Eidola

“Men are but shadows,” laugh unseen presences in the forest—while, by moonlight, soldiers sleep in their hut and bright-mailed figures pass among them, choosing the dead.

In these poems, the Western Front is more than guns and mud: it is a place where classical gods appear beside lice-ridden shirts, and a moonlit wood offers a moment’s promise of peace. Frederic Manning’s speakers are weary men marching, remembering, longing—and trying to hold fast to love and beauty as war tears through the world they know. The shells may fall; a boy’s face may vanish in smoke. Yet wind, leaves and orchard light still seem to speak of something beyond the killing. What can the living hear in that terrible silence?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.