Samuel Johnson's essays contain more wisdom per square inch than any other writer I've encountered. Like any period, the eighteenth century had its flaws, but Johnson's prose rises above all of them. His respect for common sense and his deep faith keep him safe from the delusions of perfectability that infected many of his contemporaries.

Samuel Johnson wrote in many genres, and the essay is one for which he is well-known. Of the three series of his essays, the Rambler is usaully hailed as being his best. This is the only complete edition in print.

Johnson was a great critic, a moralist, and a sharp observer of human behavior. The Rambler essays cover all three aspects of his opinions.

In literary criticism, we have discussions of pastoral poetry, of Milton's blank verse (long before his biography of Milton in "The Lives of the Poets"), and a stunning essay on the superiority of biography as a literary form.

We have his moralist perspective, and his human observations, combined in essays on the foolishness of telling secrets, procrastination, self-consciousness, anger, regret, perseverance, etc.

Admittedly, Johnson's syntax can be difficult, and occasionally he will send you to your dictionary. But your efforts will be rewarded, because Johnson's views are written from the perspective of someone who is all too familiar with his own flaws, and knows the difference between the ideals he proposes and our/his own performance in attempting to achieve those goals.

Samuel Johnson is arguably the greatest prose stylist the English language has produced, and contained within the two hundred or so Rambler essays written by Johnson (a few of the essays were written by others by invitation from Johnson) are perhaps Johnson's greatest work. Not every essay is a classic, but many of them are and bear reading and rereading.

There is unfortunately no good one-volume edition of the Rambler essays. The Bate anthology regretfully neglects the moral essays for those more aesthetic and literary in nature, which is tragic because Johnson is a religious moralist as much as he is a literary critic, and even the critical side cannot be understood without an appreciation of Johnson's religious and moral convictions and sensibilities. As a side note, I could add that this is typical of Bate, and is especially in evidence in his otherwise marvelous biography of Johnson, where he tends to treat Johnson's very powerful religious beliefs as an odd sort of psychological aberration.

It is impossible to recommend a purchase this expensive for the casual reader, but as owner of the three-volume set, I can attest that any lover of Johnson will find him or herself going to these volumes and especially particular essays, again and again and again.

This book is a really spectacular take on the ABC's format! The illustrations are just beautiful, and hook adults and children immediately with their vibrant colors and intersting details.

More importantly, the text of this book is superior - the author somehow manages to combine wonderfully flowing rhymes with new and interesting vocabulary to teach the basics of the alphabet. My son and I particularly enjoyed being able to use the helpful glossary to learn the meanings and pronunciations of some of the more unusual words. We also love reading this book year-round: in the summer in makes us look forward to trips to the beach and lake, and in the winter, it gives us a sunny break from dreary days.

Overall, this is truly one of the best books in this genre I've ever seen as a parent, and one of my son's absolute favorites.

We highly recommend it to any parent, and particulary think it would be a great book to read to multiple children of various ages - there is a something of interest for everyone, no matter their reading level.

ABC's of the Sea is not a run-of-the-mill picture book. It works on many levels and for multiple age groups.

Each page features a letter of the alphabet along with an appropriate sea creature or sea subject. For example: "Ff is for fish."

Nothing different here, is there?

Well, yes, there is. One page starts with the featured letter and the next page begins with a beginning word. "Gull begins with Gg." The pages alternate that way throughout the book.

Along the bottoms of the pages are sentences like: "Fantastic fish float with fins" or "Sea gulls glide in gusty gales."

These sentences, as with all the others, allow an older child to read to a younger one, allow any child to build his vocabulary, and keep this book from getting stale.

The alphabetic glossary in the back contains the pronunciation of selected words and their definitions.

Another feature is the page borders. Pictures surround the pages with sea horses, turtles, life preservers, canoes, and lobsters, to name a few. If you'd like, you can use the edge pictures to count. You can count total items in some pictures or pick out items that are the same or different.

The other thing I noticed is that each page has some action. Dolphins play with balls and rings, gulls fly in the sky, a ship heads for harbor in a stormy sea. The pictures aren't static.

As I've said, this book works on many levels and is one your child won't outgrow too soon.

