In the Days of the Comet (1906) is a science fiction novel by H. G. Wells in which humanity is "exalted" when a comet causes "the nitrogen of the air, the old azote," to "change out of itself" and become "a respirable gas, differing indeed from oxygen, but helping and sustaining its action, a bath of strength and healing for nerve and brain." The result: "The great Change has come for evermore, happiness and beauty are our atmosphere, there is peace on earth and good will to all men. An unnamed narrator is the author of a prologue ("The Man Who Wrote in the Tower") and an epilogue ("The...

Proserpine is a verse drama written for children by the English Romantic writers Mary Shelley and her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley. Mary wrote the blank verse drama and Percy contributed two lyric poems. Composed in 1820 while the Shelleys were living in Italy, it is often considered a partner to the Shelleys' play Midas. Proserpine was first published in the London periodical The Winter's Wreath in 1832. Whether the drama was ever intended to be staged is a point of debate among scholars. The drama is based on Ovid's tale of the abduction of Proserpine by Pluto, which itself was based on the...

Roderick Hudson is a novel by Henry James. Originally published in 1875 as a serial in The Atlantic Monthly, it is a bildungsroman that traces the development of the title character, a sculptor. Rowland Mallet, a wealthy Bostonian bachelor and art connoisseur, visits his cousin Cecilia in Northampton, Massachusetts, before leaving for Europe. There he sees a Grecian figure he thinks is a remarkable work of art. Cecilia introduces him to the local sculptor, Roderick Hudson, a young law student who sculpts in his spare time. Mallet-who loves art but is without artistic talent himself-sees an...

Marmion is an epic poem by Walter Scott about the Battle of Flodden (1513). It was published in 1808. Scott started writing Marmion, his second major work, in November 1806. When Archibald Constable, the publisher, learnt of this, he offered a thousand guineas for the copyright unseen. William Miller and John Murray each agreed to take a 25% share in the project. Murray observed: -We both view it as honourable, profitable, and glorious to be concerned in the publication of a new poem by Walter Scott.- Scott later said that he thoroughly enjoyed writing the work. He told his son-in-law,...

Sandy is the third book written by Alice Hegan Rice, and was the second best-selling novel in the United States in 1905. It was originally published in serial form in The Century Magazine from December 1904 through May 1905, and first appeared in novel form in April 1905. The novel is based on the boyhood stories of S. S. McClure, publisher of McClure's magazine, and his upbringing in Ireland and early struggles in the United States. This is the story of a young Irish boy named Sandy Kilday, who at the age of sixteen, being without home or relatives, decides to try his luck in the new country...

Extract: Jimmy had been waiting since nine in the morning, and it was now well past noon. He was a placid gentleman of curvilinear type, short of limb and large of girth. His trousers, of that morose hue termed by the country people "plum," reached to his armpits, and his hat, large and felt and weather-beaten, was only prevented from eclipsing his head by the stubborn resistance of two small, knob-like ears. "Mr. Opp ain't been back to the Cove for a long while, has he?" asked the ferryman, whose intellectual life depended solely upon the crumbs of information scattered by chance passers-by....