitation leather binding material called fabrikoid.

In 1919 Collier announced a new binding material for The Harvard Classic sets with the printing of a new set called the Southwark edition (in flexible dark green fabrikoid or imitation leather). The first set of the Southwark edition was printed in July 1919 and given to the Du Pont company. The set carries an inscription "This is the first set of Harvard Classics published by P.F. Collier & Son Company to be bound in DuPont Fabrikoid...". The set was named after the birthplace of one of the founders of Harvard College, John Harvard, who was born in London Borough of Southwark. The set is often referred to as the "Veritas" edition; however, the "Veritas" edition is bound in a dark crimson color promoted by DuPont. The new binding material, called fabrikoid, offered less weight, flexible boards, and bindings that were more durable than the cloth or leather bindings of the early editions. Fabrikoid bindings were used in editions published from the 1920s to 1950's such as the varicolored Gemston edition which has five different colors of bindings and for larger editions with increased font sizes called the (home) Library editions that were marketed as being easier to read.

The "Eliot Foundation of Adult Education" set, which appears to have been first printed around 1932 (based on included educational materials dated 1932 and later), is a rare numbered set bound in dark blue pebbled cloth. This set has gold gilt lettering with a profile of Eliot on the spine. The set was the focus of a set of materials for adult education with syllabi, instructions for study, and classroom discussions points. The set has an embossed symbol used in many of the education materials developed by the Eliot Foundation on the front board with Versitas Scientia Humanitas (trans. trust, knowledge, and culture). The number of printings of this rare set is unknown. Later editions (with names such as Gemstone, Deluxe Registered, Veritas, Home Library, and Great Literature editions) were not quite as unique as price points were further lowered to make the Harvard Classics more affordable. These later editions were printed in various sizes and binding materials such as cloth, fabrikoid, bonded leather, and even later in various types of imitation and genuine leather often printed to imitate earlier editions.

P.F. Collier & Son printed the 50th edition (that is, different set) of The Harvard Classics in 1956. Owners and prospective buyers of The Harvard Classics editions are often interested in the printing year of a particular edition. As mentioned before, not even the first editions were fully printed in 1909. First editions were printed in 1909 and 1910, and all subsequent editions were printed in 1910 or later. A printer's key could be used to describe the print run, but these were not used in the U.S. until the middle of the twentieth century. Copyright dates for book reprints are unlikely to identify the year of printing excepts for first four editions. For The Harvard Classics series, copyright pages of The Harvard Classics have no information about the printing year (or run) until 1956 when the publisher began including information about the year of the print run.

Collier's renewed the copyrights for The Harvard Classics 28 years after filing the first copyrights for The Harvard Classics (as was customary at the time, as it offered some legal advantages) in 1936 and 1937. Coliier's again renewed the copyrights in 1956 and 1959, and several times in the sixties as editions were printed in different page sizes and fonts (resulting is different pagination than described in initial copyright filings) and because some editions were printed and sold with fewer than 50 volumes. In sum, copyright dates of The Harvard Classics editions offer misleading information about the printing date or printing year after the first editions were printed in 1909 and 1910. For example, print runs following the publications of the first editions and until 1937 include copyrights dates of 1909 or 1910 although the printing year could be over 20 years later (or more).

Some clues about the printing history can help identify the print run year. For example, the inclusion of the "Lectures" began in 1914. Additionally, the "Editor's Introduction" in volume 50 includes a second "Editor's Introduction" that is dated in 1917. Fabrikoid was first used as binding for The Harvard Classics in 1919. Lastly, the publishing company marketed a larger size of books with the Home Library edition. This set of The Harvard Classics and subsequent editions are 15 percent larger than previous editions. None of these clues allow for an exact printing year, but each can be used to establish that the printing could not have occurred before a certain year, and of course, the printing cannot have occurred before the most recent copyright date.

The last edition of The Harvard Classics printed by P.F. Collier & Son (then a subsidiary of Crowell Collier & Macmillan, Inc.) was the 63rd printing in 1970 of a 22-volume called the "Great Literature Edition" in green fibrates (essentially bonded) leather with 22K decor that sold for $3.78 per volume ($1 each for the first three volumes). The Federal Trade Commission filed a complaint in 1972 against Crowell Collier for deceptive selling practices of The Harvard Classics. In a statement responding to the complaint, Crowell Collier stated that it no longer sells The Harvard Classics. On March 24, 1973, the FTC provisionally accepted a consent order from Crowell Collier (now called Crowell, Collier and MacMillan, Inc.) that the publisher would stop trying to sell The Harvard Classics in one bulk shipment. The publisher ended the subscription plan used since 1909 and stated that it had no plans to sell The Harvard Classics one book at a time.

