From Austen to Zola, from medieval to the modern day - all genres are catered for between the covers of these coveted classics.
Classics Books
Penguin Books Ltd The ThirtyNine Steps
Book SynopsisJohn Buchan (1875-1940) was born in Perth, Scotland and educated at Oxford where he published five books and won several awards, including one for poetry. He went on to be a barrister, a member of parliament, a soldier, a publisher, a historical biographer, and - in 1935 - he became the Govenor-General of Canada. Today he is best remembered as the author of his perennially popular adventure novels.
£7.59
Penguin Books Ltd The Complete Richard Hannay
Book SynopsisContains: The Thirty-Nine Steps, Greenmantle, Mr Standfast, The Three Hostages and The Island of Sheep
£17.09
Penguin Random House LLC Riders of the Purple Sage Penguin Twentieth Century Classics
Book SynopsisIn this melodramatic tale of the American Old West, Grey expresses through a vivid portrait of the natural world those emotions and passions which the hero and heroine dare not reveal themselves.Trade Review“[Zane Grey is] an amazingly significant literary phenomenon.”—Hamlin Garland
£13.05
Penguin Books Ltd Marrow of Tradition
Book SynopsisA story about the struggles of black and white half-sisters, written by the author of "The Conjure Woman", "The Wife of His Youth", "The House Behind the Cedars" and "The Colonel's Daughter".Trade Review"Chesnutt was tremendously explicit in representing the violence and his own anger. Today it reads as one of the more enduring novels of the era." —Richard Yarborough, UCLA
£13.60
Penguin Putnam Inc Cannery Row Penguin Great Books of the 20th
Book SynopsisSteinbeck’s tough yet charming portrait of people on the margins of society, dependant on one another for both physical and emotional survivalA Penguin Classic Published in 1945, Cannery Row focuses on the acceptance of life as it is: both the exuberance of community and the loneliness of the individual. Drawing on his memories of the real inhabitants of Monterey, California, including longtime friend Ed Ricketts, Steinbeck interweaves the stories of Doc, Dora, Mack and his boys, Lee Chong, and the other characters in this world where only the fittest survive, to create a novel that is at once one of his most humorous and poignant works. In her introduction, Susan Shillinglaw shows how the novel expresses, both in style and theme, much that is essentially Steinbeck: “Scientific detachment, empathy toward the lonely and depressed . . . and, at the darkest level . . . the terror of isolation and nothingness.”For more than sev
£12.80
Penguin Random House LLC The Pit A Story of Chicago the Epic of the Wheat Volume 2 Penguin Twentieth Century Classics
Book SynopsisThe author's unfinished trilogy, begun in "The Octopus", continues in this novel about a trader intent on cornering the wheat market. Curtis's obsession with controlling the market and his domination of his emotionally dependent wife are the basis of this book.
£16.20
Penguin Publishing Group Mcteague A Story of San Francisco Penguin Twentieth Century Classics S
Book SynopsisMcTeague is the story of a poor dentist scraping by in San Francisco at the end of the 19th century, and his wife Trina, whose $5,000 lottery winning sets in motion a shocking chain of events. Few works have captured the seamy side of American urban life with such graphic intensity.Trade Review“One of the great works of the modern American imagination.”—Alfred Kazin
£14.33
Penguin Publishing Group The Octopus
Book SynopsisLike the tentacles of an octopus, the tracks of the railroad reached out across California, as if to grasp everything of value in the state Based on an actual, bloody dispute between wheat farmers and the Southern Pacific Railroad in 1880, The Octopus is a stunning novel of the waning days of the frontier West. To the tough-minded and self-reliant farmers, the monopolistic, land-grabbing railroad represented everything they despised: consolidation, organization, conformity. But Norris idealizes no one in this epic depiction of the volatile situation, for the farmers themselves ruthlessly exploited the land, and in their hunger for larger holdings they resorted to the same tactics used by the railroad: subversion, coercion and outright violence. In his introduction, Kevin Starr discusses Norris's debt to Zola for the novel's extraordinary sweep, scale and abundance of characters and details.
£16.23
Penguin Publishing Group The Lime Twig
Book SynopsisThis volume brings together three early novels by John Hawkes. "The Lime Twig" is set in the underworld of postwar London; "Second Skin" is a tale of suicide and new life on two mythical islands; and "Travesty" is a monologue on fear and eroticism that takes place during a drive at night.Table of Contents"The Lime Twig"; "Second Skin"; "Travesty".
