Carti in categoria Literature & Biography

One of the BBCs 100 Novels That Shaped Our WorldRhys took one of the works of genius of the 19th Century and turned it inside-out to create one of the works of genius of the 20th Century Michele RobertsJean Rhyss masterpiece tells the story of Jane Eyres madwoman in the attic, Bertha Rochester.Born into the oppressive, colonialist society of 1930s Jamaica, white Creole heiress Antoinette Cosway meets a young Englishman who is drawn to her innocent beauty and sensuality. After their marriage, how...

One of the twentieth centurys great undisputed masterpieces, Malcolm Lowrys Under the Volcano includes an introduction by Michael Schmidt in Penguin Modern Classics.It is the fiesta Day of the Dead in the small Mexican town of Quauhnahuac. In the shadow of the volcano, ragged children beg coins to buy skulls made of chocolate, ugly pariah dogs roam the streets and Geoffrey Firmin - ex-consul, ex-husband, an alcoholic and a ruined man - is living out the last day of his life. Drowning himself in ...

A modernist novel of supreme stylistic innovation, James Joyces Ulysses is the towering achievement of twentieth century literature. This Penguin Modern Classics edition includes an introduction by Declan Kiberd. For Joyce, literature is the eternal affirmation of the spirit of man. Written between 1914 and 1921, Ulysses has survived bowdlerization, legal action and bitter controversy. Capturing a single day in the life of Dubliner Leopold Bloom, his friends Buck Mulligan and Stephen Dedalus, hi...

A pioneering work of modernist fiction, using her unique stream-of-consciousness technique to explore the inner lives of her characters, Virginia Woolfs To the Lighthouse is widely regarded as one of the greatest artistic achievements of the twentieth century. This Penguin Classics edition is edited by Stella McNichol, with an introduction and notes by Hermione Lee.To the Lighthouse is at once a vivid impressionistic depiction of a family holiday, and a meditation on marriage, on parenthood and ...

One of the BBCs 100 Novels That Shaped Our WorldA worldwide bestseller and the first part of Achebes African Trilogy, Things Fall Apart is the compelling story of one mans battle to protect his community against the forces of changeOkonkwo is the greatest wrestler and warrior alive, and his fame spreads throughout West Africa like a bush-fire in the harmattan. But when he accidentally kills a clansman, things begin to fall apart. Then Okonkwo returns from exile to find missionaries and colonial ...

Ethan Allen Hawley has lost the acquisitive spirit of his wealthy and enterprising forebears, a long line of proud New England sea captains and Pilgrims. Scarred by failure, Ethan works as a grocery clerk in a store his family once owned. But his wife is restless and his teenage children troubled and hungry for the material comforts he cannot provide. Then a series of unusual events reignites Ethans ambition, and he is pitched on to a bold course, where all scruples are put aside. Steinbecks sea...

A hugely influential philosophical work of prose poetry, Kahlil Gibrans The Prophet is an inspirational, allegorical guide to living, and this Penguin Modern Classics edition includes an introduction by Robin Waterfield.First published in the 1920s, The Prophet is perhaps the most famous work of religious fiction of the twentieth century, and has sold millions of copies in more than twenty languages. Gibrans Prophet speaks of many things central to daily life: love, marriage, death, beauty, pass...

One of the BBCs 100 Novels That Shaped Our WorldA sublimely funny book ... it is a book to be read by all ... unforgettable and universal Candia McWilliamRomantic, heroic, comic and tragic, unconventional schoolmistress Jean Brodie has become an iconic figure in post-war fiction. Her glamour, unconventional ideas and manipulative charm hold dangerous sway over her girls at the Marcia Blaine Academy - the creme de la creme - who become the Brodie set, introduced to a privileged world of adult gam...

Each of these delightful interconnected tales is devoted to a family living in a fertile valley on the outskirts of Monterey, California, and the effects that one particular family has on them all. Steinbeck tackles two important literary traditions here; American naturalism, with its focus on the conflict between natural instincts and the demand to conform to societys norms, and the short story cycle. Set in the heart of Steinbeck land, the lush Californian valleys.

