Erasmus' services to a new way of learning took various forms. He wrote school-books, bringing out his view that boys were kept too long over grammar, and ought to begin reading some good author as soon as possible. His own "Colloquies" were meant partly as models of colloquial Latin; the book was long a standard one in education. These lively dialogues are prose idylls with an ethical purpose,—the dramatic expression of the writer's views on the life of the day. Thus the dialogue between the Learned Lady and the Abbot depicts monastic illiteracy; that between the Soldier and the Carthusian brings out the seamy side of the military calling. Lucian has influenced the form; but the dramatic skill which blends earnestness with humour is the author's own; there are touches here and there which might fairly be called Shakspearian. This is part one of two.

Erasmus' Familiar Colloquies grew from a small collection of phrases, sentences, and snatches of dialogue written in Paris about 1497 to help his private pupils improve their command of Latin. Twenty years later the material was published by Johann Froben (Basel 1518). It was an immediate success and was reprinted thirty times in the next four years. For the edition of March 1522 Erasmus began to add fully developed dialogues, and a book designed to improve boys' use of Latin (and their deportment) soon became a work of literature for adults, although it retained traces of its original purposes. The final Froben edition (March, 1533) had about sixty parts, most of them dialogues. It was in the last form that the Colloquies were read and enjoyed for four centuries. For modern readers it is one of the best introductions to European society of the Renaissance and Reformation periods, with lively descriptions of daily life and provocative discussions of political, religious, social, and literary topics, presented with Erasmus's characteristic wit and verve. Each colloquy has its own introduction and full explanatory, historical, and biographical notes. Volumes 39 and 40 of the Collected Works of Erasmus series - Two-volume set.

A fresh look a the concept of resurrection in Hebrew Bible, New Testament, and non-canonical texts. >

Translation (and text) of colloquies gives vivid picture of Anglo-Saxon monastic education. The monk Aelfric Bata is the only identifiable graduate of the school of Aelfric `Grammaticus', the tenth-century Anglo-Saxon homilist whose Grammar, Glossary and Colloquyformed part of an educational plan for English boys. Bata's Colloquies, Latin conversations set in a monastic school, open a door into the world of Anglo-Saxon monasticism, revealing the details of daily activities: rising and dressing, studying the day's lesson, eating, bathing and tonsuring. Oblates ask a master's help in reading, bargain for a manuscript-copying job, obtain help in sharpening a pen. One colloquy depicts a flyting between master and student, who exchange graphic scatologicalinsults. Combining the spare diction of his teacher Aelfric with the ornate glossematic vocabulary of Aldhelm, Aelfric Bata creates a cloistered world where comedy, invective, sermon and poetic recitation mix. The Colloquiesare presented with an English translation, glosses and full notes. Dr SCOTT GWARA teaches in the Department of English at the University of South Carolina: Professor DAVID PORTER teaches in the Department of English at SouthernUniversity, Baton Rouge.

Salesman's dummy, containing prospectus (p. [1]-[39], 1st group), press notices about the work (p. 1-15), and blanks for names of subscribers; sample bindings mounted inside front and back covers. LC copy has been used as scrapbook with t.p. and first few pages of text obscured by mounted newspaper clippings.

Late at night, Robert goes to the circus and finds a fabulous balloon machine, with which he creates unusual balloons.