£17.82
Penguin Books Ltd The Virginian A Horseman of the Plains Classics
Book SynopsisThe epic novel of the American West and the heroic cowboyOwen Wister's powerful story of the tall, silent stranger who rides into the uncivilized West and defeats the forces of evil has become an enduring part of American mythology. Set in Wyoming Territory, The Virginian depicts the loneliness and challenge of an unknown land where the whistle of a freight train sounds across great miles of silence, where easy camaraderie—and sudden violence—are found around the campfire, and where the rough honesty of frontier justice is just beginning to impose a sense of society on an unruly populace. For Wister, the West represented a territory of adventure that tested the worth of a man. His hero, as John Seelye writes in his Introduction, has his roots in the historical romances of Sir Walter Scott and James Fenimore Cooper; he is a man who lives by the classic code of chivalry, ruled by quiet courage and deeply felt honor.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
£12.60
Penguin Publishing Group Four Stories By American Women Life in the Iron Mills the Yellow Wallpaper the Country of the Pointed Firs Souls Belated Rebecca Harding Davis OrneJewett Edith Wharton Penguin Classics
Book SynopsisRepresenting four prominent American women writers who flourished in the period following the Civil War, this collection includes Life in the Iron Mills by Rebecca Harding Davis, The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett, and Souls Belated by Edith Wharton.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.Table of ContentsRebecca Harding DavisCharlotte Perkins GilmanSarah Orne JewettEdith WhartonIntroduction by Cynthia Griffin WolffLife in the Iron MillsThe Yellow WallpaperThe Country of the Pointed FirsSouls Belated
£12.21
Penguin Books Ltd News from Nowhere and Other Writings Penguin
Book SynopsisThis volume illustrates the variety of William Morris's prose, while focusing on one theme: the earthly paradise. The Nowhere of News from Nowhere (1890) is England in 2102, an ideal pastoral society born out of revolution. It is as compelling a dream of the future as the nightmares of Brave New World and Nineteen Eighty-Four. Exhilaratingly, it reminds us that nothing is inevitable about the way we livenow or in 1890.Table of ContentsPart 1 Romance: the story of the unknown Church; a King's lesson; two extracts from "A Dream of John Ball"; "News from Nowhere". Part 2 Lectures: the lesser arts; some hints on pattern-designing; useful work versus useless toil; the hopes of civilization. Part 3 Occasional prose: "Looking Backward" - a review of "Looking Backward" by Edward Bellamy; under an elm-tree, or, thoughts in the countryside; preface in "The Nature of Gothic" by John Ruskin; foreword to "Utopia" by Sir Thomas More; how I became a socialist; a note by William Morris on his aims in founding the Kelmscott Press. Part 4 Letters: [the Eastern question]: letter to the "Daily News"; [anti-scrape]: letter to the "Athenaeum"; [St Mark's, Venice]: letter to the "Daily News".
£9.49
Penguin Publishing Group Ruth Hall A Domestic Tale of the Present Time Penguin Classics
Book SynopsisIn Ruth Hall, one of the bestselling novels of the 1850s, Fanny Fern drew heavily on her own experiences: the death of her first child and her beloved husband, a bitter estrangement from her family, and her struggle to make a living as a writer. Written as a series of short vignettes and snatches of overheard conversations, it is as unconventional in style as in substance and strikingly modern in its impact.
£13.05
Penguin Publishing Group Hope Leslie or Early Times in the Massachusetts Penguin Classics
Book SynopsisSet in seventeenth-century New England in the aftermath of the Pequod War, Hope Leslie not only chronicles the role of women in building the republic but also refocuses the emergent national literature on the lives, domestic mores, and values of American women.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
£15.25
Penguin Books Ltd Tales from the Thousand and One Nights Arabian
Book SynopsisThe tales told by Scheherazade over a thousand and one nights to delay her execution by the vengeful King Shahryar have become among the most popular in both Eastern and Western literature. From the epic adventures of 'Aladdin and the Enchanted Lamp' to the farcical 'Young Woman and her Five Lovers' and the social criticism of 'The Tale of the Hunchback', the stories depict a fabulous world of all-powerful sorcerers, jinns imprisoned in bottles and enchanting princesses. But despite their imaginative extravagance, the Tales are also anchored to everyday life by their bawdiness and realism, providing a full and intimate record of medieval Eastern world. Offering unexpurgated translations of the best-loved tales, including such classics as 'Sindbad the Sailor', Tales from the Thousand and One Nights - sometimes known as the Arabian Nights - is translated with an introduction by N.J. Dawood in Penguin Classics. In this selection, Dawood presents the reader wiTable of ContentsTales from the Thousand and One NightsIntroductionInvocationPrologueThe Tale of King Shahriyar and his Brother ShahzamanThe Fable of the Donkey, the Ox, and the FarmerThe Tale of the HunchbackThe Tailor's TaleThe Tale of the Lame Young Man and the Barber of BaghdadThe Barber's TaleThe Tale of Bakbook, the Barber's First BrotherThe Tale of Al-Haddar, the Barber's Second BrotherThe Tale of Bakbak, the Barber's Third BrotherThe Tale of Al-Kuz, the Barber's Fourth BrotherThe Tale of Shakashik, the Barber's Sixth BrotherThe DonkeyThe Fisherman and the JinneeThe Tale of King Yunan and Duban the DoctorThe Tale of King Sindbad and the FalconThe Tale of the Enchanted KingThe Young Woman and Her Five Lovers Sindbad the Sailor and Sindbad the PorterThe First Voyage of Sindbad the SailorThe Second Voyage of Sindbad the SailorThe Third Voyage of Sindbad the SailorThe Fourth Voyage of Sindbad the SailorThe Fifth Voyage of Sindbad the SailorThe Sixth Voyage of Sindbad the SailorThe Last Voyage of Sindbad the SailorThe Historic Fart Aladdin and the Enchanted Lamp The Tale of Kafur the Black EunuchThe Porter and the Three Girls of BaghdadThe Tale of the First DervishThe Tale of the Second DervishThe Tale of the Third DervishThe Tale of the First GirlThe Tale of the Second GirlThe Tale of Khalifah the Fisherman The DreamThe Tale of Judar and His BrothersThe Tale of Ma'Aruf the Cobbler Epilogue
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Letters from My Windmill
Book SynopsisAlphonse Daudet was born at Nimes in 1840. He is chiefly remembered today for LETTERS FROM MY WINDMILL which appeared in 1866, and for his Tartarin novels, a sequence of burlesque tales of Provencal life. Daudet died in 1897.
