1. anne bradstreet
  the prologue
  the author to her book
  in memory of my dear grandchild elizabeth bradstreet,
    who deceased august, 1665, being a year and half old.
  here follows some verses upon the burning of our house
    july 10th, 1666
  as weary pilgrim
2. benjamin franklin
  from the autobiography
3. washington irving
  rip van winkle
4. james fenimore cooper
  from the pioneers
5. ralph waldo emerson
  from self-reliance
6. henry david thoreau
  from walden
7. edgar allan poe
  ligeia
  the cask of amontillado
8. nathaniel hawthorne
  young goodman brown
  the minister's black veil
9. herman melville
  from moby-dick
10. harriet beecher stowe
  from uncle tom's cabin
11. frederick douglass
  from my bondage and my freedom
12. walt whitman
  i hear america singing
  i saw in louisiana a live-oak growing
  one's-self i sing
  out of the cradle endlessly rocking
  when lilacs last in the dooryard bloom'd
13. emily dickinson
  poems (67, 214, 288,303,328, 435, 449, 465,632, 709, 712,1129)
14. mark twain
  from the adventures of huckleberry finn
15. henry james
  from daisy miller
16. sarah orne jewett
  a white heron
17. mary e. wilkins freeman
  old woman magoun
18. stephen crane
  the open boat
19. charlotte perkins gilman
  the yellow wall-paper
20. kate chopin
  desiree's baby
  the story of an hour
  a pair of silk stockings