Enduring success

As Adam Kirsch, writing for Harvard magazine in 2001, notes, "It is surprisingly easy, even today, to find a complete set of the Harvard Classics in good condition. At least one is usually for sale on eBay, the Internet auction site, for $300 or so, a bargain at $6 a book. The supply, from attics or private libraries around the country, seems endless a tribute to the success of the publisher, P.F. Collier, who sold some 350,000 sets within 20 years of the series' initial publication".

Eliot and Neilson concluded that the 50 volumes were "so far as possible, entire works or complete segments of the world's written legacies" for English speaking readers.

Similar compendia

  • The concept of education through systematic reading of seminal works themselves (rather than textbooks) was carried on by John Erskine at Columbia University, and in the 1930s Mortimer Adler and Robert Hutchins at the University of Chicago carried this idea further with the concepts of education through study of the "great books" and "great ideas" of Western civilization. This led to the publication in 1952 of Great Books of the Western World, which is still in print and actively marketed. In 1937, under Stringfellow Barr, St. John's College introduced a curriculum based on the direct study of "great books". These sets are popular today with those interested in homeschooling.

  • Gateway to the Great Books was designed as an introduction to the Great Books of the Western World, published by the same organization and editors in 1952.

  • Palgrave's The Golden Treasury is a popular anthology of English poetry, originally selected for publication by Francis Turner Palgrave in 1861.

  • The Oxford Book of English Verse is an anthology of English poetry that had a very substantial influence on popular taste and perception of poetry for at least a generation.

  • The Loeb Classical Library is a series of books, today published by Harvard University Press, which presents important works of ancient Greek and Latin literature in a way designed to make the text accessible to the broadest possible audience.

  • Sacred Books of the East is a 50-volume set of English translations of Asian religious writings published by the Oxford University Press between 1879 and 1910. It incorporates the essential sacred texts of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Zoroastrianism, Jainism, and Islam.

  • The Delphian Society created the 10 Volume Delphian Course of Reading—with the Harvard Classics editor Eliot in mind—for young and developing minds.

  • The Everyman's Library is a series of reprints of classic literature, primarily from the Western canon.

  • The Thinker's Library is a selection of essays, literature, and extracts from greater works by various classical and contemporary humanists and rationalists, continuing in the tradition of the Renaissance that were published between 1929 and 1951 for the Rationalist Press Association by Watts & Co., London, a company founded by Charles Albert Watts.

Contents

Vol. 1–10

Vol. 1: Benjamin Franklin, John Woolman, William Penn

Vol. 2. Plato, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius

Vol. 3. Bacon, Milton's Prose, Thomas Browne

Vol. 4. Complete Poems in English, Milton

Vol. 5. Essays and English Traits, Emerson

Vol. 6. Poems and Songs, Burns

Vol. 7. The Confessions of St. Augustine, The Imitation of Christ

Vol. 8. Nine Greek Dramas

Vol. 9. Letters and Treatises of Cicero and Pliny

Vol. 10. Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith

Vol. 11–20

Vol. 11. Origin of Species, Darwin

Vol. 12. Plutarch's Lives

Vol. 13. Aeneid, Virgil

Vol. 14. Don Quixote, Part 1, Cervantes

Vol. 15. Bunyan & Walton

Vol. 16. The Thousand and One Nights

Vol. 17. Folk-Lore and Fable, Aesop, Grimm, Andersen

Vol. 18. Modern English Drama

Vol. 19. Faust, Egmont, etc., Goethe, Doctor Faustus, Marlowe

Vol. 20. The Divine Comedy, Dante

Vol. 21–30

Vol. 21. I Promessi Sposi, Manzoni

Vol. 22. The Odyssey, Homer

Vol. 23. Two Years Before the Mast, Dana

Vol. 24. On the Sublime, French Revolution, etc., Burke

Vol. 25. J.S. Mill and Thomas Carlyle

Vol. 26. Continental Drama

Vol. 27. English Essays, Sidney to Macaulay

  • The Defense of Poesy by Sir Philip Sidney

  • On Shakespeare by Ben Jonson

  • On Bacon by Ben Jonson

  • Of Agriculture by Abraham Cowley

  • The Vision of Mirza by Joseph Addison

  • Westminster Abbey by Joseph Addison

  • The Spectator Club by Sir Richard Steele

  • Hints Towards an Essay on Conversation by Jonathan Swift

  • A Treatise on Good Manners and Good Breeding by Jonathan Swift

  • A Letter of Advice to a Young Poet by Jonathan Swift

  • On the Death of Esther Johnson [Stella] by Jonathan Swift

  • The Shortest-Way with the Dissenters by Daniel Defoe

  • The Education of Women by Daniel Defoe

  • Life of Addison, 1672-1719 by Samuel Johnson

  • Of the Standard of Taste by David Hume

  • Fallacies of Anti-Reformers by Sydney Smith

  • On Poesy or Art by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  • Of Persons One Would Wish to Have Seen by William Hazlitt