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd Selected Tales
Book SynopsisSelected Tales contains some of the most timeless and enchanting folk and fairy tales collected by the Brothers Grimm, translated with an introduction by David Luke These folktales collected by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm are among the most memorable stories in European culture - conjuring up a world of spells and bewitchment, outwitted villains and cruel stepmothers, animal bridegrooms and enchanted princesses. Tales such as 'Hansel and Gretel', 'Little Red Cape' and 'The Robber Bridegroom' depict the dangers lurking in dark forests, and others, including 'Briar-Rose' and 'Snow White' show young beauties punished by unforgiving sorceresses. Other tales include 'Thickasathumb', which portrays a childless young couple whose wish for a baby is granted in an unexpected way, while 'The Frog King' tells of a rash promise made by a haughty princess to share her bed with a frog, and a fortune is won in 'The Blue Lamp', when a soldier gains a kingdom with the help of a magic Table of ContentsTranslated with an Introduction and Notes by David LukeIntroduction1. The Fisher an His Gweedwife2. Rumplestiltskin3. Hansel and Gretel4. Little Redcape5. Rapunzel6. Briar Rose7. Snowwhite8. The Jeniper Tree9. Little Brother and Little Sister10. The Three Little Men in the Forest11. Mother Snowbed12. The Three Birdies13. The Twelve Brothers14. The Seven Ravens15. The Six Swans16. The Two Brothers17. The Master Huntsman18. The Water of Life19. The Golden Bird20. The Dwarfie21. Jack the Strong Man22. The Six Who Went Far in the World23. The Six Servants24. The Sea-Rabbit25. The Worn-out Dancing-shoes26. The Devil's Three Golden Hairs27. The Griffin28. The Three Snake-leaves29. Faithful John30. One-eye, Two-eyes and Three-eyes31. Ashiepattle32. Manypelts33. The Rightful Bride34. The Iron Stove35. The Twa Royal Bairnies36. The Goosegirl37. Jack of Iron38. The Frog King, or Iron Harry39. The Young Donkey40. Jack My Hedgehog41. The Magic Table, the Gold-donkey, and the Cudgel in the Sack42. The Knapsack, the Hat and the Horn43. The Blue Lamp44. The Salad-donkey45. The Three Brothers46. The Four Skilful Brothers47. The Young Giant48. Thickasathumb49. Bearskin50. The Devil and His Grandmother51. The King of the Golden Mountain52. The Prince Afraid of Nothing53. The Crystal Ball54. Auld Rinkie55. Jorinda and Joringle56. The Nixie in the Pond57. Fetcher's Fowl58. The Robber Bridegroom59. The Bremen Town Band60. Clever Elsie61. Lazy Harry62. The Three Army-surgeons63. The Clever Little Tailor64. Bumpkin65. Owld PeadairNotesGlossary of Scots Words
£12.99
Penguin Books Ltd Seven Viking Romances Penguin Classics
Book SynopsisCombining traditional myth, oral history and re-worked European legend to depict an ancient realm of heroism and wonder, the seven tales collected here are among the most fantastical of all the Norse romances. Powerfully inspired works of Icelandic imagination, they relate intriguing, often comical tales of famous kings, difficult gods and women of great beauty, goodness or cunning. The tales plunder a wide range of earlier literature from Homer to the French romances—as in the tale of the wandering hero Arrow-Odd, which combines several older legends, or Egil and Asmund, where the story of Odysseus and the Cyclops is skilfully adapted into a traditional Norse legend. These are among the most outrageous, delightful and exhilarating tales in all Icelandic literature.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the bTable of ContentsTranslated by Hermann Pálsson and Paul EdwardsIntroductionMaps: Europe of the Viking RomancesNote on the Texts and TranslationsBibliographySeven Viking RomancesArrow-OddKing GautrekHalfdan EysteinssonBosi and HerraudEgil and AsmundThorstein Mansion-MightHelgi ThorissonAppendix: Sources and parallels of Arrow-OddList of Proper Names
£12.34
Penguin Books Ltd The Fable of the Bees or Private Vices Publick
Book SynopsisThis masterpiece of eighteenth-century British satire sparked great social controversy by rejecting a positive view of human nature and arguing the necessity of vice as the foundation of an emerging capitalist economy.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
£12.34
Penguin Books Ltd The Saga of the Volsungs
Book SynopsisThe epic Viking Age stories that inspired J. R. R. Tolkien and Wagner''s Ring cycleWritten in thirteenth-century Iceland but based on ancient Norse poetry cycles, The Saga of the Volsungs combines mythology, legend and sheer human drama. It tells of the cursed treasure of the Rhine, a sword reforged and a magic ring of power, and at its heart are the heroic deeds of Sigurd the dragon slayer, who acquires magical knowledge from one of Odin''s Valkyries. One of the great books of world literature, the saga is an unforgettable tale of princely jealousy, unrequited love, greed, vengeance and the downfall of a dynasty. Translated with an Introduction by Jesse L. Byock
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Saga of the People of Laxardal and Bolli
Book SynopsisThe Penguin Classics list of medieval sagas grows ever more impressive with these two thrilling Norse sagasOne of the best-loved works of Icelandic literature, this stirring tale of war and romance follows three generations of strong women, wise leaders, and hotheaded warriors. The only saga rumored to have been written by a woman, it tells of the centuries predating 1245, when magic rites and sorcery clashed with the spread of Christianity throughout a rapidly changing Viking world. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning tra
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd Fairy Tales