Unfinished at the time of his death, F. Scott Fitzgeralds The Last Tycoon is a story of doomed love set against the extravagance of Americas booming film industry. This Penguin Modern Classics edition is edited with an introduction by Edmund Wilson.The studio lot looks like thirty acres of fairyland the night that a mysterious woman stands and smiles at Monroe Stahr, the last of the great Hollywood princes. Enchanted by one another, they begin a passionate but hopeless love affair, starting with...

An omnibus comprising Raymond Chandlers three Philip Marlowe novels, THE LADY IN THE LAKE, THE HIGH WINDOW and THE LITTLE SISTER.

A black comedy of manners about vast wealth and a woman who can define herself only through the perceptions of others. The beautiful Lily Bart lives among the nouveaux riches of New York City - people whose millions were made in railroads, shipping, land speculation and banking. In this morally and aesthetically bankrupt world, Lily, age twenty-nine, seeks a husband who can satisfy her cravings for endless admiration and all the trappings of wealth. But her quest comes to a scandalous end when s...

She has examined the heart of man with an understanding ... that no other writer can hope to surpass Tennessee WilliamsOften cited as one of the great novels of twentieth-century American fiction, Carson McCullers prodigious first novel was published to instant acclaim when she was just twenty-three. Set in a small town in the middle of the deep South, it is the story of John Singer, a lonely deaf-mute, and a disparate group of people who are drawn towards his kind, sympathetic nature. The owner...

The Haunted Life is the coming-of-age story of Peter Martin, a college track star determined to idle away what he knows will be one of his last innocent summers in his tranquil New England home town. But with the war escalating in Europe and his two closest friends both plotting their escapes, he realizes how sheltered his upbringing has been. As he surveys the competing influences of his youth, he struggles to determine what might lead to an intellectually authentic life. The Haunted Life is ul...

Fifteen exquisite tales from one of the worldd greatest writers of the short storyInnovative, startlingly perceptive and aglow with colour, these stories were written towards the end of Katherine Mansfields tragically short life. Many are set in the authors native New Zealand, others in England and the French Riviera. All are revelations of the unspoken, half-understood emotions that make up everyday experience - from the blackly comic The Daughters of the Late Colonel, and the short, sharp sket...

Her first major literary success, Ayn Rands The Fountainhead is an exalted view of her Objectivist philosophy, portraying a visionary artist struggling against the dull, conformist dogma of his peers; a book of ambition, power, gold and love, published in Penguin Modern Classics.Architect Howard Roark is as unyielding as the granite he blasts to build with. Defying the conventions of the world around him, he embraces a battle over two decades against a double-dealing crew of rivals who will stop...

Described as a metaphysical shocker at the time of its release, Muriel Sparks The Drivers Seat is a taut psychological thriller, published with an introduction by John Lanchester in Penguin Modern Classics.Lise has been driven to distraction by working in the same accountants office for sixteen years. So she leaves everything behind her, transforms herself into a laughing, garishly-dressed temptress and flies abroad on the holiday of a lifetime. But her search for adventure, sex and new experien...

Revealing the breadth of F. Scott Fitzgeralds gift for the short story form, this Penguin Classics edition of The Case of Benjamin Button and Six Other Stories spans multiple genres and styles to dazzling effect.Full grown with a long, smoke-coloured beard, requiring the services of a cane and fonder of cigars than warm milk, Benjamin Button is a very curious baby indeed. And, as Benjamin becomes increasingly youthful with the passing years, his family wonders why he persists in the embarrassing...

Arthur Millers classic parable of mass hysteria draws a chilling parallel between the Salem witch-hunt of 1692 - one of the strangest and most awful chapters in human history - and the American anti-communist purges led by Senator McCarthy in the 1950s. The story of how the small community of Salem is stirred into madness by superstition, paranoia and malice, culminating in a violent climax, is a savage attack on the evils of mindless persecution and the terrifying power of false accusations.A d...

Including a previously-unpublished story The Bargain, Truman Capotes The Complete Stories is the first ever complete collection stories from one of the masters of American literature, and the author of Breakfast at Tiffanys. This Penguin Classics edition includes an introduction by Reynolds Price.Passionate, perceptive and eloquent, the short stories of Truman Capote are amon the greatest works of twentieth-century American fiction. This new collection gathers them all together for the first tim...