  • Deaths of Little Children by Leigh Hunt

  • On the Realities of Imagination by Leigh Hunt

  • On the Tragedies of Shakspere by Charles Lamb

  • Levana and Our Ladies of Sorrow by Thomas De Quincey

  • A Defence of Poetry by Percy Bysshe Shelley

  • Machiavelli by Thomas Babington Macaulay

Vol. 28. Essays, English and American

  • William Makepeace Thackery

    Jonathan Swift

    John Henry Newman

    The Idea of a University

    Matthew Arnold

    The Study of Poetry

    John Ruskin

    Sesame and Lilies

    Walter Bagehot

    John Milton

    Thomas Henry Huxley

    Science and Culture

    Edward Augustus Freeman

    Race and Language

    Robert Louis Stevenson

    Truth Of Intercourse

    Samuel Pepys

    William Ellery Channing

    On the Elevation of the Laboring Classes

    Edgar Allan Poe

    The Poetic Principle

    Henry David Thoreau

    Walking

    James Russell Lowell

    Abraham Lincoln

    Democracy

Vol. 29. Voyage of the Beagle, Darwin

Vol. 30. Faraday, Helmholtz, Kelvin, Newcomb, etc.

Vol. 31–40

Vol. 31. Autobiography, Cellini

Vol. 32. Montaigne, Sainte-Beuve, Renan, etc.

Vol. 33. Voyages and Travels

  • An account of Egypt from The Histories, by Herodotus

  • Germany, by Tacitus

  • Sir Francis Drake Revived, by Philip Nichols

  • Sir Francis Drake's Famous Voyage Round the World, by Francis Pretty

  • Drake's Great Armada, by Captain Walter Bigges

  • Sir Humphrey Gilbert's Voyage to Newfoundland, by Edward Haies

  • The Discovery of Guiana, by Sir Walter Raleigh

Vol. 34. Descartes, Voltaire, Rousseau, Hobbes

Vol. 35. Froissart, Malory, Holinshead

Vol. 36. Machiavelli, More, Luther

Vol. 37. Locke, Berkeley, Hume

Vol. 38. Harvey, Jenner, Lister, Pasteur

Vol. 39. Famous Prefaces

  • "Title, Prologue and Epilogues to the Recuyell of the Histories of Troy", by William Caxton

  • "Epilogue to Dictes and Sayings of the Philosophers", by William Caxton

  • "Prologue to Golden Legend", by William Caxton

  • "Prologue to Caton", by William Caxton

  • "Epilogue to Aesop", by William Caxton

  • "Proem to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales", by William Caxton

  • "Prologue to Malory's King Arthur", by William Caxton

  • "Prologue to Virgil's Eneydos", by William Caxton

  • "Dedication of the Institutes of the Christian Religion" by John Calvin

  • "Dedication of the Revolutions of the Heavenly Bodies" by Nicolaus Copernicus

  • "Preface to the History of the Reformation in Scotland", by John Knox

  • "Prefatory Letter to Sir Walter Raleigh on The Faerie Queene", by Edmund Spenser

  • "Preface to the History of the World" by Sir Walter Raleigh

  • "Prooemium, Epistle Dedicatory, Preface, and Plan of the Instauratio Magna, etc.", by Francis Bacon

  • "Preface to the Novum Organum", by Francis Bacon

  • "Preface to the First Folio Edition of Shakespeare's Plays" by Heminge and Condell

  • "Preface to the Philosophiae Naturalis Pricipia Mathematica", by Sir Isaac Newton

  • "Preface to Fables, Ancient and Modern", by John Dryden

  • "Preface to Joseph Andrews", by Henry Fielding

  • "Preface to the English Dictionary", by Samuel Johnson

  • "Preface to Shakespeare", by Samuel Johnson

  • "Introduction to the Propylaen", by J.W. von Goethe

  • "Prefaces to Various Volumes of Poems", by William Wordsworth

  • "Appendix to Lyrical Ballads", by William Wordsworth

  • "Essay Supplementary to Preface", by William Wordsworth

  • "Preface to Cromwell", by Victor Hugo

  • "Preface to Leaves of Grass", by Walt Whitman

  • "Introduction to the History of English Literature", by H.A. Taine

Vol. 40. English Poetry 1: Chaucer to Gray

Geoffrey Chaucer

Traditional Ballads

Anonymous

  • "Balow"

  • "The Old Cloak"

  • "Jolly Good Ale and Old"

Sir Thomas Wyatt

  • "A Supplication"

  • "The Lover's Appeal"

Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey

  • "Complaint of the Absence of Her Lover"

  • "The Means to Attain Happy Life"

George Gascoigne

  • "A Lover's Lullaby"

Nicholas Breton

  • "Phillida and Coridon"

Anonymous

  • "A Sweet Lullaby"

