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"Noah Webster was a truly remarkable man, shrewd, passionate, learned and energetic, God-fearing and patriotic. Mr. Unger has done a fine job reintroducing him to a new generation of Americans." --Washington Times Noah Webster The Life and Times of an American Patriot "More than a lexicographer, Webster was a teacher, philosopher, author, essayist, orator, political leader, public official, and crusading editor. Webster's life thrust him into every major event of the early history of our nation, from the Revolutionary War to the War of 1812. He touched the lives of the most renowned Americans --and the most obscure. He earned the love and friendship of many, the hatred of some, but the respect of all. Noah Webster helped create far more than an American dictionary; he helped create an American nation." --from the Prologue In the first major biography of Noah Webster in over sixty years, author Harlow Unger creates an intriguing portrait of the United States as an energetic and confident young country, even when independence was fragile and the future unclear. Harlow Unger brilliantly restores Webster's monumental legacy as a teacher,legislator, philosopher, lawyer, editor, and one of history's most profoundly influential lexicographers. Breathtaking adventure--from the American Revolution to the War of 1812--and masterful scholarship converge in this riveting chronicle of a singularly American intellect.

For the Encouragement of Learning addresses the contested history of copyright law in Canada, where the economic and reputational interests of authors and the commercial interests of publishers often conflict with the public interest in access to knowledge. It chronicles Canada’s earliest copyright law to explain how pre-Confederation policy-makers understood copyright’s normative purpose. Using government and private archives and copyright registration records, Myra Tawfik demonstrates that the nineteenth-century originators of copyright law intended to promote the advancement of learning in schools by encouraging the mass production of educational material. The book reveals that copyright laws were integral features of British North American education policy and highlights the important roles played by teachers, education reformers, and politicians in the emergence and development of the laws. It also explains how policy-makers began to consider the relationship between copyright and cultural identity formation once British interference into domestic copyright affairs increased, and as Canadian Confederation neared. Using methodologies at the intersection of legal history and book history, For the Encouragement of Learning embeds the copyright legal framework within the history of Canada’s book and print culture.