William Wilkie Collins (1824-1889) is best known as the innovator of the English detective novel, whose sensational novels, plays, and short stories were hugely popular in the Victorian era. Today, readers enjoy Collins' intricate and suspenseful plots, and his penetrating social commentary on the plight of women and domestic issues of the time. Unfortunately Collins suffered from rheumatic gout, for which he took the opiate laudanum, and w ...
Thomas Hardy's second to last novel, «Tess of the d'Urbervilles» is the story of Teresa «Tess» Durbeyfield. The plot of the novel is set in motion when a local parson mentions that the Durbeyfields are actually related to the noble family the d'Urbervilles. Trying to capitalize on this knowledge the Durbeyfields send a reluctant Tess to work at the d'Urbervilles estate. There the tragic fate of Tess ensues. «Tess of the d&apo ...
Edith Nesbit (1858-1924) was an English author and poet who wrote and collaborated on over 60 books of children's fiction, and is considered today to be one of the founders of modern children's literature. Many of Nesbit's works have been adapted for film and plays, and her popular fantasy stories set the standard for modern children's writers like J. K. Rowling and C. S. Lewis. «The Story of the Treasure Seekers» was Nesbit& ...
Actually written sixty years after the plague of 1665 swept through London, Defoe brings the city to life in all of its hardship and fear. With a wealth of detail, «A Journal of the Plague Year» seems almost a firsthand account, taking readers through the neighborhoods, houses, and streets that have drastically changed with the rising death toll. The bustle of business and errands gives way to doors marked with the cross to signify a house of de ...
"The Chimes" is Charles Dickens 1844 novella that concerns the disillusionment of Toby «Trotty» Veck, a poor working-class man. When Trotty has lost his faith in Humanity and believes that his poverty is the result of his unworthiness he is visited on New Year's Eve by spirits to help restore his faith and show him that nobody is born evil, but rather that crime and poverty are things created by man. ...
One of Henry James's masterpieces, «The Ambassadors» is the story of Lewis Lambert Strether who travels to Europe to find the supposedly wayward son of his widowed fiancee. With the intent of bringing back the young man and into the family business, Strether encounters many unexpected complications along the way. ...
Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) was an English literary and social critic, historian, playwright, poet, Catholic theologian, debater, mystery writer and foremost, a novelist. Among the primary achievements of Chesterton's extensive writing career are the wide range of subjects written about, the large number of genres employed, and the sheer volume of publications produced. He wrote several plays, around 80 books, several hundred poems ...
Collected here are Jane Austen's three unfinished works; «Sanditon, The Watsons, and Lady Susan». «Sanditon» is the story of the idyllic modern seaside town and its inhabitants. «The Watsons» is the story of Mr. Watson, a widowed clergyman, and his two sons and four daughters. «Lady Susan», the most complete of the three, is an epistolary novel; the story of its title character, a woman who engages in affairs and searches for suitable husba ...
Mark Twain was born on November 30th, 1835, when Halley's Comet shone in the night sky, and died April 21, 1910, during the return of the same comet. Twain was born Samuel Langhorne Clemens and grew up in Hannibal, Missouri near the banks of the Mississippi River, a setting displayed prominently in his best works. Twain met a great deal of literary success during his lifetime, and is to this day regarded as one of the greatest North America ...
