|
|
|
Wordsworth
|
The Best of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of twenty of the very best tales from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s fifty-six short stories featuring the arch-sleuth. Basing his selection around the author’s own twelve personal favourites, David Stuart Davies has added a further eight sparkling stories to Conan Doyle’s ‘Baker Street Dozen’ creating a unique volume which distils the pure essence of the world’s most famous detective. |
|
Melville's short stories are masterpieces. The best are to be appreciated on more than one level and those presented here are rich with symbolism and spiritual depth. Set in 1797, Billy Budd, Foretopman exploits the tension of this period during the war between England and France to create a tale of satanic treachery, tragedy and great pathos that explores human relationships and the inherently ambiguous nature of man-made justice. Tales such as Bartleby, Benito Cereno, The Lightning Rod Man, The Tartarus of Maids or I and My Chimney, show the timeless poetic power of Melville's writing as he consciously uses the disguise of allegory in various ways and to various ends. |
|
Black Beauty had a fine, soft black coat, one white foot and a silver star on his forehead. This tale tells of the horse's adventures and the disappointments and joys that surround him. |
|
Bleak House is one of Dickens' finest achievements, establishing his reputation as a serious and mature novelist, as well as a brilliant comic writer. It is at once a complex mystery story that fully engages the reader in the work of detection, and an unforgettable indictment of an indifferent society. Its representations of a great city's underworld, and of the law's corruption and delay, draw upon the author's personal knowledge and experience. But it is his symbolic art that projects these things in a vision that embraces black comedy, cosmic farce, and tragic ruin. In a unique creative experiment, Dickens divides the narrative between his heroine, Esther Summerson, who is psychologically interesting in her own right, and an unnamed narrator whose perspective both complements and challenges hers. |
|
The Call of the Wild (1903) and White Fang (1906) are world famous animal stories. Set in Alaska during the Klondike Gold Rush of the late 1890s, The Call of the Wild is about Buck, the magnificent cross-bred offspring of a St Bernard and a Scottish Collie. Stolen from his pampered life on a Californian estate and shipped to the Klondike to work as a sledge dog, he triumphs over his circumstances and becomes the leader of a wolf pack. The story records the ‘decivilisation’ of Buck as he answers ‘the call of the wild’, an inherent memory of primeval origins to which he instinctively responds. In contrast, White Fang relates the tale of a wolf born and bred in the wild which is civilised by the master he comes to trust and love. The brutal world of the Klondike miners and their dogs is brilliantly evoked and Jack London’s rendering of the sentient life of Buck and White Fang as they confront their destiny is enthralling and convincing. The deeper resonance of these stories derives from the author’s use of the myth of the hero who survives by strength and courage, a powerful myth that still appeals to our collective unconscious. |
|
This volume completes the canon of the illustrated Sherlock Holmes stories, reprinted from The Strand Magazine. It contains the short story series “Reminiscences of Sherlock Holmes, The Valley of Fear” — a sinister novella which appeared in 1914-15 – “His Last Bow: The War Service of Sherlock Holmes” and the last 12 stories “The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes”. |
|
The 64 poems in “A Child's Garden of Verses” are a masterly evocation of childhood from the author of “Treasure Island” and “Kidnapped”. They are full of delightful irony, wit and the fantasy worlds of childhood imagination, and introduce for the first time the Land of Nod. But they are also touched with a genuine and gentle pathos at times as they recall a world which seems so far away from us now. This edition, which includes Charles Robinson's charming illustrations and vignettes, is described as the definitive edition by “The Oxford Companion to Children's Literature”. |
|
«Vampires, those dark children of the night, who rise from their coffins to suck the blood of the living, continue to hold a strange fascination and dread. In this unique collection of vampire stories you will find some of the earliest depictions of these fearful creatures as in John Polidori’s «The Vampyre» and James Malcolm Rymer’s «Varney the Vampyre», a tale which held readers in thrall when it was first published in the mid-nineteenth century. As well as these rare stories and those featuring the more well known bloodsuckers such as Le Fanu’s «Carmilla» and Stoker’s «Dracula», there is a clutch of lesser known but equally frightening tales written by expert practitioners in the art of raising goose pimples. «Children of the Night» is a volume filled with the rich blood of chilling vampire fiction.» |
|
Cavalier and Roundhead battle it out in the turbulent setting of the English Civil war and provide the background for this classic tale of four orphans as they face adversity, survival in the forest, reconciliation and eventual forgiveness. This is the first enduring historical novel for children, which conjures up as much magic today as it did on first publication. The freedom from adult constraint allied with the necessary disciplines to survive in a hostile world make for a gripping read. |
|
«Tales from Shakespeare», written by Charles and Mary Lamb as an 'introduction to the study of Shakespeare', are much more entertaining than that. All of Shakespeare's best-loved plays, comic and tragic, are retold in a clear and robust style. Illustrated by Arthur Rackham. «Tales from King Arthur», edited by Andrew Lang, takes the reader into the romantic world of the gallant Knights of the Round Table. It tells of their brave and chivalrous deeds, fair maidens, the quest for the Holy Grail, and the tragic love of King Arthur for Guinevere. The most potent of the mist-enshrouded tales of adventure passed down from pre-recorded history, the Arthurian legends have as much appeal today as they did in the days of the troubadors. «Tales from the Arabian Nights», also edited by Andrew Lang, tells of the beautiful Scheherazade. Her husband has threatened to kill her, so each night she diverts him with tales of fantastic adventure, leaving each story unfinished so that he spares her life to hear the ending on the morrow. Illustrated by H.J Ford, the tales include Aladdin, The Enchanted Horse, Sinbad the Sailor and the great Caliph of Bagdad, Haroun-al-Raschid. «Tales of Troy and Greece» allow Andrew Lang to draw on his classical knowledge to retell the Homeric legend of the wars between the Greeks and the Trojans. Paris, the lovely Helen of Troy, Achilles, Hector, Ulysses, the Amazons and the famous Wooden Horse all feature in this magical introduction to one of the greatest legends ever told.» |
