A engaging, stimulating collection of writings by a wide variety of personage from Thomas Jefferson to Fredrick Douglas to William Shakespeare to George Orwell or Maya Angelou to Igor Stravinsky to Alexander Woollcott to JohnUpdike or Mark Twain and much more. Quite a collection as you can see from that short list of names. Thought-provoking, a book that will get the fluids flowing in the reader's brain.
Great collection of short stories and essays to give a writer an idea of the diversity of writing styles and subject matter available to share with his audience.
Poetry selection isn't that good. The essays are fine, but they are generally heavily anthologized, so you could really find the material in this book anywhere.