BASIC ENGLISH READING BOOKS and SOURCES

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Ogden hoped to have 1,000 works of great writers of the present and past and 1,000 books of general knowledge in the sciences as a seed for Basic English. He was well on the way when he died, as this list shows.

Works by Ogden.  From The Basic English Publishing Company, London

• Basic English. A general account of the system, its history, and its purposes. Ogden, C.K, London, 1930, 1940.
• Basic English Applied (Science), Ogden, C.K, London, 1931.
• The Basic Dictionary. Provides Basic translations for 7,500 words of ordinary English. Ogden, C.K, London, 1932.
• Basic English and Grammatical Reform. Ogden, C.K., Eldritch Press, 1937.   Or here.
• Our Changing Times, The Basic English Publishing Co, Cambridge.
• The Basic Reading Books, Pitman and Sons, London.
• Basic English Versus the Artificial Languages. Kegan Paul, Trench & Co, 1935, 184 pages.
• A Basic Astronomy, by S.L. Salzedo; London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, 1934. Psyche Miniatures General Series No. 65, 96 pages.
• Basic for Business by S L Salzedo. 1933 . Psyche Miniatures series, 101 pages. ISBN: B0007JSZVK
• Basic for Economics. by L.W. Lockwood, with a special word-list.
• Basic for Geology. With a special word-list.
• Basic for Science. With the special word-list for general science and those for certain branches.
• Basic English and Grammatical Reform. A discussion of the place of Basic English in general education.
• Basic Step by Step, Ogden, C. K., 1935. 280 pages.
  A simple teaching-book giving the 850 words in 30 groups, with reading-material, notes, and pictures.
• The Basic Teacher : A Course for European Students by L. W. Lockhart - complete
• The Basic Books by Ogden gives a description of all of the books in Basic or about Basic at the time : texts, factual and fiction , is put online by Ryota Iijima in 2005 . If that link does not work, then here.
• "The Basic News," No. 10.

Reading Books:

• The Basic Reading Books by L.W. Lockhart
• The Basic Books and Our Changing Times
• Basic by Isotype by Dr. Otto Neurath , 1937. Psyche Miniatures No. 86
• A Basic Phonetic Reader by Lloyd James -- a few pages from many works

For The Young

• Black Beauty, Anne Sewell. With pictures.
• Gulliver in Lilliput, Jonathan Swift; retold by Hodges, translated by BEI. - complete
• Jackanapes, Juliana Horatia Ewing.
• Keawe's Bottle ("The Bottle Imp"), R. L. Stevenson.
• Robinson Crusoe, Daniel Defoe.
• Stories for the Young, Leo Tolstoi, 1934, 94 pages, PM#66. Put into Basic by J Rantz.
• Stories from France, Perrault.
• Stories from Hans Andersen.   
  The Little Match Girl
• Wise Words of an Early American, Benjamin Franklin

  "Our Changing Times" books

  Across the Isthmus of Panama.	Schoolboys of Early Times
  All About Motion Pictures.	(I and II).
  Electric Power at Work.	Ships of Yesterday.
  Fireside Stories.	The Thunder Bird.
  The First Virginians.	To Far Cathay.
  Great Discoveries.	Traders of Santa Fe.
  How Men Have Kept Their Records.	The White Man Comes to New York.
  Late Night Special.	Wings Away.
  The Post Bag.	Wires Round the Earth.
  The Potter's Wheel.

