Think the title of my review sounds a bit lofty? Wait till you read this book. It is absolutely amazing, the degree to which Sheperd's reading has gone-- an inexhaustible source list in at least ten different languages spanning centuries, all in an attempt to document the myth of the unicorn. Fuzzy fantasy novel fans beware, this is not a book up your alley! And if you aren't really interested in medieval thought and language, it's not up your alley either. However, if cultural studies, intellectual history and comparative mythology strike your fancy, read on.

I give this book my heartiest recommendation. It is 73 years old and represents a very well-read man's excursion into whimsy-- dabbling in an interest, a break from the scholarly routine, ascribe whatever motive you want-- but I promise that it is deeply absorbing, enlightening and marvelously arcane.

If you fish for trout, using a fly floating on top of the water, you will love this book.
If you're not a dry fly fisherman, you might just become one after reading this book.

I recieved my first copy when it first came out! It was one of my first unicorn books, and i was just a kid. I loved it, it got me into history, mythology and helped me understand a lot about the unicorn in general.

this book is a great reference for unicorn mythology, lore, pictoral reference and anything else you can use it for. I have actually used it in my own artwork , i have done illustrations of all the unicorns in the book, as a kid i had made it a goal, the unicorn, monoceras, kirrin, abath, re'em and everything in between. it was actually a book that got me to get up and do something. it got me to study that mythical beast that is always in my dreams and near me in some way...

from the mythology of the unicorn's creation, to Jesus, to Satan to whatever else this creature has pranced though

You can tell so much how dedicated this author was, i have even found references in fiction and fantasy books about this author and his wonderful book (Unicorn Mountain). this book is a must-have, must-read book for anyone who likes unicorns. It is always in the bibliography section of unicorn books, and it itself has a great bibliography, which i love so that i can get those books!!

i recommend this book above all others if you like the rich history of the elusive and magnificent Unicorn!

If you have any experience with Dover publications, you'll know to expect something terrific. You won't be mistaken. Odell Shepard presents a work of such thorough, painstaking scholarship, it should be held up as a model for what scholarship ought to be. In fact, you get a pretty good sense of the history of scholarliness itself, reading this. If you find yourself sort of hypnotized by the excitement of looking over the shoulders of centuries worth of savants, I recommend you also read anything by Anthony Grafton, who writes about issues in the history of Renaissance scholarship. Another thing -- what a beautiful writing style this Odell Shepard possesses. His prose is characterized by an exacting usage of language (languages, I should say, because he apparently has a fluency with Latin, Greek, French, Italian, and probably other languages as well), and also by a taste for baroque, nineteenth century sentence structure. Really beautiful stuff. He loves his subject, and he loves the way it has been handed down through the ages. Two thumbs up.

I've been looking for a while for an all-encompassing, in-depth text on the historical significance and study of the unicorn. This book is it. It is filled to the brim with hundreds and hundreds of facts, accounts, testimonials, examinations and analyses of the unicorn throughout history. I was deeply disappointed in reading Roy Wilkinson's sappy "Are You A Unicorn?" This book compensates extensively where other books about the unicorn have failed. Especially interesting are juxtaposed conjectures and certainties of the unicorn. Wonderfully written and thoroughly researched, this is the truest guide to the Unicorn if ever there was one.

The Heart Of Thoreau's Journals provides readers with an intimate glimpse into the heart and mind of American literature's premier individualist. Consolidated into 218 concise pages by Odell Shepard from the 39 volumes Thoreau left behind upon his death at 45 in 1862, the journals reveal Thoreau as an irreverent and shrewd observer of the human character who was happily fated with the gift of forever seeing the king riding proudly in public without clothes ("The mass never comes up the standard of its best member, but on the contrary degrades itself to the level with the lowest," "After all, the field of battle possesses many advantages over the drawing - room. There is at least no room for pretension or excessive ceremony, no shaking of hands or rubbing of noses, which makes one doubt your sincerity, but hearty as well as hard hand - play. It at least exhibits one of the faces of humanity, the former only a mask," "This lament for a golden age is only a lament for golden men").

