for 32 days, i am showing samples of the problems
with the text in e-books from the internet archive...
***
today's example is again from our friend from baltimore,
edgar allen poe, this time volume 1 of his collected works.
here's the scan for page 29:
> http://www.archive.org/stream/worksofedgaralle01poee#page/29
here's the o.c.r. for the whole book:
> http://ia341314.us.archive.org/0/items/worksofedgaralle01poee/worksofedgaralle01poee_djvu.txt
and here's the o.c.r. for page 29:
>
> THE POETIC PRINCIPLE 29
>
> work more thoroughly dignified, more supremely
> noble, than this verj^ poem, this poem per se, this
> poem which is a poem and nothing more, this
> poem wi'itten solely for the poem's sake.
>
> With as deep a reverence for the True as ever
> inspired the bosom of man, I would nevertheless
> limit, in some measure, its modes of inculcation.
> I would limit to enforce them. I would not en-
> feeble them by dissipation. The demands of
> Truth are severe. She has no sympathy with
> the myrtles. All that which is so indispensable
> in Song is precisely all that with which she has
> nothing whatever to do. It is but making her a
> flaunting paradox to wreathe her in gems and
> flowers. \ln^ enforci ng a truth we need severity
> rather than etilo rescence "o? lans;uage . We^ miist
> be'simple, prec ise,"l:erse. We^QUst pe cooL c^ItQ:
> ummp assioned." In a word, "we must be in that
> mood wJiicli, as nearly as possible, isjtlia exaoj^
> converse of the poe tical . He must be blind in-
> deed who does not perceive the radical and chas-
> mal difference between the truthful and the
> poetical modes of inculcation. He must be
> theory-mad beyond redemption who, in spite of
> these differences, shall still persist in attempting
> to reconcile the obstinate oils and waters of
> Poetry and Truth.
>
> Dividing the world of mind into its three most
> immediately obvious distinctions, we have the
> Pure Intellect, Taste, and the Moral Sense. I
> place Taste in the middle because it is just this
> position which in the mind it occupies. It holds
> intimate relations with either extreme ; but from
once again, we have patron-inflicted annotations on this page,
a few sentences which've been underlined. but if you examine
the o.c.r. throughout the page, you'll also find errors elsewhere.
mostly i choose this page because i was struck by the irony that
the passages which people underline are likely quite meaningful;
yet their underlining can cause o.c.r. to _miss_ that very passage.
-bowerbird