Book SynopsisContaining an enchanting mix of familiar favourites and hidden gems, the Penguin Classics edition of Hans Christian Andersen''s Fairy Tales is translated by Tiina Nunnally and edited with an introduction by Jackie Wullschlager.The first writer to create timeless, universal fairy tales from his own imagination, Hans Christian Andersen conjured up a world of icy queens, match girls and tin soldiers, rewarded virtue and unfulfilled desire. Rich with popular tales such as ''The Emperor''s New Clothes'' and ''The Ugly Duckling'', this revelatory new collection contains many later, darker and rarely collected stories, such as ''Auntie Toothache'' and ''The Shadow'', in which a man''s shadow slyly takes over his life.This sparkling new translation captures the eccentric charm of Andersen''s original, colloquial Danish style as never before. The introduction vividly describes his changing style and there are notes on every tale.''Truly scrumptious, a proper treasury ... Read on with eyes as big as teacups''Guardian''This translation gives me, for the first time, a real sense of the range and variety of Andersen''s style''A.S. Byatt''There have been some capable versions in English, but Tiina Nunnally''s seems to me the best. Jackie Wullschlager''s introduction will be of enormous value''Harold Bloom
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Real Story of AhQ and Other Tales of China
Book SynopsisLu Xun (Lu Hsun) is arguably the greatest writer of modern China, and is considered by many to be the founder of modern Chinese literature. Lu Xun''s stories both indict outdated Chinese traditions and embrace China''s cultural richness and individuality. This volume presents brand-new translations by Julia Lovell of all of Lu Xun''s stories, including ''The Real Story of Ah-Q'', ''Diary of a Madman'', ''A Comedy of Ducks'', ''The Divorce'' and ''A Public Example'', among others. With an afterword by Yiyun Li.Trade ReviewThe book could be considered the most significant Penguin Classic ever published...Lu Xun is critically regarded as the most accomplished modern writer of the most populous nation on earth, and a grasp of his work is thus extremely useful in forming an understanding of much of humanity...Julia Lovell's are arguably the most accessible translations yet * Jeffrey Wasserstrom, Time magazine *
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd The Great Gatsby
Book SynopsisFrancis Scott Fitzgerald was born in 1896 in Saint Paul, Minnesota, and educated at Princeton. Stationed in Alabama, he met and later married Zelda Sayre. His first novel, This Side of Paradise, published in 1920. was a tremendous critical and commercial success. Fitzgerald followed with The Beautiful and the Damned in 1922, The Great Gatsby in 1925, Tender is the Night (1934), and was working on The Last Tycoon (1941) when he died, in Hollywood, in 1940.
£7.59
Penguin Books Ltd In Cold Blood
Book SynopsisControversial and compelling, In Cold Blood reconstructs the murder in 1959 of a Kansas farmer, his wife and children. Truman Capote''s comprehensive study of the killings and subsequent investigation explores the circumstances surrounding this terrible crime and the effect it had on those involved. At the centre of his study are the amoral young killers Perry Smith and Dick Hickcock, who, vividly drawn by Capote, are shown to be reprehensible, yet entirely and frighteningly human. The book that made Capote''s name, In Cold Blood is a seminal work of modern prose, a remarkable synthesis of journalistic skill and powerfully evocative narrative.Trade Review'The American dream turning into the American nightmare ... a remarkable book' Spectator
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd Gunnars Daughter
Book SynopsisThe first historical novel by the Nobel Prize-winning author of Kristin LavransdatterA Penguin ClassicMore than a decade before writing Kristin Lavransdatter, the trilogy about fourteenth-century Norway that won her the Nobel Prize, Sigrid Undset published Gunnar’s Daughter, a brief, swiftly moving tale about a more violent period of her country’s history, the Saga Age. Set in Norway and Iceland at the beginning of the eleventh century, Gunnar's Daughter is the story of the beautiful, spoiled Vigdis Gunnarsdatter, who is raped by the man she had wanted to love. A woman of courage and intelligence, Vigdis is toughened by adversity. Alone she raises the child conceived in violence, repeatedly defending her autonomy in a world governed by men. Alone she rebuilds her life and restores her family's honor—until an unremitting social code propels her to take the action that again destroys her happiness. First published in 1909, Gunnar's Daughter was in part a response to the rise of nationalism and Norway's search for a national identity in its Viking past. But unlike most of the Viking-inspired art of its period, Gunnar's Daughter is not a historical romance. It is a skillful conversation between two historical moments about questions as troublesome in Undset's own time—and in ours—as they were in the Saga Age: rape and revenge, civil and domestic violence, troubled marriages, and children made victims of their parents' problems.Trade ReviewBy the Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature“A better told story of its kind would be difficult to imagine, for Sigrid Undset has retained the directness and concise power of the old Norse and Icelandic sagas. . . . Beautifully told; already so early in her career [Undset] had learned the true meaning of form and proportion, pace and suspense.” —The New York Times
£13.60
Penguin Putnam Inc Hunger
Book SynopsisA modernist masterpiece: the Nobel Prize winner’s first and most important novelA Penguin Classic First published in Norway in 1890, Hunger probes the depths of consciousness with frightening and gripping power. Contemptuous of novels of his time and what he saw as their stereotypical plots and empty characters, Knut Hamsun embarked on “an attempt to describe the strange, peculiar life of the mind, the mysteries of the nerves in a starving body.” Like the works of Dostoyevsky, it marks an extraordinary break with Western literary and humanistic traditions.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
