ELT & Literary Studies Books

Book SynopsisIn these extraordinary poems, using multiple viewpoints - from Darwin himself, to his beloved wife Emma, and even, at one point, the orangutang at London Zoo - Ruth Padel illuminates the development of Darwin''s thought, the drama of the discovery of evolution, and the fluctuating emotions of Darwin the husband, the naturalist and the tender father, in a powerful tribute to her famous ancestor.Shortlisted for the 2009 Costa Poetry Award.Trade ReviewExquisite, precise and moving poems... Once I started reading I could not put it down until I had reached the end, and then I turned back for the pleasure of reading again -- Claire TomalinA fascinating, very rich book... With sympathy and grace, Padel moves deftly between between science, love and family; between the vast processes of evolution and a personal life -- Sean O'BrienDaring and exciting, brilliant and subtle, stunning and deeply impressive... a lesson to biographers and poets alike -- Colm ToibinAmbitious... shows her extraordinary talent * Observer *Moments of Darwin's life captured with an economy and fluency that prosaic biographers might envy * Spectator *

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Book SynopsisDavid Lodge (CBE)'s novels include Changing Places, Small World and Nice Work (shortlisted for the Booker) and, most recently, A Man of Parts. He has also written plays and screenplays, and several books of literary criticism. His works have been translated into more than thirty languages. He is Emeritus Professor of English Literature at Birmingham, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and is a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres.Trade ReviewThe professor, the critic and the novelist work in harmony to provide a valuable tutorial on modern fiction * Observer *A fascinating survey of how novels convey our thoughts * Guardian *The abandonment of civilized talk about literature by the ‘theory’ fraternity would leave us very short if it were not for the likes of Lodge, the quality of whose prose and insights, not least because they both come matured from the casks of his own vocation, is a high treat. Leave consciousness to the neurophysiologists and philosophers, and explore human experience and selfhood with Lodge and the novelists, and enjoy -- A. C. Grayling * Financial Times *Lodge is a clear writer, wise about things and a careful reader and in general kind even to people who plainly irritate him -- Sam Leith * Spectator *He excels when he writes about books. His wide learning and through understanding of critical trends give confidence and enthusiasm to his work * Sunday Times *Lodge’s animating spark is his sedulousness, his ability to marshal the facts, pronounce a judgement and then subtly qualify it -- D. J. Taylor * Independent on Sunday *Consciousness and the Novel makes a bright, instructive introduction to David Lodge – as critic and novelist – for anyone who does not know his work * San Francisco Chronicle *Most other critics would make heavy weather of such topics, but Lodge always scintillates * Boston Globe *

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Book SynopsisAzar Nafisi is a visiting professor and the executive director of Cultural Conversations at the Foreign Policy Institute of Johns Hopkins University. She has taught Western literature at the University of Tehran, the Free Islamic University and the University of Allameh Tabatabai in Iran. In 1981 she was expelled from the University of Tehran after refusing to wear the veil. In 1994 she won a teaching fellowship from Oxford University, and in 1997 she and her family left Iran for America. She is the author of Reading Lolita in Tehran and Things I've Been Silent About, and has written for the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal and the New Republic, and has appeared on countless radio and television programs. She lives in Washington, D.C. with her husband and two children.www.azarnafisi.comTrade ReviewPlayful, sombre and tender, Nafisi's character-vignettes persuade us that reading nourishes empathy and friendship, opening the forbidden path through the green gate. * Independent *Resonant and deeply affecting . . . an eloquent brief on the transformative powers of fiction. * New York Times *We are all citizens of Azar Nafisi’s The Republic of Imagination. Without imagination there are no dreams, without dreams there is no art, and without art there is nothing. Her words are essential. * Marjane Satrapi *A lovely book: sharp in observation and wholly readable. * Larry McMurtry *An arresting read … striking and utterly persuasive * Times Higher Education *

