. Proofread as often or as
seldom as you like, and as many or as few pages as you like. We encourage people
to do 'a page a day', but it's entirely up to you! We hope you will join us in
our mission of 'preserving the literary history of the world in a freely
available form for everyone to use'."

6. EBOOKS IN MORE AND MORE LANGUAGES

What about languages?

Initially, the eBooks were mostly in English. As Project Gutenberg is based in
the United States, it first focused on the English-speaking community in the
country and worldwide.

In October 1997, Michael Hart expressed his intention to expand the publishing
of eBooks in other languages. At the beginning of 1998, the catalog had a few
titles in French (10 titles), German, Italian, Spanish and Latin. In July 1999,
Michael wrote: "I am publishing in one new language per month right now, and
will continue as long as possible."

In early 2004, there were works in 25 languages. In July 2005, there were works
in 42 languages, including Iroquoian, Sanskrit and the Mayan languages. The
seven "main" languages were: English (with 14,548 books on July 27, 2005),
French (577 books), German (349 books), Finnish (218 books), Dutch (130 books),
Spanish (103 books) and Chinese (69 books).

Let us take French as an example. On February 13, 2004, there were 181 eBooks in
French (out of a total of 11,340 eBooks). On May 16, 2005, there were 547 eBooks
in French (out of 15,505 Books). The number tripled in 15 months. This number
should rise significantly during the next few years, notably with Project
Gutenberg Europe (launched in June 2005).

What were the first eBooks posted in French? They were six novels by Stendhal
and two novels by Jules Verne, all released in early 1997. The six novels by
Stendhal were: L'Abbesse de Castro, Les Cenci, La Chartreuse de Parme, La
Duchesse de Palliano, Le Rouge et le Noir and Vittoria Accoramboni. The two
novels by Jules Verne were: De la terre a la lune and Le tour du monde en
quatre-vingts jours. In early 1997, whereas Project Gutenberg offered no English
version of any of Stendhal's writings (yet), three of Jules Verne's novels were
available in English: 20,000 Leagues Under the Seas (original title: Vingt mille
lieues sous les mers), posted in September 1994; Around the World in 80 Days
(original title: Le tour du monde en quatre-vingts jours), posted in January
1994 and From the Earth to the Moon(original title: De la terre a la lune),