£14.45
Penguin Putnam Inc One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest
Book SynopsisMcMurphy, a criminal who feigns insanity, is admitted to a mental hospital where he challenges the autocratic authority of the head nurse.Trade Review"A work of genuine literary merit . . . What Mr. Kesey has done in his unusual novel is to transform the plight of a ward of inmates in a mental hospital into a glittering parable of good and evil."--The New York Times Book Review"[A] brilliant first novel . . . a strong, warm story about the nature of human good and evil . . . Keysey has made his book a roar of protest against middlebrow society's Rules and the invisible Rulers who enforce them."--Time"The final triumph of these men at the cost of a terrifying sacrifice should send chills down any reader's back. . . . This novel's scenes have the liveliness of a motion picture."--The Washington Post"An outstanding book . . . [Kesey's] characters are original and real. . . . This is a tirade against the increasing controls over man and his mind, yet the author never gets on a soap box. Nor does he forget that there is a thin line between tragedy and comedy."--Houston Chronicle Table of ContentsSketches by Ken Kesey viiIntroduction by Robert Faggen ixPart One 1Part Two 127Part Three 173Part Four 223
£15.30
Penguin Putnam Inc Kristin Lavransdatter II The Wife
Book Synopsis“[Sigrid Undset] should be the next Elena Ferrante.” —SlateA Penguin ClassicKristin Lavransdatter interweaves political, social, and religious history with the daily aspects of family life to create a colorful, richly detailed tapestry of Norway during the fourteenth-century. The trilogy, however, is more than a journey into the past. Undset's own life—her familiarity with Norse sagas and folklore and with a wide range of medieval literature, her experiences as a daughter, wife, and mother, and her deep religious faith—profoundly influenced her writing. Her grasp of the connections between past and present and of human nature itself, combined with the extraordinary quality of her writing, sets her works far above the genre of historical novels. This new translation by Tina Nunnally—the first English version since Charles Archer's translation in the 1920s—captures Undset's str
£16.15
Penguin Publishing Group Kristin Lavransdatter III The Cross
Book Synopsis
£13.60
Penguin Books Ltd In Cold Blood
Book SynopsisThe chilling true crime ''non-fiction novel'' that made Truman Capote''s name, In Cold Blood is a seminal work of modern prose, a remarkable synthesis of journalistic skill and powerfully evocative narrative published in Penguin Modern Classics.Controversial and compelling, In Cold Blood reconstructs the murder in 1959 of a Kansas farmer, his wife and both their children. Truman Capote''s comprehensive study of the killings and subsequent investigation explores the circumstances surrounding this terrible crime and the effect it had on those involved. At the centre of his study are the amoral young killers Perry Smith and Dick Hickcock, who, vividly drawn by Capote, are shown to be reprehensible yet entirely and frighteningly human. Truman Capote (1924-84) was born in New Orleans. He left school when he was fifteen and subsequently worked for The New Yorker, which provided his first - and last - regular job. He wrote both fiction and non-fiction - short stories, novels and novellas, travel writing, profiles, reportage, memoirs, plays and films; his other works include In Cold Blood (1965), Music for Chameleons (1980) and Answered Prayers (1986), all of which are published in Penguin Modern Classics.If you enjoyed In Cold Blood, you might like Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs'' And the Hippos were Boiled in their Tanks, also available in Penguin Modern Classics.''It is the American dream turning into the American nightmare ... By juxtaposing and dovetailing the lives and values of the Clutters and those of the killers, Capote produces a stark image of the deep doubleness of American life ... a remarkable book''Spectator
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Fictions
Book SynopsisThe most popular anthology of Jorge Luis Borges''s short stories, Fictions is a wildly original and influential collection of fantastic tales, translated from the Spanish with an afterword by Andrew Hurley in Penguin Modern Classics.Jorge Luis Borges''s Fictions introduced an entirely new voice into world literature. It is here that we find the astonishing accounts of ''Funes the Memorious'', the man who can forget nothing; ''Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote'', who recreates Miguel de Cervantes''s epic word-for-word; a society run on the basis of an all-encompassing game of chance in ''The Lottery in Babylon''; the mysterious world of ''Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius'' which seems to be supplanting our own ; and the ''Library of Babel'', which contains every possible book in the whole universe. Here too are the philosophical detective stories and the haunting tales of Irish revolutionaries, gaucho knife fights and dreams within dreams which proved
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd If Not Now When Penguin Modern Classics
Book SynopsisPrimo Levi was among the greatest witnesses to twentieth-century atrocity. In this gripping novel, based on a true story, he reveals the extraordinary lives of the Russian, Polish and Jewish partisans trapped behind enemy lines during the Second World War. Wracked by fear, hunger and fierce rivalries, they link up, fall apart, struggle to stay alive and to sabotage the efforts of the all-powerful German army. A compelling tale of action, resistance and epic adventure, it also reveals Levi''s characteristic compassion and deep insight into the moral dilemmas of total war. It ranks alongside THE PERIOD TABLE and IF THIS IS A MAN as one of the rare authentic masterpieces of our times.
