h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Grit, by Horatio Alger: Ambition and Exploitation - A87952206
Author: Dmitri Gheorgheni - Not Banned in China - U1590784

Every year during the autumn festival, the public library has a big book sale. You can get a bagful of books for $5. This year, I found a box of Horatio Alger novels - not first editions, but certainly worth more than I paid for the two I picked up.

I thought we ought to get a Guide Entry out of it.

Unfortunately, some of the prose made me suspicious. (It might be all that 'Law & Order: SVU' I've been watching.) So I did my due diligence and checked out the author's bio. The result was less than edifying, but that's all part of the story.

Thank you for finding the books and digging under the surface of the stories for us...

"14 faculty members" - does that mean Harvard had 14 members of academic staff in the Faculty of Humanities, or 14 in total?

"There were never any official complaints in New York, but a 21st-century observer might still be suspicious." - well said...

Excellent 'Further Reading' section

Thanks, Sasha! Yes, there were only 14 members of the faculty, according to my source. I added 'in total' to make that clear. I was surprised, too: Harvard had already been around for a couple of centuries by then, but apparently, it was quite provincial. Of course, that didn't count the medical, law, or divinity schools.

Ah, I see, yes that makes sense given that there were separate Schools, so the main bit would be relatively small

Yeah, that was just the undergrads.

This Entry really makes me angry, thanks for writing. People should read this.

Thanks, Tav. That's exactly the right response, I think.

I must admit when I read the line 'At the beginning of the tale, Grit's rowing people across the Kennebec River for five cents a ride. By the end… he's headed for New York City' I felt sorry for the poor people on the Kennebec River unable to cross, and wondered whether they'd like to buy a floating bridge for, say, a mere £10 million.
It really is as good as new (literally, it didn't work then and it doesn't work now).

The tale gets disturbing after that…

<BB<

I can understand that thought, Bluebottle. And now I'm imagining that floating bridge in New England.

Just reading this again, I had one more question:

"the would-be securities thieves" - this epithet is a bit of a mouthful - would it work better to delete the word 'securities', as you haven't mentioned what they are?

No problem, done.

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