Books with title Corydon

Corydon was founded at the population center of the Indiana Territory. William Smith chose a ridge with a commanding view at the confluence of Big and Little Indian Creeks for his home and was comfortably settled around 1800. Territorial governor William Henry Harrison was a frequent guest, giving his name to the county that was later established. Corydon eclipsed Clarksville to become the territorial capital when the Illinois Territory was cut away in 1813, leaving the previous capital at Vincennes on the extreme western boundary of the Indiana Territory. Indiana became the 19th state on December 11, 1816. In 1827, William Holmes McGuffey (of McGuffey's Readers fame) recommended William Porter for headmaster of the Corydon Seminary. Porter went on to become a judge and bought the Gov. William Hendricks residence. Porter's daughter Helen married Patrick Griffin and raised her family in the house where she had been born. Maurice Griffin raised his family on the square, where his son Frederick Porter Griffin resided until arranging for the Hendricks house to become part of the Corydon Capitol State Historic Site. The Porter-Griffin family photographs, now housed in the Frederick Porter Griffin Center, made this book possible.

Corydon was founded at the population center of the Indiana Territory. William Smith chose a ridge with a commanding view at the confluence of Big and Little Indian Creeks for his home and was comfortably settled around 1800. Territorial governor William Henry Harrison was a frequent guest, giving his name to the county that was later established. Corydon eclipsed Clarksville to become the territorial capital when the Illinois Territory was cut away in 1813, leaving the previous capital at Vincennes on the extreme western boundary of the Indiana Territory. Indiana became the 19th state on December 11, 1816. In 1827, William Holmes McGuffey (of McGuffey’s Readers fame) recommended William Porter for headmaster of the Corydon Seminary. Porter went on to become a judge and bought the Gov. William Hendricks residence. Porter’s daughter Helen married Patrick Griffin and raised her family in the house where she had been born. Maurice Griffin raised his family on the square, where his son Frederick Porter Griffin resided until arranging for the Hendricks house to become part of the Corydon Capitol State Historic Site. The Porter-Griffin family photographs, now housed in the Frederick Porter Griffin Center, made this book possible.

Considered by Gide to be the most important of his books, this slim, exquisitely crafted volume consists of four dialogues on the subject of homosexuality and its place in society. Published anonymously in bits and pieces between 1911 and 1920, Corydon first appeared in a signed, commercial edition in France in 1924 and in the United States in 1950, the year before Gide's death. The present edition features the impeccable translation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Richard Howard. In spirited dialogue with his bigoted, boorish interviewer, Corydon marshals evidence from naturalists, historians, poets, and philosophers to support his contention that homosexuality pervaded the most culturally and artistically advanced civilizations, from Greece in the age of Pericles to Renaissance Italy and England in the age of Shakespeare. Although obscured by later critics, literature and art from Homer to Titian proclaim the true nature of relationships between such lovers as Achilles and Patrocles--not to mention Virgil's mythical Corydon and his shepherd, Alexis. The evidence, Corydon suggests, points to heterosexuality as a socially constructed union, while the more fundamental, natural relation is the homosexual one. "My friends insist that this little book is of the kind which will do me the greatest harm," Gide wrote of his Corydon. In these pages, contemporary readers will find a prescient and courageous treatment of a topic that has scarcely become less controversial.