I wanted to just "read" the book to the kids. But gosh, I started singing it. And did they love it. I sang and flipped pages as fast as I could. Over and over. I teach preschool and this was America week. This was pretty much the only book about America their "level." It has beautiful "impressionistic" painitings of all sorts of beautiful and significant places in America that you can talk about. And if you are proud and interested, the kids will be too. We sit on a map rug so the kids are getting familiar with all our landmarks. But this book helps learn the song and gets them familiar with our nation. The last page has a picture of the Statue of Liberty in the harbor, "from sea to shining sea." I felt so good to read this to the kids. Please get this to make not only children feel good about where they come from, but also you as well!

The book has good illustrations and it has the song five times. The illustrations go very nicely with the words to the song.

THE REASON I READ THE BOOK IN THE FIRST PLACE WAS BECAUSE I HAVE A DAUGHTER NAMED ANDREA BATES IT WAS A GOOD BOOK L.

This is the best of the hydrotherapy books that I was able to find at the National Institute of Health Library in Washington, DC.

Stephen Bates must have invested three or four lives of time interviewing the original participants and digging up the actual letters and documents of this highly complex series of interconnected events. No, it is not out of date. The flaming issues of that date are merely the warning flickering of huge blasts of fire still to come. Scopes I was had nothing on this.

At the same time his balance and meticulous fairness to all sides is one of the most impressive things about this book. Few people can treat religiously motivated people as rational, or religion as as relevant a topic as any other free speech.

All in all it is as griping as any mystery novel yet it portrays an issue of political correctness versus individual liberty which is both a local and a national matter even more important than the future of our entire educational tradition.

A brilliant look at some of the more intractable intersections between the legal and the moral, here in the context of schools and the education of our kids. Bates wrestles with the issues, to be sure, but without preaching -- he leaves it to us, the parents, to draw our own lessons. Read this if you care about your child.

Big Truck and Little Truck lived and worked together on Farley's Farm and Big Truck took care of Little Truck and taught him everything he knew. That is until the day Big Truck's engine wouldn't start. Little Truck cried as he watch Tow Truck pull Big Truck away. He had never been alone. "I'll be back soon," Big Truck assured him. "Just remember the things I taught you." Little Truck was sad and anxious, but he got right to work. He took all the fruits and vegetables to market. He drove alone on the highway and remembered to keep his lights on the road. And when he skidded into a ditch, Little Truck knew how to go easy and rock back and forth to get himself out. After a few days Big Truck came back home and he looked great. His engine purred and he even had a nice new paint job. Little Truck couldn't wait to tell him all the "big truck" things he had done. But there was no time to talk right then. They had lots of work to do on Farley's Farm..... Jan Carr has written a very tender and sensitive story about love and the fear of separation all pre-schoolers experience, from time to time. Her gentle text is complimented by Ivan Bates colorful and expressive artwork and youngsters will be entranced as they watch Little Truck triumph and become more and more sure of himself. This is a wonderful, reassuring story that helps teach self-reliance and the big lesson that separation isn't forever.

My son spent hours at the bookstore reading this book over and over again. So we had to get it. Amazing illustrations!

With four children and seven grandchildren, Gesell Institute's CHILD BEHAVIOR has become our constant reference guide. The book's "Ages and Stages" section was one we always anxiously referred to when one of our children was doing something unusual. It was reassuring to us to find out they were each very normal for their age. In fact, it almost seemed like the particular section had been written after observing what our kids were doing at that specific stage in their development. Today it is not unusual for one of our children to call us with a question they have about their kids. Even though our original copy is over 35 years old, the examples and descriptions still fit. Many things may have changed over the years, but children seem to develop and react similarly to specific situations. Just take one look at our tattered copy and you will see that this has been a well-used reference book in our home and we recommend it to any parent or grandparent.

this book has been 100% on the mark foretelling stages in my niece's development. she is 4 years old now and the book has been her parents best guide. a much better book than the "what to expect" series.

I picked this book up because of the topic but it was so much more than an infertility story:it was a great chronicle of one womans growing up.When I was done I felt I had made a new friend and was sad to put the book down.

