The three plays collected in this volume depict the faults, errors and foibles of ordinary people with exuberant humour, savage satire and acute observations. Volpone portrays a rich Venetian who pretends to be dying so that his despised acquaintances will flock to his bedside with extravagant gifts in hope of an inheritance. The Alchemist also deals with greed and gullibility, as a rascally trio of confidence tricksters, claiming to have the legendary Philosopher's Stone, fool a series of victims who are hoping to make some easy money. And in a wonderfully energetic portrait of...
The three plays collected in this volume depict the faults, errors and foibles of ordinary people with exuberant humour, savage satire and acute obser...
When honest young Caleb Williams comes to work as a secretary for Squire Falkland, he soon begins to suspect that his new master is hiding a secret. As he digs deeper into Falkland's past and finally unearths the horrible truth, the results of his curiosity prove calamitous when--even though Caleb has loyally sworn never to disclose what he has discovered--the Squire enacts a cruel revenge. A tale of gripping suspense and psychological power, William Godwin's novel creates a searing depiction of the intolerable persecution meted out to a good man in pursuit of justice and equality. Written to...
When honest young Caleb Williams comes to work as a secretary for Squire Falkland, he soon begins to suspect that his new master is hiding a secret. A...
Following Queen Elizabeth I's reign, the new court of King James was beset by political instability and moral corruption. This atmosphere provided fertile ground for the dramatists of the age, who explored the ways in which social decadence and the abuse of power breed resentment, leading inexorably to violent retribution.
In Cyril Tourneur's The Revenger's Tragedy, the debauched son of an Italian Duke attempts to rape the virtuous Gloriana--a veiled reference to Elizabeth I. John Webster's The White Devil depicts a sinister world of intrigue and murderous infidelity, while The...
Following Queen Elizabeth I's reign, the new court of King James was beset by political instability and moral corruption. This atmosphere provided ...
Writing in an age when the call for the rights of man had brought revolution to America and France, Mary Wollstonecraft produced her own declaration of female independence in 1792. Passionate and forthright, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman attacked the prevailing view of docile, decorative femininity, and instead laid out the principles of emancipation: an equal education for girls and boys, an end to prejudice, and for women to become defined by their profession, not their partner. Mary Wollstonecraft's work was received with a mixture of admiration and outrage - Walpole called her 'a...
Writing in an age when the call for the rights of man had brought revolution to America and France, Mary Wollstonecraft produced her own declaration o...
A cornerstone of early science fiction and a haunting image of world war Following the development of massive airships, naive Londoner Bert Smallways becomes accidentally involved in a German plot to invade America by air and reduce New York to rubble. But although bombers devastate the city, they cannot overwhelm the country, and their attack leads not to victory but to the beginning of a new and horrific age for humanity. And so dawns the era of Total War, in which brutal aerial bombardments reduce the great cultures of the twentieth century to nothing. As civilization collapses...
A cornerstone of early science fiction and a haunting image of world war Following the development of massive airships, naive Londoner Bert...
The letters of one of the world's greatest composers
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart?seen variously as a child prodigy, musical genius, tragic Romantic artist, and cultural icon?is among the most written-about of all composers. This fascinating set of his letters offers a new understanding of his life story?his marriage, compositions, performances, occasional money worries, opinions of fellow musicians, and complex relationship with his father?and a revealing portrait of both the man and the musician.
The letters of one of the world's greatest composers
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart?seen variously as a child prodigy, musical genius, tragic Romantic ar...
Joseph Conrad's dark satire on English society In the only novel Conrad set in London, The Secret Agent communicates a profoundly ironic view of human affairs. The story is woven around an attack on the Greenwich Observatory in 1894 masterminded by Verloc, a Russian spy working for the police, and ostensibly a member of an anarchist group in Soho. His masters instruct him to discredit the anarchists in a humiliating fashion, and when his evil plan goes horribly awry, Verloc must deal with the repercussions of his actions. While rooted in the Edwardian period, Conrad's tale...
Joseph Conrad's dark satire on English society In the only novel Conrad set in London, The Secret Agent communicates a profoundly i...
Three short works of pyschological liberation from the author of Women in Love The three works collected in this volume, all written in 1924, explore the profound effects on protagonists who embark on psychological voyages of liberation. In St Mawr, Lou Witt buys a beautiful, untamable bay stallion and discovers an intense affinity with the horse that she cannot feel with her husband. This superb novella displays Lawrence's mastery of satirical comedy in a scathing depiction of London's fashionable horse riding set. 'The Princess' portrays the intimacy between an...
Three short works of pyschological liberation from the author of Women in Love The three works collected in this volume, all written...
Joseph Conrad's enduring portrait of the ugliness of colonialism Heart of Darkness is the thrilling tale of Marlow, a seaman and wanderer recounting his physical and psychological journey in search of the infamous ivory trader Kurtz. Traveling upriver into the heart of the African continent, he gradually becomes obsessed by this enigmatic, wraith-like figure. Marlow's discovery of how Kurtz has gained his position of power over the local people involves him in a radical questioning, not only of his own nature and values, but of those that underpin Western civilization...
Joseph Conrad's enduring portrait of the ugliness of colonialism Heart of Darkness is the thrilling tale of Marlow, a seaman and wan...
The first volume of James T. Farrell's remarkable Studs Lonigan trilogy An American classic in the vein of John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, the first book of James T. Farrell's powerful Studs Lonigan trilogy covers five months of the young hero's life in 1916, when he is sixteen years old. In this relentlessly naturalistic yet richly complex portrait, Studs is carried along by his swaggering and shortsighted companions, his narrow family, and his educational and religious background toward a fate that he resists yet cannot escape. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the...
The first volume of James T. Farrell's remarkable Studs Lonigan trilogy An American classic in the vein of John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, t...