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Book SynopsisSalman Rushdie is the author of eleven novels, one collection of short stories, three works of non-fiction, and the co-editor of The Vintage Book of Indian Writing. In 2008 Midnight's Children was judged to be the Best of the Booker, the best novel to have won the Booker Prize in its forty year history. The Moor's Last Sigh won the Whitbread Prize in 1995 and the European Union's Aristeion Prize for Literature in 1996. He is a Commandeur des Arts et des Lettres and in 2007 was knighted for his services to literature.Trade ReviewJoseph Anton is a splendid book, the finest new memoir to cross my desk in many a year -- Jonathan Yardley * Washington Post *Funny, painfully moving and absolutely necessary to read -- Nicholas Shakespeare * Daily Telegraph *Joseph Anton is a book that makes you laugh. It makes you sympathise. It may even scare you. It should also make you — if you believe that freedom is essential — very, very angry. -- David Aaronovitch * Times *Frank and…more gripping than any spy story…the prose makes for powerful reading... He is a great writer who has been brave. -- Margaret Drabble * Observer *An intimate tale of fathers and sons, of the beginnings and ends of marriages, of friendships and betrayals. At the same time, Joseph Anton is a large-scale spectacle of political and cultural conflicts. * New York Times Book Review *

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Book SynopsisDuring the early fifties, Kenya was a country in turmoil. While Ngugi enjoys scouting trips, chess tournaments and reading about Biggles at the prestigious Alliance School near Nairobi, things are changing at home. He arrives back for his first visit since starting school to find his house razed to the ground and the entire village moved up the road closer to a guard checkpoint. Later, his brother, Good Wallace, who fights for the rebels, is captured by the British and taken to a concentration camp. Finally, Ngugi himself comes into conflict with the forces of colonialism when he is victimised by a police officer on a bus journey and thrown in prison for six days. This fascinating memoir charts the development of a significant voice in international literature, as well as standing as a record of the struggles of a nation to free itself.Trade ReviewGrowing up in Kenya in the 1950s, the future novelist went to an elite school run by a Briton just as the Mau Mau uprising swept his family into the revolt against colonial rule. This powerful memoir depicts a youth torn between these separate worlds * i *This is a book about a young boy’s fear, not just of letting his mother down or failing to fulfill his potential, but some of the worst political violence that Africa endured in the colonial period -- Tim Butcher * Mail on Sunday *No writer alive today has more complex experience to draw upon or greater resource to convey it -- Brian Morton * Glasgow Herald *The only thing more amazing than identifying the themes of your life is using them to create deceptively simple literature about it. Such labor is child’s play for the Kenyan novelist and playwright Ngugi wa Thiong'o... [With] echoes of Barack Obama’s own Dreams... [Thiong’o] easily keeps the balance between the whimsical, political, spiritual and personal -- Todd Steven Burroughs * Ebony *Eloquently telegraphs the complicated experience of being simultaneously oppressed and enlightened at the hands of a colonial regime * New York Times Book Review *

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Book SynopsisThe daughter of Iraqi-Jewish refugees, Samantha Ellis is the author of the books How to be a Heroine and Take Courage and her plays include How to Date a Feminist, Cling to me Like Ivy and Operation Magic Carpet. Her journalism has appeared in the Guardian, TLS, Spectator, Literary Review and more. She worked on the first two Paddington films. She lives in London.Trade ReviewAny woman with a remotely bookish childhood will find great pleasure in How to be a Heroine... like Ellis, I find it reassuring that Lizzy Bennet can admit that she was wrong about Darcy, have used Scarlett's indomitable mantra in times of adversity, and have every sympathy with the women who keep their bank accounts separate as in Lace -- Daisy Goodwin * Sunday Times *This is quite simply a genius idea for a book.... A fantastically inspirational memoir that makes you want to reread far too many books -- Viv Groskop * Observer *Brilliant... From Lizzy Bennet to 'go-getting Judy Jordan' from Lace, Samantha Ellis did what we all do, mostly without realising: tried other people's lives on for size in literature * Red *The best kind of book: one that I gobbled up, wanting to go slow to savour it but unable to stop reading until it was all gone. One that made me want to run to the bookshop to buy copies of novels I’ve never got round to reading and devour those, too -- Rebecca Armstrong * Independent *Delightfully honest and warmly funny -- Eithne Farry * Daily Mail *