Requiring solitude in the manner most require food and shelter, the philosophical, ascetic Thoreau lived most of his life in isolation ("The poet must keep himself unstained and aloof") as an ardent lover and keen observer of the natural world ("All of nature is my bride," "My profession is to be always on the alert to find God in nature, to know his lurking - places, to attend all the oratorios, the operas, in nature"). A comedic misanthrope ("I have lived some thirty - odd years on this planet, and I have yet to hear the first syllable of valuable or even earnest advice from my seniors," "The society of young women is the most unprofitable I have ever tried"), Thoreau also wrote with sympathy, understanding, and concern about the townspeople whose company he preferred not to keep. Even his plain - spoken contempt for the boorish, the smug, the pretentious and the assertively conformist ("What men call social virtues, good fellowship, is commonly but the virtue of pigs in a litter, which lie close together to keep each other warm") was often tempered with humanity and matter - of - fact acceptance for the inevitable variations of man's psychology. The simple, the genuine, the uncomplicated and the sincere came in for high marks in Thoreau's estimation of people, places, and things.

A Harvard graduate who was born and spent most of his life in New England, bachelor Thoreau set the standard and defined the blueprint for all introverted American artists and thinkers to come. Though Thoreau wrote incessantly and found work as a lecturer, schoolteacher, editor, and tutor at different periods of his life, he typically worked as a gardener, handyman or land surveyor, and spent a particularly frustrating period working in his father's pencil factory. Though he knew himself to be misunderstood by most, Thoreau was uncomplaining ("Ah! How I have thriven on solitude and poverty! I cannot overstate this advantage"), confident, ultimately self - satisfied, and generally unconcerned with what, if anything, future generations would make of him. The respect, acknowledgement, and honor of society meant far less to him than his day - to - day, moment - to - moment freedom to continue to enjoy his perceptions, sensations, and ideas, which he rightfully understood to be his life's work and birthright.

As one of the founders of Transcendentalism, the idealistic Thoreau was a dryly passionate believer in man's capacity to overcome mundane (and often self - imposed) obstacles, identify and focus his attention on the eternal fundamentals of life, and enjoy personal communion with God by utilizing nature as a lens. The journals abound with declarative passages which readers have found enlightening, guiding, and inspirational for generations ("Despair and postponement are cowardice and defeat. Men were born to succeed, and not to fail," "We forever and ever and habitually underrate our fate...ninety - nine and one - hundredths of our lives we are mere hedgers and ditchers, but from time to time we meet with reminders of our destiny"). Thoreau's journals, along with key American text and masterpiece Walden, represent the cream of his work.

I once sat through a very snide speech, by a very snide editor, who pontificated in a very snide manner, that "no one wants to read your journals." This editor was of course a fool- the very best writing is to be found in personal journals. Nowhere is this demonstrated to be more true than in Thoreau's. Or as he himself put it,"The writer who postpones the recording of his thoughts uses an iron which has cooled to burn a hole with. He cannot inflame the minds of his audience." Well, these writings inflame the mind. Thoreau was that rarest of of divine gifts, a true Individual. I often wonder if he did not represent the highest point that anyone in our society ever reached- the high water mark of a civilization before steam engines, corporations, and mass education reduced us to our present state.
I was concerned that the journals might suffer by editing, especially if an academic type with a deconstructionist ax to grind got his hands on them. Mr. Shepard's brief introduction put my mind to rest. He obviously has a close sympathy with the spirit of Henry David Thoreau and his selections are masterful. As Shepard puts it: "With a fit audience, though few, he is likely to win a more thoughtful reading now that individuals are so obviously withering among us, now that men are quite obviously enslaved by machines, now that we have floundered about as far as we can in the bogs of stupidity, greed, and cowering compliance that he warned us against long ago."
If _Walden_ spoke to you, these journal entries will speak even more strongly to you. This is the spring from which _Walden_ and all the rest sprang. This is the soul of Thoreau. It is the soul of the true America before the Byzantine rot set in.
There is one line from the very first year of the journals that has never ceased to inspire me: "All fear of the world or consequences is swallowed up in a manly anxiety to do Truth justice."

"The words of some men are thrown forcibly against you and adhere like burs." Thoreau's Journal, June 4, 1839. This is certainly true with me and this book.

No book that I own -- aside from Scripture -- is more valuable to me than this slim one. I have reread it countless times, usually while sitting of a warm or cool evening beneath the trees waiting for the stars to troop out.

In Walden Thoreau speaks of Alexander carrying the Iliad in a precious cask with him on his journeys. This is book worthy to be carried with me on my journey.

As I read and reread this book it causes me to look on everything I have ever thought, done or believed in a new and startlingly new light.

This little paperback is at once one of the cheapest and most valuable books I own.