  • "Preparations"

  • "The Unfaithful Shepherdess"

Anthony Munday

  • "Beauty Bathing

Richard Edwardes

  • "Amantium Irae"

Sir Walter Raleigh

  • "His Pilgrimage"

  • "The Lie"

  • "Verses"

  • "What Is Our Life"

Sir Edward Dyer

  • "My Mind to Me a Kingdom Is"

John Lyly

  • "Cupid and Campaspe"

  • "Spring's Welcome"

Sir Philip Sidney

  • "Song"

  • "A Dirge"

  • "A Ditty"

  • "Loving in Truth"

  • "Be Your Words Made, Good Sir, of Indian Ware"

  • "To Sleep"

  • "To the Moon"

Thomas Lodge

  • "Rosalind's Madrigal"

  • "Rosaline"

  • "Phillis"

George Peele

  • "Paris and None"

Robert Southwell

  • "The Burning Babe"

Samuel Daniel

  • "Beauty, Time, and Love Sonnets"

  • "To Sleep"

Michael Drayton

  • "Agincourt"

  • "To the Virginian Voyage"

  • "Love's Farewell"

Henry Constable

  • "Diaphenia"

Edmund Spenser

  • Prothalamion

  • Epithalamion

  • "A Ditty"

  • "Perigot and Willie's Roundelay"

  • "Easter"

  • "What Guile Is This?"

  • "Fair Is My Love"

  • "So Oft as I Her Beauty do Behold"

  • "Rudely Thou Wrongest My Dear Heart's Desire"

  • "Like as the Culver, on the Bared Bough"

William Habington

  • "To Roses in the Bosom of Castara"

  • "Nox Nocti Indicat Scientiam"

Christopher Marlowe

Richard Rowlands

  • "Our Blessed Lady's Lullaby"

Thomas Nashe

  • "In Time of Pestilence"

  • "Spring"

William Shakespeare

Robert Greene

  • "Content"

Richard Barnfield

  • "The Nightingale"

Thomas Campion

  • "Cherry-ripe"

  • "Follow your Saint"

  • "When to Her Lute Corinna Sings"

  • "Follow Thy Fair Sun"

  • "Turn All Thy Thoughts to Eyes"

  • "Integer Vitae"

Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex

  • "A Passion of My Lord of Essex"

Sir Henry Wotton

  • "Elizabeth of Bohemia"

  • "Character of a Happy Life"

Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford

  • "A Renunciation"

Ben Jonson

  • "Simplex Munditiis"

  • "The Triumph"

  • "The Noble Nature"

  • "To Celia"

  • "A Farewell to the World"

  • "A Nymph's Passion"

  • "Epode"

  • "Epitaph on Elizabeth L. H."

  • "On Lucy, Countess of Bedford"

  • "An Ode to Himself"

  • "Hymn to Diana"

  • "On Salathiel Pavy"

  • "His Supposed Mistress"

  • "To the Memory of My Beloved the Author, Mr. William Shakespeare and What He Hath Left Us"

John Donne

Joshua Sylvester

  • "Love's Omnipresence"

William Alexander, Earl of Stirling

  • "To Aurora"

Richard Corbet

  • "Farewell, Rewards and Fairies"

Thomas Heywood

  • "Pack, Clouds, Away"

Thomas Dekker

  • "Country Glee"

  • "Cold's the Wind"

  • "O Sweet Content"

Francis Beaumont

  • "On the Tombs in Westminster Abbey"

  • "Master Francis Beaumont's Letter to Ben Jonson"

John Fletcher

  • "Aspatia's Song"

  • "Melancholy"

John Webster

  • "Call for the Robin-Redbreast"

Anonymous

William Drummond

  • "Saint John Baptist"

  • "Madrigal"

  • "Life"

  • "Human Folly"

  • "The Problem"

  • "To His Lute"

  • "For the Magdalene"

  • "Content and Resolute"

  • "Alexis, Here She Stayed; Among These Pines"

  • "Summons to Love"

George Wither

  • "I Loved a Lass"

  • "The Lover's Resolution"

William Browne (?)

  • "On the Countess Dowager of Pembroke"

Robert Herrick

  • "Cherry-Ripe"

  • "A Child's Grace"

  • "The Mad Maid's Song"

  • "To the Virgins"

  • "To Dianeme"

  • "A Sweet Disorder"

  • "Whenas in Silks"

  • "To Anthea Who May Command Him Any Thing"

  • "To Daffodils"

  • "To Blossoms"

  • "Corinna's Maying"

Francis Quarles

  • "An Ecstasy"

George Herbert

  • "Love"

  • "Virtue"

  • "The Elixir"

  • "The Collar"

  • "The Flower"

  • "Easter Song"

  • "The Pulley"

Henry Vaughan

  • "Beyond the Veil"

  • "The Retreat"

Francis Bacon, Viscount St. Alban

  • "Life"

James Shirley

  • "The Glories of Our Blood and State"

  • "The Last Conqueror"

Thomas Carew

  • "The True Beauty"

  • "Ask Me No More"

  • "Know, Celia"

  • "Give Me More Love"

Sir John Suckling

  • "The Constant Lover"

  • "Why So Pale and Wan"

Sir William D'Avenant

  • "Dawn Song"

Richard Lovelace

Edmund Waller

  • "On a Girdle"

  • "Go, Lovely Rose!"