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Book SynopsisThis stunning translation, by the acclaimed poet Robin Robertson (Forward Prize, Man Booker shortlist 2018), has reinvigorated Euripides'' devastating take of a god''s revenge for contemporary readers, bringing the ancient verse to fervid, brutal life.Dionysus, god of wine and ecstasy, has come to Thebes, and the women are streaming out of the city to worship him on the mountain, drinking and dancing in wild frenzy. The king, Pentheus, denouces this so-called ''god'' as a charlatan. But no mortal can deny a god and no man can ever stand against Dionysus.''The dialogue is taut, volcanic and often exquisitely beautiful... Euripides deserves to have his exquisite verse transformed into modern speech, and in Robertson I believe he has found a poet who can do that.'' Edith Hall, Literary ReviewTrade Review‘Euripides’s Bacchae is one of the most powerful poems in Greek literature...one of the hardest texts in Western literature to translate. The astute Scottish poet Robin Robertson has already shown with his Medea, published in 2008, that he can translate Euripides into chiselled English poetry ripe for theatrical delivery. Bacchae is even better. In the choral odes, sung by the titular Bacchants, he has radiantly evoked the ritual solemnity, supported by assonance and percussive drive, that makes these sung poems so otherworldly. The dialogue is taut, volcanic and often exquisitely beautiful... Euripides deserves to have his exquisite verse transformed into modern speech, and in Robertson I believe he has found a poet who can do that. This translation cries out for realisation by multiple voices on radio or in live theatre -- Edith Hall * Literary Review *Robin Robertson is the great Euripides translator of our time. The clarity and power of his Medea is unmatched, and his Bacchae is just as direct, unhindered and fluid, perfect for revealing such madness. -- David VannI can recommend the clarity of the translation...Robertson maintains a robust and exuberant style. It’s time to brush up on our Greek theatre and here’s a stunning chance -- Grace Cavalieri * Washington Independent Review of Books *It's 2,400 years old, yet it is so compelling and absolutely modern -- Deborah WarnerI portray men as they should be, but Euripides portrays them as they are -- Sophocles, Aristotle's 'Poetics'

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Book SynopsisRobert Frost was born in San Francisco in 1874. After the death of his father he moved with his mother and sister to Massachusetts. His first collection, A Boy's Will, was published in 1913. In 1924 he won the first of four Pulitzer Prizes for his fourth book, New Hampshire. In the 1930s, as he became ever more revered, he suffered a series of family tragedies: his youngest child Marjorie died in 1934, his wife Elinor in 1938, and his son Carol in 1940. Another daughter, Irma, suffered from mental illness. Frost's last major collection, A Witness Tree (1942), contains a number of poems reflecting these disasters. In 1957 Robert Frost received honorary degrees from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. He died in January 1963.Trade ReviewThe most eminent, the most distinguished Anglo-American poet now living -- T. S. EliotFrost was the first American poet who could honestly be reckoned a master-poet by world standards -- Robert GravesRobert Frost has passed into the poetic pantheon * Independent *Of all the poetry written in our generation, Frost's is most likely to stand the test of time * Lewis Gannett *

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Book SynopsisAlthough Paul Auster and J.M. Coetzee had been reading each other''s books for years, the two writers did not meet until February 2008. Not long after, Auster received a letter from Coetzee, suggesting they begin exchanging letters on a regular basis and, ''God willing, strike sparks off each other.''Here and Now is the result of that proposal: an epistolary dialogue between two great writers who became great friends. Over three years their letters touched on nearly every subject, from sports to fatherhood, film festivals to incest, philosophy to politics, from the financial crisis to art, family, marriage, friendship, and love.Their correspondence offers an intimate and often amusing portrait of these two men as they explore the complexities of the here and now and is a reflection of two sharp intellects whose pleasure in each other''s friendship is apparent on every page.Trade ReviewExtraordinary book * Times Literary Supplement *Uniquely insightful, unfailingly interesting -- Arifa Akbar * Independent *How gripping it is to watch these two thoughtful, articulate men grappling with a world that hasn't quite turned out how they expected -- Olivia Laing * New Statesman *These pages are at their most compelling when the respective writers begin to dwell on the currency of their fiction -- Tim Adams * Observer *You feel that Auster and Coetzee are addressing each other directly and honestly. Some of it is rather moving, and underpinning it all is genuine affection -- Jon Day * Daily Telegraph *