|
«Each of these short stories was written specifically for Christmas. They combine concern for social ills with the myths and memories of childhood and traditional Christmas spirit-lore. The stories include «A Christmas Carol», «The Chimes», «The Battle of Life» and «The Cricket on the Hearth».» |
|
Ebenezer Scrooge is a miserly old skinflint. He hates everyone, especially children. But at Christmas three ghosts come to visit him, scare him into mending his ways, and he finds, as he celebrates with Bob Cratchit, Tiny Tim and their family, that geniality brings its own reward. |
|
This is a book to be read by a blazing fire on a winter's night, with the curtains drawn close and the doors securely locked. The unquiet souls of the dead, both as fictional creations and as 'real' apparitions, roam the pages of this haunting new selection of ghost stories by Rex Collings. Some of these stories are classics while others are lesser-known gems unearthed from this vintage era of tales of the supernatural. There are stories from distant lands — Fisher's Ghost by John Lang is set in Australia and A Ghostly Manifestation by 'A Clergyman' is set in Calcutta. In this selection, Sir Walter Scott (a Victorian in spirit if not in fact), keeps company with Edgar Allen Poe, Sheridan Le Fanu and other illustrious masters of the genre. |
|
M.R. James is probably the finest ghost-story writer England has ever produced. These tales are not only classics of their genre, but are also superb examples of beautifully-paced understatement, convincing background and chilling terror. As well as the preface, there is a fascinating tail-piece by M.R. James, ‘Stories I Have Tried To Write’, which accompanies these thirty tales. Among them are ‘Casting the Runes’, ‘Oh, Whistle and I’ll come to you, My Lad’, ‘The Tractate Middoth’, ‘The Ash Tree’ and ‘Canon Alberic’s Scrapbook’. |
|
«Robert Burns, the most celebrated of all Scottish poets, is remembered with great devotion — his birthday on 25th January provokes fervour and festivity among Scots and many others the world over. Born in 1759 into miserable rustic poverty, by the age of eighteen Burns had acquired a good knowledge of both classical and English literature. In June 1786 his first collection of verse, «Poems Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect», which included «To a Mouse» and «The Cotter's Saturday Night», was greeted with huge acclaim by all classes of society. His later poems and ballads include Auld Lang Syne, the beautiful song «My Love is like a Red Red Rose», «Highland Mary», «Scots Wha Hae» and his masterpiece, «Tam o'Shanter».» |
|
Thomas Hardy started composing poetry in the heyday of Tennyson and Browning. He was still writing with unimpaired power sixty years later, when Eliot and Yeats were the leading names in the field. His extraordinary stamina and a consistent individuality of style and vision made him a survivor, immune to literary fashion. At the start of the twenty-first century his reputation stands higher than it ever did, even in his own lifetime. He is now recognised not only as a great poet, but as one who is widely loved. He speaks with directness, humanity and humour to scholarly or ordinary readers alike. |
|
This edition of the poetry of Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) includes all the poems contained in the Definitive Edition of 1940. In his lifetime, Kipling was widely regarded as the unofficial Poet Laureate, and he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907. His poetry is striking for its many rhythms and popular forms of speech, and Kipling was equally at home with dramatic monologues and extended ballads. He is often thought of as glorifying war, militarism, and the British Empire, but an attentive reading of the poems does not confirm that view. This edition reprints George Orwell's hard-hitting account of Kipling's poems, first published in 1942, and generally regarded as one of the most important contributions to critical discussion of Kipling. |
|
John Donne (1572-1631) is a poet of concerted emotional and intellectual force, whose strenuously original approach to the subject matter, diction and form of verse re-made English poetry. Donne’s poetry combines paradoxical wit, scientific and theological learning with the rhythms and diction of spoken language. Crises of love, conscience, and faith are the great concerns of his poetry which is by turns exalted or disenchanted, direct or oblique, morally profound or outrageously spiteful. |
|
Housman's melodic and memorable poems have been popular for over a century. He writes typically of lost love, of the brevity of happiness, of young soldiers doomed to die. Admirers have found his work elegant and resonant; detractors have thought much of it mannered and glib. But Housman speaks with two voices: the smooth texts conceal a dark sub-text. This tormented and secretive man wrote poems alive with indirect self-disclosure. |
|
Wilde, glamorous and notorious, more famous as a playwright or prisoner than as a poet, invites readers of his verse to meet an unknown and intimate figure. The poetry of his formative years includes the haunting elegy to his young sister and the grieving lyric at the death of his father. The religious drama of his romance with Rome is captured here, as well as its resolution in his renewed love of ancient Greece. He explores forbidden sexual desires, pays homage to the great theatre stars and poets of his day, observes cityscapes with impressionist intensity. His final masterpiece, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, tells the painful story of his own prison experience and calls for universal compassion. This edition of Wilde's verse presents the full range of his achievement as a poet. |
|
