A Picturesque Tale of Progress - advice please!

[mathnmusic]

What would you do? I have the opportunity to buy a fair condition set of A Picturesque Tale of Progress for $30 without the index volume. Would you consider this set a "must have", a "nice to have", "take it or leave it" or something in between? Also, is there any overtly racist commentary in there? We have SOTW and CHOW at home already. Does this set add something really special?

[PeterPan]

Fair condition isn't very good in used book terms. I have part of a set (not sure how much) in my bookroom. I'll go check on it in a couple hours after this workshop I'm watching ends. It's in fabulous condition.

[Violet Crown]

1. I'd worry about the 'fair' condition a bit.

2. It's not overtly racist, but Miller shared in the obsession of her time in knowing exactly what shade of skin everyone had. In the Egypt section, it got so tiresome having the Nubians and their neighbors always referred to with the adjective 'dark-skinned' - I mean like every third sentence sometimes - that I would just edit it out as I went. In the Africa section, she actually refers to children in one caption as 'pickaninnies.':ack2: But her saving grace is that, as I recall, she genuinely doesn't look down on any cultures or present them as inferior (except with regard to obvious things aspects like human sacrifice).

3. It's old enough that there are some errors; the history of the migrations of some Central American peoples, for instance, is out of date.

 

Putting aside these caveats, I think it's a series worth owning. Use it as a readaloud and discuss or edit as you go. I love that it includes stories from the various cultures in nearly every section, and that the illustrations are often detailed drawings of artifacts.

[mathnmusic]

Thanks OhElizabeth for bumping the thread and checking your books!

 

Thanks Sharon in Austin for the very good points you made. History was my worst subject in school so I'm afraid I won't know enough to correct the errors that we might read in these books. Despite being a book hoarder, I might have to pass on this set because of that. You provided me with valuable input to make a decision after hemming and hawing on this sale for a couple days - thank you! And my overly stuffed bookcases thank you too. :001_smile:

 

You ladies rock!

[kalanamak]

But her saving grace is that, as I recall, she genuinely doesn't look down on any cultures or present them as inferior (except with regard to obvious things aspects like human sacrifice).

 

Putting aside these caveats, I think it's a series worth owning. Use it as a readaloud and discuss or edit as you go. I love that it includes stories from the various cultures in nearly every section, and that the illustrations are often detailed drawings of artifacts.

 

:iagree: I sure enjoyed it.

[Aurelia]

I'd say the series is "nice to have", but only in better than "fair" condition. Books in that range are generally well-used, and not particularly gently. I actually decided to get the first four volumes to use for ancient history next year, since the narrative seems to flow better than SOTW (we found SOTW to be really choppy). I am cutting back on some of the material they cover (IIRC, the life of Jesus and the growth of Christianity covers 2/3 of book 4) and using SOTW to cover topics either not touched on in PTOP (mostly the history of civilizations of China, India, etc) or to briefly cover a couple of topics I want to spend less time on. Ariel loves that it has many more pictures than SOTW, she's a visual learner and pictures help her retention tremendously.