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Book SynopsisTells the story of Ian Fleming at Goldeneye in Jamaica, where all his novels and stories on James Bond were written. This book includes interviews with Ian's family, his Jamaican lover Blanche Blackwell and many other islanders. It deals with Ian Fleming's life and work.Trade ReviewSupremely enjoyable... Matthew Parker has created a completely new picture of Ian, Bond and the role of Jamaica in the making of the legend -- John Pearson, author of THE LIFE OF IAN FLEMINGThe book that James Bond obsessives have been waiting for – a beautiful, brilliant history of Ian Fleming at home at Goldeneye, all of sun-drenched, gin-soaked, bed-hopping colonial Jamaica outside the window and 007 at the moment of his creation. This is the big bang of Bond books. -- Tony Parsons[Here are] the glowing sea, the teeming life beneath the waves, and the warm black nights, all of which made their way into the Bond novels... [But] Parker’s highly readable account of Fleming’s Jamaican life is less Thunderball and more Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Bond himself might have been a touch jealous. -- Sinclair McKay * Daily Telegraph *A superb account of Fleming’s Jamaica… well-researched, excellently written… Without Jamaica, it is safe to say, there would have been no Agent 007. * Financial Times *Matthew Parker's brilliant book Goldeneye is indispensable for anyone interested in the inner life of the enigmatic Ian Fleming and the whole James Bond phenomenon he created. -- Nicholas Rankin * author of Ian Fleming's Commandos *

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Book Synopsis***AS READ ON BBC RADIO 4***NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD WINNER'A gripping account of the heartbreaks and triumphs of two of history's most formidable female intellectuals, Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley.Trade Review[A] unique double biography... An excellent and poignant book whose heroines breathe in its pages. -- David Aaronovitch * The Times *A mother and daughter who changed not only the way we think, but the way we are… extraordinary women, a dozen decades ahead of their time… Romantic Outlaws enables readers to compare the different ways in which these two remarkable women confronted their tragically different destinies… [A] thoughtful, intelligent, deeply-felt book’ -- Miranda Seymour * Sunday Times *A gripping account of the heartbreaks and triumphs of two of history's most formidable female intellectuals, Mary Wollstonecraft and Mary Shelley. Gordon has reunited mother and daughter through biography, beautifully weaving their narratives for the first time. -- Amanda Foreman * author of A World on Fire *Full of enriching paradox… Charlotte Gordon has managed to produce that rare thing, a work of genuinely popular history... It works beautifully. -- Melissa Benn * New Statesman *Wollstonecraft and Shelley were extraordinary women who led sensational lives. They were Romantic revolutionaries… retelling their story cannot fail to captivate and provoke. * Spectator *Unique... Marvellous, passionate stuff. -- David Aaronovitch * Books of the Year, Times *An exceptional achievement -- Michael Morpugo * Daily Telegraph *Read and be seriously inspired. * Stylist *An innovative dual biography that foregrounds the writing of two women who disregarded the moral codes of their eras and shaped their own destinies. Gordon’s parallel mapping of their lives reveals fascinating similarities in the ways writing sustained, and sometimes saved, them both. * Financial Times *Mother and daughter shadow and reveal each other. The retelling emphasises the extent to which Shelley’s life was shaped by her mother’s legacy but here is underlined in thought-provoking ways... In Gordon’s narrative, [Wollstonecraft and Shelley] appear at their best and bravest. * Observer *