£10.44
Penguin Books Ltd The Bridge of San Luis Rey
Book SynopsisAn ancient bridge collapses over a gorge in Peru, hurling five people into the abyss. It seems a meaningless human tragedy. But one witness, a Franciscan monk, believes the deaths might not be as random as they appear. Convinced that the disaster is a punishment sent from Heaven, the monk sets out to discover all he can about the travellers. The five strangers were connected in some way, he thinks. There must be a purpose behind their deaths. But are their lost lives the result of sin? ... Or of love?Trade ReviewA glorious thing -- David Mitchell
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd Pale Fire
Book SynopsisThe American poet John Shade is dead; murdered. His last poem, Pale Fire, is put into a book, together with a preface, a lengthy commentary and notes by Shade''s editor, Charles Kinbote. Known on campus as the ''Great Beaver'', Kinbote is haughty, inquisitive, intolerant, but is he also mad, bad - and even dangerous? As his wildly eccentric annotations slide into the personal and the fantastical, Kinbote reveals perhaps more than he should. Nabokov''s darkly witty, richly inventive masterwork is a suspenseful whodunit, a story of one-upmanship and dubious penmanship, and a glorious literary conundrum.Trade ReviewThis centaur work, half-poem, half-prose . . . is a creation of perfect beauty, symmetry, strangeness, originality and moral truth. Pretending to be a curio, it cannot disguise the fact that it is one of the great works of art of this century -- Mary McCarthy
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Reprieve
Book SynopsisPhilosopher, novelist, playwright and polemicist, Jean-Paul Sartre is thought to have been the central figure in post-war European culture and political thinking. His most well-known works, all of which are published by Penguin, include THE AGE OF REASON, NAUSEA and IRON IN THE SOUL.
£13.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Pastures of Heaven Penguin Modern Classics
Book SynopsisEach of these delightful interconnected tales is devoted to a family living in a fertile valley on the outskirts of Monterey, California, and the effects that one particular family has on them all. Steinbeck tackles two important literary traditions here; American naturalism, with its focus on the conflict between natural instincts and the demand to conform to society''s norms, and the short story cycle. Set in the heart of ''Steinbeck land'', the lush Californian valleys.
£11.99
Penguin Books Ltd The Acts of King Arthur and his Noble Knights
Book SynopsisSteinbeck''s first posthumously published work, The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights is a reinterpretation of tales from Malory''s Morte d''Arthur. In this highly successful attempt to render Malory into Modern English, Steinbeck recreated the rhythm and tone of the original Middle English.
£13.49
Penguin Books Ltd Another Country Penguin Modern Classics
Book Synopsis''A masterwork... an almost unbearable, tumultuous, blood-pounding experience'' Washinton PostWhen Another Country appeared in 1962, it caused a literary sensation. James Baldwin''s masterly story of desire, hatred and violence opens with the unforgettable character of Rufus Scott, a scavenging Harlem jazz musician adrift in New York. Self-destructive, bad and brilliant, he draws us into a Bohemian underworld pulsing with heat, music and sex, where desperate and dangerous characters betray, love and test each other to the limit.''In Another Country, Baldwin created the essential American drama of the century'' Colm TóibínTrade ReviewA masterwork... an almost unbearable, tumultuous, blood-pounding experience * Washington Post *Baldwin is one of the few genuinely indispensable American writers * Saturday Review *A delicate and fine-tuned talent... The book reveals Baldwin's immense will and professionalism * The New Yorker *Let our novelists read Mr Baldwin and tremble. There is a whirlwind loose in the land * Sunday Times *In Another Country, Baldwin created the essential American drama of the century -- Colm Tóibín
£9.49
Penguin Random House Australia Studs Lonigan Young Loniganthe Young Manhood of
Book SynopsisCollected here in one volume is James T. Farrell's renowned trilogy of the youth, early manhood, and death of Studs Lonigan: Young Lonigan, The Young Manhood of Studs Lonigan, and Judgment Day. In this relentlessly naturalistic portrait, Studs starts out his life full of vigor and ambition, qualities that are crushed by the Chicago youth's limited social and economic environment. Studs's swaggering and vicious comrades, his narrow family, and his educational and religious background lead him to a life of futile dissipation. Ann Douglas provides an illuminating introductory essay to Farrell's masterpiece, one of the greatest novels of American literature.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide
£22.50
Penguin Books Ltd The Garden of the FinziContinis
Book SynopsisThis is a haunting, elegiac novel which captures the mood and atmosphere of Italy (and in particular Ferrara) in the last summers of the thirties, focusing on an aristocratic Jewish family moving imperceptibly towards its doom. Vittorio De Sica turned the book into a film in 1970, winning the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1974.Trade ReviewPowerful new translations . . . Bassani began as a poet, and McKendrick's redelivery of this taut uncompromising fiction reveals resonance and generosity -- Ali Smith
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd I Claudius
