Mark Twain is best known as one of this country's finest humorists and novelists. As this collection confirms, he was one of our finest essayists as well. Gathered here in a single volume, these pieces reveal the complete range of this esteemed American writer and contain some of his best, funniest, and most caustic work. "English as She Is Taught," "What Is Man?," and "Letters to Satan" are among the seventy-seven essays, each featuring Twain's witty, vital, colorful style--and reminding us why, nearly one hundred years after his death, he continues to be one of the most widely read and...

Ten classic short novels appear in this collection by noted editor Neider. The contents include: Benito Cereno by Herman Melville, Notes from Underground by F. M. Dostoyevsky, A Simple Heart by Gustave Flaubert, The Death of Ivan Ilych by L. N. Tolstoy, The Aspern Papers by Henry James, Ward No. 6 by A. P. Chekhov, Death in Venice by Thomas Mann, The Dead by James Joyce (recently made into a musical), The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, and The Fox by D. H. Lawrence. In the introduction, Neider discusses the themes that arise in several of the novels, grouping them by more than just their...