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Practice your writing by typing out classic literature. This method not only enhances your understanding of rhythm, structure, and nuances but also connects you deeply with the timeless flow of literary history.This is a BETA version.
Cranford
by Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
Cranford is a novel by Elizabeth Gaskell, first published in 1851. It is a humorous and poignant portrayal of the lives of the residents of the small town of Cranford, focusing on the experiences of the town, particularly the lives of the town's older residents. The novel is a social satire that explores themes of society, social dynamics, and the human condition.
lives of others and calling others to share the emotion, does not mean, as people sometimes imagine, that a writer copies textually from the world before her, I have heard my father say that no author worth anything, deliberately, and as a rule, copies the subject before him. And so with Mrs. Gaskell. Her early impressions were vivid and dear to her, but her world, though coloured by remembrance and sympathy, was peopled by the fresh creations of her vivid imagination, not by stale copies of the people she had known. Mary Barton made a great and remarkable sensation. Carlyle, Landor, Miss Edgeworth praised and applauded, and nameless thousands also praised and read the noble outspoken book. ‘Individuals may have complained,’ so says the biographer, from whom I have so often quoted, ‘but the work has unquestionably helped to make the manufacturing world very different from what it was forty years ago.’ The same intuition which guided her along the pleasant country lanes made her at home in the teeming streets and crowded alleys of Manchester.
Other classics
Oscar Wilde
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Ernest Hemingway
In Our Time
Marcel Proust
Swann's Way
Marcel Proust
Within a Budding Grove
Hjalmar Söderberg
Förvillelser
F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Great Gatsby
August Strindberg
Röda Rummet
Victoria Benedictsson
Modern
Emily Brontë
Wuthering Heights
Jane Austen
Emma
William Shakespeare
Romeo and Juliet
August Strindberg
Inferno
Louisa May Alcott
Aunt Jo’s Scrap-Bag Vol. 1
Franz Kafka
The Metamorphosis
Lewis Carroll
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland
Herman Melville
Moby-Dick; or, The Whale
Mary Shelley
Frankenstein
Virginia Woolf
Mrs. Dalloway
Henry David Thoreau
Walden
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Crime and PunishmentWhy Type a Masterpiece?
Typing out classical literature is not just an exercise in patience; it's a deeply immersive way to understand the rhythm, structure, and nuances of great writing. By manually reproducing the works of renowned authors, you engage with the text on a level that reading alone cannot offer. This method allows you to feel the flow of sentences, the choice of words, and the intricate construction of paragraphs that make these works timeless.
Style is a very simple matter; it is all rhythm. Once you get that, you can't use the wrong words.
– Virginia Woolf
literati is a unique platform where writers can select from a vast collection of public domain classics to type out. This practice is akin to a musician playing pieces by the masters to internalize the elements of composition and performance. Just as the musician learns the subtleties of each note and chord, the writer learns the power of each word and sentence.
Prose is like hair; it shines with combing.
– Gustave Flaubert
Engaging directly with masterpieces allows writers to absorb the rhythm of the text, the ebb and flow of its pacing, and the beauty of its imagery. It cultivates an appreciation for the craft of writing and provides invaluable lessons in how to construct compelling narratives, develop characters, and evoke emotions in readers. Happy typing!
The only truth is music.
– Jack Kerouac