William Cartwright

  • "On the Queen's Return from the Low Countries"

James Graham, Marquis of Montrose

  • "My Dear and Only Love"

Richard Crashaw

  • "Wishes for the Supposed Mistress"

  • "Upon the Book and Picture of the Seraphical Saint Teresa"

Thomas Jordan

  • "Let Us Drink and Be Merry"

Abraham Cowley

  • "A Supplication"

  • "Cheer Up, My Mates"

  • "Drinking"

  • "On the Death of Mr. William Hervey"

Alexander Brome

  • "The Resolve"

Andrew Marvell

  • "A Garden"

  • "The Picture of Little T. C. in a Prospect of Flowers"

  • "Horatian Ode upon Cromwell's Return from Ireland"

  • "Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda"

  • "Thoughts in a Garden"

Anonymous

  • "Love Will Find Out the Way"

  • "Phillada Flouts Me"

Earl of Rochester

  • "Epitaph on Charles II"

Sir Charles Sedley

  • "Chloris"

  • "Celia"

John Dryden

  • "Ode"

  • "Song to a Fair Young Lady, Going Out of the Town in the Spring"

  • "Song for St. Cecilia's Day"

  • "Alexander's Feast"

  • "On Milton"

Matthew Prior

  • "To a Child of Quality"

  • "Cloe"

  • "The Dying Adrian to His Soul"

  • "Epigram"

Isaac Watts

  • "True Greatness"

Lady Grisel Baillie

  • "Werena My Heart Licht I Wad Dee"

Joseph Addison

  • "Hymn"

Allan Ramsay

  • "Peggy"

John Gay

  • "Love in Her Eyes Sits Playing"

  • "Black-Eyed Susan"

Henry Carey

  • "Sally in Our Alley"

Alexander Pope

Ambrose Philips

  • "To Charlotte Pulteney"

Colley Cibber

  • "The Blind Boy"

James Thomson

Thomas Gray

  • Elegy

  • "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College"

  • "Hymn to Adversity"

  • "Ode on the Spring"

  • "The Progress of Poesy"

  • "The Bard"

  • "Ode on the Pleasure Arising from Vicissitude"

  • "On a Favourite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes"

George Bubb Dodington, Lord Melcombe

  • "Shorten Sail"

Vol. 41–50

Vol. 41. English Poetry 2: Collins to Fitzgerald

William Collins

  • "Fidele"

  • "Ode Written in MDCCXLVI"

  • "The Passions"

  • "To Evening"

George Sewell

  • "The Dying Man in His Garden"

Alison Rutherford Cockburn

Jane Elliot

  • "Lament for Flodden"

Christopher Smart

Anonymous

  • "Willy Drowned in Yarrow"

John Logan

  • "The Braes of Yarrow"

Henry Fielding

  • "A Hunting Song"

Charles Dibdin

  • "Tom Bowling"

Samuel Johnson

  • "On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet"

  • "A Satire"

Oliver Goldsmith

Robert Graham of Gartmore

  • "If Doughty Deeds"

Adam Austin

  • "For Lack of Gold"

William Cowper

  • "Loss of the Royal George"

  • "To a Young Lady"

  • "The Poplar Field"

  • "The Solitude of Alexander Selkirk"

  • "To Mary Unwin"

  • "To the Same"

  • "Boadicea: An Ode"

  • "The Castaway"

  • "The Shrubbery"

  • "On the Receipt of My Mother's Picture Out of Norfolk"

  • "The Diverting History of John Gilpin"

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

  • "Drinking Song"

Anna Laetitia Barbauld

  • "Life"

Isobel Pagan

Lady Anne Lindsay

Thomas Chatterton

  • "Song from Ælla"

Carolina Oliphant, Lady Nairne

Alexander Ross

  • "Wooed and Married and A'"

John Skinner

  • "Tullochgorum"

Michael Bruce

  • "To the Cuckoo"

George Halket

  • "Logie o' Buchan"

William Hamilton of Bangour

  • "The Braes of Yarrow"

Hector MacNeil

  • "I Lo'ed Ne'er a Laddie but Ane"

  • "Come Under My Plaidie"

Sir William Jones

  • "An Ode"

  • "On Parent Knees a Naked New-born Child"

Susanna Blamire

  • "And Ye Shall Walk in Silk Attire"