Book Synopsis''Still an acknowledged masterpiece and a model for historical fiction ... sympathetic and intensely involving: a great feat of imagination'' Hilary Mantel Bringing to life the intrigue of ancient Rome, Robert Graves''s I, Claudius is one of the most celebrated, gripping historical novels ever writtenDespised for his weakness and regarded by his family as little more than a stammering fool, the nobleman Claudius quietly survives the bloody purges and mounting cruelty of the imperial Roman dynasties. In I, Claudius he watches from the sidelines to record the reigns of its emperors: from the wise Augustus and his villainous wife Livia to the sadistic Tiberius and the insane excesses of Caligula. Written in the form of Claudius'' autobiography, this is the first part of Robert Graves''s brilliant account of the madness and debauchery of ancient Rome.With an introduction by Barry Unsworth''An imaginative and hugely readable account of the early decades of the Roman Empire ... racy, inventive, often comic'' Daily TelegraphTrade ReviewI, CLAUDIUS and CLAUDIUS THE GOD are an imaginative and hugely readable account of the early decades of the Roman Empire ... racy, inventive, often comic * Daily Telegraph *One of the really remarkable books of our day, a novel of learning and imagination, fortunately conceived and brilliantly executed * New York Times *Still an acknowledged masterpiece and a model for historical fiction ... sympathetic and intensely involving: a great feat of imagination -- Hilary Mantel
£9.99
Penguin Books Ltd Collected Stories Bellow Saul Penguin Modern
Book SynopsisThis is the definitive collection of short stories by Saul Bellow. Abundant, precise, various, rich and exuberant, the stories display the stylistic and emotional brilliance which characterizes this master of prose. Some stories recount the events of a single day, some are contained in a wider frame; each story is a characteristic combination of observation and a celebration of humanity.
£15.29
Penguin Books Ltd Alone in Berlin Penguin Modern Classics
Book SynopsisTHE ACCLAIMED INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER''One of the most extraordinary and compelling novels written about World War II. Ever'' Alan Furst Inspired by a true story, Hans Fallada''s Alone in Berlin is a gripping wartime thriller following one ordinary man''s determination to defy the tyranny of Nazi rule Berlin, 1940, and the city is filled with fear. At the house on 55 Jablonski Strasse, its various occupants try to live under Nazi rule in their different ways: the bullying Hitler loyalists the Persickes, the retired judge Fromm and the unassuming couple Otto and Anna Quangel. Then the Quangels receive the news that their beloved son has been killed fighting in France. Shocked out of their quiet existence, they begin a silent campaign of defiance, and a deadly game of cat and mouse develops between the Quangels and the ambitious Gestapo inspector Escherich. When petty criminals Kluge and Borkhausen also become involved, deception, betrayal and muTrade ReviewOne of the most extraordinary and compelling novels written about World War II. Ever. -- Alan FurstTerrific ... a fast-moving, important and astutely deadpan thriller. * Irish Times *A classic study of a paranoid society. Fallada's scope is extraordinary. Alone in Berlin is ... as morally powerful as anything I've ever read. -- Charlotte Moore * Telegraph *The greatest book ever written about the German resistance to the Nazis. -- Primo LeviFallada assembles a cast of vivid low-life characters, stoolies, thieves and whores -- James Buchan * Guardian *Visceral, chilling ... has the suspense of a Le Carré novel * New Yorker *A classic study of a paranoid society. Fallada's scope is extraordinary. Alone in Berlin is ... as morally powerful as anything I've ever read -- Charlotte Moore * Telegraph *First published in Germany in 1947 and evoking the horror of life in Germany in the Second World War. A rediscovered masterpiece that makes you want to seek out more works by this great chronicler of events in my own lifetime. * Barry Humphries, Books of the Year, Sunday Telegraph *The other fictional high point of 2009 was Alone in Berlin ... Hans Fallada's 1947 portrait of an ordinary German couple stung into a life of protest by the death of their soldier son is harrowing and masterly. -- David Robson * Books of the Year, Sunday Telegraph *[This novel] suggests that resistance to evil is rarely straightforward, mostly futile, and generally doomed. Yet to the novel's aching, unanswered question: 'Does it matter?' there is in this strange and compelling story to be found a reply in the affirmative. Primo Levi had it right: This is the great novel of German resistance. -- Richard Flanagan'What Irène Némirovsky's "Suite Française" did for wartime France after six decades in obscurity, Fallada does for wartime Berlin.' * Roger Cohen, New York Times *'[Alone in Berlin] has something of the horror of Conrad, the madness of Dostoyevsky and the chilling menace of Capote's "In Cold Blood"'. * Roger Cohen, New York Times *'Fallada's great novel, beautifully translated by the poet Michael Hofmann, evokes the daily horror of life under the Third Reich, where the venom of Nazism seeped into the very pores of society, poisoning every aspect of existence. It is a story of resistance, sly humour and hope' -- Ben Macintyre * The Times *'an extraordinary novel' * Daily Express *A marvellous book, almost a masterpiece. The tension he maintains despite a fogegone conclusion is miraculous. This is the truest, most vivid I-was-there novel of the epoch. * Norman Lebrecht *The stand-out book this year for me was Alone in Berlin (Penguin Classics £9.99) ... It's a page-turning moral thriller, based on fact, of a working-class German couple and their small-scale attempts to resist Nazi rule in Berlin. Bleak, chilling, utterly compelling and unforgettable. -- Pugh * Books of the Year, Daily Mail *Penguin's reissue of Hans Fallada's Alone in Berlin, brilliantly