Or about to run out of time all together? Then this book is for you...or anyone else who loves suberb memoir writing. We need to keep hearing from Bates Alden on a regular basis. She has important things to tell us.

Within this book's 331 pages are the first three of five novels in H.E. Bates' "Pop Larkin" series: The Darling Buds of May, A Breath of French Air, and When the Green Woods Laugh. For anyone looking for a light, sunny, happy, warm-hearted, gently-humourous book, I just cannot recommend this one highly enough. In fact, it's one of the few books that can easily be read and reread again.

The novels are set in rural England of the 1950s and centre around Pop and Ma Larkin (actually they're not married, but somehow it just never seems to matter) and their brood of six (make that seven) children. The world in which they live can only be described as a pastoral paradise. Although we get an inkling that the Larkin's farm is, in reality, rather like a junkyard, the novels are a testament to that old saying that life is 90% attitute and 10% circumstance. We see the farm and its surroundings and inhabitants largely through Pop's rose-coloured perspective. As a result, we escape into a world of fragrant golden buttercups and bluebells, into fields of plump, ripe strawberries, and into a kitchen that endlessly emits the heavenly, mouthwatering aromas of Ma's rich, delectable country meals.

Pop is quite a character, and his sunny, carefree disposition and overwhelming generosity, together with his acute focus on the sensory delights of his surroundings, imbue the book with a sense of warmth and beauty that one seldom finds in novels. Pop and Ma take life as they find it and people as they find them, and they never seem to let anything rattle them. Though it's never spelled out, one gets the feeling that life is simply too short a journey to spend it focussing on the bumps one incurs along the way.

I discovered this lovely series through watching the wonderful dramatisation starring David Jason (as Sidney "Pop" Larkin) and Catherine Zeta Jones (as his daughter Mariette), which I also highly recommend. Whether or not you've seen the dramatisation, if you're looking for a cheery, thoroughly relaxing and thoroughly enjoyable read, you'll enjoy this sweet book. In short, it's absolutely "perfick"!

Within this book's 331 pages are the first three of five novels in H.E. Bates' "Pop Larkin" series: The Darling Buds of May, A Breath of French Air, and When the Green Woods Laugh. For anyone looking for a light, sunny, happy, warm-hearted, gently-humourous book, I just cannot recommend this one highly enough. In fact, it's one of the few books that can easily be read and reread again.

The novels are set in rural England of the 1950s and centre around Pop and Ma Larkin (actually they're not married, but somehow it just never seems to matter) and their brood of six (make that seven) children. The world in which they live can only be described as a pastoral paradise. Although we get an inkling that the Larkin's farm is, in reality, rather like a junkyard, the novels are a testament to that old saying that life is 90% attitute and 10% circumstance. We see the farm and its surroundings and inhabitants largely through Pop's rose-coloured perspective. As a result, we escape into a world of fragrant golden buttercups and bluebells, into fields of plump, ripe strawberries, and into a kitchen that endlessly emits the heavenly, mouthwatering aromas of Ma's rich and flavourful country meals.

Pop is quite a character, and his sunny, carefree disposition and overwhelming generosity, together with his acute focus on the sensory delights of his surroundings, imbue the book with a sense of warmth and beauty that one seldom finds in novels. Pop and Ma (who, by the way, is tremendously overweight) take life as they find it and people as they find them, and they never seem to let anything rattle them. Though it's never spelled out, one gets the feeling that life is simply too short a journey to spend it focussing on the bumps one incurs along the way.

I discovered this lovely series through watching the wonderful dramatisation starring David Jason (as Sidney "Pop" Larkin) and Catherine Zeta Jones (as his daughter Mariette), which I also highly recommend (and which is available, at the time of writing, on video and DVD). Whether or not you've seen the dramatisation, if you're looking for a cheery, thoroughly relaxing and thoroughly enjoyable read, you'll enjoy this sweet book. It's well worth ferretting out a copy. In short, it's absolutely "perfick"!

This was one of the best fantasy/fiction books that I've read. Definitely worth the time and money.

Nay, not for Grades 2-3 rather for anyone who wants a good read, and loves magic. This writer doesn't cheat, Martine delivers the goods. Her ability to weave words into a spell, is her magic. Read it,don't fear the Taker.