The Real Adventure vs Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1
Both counted from their full texts, the same way, on the same day.
2,061words between them — 8 min of it
The Real Adventure is longer — 202,555 words against 200,494 for Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1, a difference of 2,061 words or about 8 min of extra reading. Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 is the harder read, at grade 12.7 against 8.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·both editions counted the same way·REVIEWED JUL 2026
Side by side
| The Real Adventure | Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 | |
|---|---|---|
| Author | Webster, Henry Kitchell | Disraeli, Isaac |
| Words | 202,555 | 200,494 |
| Reading time at 250 wpm | 13h 30m | 13h 22m |
| Unique words | 13,514 | 18,635 |
| Sentences | 10,467 | 7,506 |
| Average sentence length | 19.4 words | 26.7 words |
| Reading grade | 8 | 12.7 |
| Reading ease | 71.9 | 51.8 |
| Long words | 8.2% | 13.2% |
Highlighted cells are the larger figure — except reading ease, where higher means easier.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·both editions, same counting rule·REVIEWED JUL 2026
How this is worked out
- Both texts are counted the same way, from the same source, with Gutenberg's header and licence footer struck first.
- The gap is stated in words and then in time at 250 words a minute — the rate is printed because a duration without one cannot be checked.
- Difficulty is compared on Flesch–Kincaid grade, which reads sentence and word length only. It cannot see irony or dialect, so treat it as a measure of surface, not of effort.
gap = |202,555 − 200,494| = 2,061 words 2,061 ÷ 250 wpm = 8 min of extra reading
The second question
Which is longer, The Real Adventure or Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1?
The Real Adventure is longer — 202,555 words against 200,494 for Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1, a difference of 2,061 words or about 8 min of extra reading. Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 1 is the harder read, at grade 12.7 against 8.
Colophon
Both figures computed from Project Gutenberg plain-text editions — ebook no. 15384 and no. 21615 — and from no other source. Neither book’s text is set on this site.
SOURCE·Project Gutenberg full texts·US public domain·REVIEWED JUL 2026
Word counts and reading levels are computed from a specific public-domain edition and will differ from other editions and from other counting methods — see the method page.