translated by Michael Hofmann, makes available one of the great novels of the past century. An almost unbearably intense challenge to its readers. -- George Steiner * Books of the Year, TLS *What makes Alone in Berlin such a cracking read is that it pushes us into the midst of that grim reality and yet allows us to put it down - only at the very end - with a feeling of warm humanity. -- Peter Millar * The Times *Hans Fallada wrote Alone in Berlin between September and November 1946, in postwar East Germany. He told his family that he had written "a great novel". He would die a few months later. .... Fallada was correct: he had written a great book, in circumstances and a space of time which make the achievement almost miraculous. But it's the double miracle of translation which gives us Fallada's novel in English as Alone in Berlin. Michael Hoffman is a fine poet, whose acute ear and eloquent understanding of the transition-points between the two languages make the text as powerful as it is down-to-earth. -- Helen Dunmore * Guardian *
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Johnny Got His Gun
Book SynopsisIt was the war to end all wars, the global struggle that would finally make the world safe for democracy - at any cost. But one American soldier has paid a price beyond measure. And within the disfigured flesh that was once a vision of youth lives a spirit that cannot accept what the world has become. An immediate bestseller upon its first publication in 1939, Trumbo''s stark, profoundly troubling masterpiece about the horrors of the First World War brilliantly crystallized the uncompromising brutality of war and became the most influential protest novel of the Vietnam era. As timely as ever.Trade Review'Powerful ... an eye-opener' - Michael Moore 'A book that can never be forgotten by anyone who reads it' Saturday Review
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Fantastic Tales
Book SynopsisFrom fabulous enchantments and supernatural horrors to subtler, more psychological terrors, the best of nineteenth-century fantastic literature is collected here by Italo Calvino. These mysterious and macabre tales include Hoffmann''s nightmarish ''The Sandman'', Poe''s terrifying ''The Tell-Tale Heart'' and Dickens''s chilling ghost story ''The Signal-Man'', and relatively unknown works from celebrated writers including Honoré de Balzac, Henry James, Sir Walter Scott, Guy de Maupassant and Robert Louis Stevenson, alongside lesser-known contributors. Each story comes with a fascinating introduction by Calvino.Trade Review'Describes imaginary worlds with the most extraordinary precision and beauty' - Gore Vidal 'One of the most playful, intelligent and inventive minds in the whole of European fiction' - Philip Hensher, Mail on Sunday
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd Journey into Fear
Book SynopsisIt is 1940 and Mr Graham, a quietly-spoken engineer and arms expert, has just finished high-level talks with the Turkish government. And now somebody wants him dead. The previous night three shots were fired at him as he stepped into his hotel room, so, terrified, he escapes in secret on a passenger steamer from Istanbul. As he journeys home - alongside, among others, an entrancing French dancer, an unkempt trader, a mysterious German doctor and a small, brutal man in a crumpled suit - he enters a nightmarish world where friend and foe are indistinguishable. Graham can try to run, but he may not be able to hide for much longer ...Trade Review'Holds one up as effectively as a gun barrel' Evening Standard 'If you want to experience the feel of the Continent in the 1930s, you will find few better guides' - Robert Harris
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd The Haunting of Hill House
Book SynopsisFour seekers have arrived at the rambling old pile known as Hill House: Dr Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of psychic phenomena; Theodora, his lovely assistant; Luke, the future inheritor of the estate; and Eleanor, a friendless, fragile young woman with a dark past.Trade ReviewThe scariest book I’ve ever read ... I read it one night next to my sleeping wife and found myself unable to move, unable to go to bed, unable to do anything except keep reading and praying the shadows around me didn’t move -- Carmen Maria Machado * The New York Times *the haunted house novel. All others stand in its shadow -- Paul Tremblay * author of A Head Full of Ghosts *Shirley Jackson’s “The Haunting of Hill House” beats them all: a maleficent house, real human protagonists, everything half-seen or happening in the dark. It scared me as a teenager and it haunts me still, as does Eleanor, the girl who comes to stay -- Neil Gaiman * The New York Times *The Haunting of Hill House rewrote horror’s rules -- Alison Flood * Guardian *Stepping into Hill House is like stepping into the mind of a madman; it isn't long before you weird yourself out * Stephen King *An amazing writer ... If you haven't read We Have Always Lived in the Castle or The Haunting of Hill House or any of her short stories you have missed out on something marvellous -- Neil GaimanThe world of Shirley Jackson is eerie and unforgettable ... She is a true master -- A. M. HomesOne of the twentieth century's most luminous and strange American writers -- Jonathan LethemHer books penetrate keenly to the terrible truths which sometimes hide behind comfortable fictions, to the treachery beneath cheery neighborhood faces and the plain manners of country folk -- Donna TarttShe is the finest master...of the cryptic, haunted tale * The New York Times Book Review *A novel which at one stroke puts her unquestionably among the great masters of the genre . . . as spine-chilling . . . as anything Edgar Allan Poe dreamed up. -- Peter Green * Daily Telegraph *
£9.49
