Parnassus on Wheels
by Christopher Morley 1890–1947
The book, and the century it came out of.
A middle-aged farm woman, tired of keeping house for a brother who has become a famous author of rustic sketches, buys a travelling bookshop — horse, van and stock — from the little red-bearded man driving it, and takes to the roads of New England selling literature door to door. Morley was a Rhodes Scholar and a founder of the Saturday Review who adored books to the point of writing this in 1917 as a love letter to selling them. Illustrated with 58 full-page plates — paintings by Mount, Inness and Bricher among them.
I wonder if there isn’t a lot of bunkum in higher education?
Parnassus on Wheels, by Christopher Morley, complete and unabridged. Spelling and punctuation follow present-day American usage; the sentences, the paragraphs and the voice are the author’s, word for word.
It was written in another era and may carry attitudes a reader today will find dated. They are kept for the sake of the work and do not reflect the views of this house.
- Series
- Comedy & Satire
- Format
- Ebook
- Extent
- about 72 pages
- Reading time
- about an hour
- Illustrations
- Full-page plates, credited
- Text
- Complete, unabridged
- Language
- en
- This edition
- 2026
- ISBN
- 9785501909236
58 paintings are bound into this edition
Six of them are shown here, taken from the volume itself. Each is reproduced full page and named with its painter and year.
A page from this edition
Not a mock-up: this page is taken from the finished volume. The ornament above the chapter belongs to its shelf and to no other, the opening letter is set as a drop capital, and the plate below carries the name of the painter and the year.
Both photographed from the finished volume.
Parnassus on Wheels, issued in this edition by Aeneas Press in 2026 on the Comedy & Satire shelf. Newly set, with the ornament of its series above each chapter and a drop capital on the opening page. Illustrated with full-page plates, each named with its painter.
Published as an ebook and not issued in print by this house; it carries one ISBN, 9785501909236, and is supplied worldwide. This edition — its setting, its ornament, its cover art, and the selection and attribution of its plates — © 2026 Aeneas Press.
Questions readers ask
- Is this the whole of Parnassus on Wheels?
- Yes — complete and unabridged. Nothing is cut, condensed or paraphrased. This is the book, not a summary of it.
- What exactly did you change?
- The spelling and the punctuation follow present-day American usage. Christopher Morley's sentences are untouched — same words, same order, same rhythm.
- Are the pictures really in the book?
- Yes. The edition carries full-page plates bound into the text, each one named with its painter and the year it was made. Six of them are shown on this page.
- How long is it?
- About 72 pages, which is roughly about an hour of reading.
- What do I actually get?
- An illustrated ebook with its own ISBN, sold worldwide. One file, yours to keep, readable on any device.
