The Folio Book of Historic Speeches

This anthology reprints speeches delivered at moments of political, religious, or military crisis, from ancient addresses to later twentieth-century oratory. Typical pieces include a philosopher before a court, a preacher defining a community, a commander before battle, and a civil-rights or revolutionary leader stating terms. Brief headnotes place speaker, date, and occasion; the texts themselves are the speeches, not later summaries. There is no continuous narrative. The book is a documentary reader in public address, not a history of rhetoric and not a biography of the speakers.

Bound in black buckram blocked with a design in silver. Silver endleaves. Black slipcase covered with a photograph of a crowd listening to Douglas Fairbanks.