Anne Hunter

  • "My Mother Bids Me Bind My Hair"

John Dunlop

  • "The Year, That's Awa'"

Samuel Rogers

  • "A Wish"

  • "The Sleeping Beauty"

William Blake

John Collins

  • "To-Morrow"

Robert Tannahill

  • "Jessie, the Flower o' Dunblane"

  • "Gloomy Winter's Now Awa'"

William Wordsworth

William Lisle Bowles

  • "Dover Cliffs"

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Robert Southey

Charles Lamb

Sir Walter Scott

  • "The Outlaw"

  • "To a Lock of Hair"

  • "Jock of Hazeldean"

  • "Eleu Loro"

  • "A Serenade"

  • "The Rover"

  • "The Maid of Neidpath"

  • "Gathering Song of Donald the Black"

  • "Border Ballad"

  • "The Pride of Youth"

  • "Coronach"

  • "Lucy Ashton's Song"

  • "Answer"

  • "Rosabelle"

  • "Hunting Song"

  • "Lochinvar"

  • "Bonny Dundee"

  • "Datur Hora Quieti"

  • "Here's a Health to King Charles

  • "Harp of the North, Farewell!"

James Hogg

Robert Surtees

  • "Barthram's Dirge"

Thomas Campbell

  • "The Soldier's Dream"

  • "To the Evening Star"

  • "Ode to Winter"

  • "Lord Ullin's Daughter"

  • "The River of Life"

  • "To the Evening Star"

  • "The Maid of Neidpath"

  • "Ye Mariners of England"

  • "Battle of the Baltic"

  • "Hohenlinden"

J. Campbell

  • "Freedom and Love"

Allan Cunningham

  • "Hame, Hame, Hame"

  • "A Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea"

George Gordon, Lord Byron

Thomas Moore

  • "The Light of Other Days"

  • "Pro Patria Mori"

  • "The Meeting of the Waters"

  • "The Last Rose of Summer"

  • "The Harp that Once Through Tara's Halls"

  • "A Canadian Boat-Song"

  • "The Journey Onwards"

  • "The Young May Moon"

  • "Echo"

  • "At the Mid Hour of Night"

Charles Wolfe

  • "The Burial of Sir John Moore at Corunna

Percy Bysshe Shelley

James Henry Leigh Hunt

John Keats

Walter Savage Landor

  • "Rose Aylmer"

  • "Twenty Years Hence"

  • "Proud Word You Never Spoke"

  • "Absence"

  • "Dirce"

  • "Corinna to Tanagra, from Athens"

  • "Mother, I Cannot Mind My Wheel"

  • "Well I Remember"

  • "No, My Own Love"

  • "Robert Browning"

  • "The Death of Artemidora"

  • "Iphigeneia"

  • "'Do You Remember Me?'"

  • "For an Epitaph at Fiesole"

  • "On Lucretia Borgia's Hair"

  • "On His Seventy-Fifth Birthday"

  • "To My Ninth Decade"

  • "Death Stands Above Me"

  • "On Living Too Long"

Thomas Hood

Sir Aubrey de Vere

  • "Glengariff"

Hartley Coleridge

  • "She Is Not Fair"

Joseph Blanco White

  • "To Night"

George Darley

  • "The Loveliness of Love"

Thomas Babington Macaulay, Lord Macaulay

  • "The Armada"

  • "A Jacobite's Epitaph"

Sir William Edmondstoune Aytoune

  • "The Refusal of Charon"

Hugh Miller

  • "The Babie"

Helen Selina, Lady Dufferin

  • "Lament of the Irish Emigrant"

Charles Tennyson Turner

  • "Letty's Globe"

Sir Samuel Ferguson

  • "The Fair Hills of Ireland"

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Edward Fitzgerald

Vol. 42. English Poetry 3: Tennyson to Whitman

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Richard Monckton Milnes, Lord Houghton

  • "Sonnet"

William Makepeace Thackray

  • "The End of the Play"

Charles Kingsley

  • "Airly Beacon"

  • "The Sands of Dee"

  • "Youth and Old"

  • "Ode to the North-east Wind"

J. Wilson

Robert Browning

Emily Brontë

  • Last Lines

  • "The Old Stoic"

Robert Stephen Hawker

Coventry Patmore

  • "Departure"

William (Johnson) Cory

  • Heraclitus

  • "Mimnermus in Church"

Sydney Dobell

  • "The Ballad of Keith of Ravelston"

William Allingham

  • "The Fairies"

George Mac Donald

  • "That Holy Thing"

  • "Baby"

Edward, Earl of Lytton

  • "The Last Wish"

Arthur Hugh Clough

  • "Say Not the Struggle Naught Availeth"

  • "The Stream of Life"

  • "In a London Square"

  • "Qua Cursum Ventus"

  • "Where Lies the Land"

Matthew Arnold

  • "The Forsaken Merman"

  • "The Song of the Callicles"

  • "To Marguerite"

  • "Requiescat"

  • "Rugby Chapel"

  • "Memorial Verses"

  • "Dover Beach"

  • "The Better Part"

  • "Worldly Place"

  • "The Last Word"

George Meredith

  • "Love in the Valley"

Alexander Smith

  • "Barbara"

Charles Dickens

  • "The Ivy Green"

Thomas Edward Brown

  • "My Garden"

James Thomson (B.V.)

