Bøger af James H Ford

Herein are contained the sardonic definitions published by Ambrose Bierce as The Cynic's Word Book in 1906; augmented, edited and republished by the illustrious author in 1911 as The Devil's Dictionary. Unlike other editions which modify, tone down and make moronic additions to Bierce's original Devil's Dictionary, presented here are the complete contents of the 1911 edition without deletions, modifications or embellishments, of any kind, which might diminish the impact of the original politically incorrect collection; hence, the redundant descriptive addition to the title as "Complete and Unabridged" which would surely have caused the author to go ballistic if he were still alive. Ambrose Bierce was an extraordinary individual: a veteran of the American Civil War, renowned writer, political pundit, social commentator and, in many ways, a philosopher who was ahead of his time. His mysterious disappearance, in 1914 during the Mexican Revolution, was the subject of the movie: Old Gringo. Shortly before he vanished, he wrote to a friend: "Good-bye - if you hear of my being stood up against a Mexican stone wall and shot to rags please know that I think that is a pretty good way to depart this life. It beats old age, disease, or falling down the cellar stairs. To be a Gringo in Mexico - ah, that is euthanasia". His own definition of a cynic suited him well: "CYNIC, n. A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be. Hence the custom among the Scythians of plucking out a cynic's eyes to improve his vision."

The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is an account of the early history of Britain. It was originally compiled on the orders of King Alfred the Great, approximately A.D. 890, and subsequently maintained and added to by generations of anonymous scribes until the middle of the 12th Century. The original language is Anglo-Saxon (Old English), but later entries are essentially Middle English in tone.This edition is a translation from the Old English to a more readable Modern English by the Reverend James Ingram. His scholarly view is amply demonstrated in his introduction that traces the early fusion of The Doomsday Book and the Saxon Chronicle into this work that has come to be known as The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.It consists of 9 differing manuscripts that collectively trace the outlines of British history. Together, even with their inconsistencies, they comprise the best source of factual information from an era shrouded in myth. For a millennium or so, historians have been reading this landmark reference to distinguish between fact and fantasy in the complex history of Britain. It has established the standard time-line from pre-history into the middle ages.