Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia

Benét's Reader's Encyclopedia is an American reference work devoted to world literature. The first volume appeared in 1948, edited by Pulitzer Prize-winner William Rose Benét, older brother of the writer Stephen Vincent Benét. Benét set out to "present to [the reader] a well-organized supplementary memory, in one volume". The encyclopedia was based on Ebenezer Cobham Brewer's classic Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, and offered a compendium of curious information (such as "Aani. In Egyptian mythology, the dog-headed ape sacred to the god Thoth"). The second edition appeared in 1965, with the addition of new entries, the expansion of old entries, and the addition of illustrations.