  For Older Readers

• Arms and the Man, Bernard Shaw.   - a humorous play. - complete
• A Basic Astronomy, S. L. Salzedo. - complete
• The Basic St. John, This book of The Bible put into Basic English by the Rev. Edwin W. Smith.
• Between the Lines, Old Greek Stories in New Dress, W. Repton.
• Bible in Basic English,   - New Testiment - complete , plus most of Hebrew Bible
  Discussion
• Carl and Anna, Leonhard Frank.   - a sophisticated novel. - complete
• The Chemical History of a Candle, Michael Faraday.
• Death in High Society, Inez Holden. Short Stories. - complete
• Electricity and Magnetism, H. S. Hatfield.
• European Science, H. S. Hatfield.
• General History in Outline and Story, E. H. Carter and C. K. Ogden - complete
• The Gold Insect by Edgar Allan Poe, being "The Gold Bug" put into Basic English by A.P. Rossiter. - complete
• International Picture Language, Otto Neurath. An account of the Iso-type system.
• International Talks, Wickham Steed. With Basic parallel.
• Lamb's Stories from Shakespeare
• Japanese Stories, Lafcadio Hearn.
• Julius Caesar, William Shakespeare. With Basic parallel and notes by A. P. Rossiter.
• Mr. Midshipman Easy, Captain Marryat. Basic by M Bottrall.
• The Organization of Peace, Maxwell Garnett
• The Outlook of Science, J. B. S. Haldane.
• The Potter's Art, W. Repton.
• Science and Well-Being, J. B. S. Haldane.
• Stories from the Bible; The Basic St. Mark; Song of Songs.
• That Night ("Sono Yo"), Tumura
• The Three Signs, Hawthorne, Irving, and Poe. Short stories.
• The Time Machine, H. G. Wells.
• The Two Friends, Ivan Tourgenieff. Put into Basic by Noel Evans.
• Uncle Silas, J. Sheridan LeFanu.
• What Things are Made Of, H. S. Hatfield.
  
      The books above were in-print from The Basic English Publishing Company, London, at the time of Ogden's death.

  From Other Book Companies

• The Bible in Basic English   or here. (Cambridge University Press, 1949, 910 pp. Old & New Testament. Reprint 1961, 1994)
• The New Testament in Basic English   (Cambridge University Press, 1941, 461 pages.) - complete.
• The General Basic English Dictionary. Giving the sense in Basic English of over 20,000 English words   (Evans Brothers Limited).
• The Science Dictionary in Basic English. U.K.   (Evans Brothers Limited, London, 1965.)   Or as
  The Basic Science Dictionary. U.S.   (Macmillan Company, New York, 1966.)
  Giving the sense of over 25,000 words and word-groups taken from all branches of science. First put out in 1965, this work is an addition to the list of books in print at C. K. Ogden's death.
• The Basic Way to English, Books 1-4 , in ordered stages, with pictures, and separate Teachers' Books 1-4 (Evans Brothers limited).
• The Basic Way Reading Books, 1 and 2. (Evans Brothers Limited).
• From Basic to Wider English, Books 1-6. Latest printing, with new pictures and other changes, 1968 (Evans Brothers).
• Basis and Essentials, series. (Nelson) by Duff
• A Christmas Story ("A Christmas Carol"), Charles Dickens (Evans Brothers Limited).
• Development of Mathematical Logic , Nidditch, Peter H. Summary of history of formal logic. In print
• The Growth of Science, Rossiter
• Gulliver in Lilliput, Johathan Swift
• Inventions Today, Hatfield (Penguin-Pelican)
• The Jefferson Bible by Thomas Jefferson
• The Republic of Plato : a new version founded on Basic English,* I. A. Richards (Norton)
• The Roots of Science, J. A. Lauwerys (Evans Brothers Limited).
• The Sea and Its Living Things, H. S. Hatfield (Evans Brothers limited).
• Stories from the Odyssey, (Evans Brothers Limited).
• Treasure Island, R. L. Stevenson (Evans Brothers Limited).
• The Water-Babies, Charles Kingsley (Evans Brothers Limited).
• African Beliefs and Christian Faith, Rev. Edwin Smith.
• Basic Rules of Reason, I.A. Richards.
• Statement and Suggestion : The Basic English System as an Instrument for Reading Verse, A. P. Rossiter.
• Twentieth Century Houses, Raymond McGrath.

Books about Basic English  or  English as an International Language:

• Basic English compiled by Julia E. Johnson. Wilson, Reference Self Series, Vol 15 No.1, 1944. A collection of 30 essays on Basic English to satisfy the curiosity generated by Winston Churchill's encouragement before the Congress of the United States in 1943. Ten descriptive by Ogden, Richards, etc., 10 favorable, and 10 critical . - Good.
• Basic English for Adult Education by the Department of Adult Education of the National Education Association to give the whole setting of Basic English in its larger aspects, to give some picture of what it is over and above its usefulness to foreign-born Americans.
• Basic English and Its Uses, Richards, I.A., 1943, Norton & Co.,New York. Includes a list of books on or in Basic. (Many books, from the Bible to H.G. Wells' stories, were translated to Basic, to popularize it and prove that it was adequate to saying anything.)
• Basic in Teaching: East and West, Richards, I.A., 1935, Psyche Miniatures. China experience.
• Basic English versus the Artificial Languages, C.K. Ogden
• C.K. Ogden : A Collective Memoir, edited by P. Sargant Florence and J.R.L. Anderson ; Clarke, Doble, & Brendon Ltd, 1977. ISBN: 0301 76061 6. 252 pages.
• Brighter Basic, C.K. Ogden 1931. Examples of Basic
• C. K. Ogden: a bio-bibliographic study by W. Terrence Gordon. Scarecrow Press, Metuchen, N.J. & London, 1990 . Summery of Ogden's life (55 pp) and complete bibliography (96 pp) .
• Counter-Offensive : An Exposure of Certain Misrepresentations of Basic English Introduction by W. Terrence Gordon.   Ogden's reply to a critic of Basic English, simultaneously giving the full background of the development of Basic, its teaching techniques, and an instructive case-study of careless scholarship and statistical method gone awry. March 1999. Thoemmes Press ISBN 1-85506-770-6   396 pages. Price: £75.00 / $120.00
• Debabelization : With a survey of contemporary opinion on the problem of a universal language, (Psyche miniatures. General series) by C. K Ogden
• Design for Escape : World Education Through Modern Media" by I. A. Richards
• From Pictures to Letters by Ellen Walpole. Psyche Miniatures No. 85 - Kindergarten.
• How to Read A Page by I. A. Richards. A course in efficient reading with an introduction to 100 Great Words. 99 are from Basic English.
• Jeremy Bentham 1832-2032, being the Centenary Lecture, by C. K. Ogden. He credits Bentham as the spark for Basic .
• Learning Basic English. A practical handbook for English-speaking people., I.A. Richards and Christine Gibson. Norton & Co., New York, 1945. - Good.
• Lone Star Planet Fiction, Basic English as an Interplanetary language. by H. Beam Piper and John J. McGuire, 1958, Ace SciFi.
• Opposition : A Linguistic and Psychological Analysis by C. K. Ogden, 1932 . Helps understand how he selected words of opposite meanings and scales.
• So Much Nearer: Essays Toward a World English, Richards, I.A., 1968.
  Ten linked essays moving toward that humane society where all men will better understand what they see, read, hear.
• Techniques in Language Control by I.A. Richards, Christine Gibson, 1974. Basic for Every Man's English.
• Word Economy: A Study in Applied Linguistics   by L. W. Lockhart , 1931   new
• English as a Global Language by David Crystal, Cambridge U. Press, 1997. ISBN 0 521 5 9247x. History and future of International English.
• English as Lingua Franca: Double talk in Global Persuasion by Karin Devring, 1997. ISBN 0-275-95878-7 Even though English is actually the world language of economics, technology, and sports -- the same words and phrases do mean the same thing -- air traffic control and stock market quotes. But political ...

  Not Basic English - avoid confusion

• Basic International Language Quick International Understanding in One-Tenth the Time Using International Words by Wesley E Arnold, June 1993. This is Esperanto. Trade paperback, 104 pages, ISBN: 0915935120
• Basic English for Science by Peter Donovan, Aug 1978, Oxford Univ Press, 149 pg. ISBN: 0194571815
  This is introductory standard English for non-native speakers preparing to study a science subject. $11.50.
• English Picture Word Book by Hayward Cirker and Barbara Steadman. This is a coloring book with objects named. Page one introduces apple, bird, and cat, but also paper plate, clothes pole, and picnic table. Although not Basic English, it is an educational toy that supports learning language. ISBN: 0-486-27776-3. List$4, sale $1 + S&H at Half.com.
• Gulliver in Lilliput . Not all translations by Margaret Hodges are Basic. The Institute has made a translation..

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  Full Bibliographies
• Basic English Bibliography   -- 196 books
• The BASIC BOOKS by Ogden gives a description of all of the books in Basic or about Basic at the time : texts, factual and fiction , is put online by Ryota Iijima in 2005 at : http://www2.educ.fukushima-u.ac.jp/~ryota/basic_books.html. If that link does not work, then here.

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  Last updated Oct'12 - add Word Economy.
  March 2012 - add "Arms and the Man". ; July 2012 - add "The Gold Insect", "A Basic Astronomy" ; Aug 2012 - add "Death in High Society".
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