  • "Gifts"

Dante Gabriel Rossetti

  • "The Blessed Damozel"

  • "The Kings Tragedy"

  • "Lovesight"

  • "Heart's Hope"

  • "Genius in Beauty"

  • "Silent Noon"

  • "Love-Sweetness"

  • "Heart's Compass"

  • "Her Gifts"

Christina Georgina Rossetti

  • "Song"

  • "Remember"

  • "Up-Hill"

  • "In the Round Tower at Jhansi"

William Morris

  • "The Defence of Guenevere"

  • Prologue of The Earthly Paradise

  • "The Nymph's Song to Hylas"

  • "The Day Is Coming"

  • "The Days That Were"

John Boyle O'Reilly

  • "A White Rose"

Arthur William Edgar O'Shaughnessy

Robert Williams Buchanan

  • "Liz"

Algernon Charles Swinburne

  • Chorus from "Atalanta"

  • "Itylus"

  • "The Garden of Proserpine"

  • "A Match"

  • "A Forsaken Garden"

William Ernest Henley

  • "Margaritæ Sorori"

  • "Invictus"

  • "England, My England"

Robert Louis Stevenson

  • "In the Highlands"

  • "The Celestial Surgeon"

  • "Requiem"

William Cullen Bryant

Edgar Allan Poe

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

John Greenleaf Whittier

  • "The Eternal Goodness"

  • "Randolph of Roanoke"

  • "Massachusetts to Virginia"

  • "Barclay of Ury"

  • "Maud Muller"

  • "The Barefoot Boy"

  • "Skipper Ireson's Ride"

  • "The Pipes at Lucknow"

  • "Barbara Frietchie"

Oliver Wendell Holmes

  • "The Chambered Nautilus"

  • "Old Ironsides"

  • "The Last Leaf"

  • "Contentment"

James Russell Lowell

  • "The Present Crisis"

  • "The Pious Editor's Creed"

  • "The Courtin'"

  • "Ode Recited at the Harvard Commemoration"

Sidney Lanier

Bret Harte

  • "The Reveille"

Walt Whitman

Vol. 43. American Historical Documents

Introductory Note

Vol. 44. Sacred Writings: Volume 1

Confucian

Hebrew

Christian, (Part I)

Vol. 45. Sacred Writings: Volume 2

Christian, (Part II)

Buddhist

Hindu

Islam

Chapters from the Koran, Translated and Annotated by E. H. Palmer

Vol. 46. Elizabethan Drama 1

Vol. 47. Elizabethan Drama 2

Vol. 48. Thoughts and Minor Works, Pascal

Vol. 49. Epic and Saga

Vol. 50. Introduction, Reader's Guide, Indexes

  • The Editor's Introduction to the Harvard Classics

Reader's Guide to the Harvard Classics

Class I

The History of Civilization

  • Race and Language

  • Ancient Egypt

  • The East in Patriarchal Time

  • Ancient Greece: Legendary

  • Ancient Greece: Historic

  • Ancient Rome: Republican

  • Ancient Rome: Imperial

  • Germanic Peoples in Primitive Times

  • Ireland in Primitive Times

  • The Early Christian Church

  • The Mohammedan East

  • The Middle Ages

  • The Renaissance

  • Modern Europe

  • America

Religion and Philosophy

  • Hebrew

  • Greek

  • Roman

  • Chinese

  • Hindu

  • Christian: Primitive and Medieval

  • Mohammedan

  • Christian: Modern

  • Modern Philosophers

Education

  • Montaigne...Huxley

Science

  • Hippocrates...Geikie

Politics

  • Plutarch...American Historical Documents

Voyages and Travels

  • Herodotus...Emerson

Criticism of Literature and the Fine Arts

  • Caxton...Stevenson

Class II

Drama

  • Greek

  • English

  • Spanish

  • French

  • German

Biography and Letters

  • Plutarch...Stevenson

Essays

  • Montaigne...Stevenson

Narrative Poetry and Prose Fiction

  • Homer...Lanier

  • An Index of the First Lines of Poems, Songs and Choruses, Hymns and Psalms

  • General Index

  • Chronological Index

Lectures

Lectures on The Harvard Classics

The last volume contains sixty lectures introducing and summarizing the covered fields:

