A National Edition of the Country's Literature

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Dec 4, 2000 | by Rex Roberts

Now more than two decades old, with some 130 volumes in print, the Library of America has made considerable progress toward its venerable goal: "to help preserve the nation's cultural heritage by publishing America's best and most significant writing in durable and authoritative editions."

The library prides itself on its "neat, handsome and unpretentious" editions (as it describes them on its useful Website, www.loa.org), which range between 700 and 1,600 pages in length. The books are printed in Galliard type on 30-lb. acid-free stock and bound with the grain of the paper "to ensure they open easily and lie flat without crinkling or buckling." The designers have considered every detail, from ribbon markers to trim size (all books measure 4 7/8 by 7 7/8, "based on the `golden section,' which the ancient Greeks considered to be the ideal proportion").

The editing of the texts has been equally rigorous. Scholars research each work to ameliorate differences in various editions, taking into consideration the author's comments where available and restoring passages that were dropped or altered. The new collections of Thomas Paine, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Wright, William Faulkner and Robed Frost "have made all previous editions of these writers' works obsolete," according to the library.

The Library of America sells about a quarter-million volumes a year, at a reduced cost, it claims, so as to ensure that books will be available to all readers as well as to small public libraries and high schools with limited budgets. To cover the shortfall, the publisher relies on grants and contributions from foundations and private individuals (seed money came from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Ford Foundation).

Among the interesting editions published so far in series:

* American Sermons: The Pilgrims to Martin Luther King Jr.

* The Debate on the Constitution, Volume One: September 1787 to February 1788; Volume Two: January to August 1788.

* Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1930s and 40s; American Noir of the 1950s.