History

  • "General Introduction", by Robert Matteson Johnston

  • "Ancient History", by William Scott Ferguson

  • "The French Revolution", by Robert Matteson Johnston

  • "The Renaissance", by Murray Anthony Potter

  • "The Territorial Development of the United States", by Fredrick Jackson Turner

Poetry

  • "General Introduction", by Carlton Noyes

  • "Homer and the Epic", by Charles Burton Gulick

  • "Dante", by Charles Hall Grandgent

  • "The Poems of John Milton", by Ernest Bernbaum

  • "The English Anthology", by Carleton Noyes

Natural Science

  • "General Introduction", by Lawrence Joseph Henderson

  • "Astronomy", by Lawrence Joseph Henderson

  • "Physics and Chemistry", by Lawrence Joseph Henderson

  • "The Biological Sciences", by Lawrence Joseph Henderson

  • "Kelvin on 'Light' and 'The Tides'", by William Morris Davis

Philosophy

  • "General Introduction", by Ralph Barton Perry

  • "Socrates, Plato, and the Roman Stoics", by Charles Pomeroy Parker

  • "The Rise of Modern Philosophy", by Ralph Barton Perry

  • "Introduction to Kant", by Ralph Barton Perry

  • "Emerson", by Chester Noyes Greenough

Biography

  • "General Introduction", William Roscoe Thayer,

  • "Plutarch", by William Scott Ferguson,

  • "Benvenuto Cellini", by Chandler Rathfon Post

  • "Franklin and Woolman", by Chester Noyes Greenough

  • "John Stuart Mill", by Oliver Mitchell Wentworth

Prose Fiction

Criticism and the Essay

  • "General Introduction", by Bliss Perry

  • "What the Middle Ages Read", by William Allan Neilson

  • "Theories of Poetry", by Bliss Perry

  • "Æsthetic Criticism in Germany", by William Guild Howard

  • "The Composition of a Criticism", by Ernest Bernbaum

Education

  • "General Introduction", by Henry Wyman Holmes

  • "Francis Bacon", by Ernest Bernbaum

  • "Locke and Milton", by Henry Wyman Holmes

  • "Carlyle and Newman", by Frank Wilson Cheney Hersey

  • "Huxley on Science and Culture", by A. O. Norton

Political Science

Drama

  • "General Introduction", by George Pierce Baker

  • "Greek Tragedy", by Charles Burton Gulick

  • "The Elizabethan Drama", by William Allan Neilson

  • "The Faust Legend", by Kuno Francke

  • "Modern English Drama", by Ernest Bernbaum

Voyages and Travel

  • "General Introduction", by Roland Burrage Dixon

  • "Herodotus on Egypt", by George H. Chase

  • "The Elizabethan Adventurers", by William Allan Neilson

  • "The Era of Discovery", by William Bennett Monro

  • "Darwin's Voyage of the Beagle", by George Howard Parker

Religion

The Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction

The Harvard Classics Shelf of Fiction is a supplement of 20 volumes of modern fiction added in 1917. Items were selected for inclusion by Charles W. Eliot, with notes and introductions by William Allan Neilson.

Vol. 1. HENRY FIELDING 1

Vol. 2. HENRY FIELDING 2

  • The History of Tom Jones, part 2, by Henry Fielding

Vol. 3. LAURENCE STERNE, JANE AUSTEN

Vol. 4. SIR WALTER SCOTT

Vol. 5. WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 1

Vol. 6. WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY 2

  • Vanity Fair, part 2, by William Makepeace Thackeray

Vol. 7. CHARLES DICKENS 1

Vol. 8. CHARLES DICKENS 2

  • David Copperfield, part 2, by Charles Dickens

Vol. 9. GEORGE ELIOT

Vol. 10. HAWTHORNE, IRVING, POE, BRET HARTE, MARK TWAIN, HALE

Vol. 11. HENRY JAMES JR.

Vol. 12. VICTOR HUGO

Vol. 13. BALZAC, SAND, DE MUSSET, DAUDET, DE MAUPASSANT

Vol. 14. JOHANN WOLFGANG GOETHE

Vol. 15. GOETHE, KELLER, STORM, FONTANE

Vol. 16. LEO NIKOLAEVITCH TOLSTOY 1

Vol. 17. LEO NIKOLAEVITCH TOLSTOY 2

Vol. 18. FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY

Vol. 19. IVAN TURGENEV

Vol. 20. VALERA, BJØRNSON, KIELLAND

Media

Television

The Waltons season 2 episode 24 "The Five-Foot Shelf", where a broke salesman (of the Harvard books) buys a doll for his daughter with Olivia's down-payment on a set of books.

Literature

Saul Bellow's The Adventures of Augie March makes several mentions of a signed copy of "Dr. Eliot's five-foot shelf" throughout.

References

  • (Online version.)

  • (All volumes.)