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Book SynopsisAn extraordinary book of real passionate research' Edmund de WaalIn 1945, Ezra Pound was due to stand trial for treason for his broadcasts in Fascist Italy during the Second World War. But before the trial could take place Pound was pronounced insane. Escaping a potential death sentence he was shipped off to St Elizabeths Hospital near Washington, DC, where he was held for over a decade. At the hospital, Pound was at his most contradictory and most controversial: a genius writer The most important living poet in the English language' according to T. S. Eliot but also a traitor and now, seemingly, a madman. But he remained a magnetic figure. Eliot, Elizabeth Bishop, Robert Lowell and John Berryman all went to visit him at what was perhaps the world's most unorthodox literary salon: convened by a fascist and held in a lunatic asylum. Told through the eyes of his illustrious visitors, The Bughouse captures the essence of Pound the artistic flaiTrade ReviewIt is Swift’s considerable achievement sympathetically to examine an extraordinary, often troubling, tale...an enthralling narrative -- Robert McCrum * Observer *An extraordinary book of real passionate research which keeps surprising and illuminating by turns. -- Edmund de WaalLively and searching… He has an engaging authorial presence and his own hesitations and uncertainties about Ezra Pound, both as poet and personality, lend a certain tension and a pleasing piquancy to his narrative -- Eric Ormsby * Times Literary Supplement *Swift is a sensitive and thoughtful reader of both poetry and human psychology... The Bughouse is also a kind of immersive adventure journalism, in which he retraces Pound's steps and tries to unearth new details about his life -- Adam Kirsch * New Statesman *To understand an artist as compromised by circumstances – and by his own many contradictions – as Ezra Pound, we have to trace a complex path through a maze of half-truths, myth, and simplification. The Bughouse does so with supreme care, critical acumen, and humanity, shedding a whole new light not only on Pound the man, but also on the shape and character of The Cantos, one of the most seriously flawed and truly brilliant artworks of the twentieth century -- John BurnsideA wonderful portrait of Ezra Pound in all his moods - mad, bad and blindingly sane. -- A. AlvarezSwift does a fine job of allowing Pound’s many contradictions to stay in place and reminds us, too, that 45 years after his death there are plenty of contradictions left in the people who admire him -- James Walton * Daily Mail *It is a tribute to the brightness of The Bughouse that Swift has revived my interest in the old monster -- Roger Lewis * The Times *Swift’s strength is his refusal to separate Pound’s writings from the issues of Fascism and insanity... Sharp-eyed and pacey...it highlights memorably the tangled relations between lunatic, lover and poet -- Robert Crawford * Literary Review *[A] remarkable study of [Ezra Pound’s] fertile afterlife -- Suzi Feay * Financial Times *At the heart of this books lies a fascinating debate about poets and society -- Craig Brown * Mail on Sunday *A powerful and very talented writer…dashing and arresting…the greatness in his subject shines through every dark corner -- Peter Craven * Sydney Review of Books *Swift admits that he cannot pin his elusive subject down, but there is no need. By following his instinct he has allowed the poet, with his ‘shifting self-narration’, to lead the way in this marvellous evocation. -- Philippa Williams * The Lady *American poet Ezra Pound… proves an elusive but fascinating subject in this non-linear, impressionistic biography -- Juanita Coulson * Lady *

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Book SynopsisBeecher Stowe's vivid descriptions uncover the harrowing situations faced by slaves in Civil War America.When a Kentucky farmer faces financial ruin, he reluctantly sells his slaves, and Uncle Tom finds himself the property of a cruel plantation owner, fighting for his freedom and ultimately, for his right to live. With a rich narrative and wonderfully realised characters, this is a panoramic, incredibly accomplished work. Originally published to much acclaim in 1852, it quickly established Harriet Beecher Stowe as one of America's most influential female novelists and was crucial in helping to secure the abolition of slavery.Trade ReviewIts power is that it never makes light of slavery and its attendant vast misery -- John Updike * New Yorker *A century and a half since its publication, Uncle Tom's Cabin retains a fascination for Americans… it stoked a furious hostility among many Americans to the continuation of slavery in their own Southern states * Daily Telegraph *The novel's impact was global… Among those who hailed it as a masterpiece were Ivan Turgenev, Victor Hugo, Leo Tolstoy and George Eliot -- Gary Younge * Guardian *Explosive * Economist *

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Book SynopsisThe final volume of the definitive authorised biography of one of the greatest American writers.A moving testament to one of the last century's greatest writers' Sunday TimesAt forty-nine, Saul Bellow was at the pinnacle of American letters he was rich, famous and critically acclaimed, with the best yet to come: Mr Sammler's Planet, Humboldt's Gift, all his best stories. He went on to win two more National Book Awards, a Pulitzer Prize, and the Nobel Prize. However, away from his desk, Bellow''s life was set to become embroiled in controversy: over foreign affairs, race, religion, education, social policy, the state of culture, the fate of the novel. From the women he pursued and his turbulent family relations, to his struggles with cultural relativism and the perceived excesses of civil rights movements, this second and final volume of Zachary Leader''s monumental Life of Saul Bellow charts Bellow''s heroic energy and will throughout his life, right to the end - where his immense achievements and their costs, to himself and others, became ever more apparent.''Brilliant'' Spectator''Compelling'' Times Literary Supplement''Riveting'' New Statesman''Superb'' New York TimesTrade ReviewLeader is our hyper-sensitive ammeter, charting the myriad effects of all this fame on his difficult, brilliant subject. A great feat of scholarship and, at the end, a moving testament to one of the last century’s greatest writers. -- Claire Lowdon * Sunday Times, **Literary Book of the Year** *This will stand as the definitive account. Leader talked to the surviving three wives and drew on the memories of Bellow’s three sons, as well as more than 100 friends (and one or two enemies) and devout literary progeny including Martin Amis and the critic James Wood. -- Tim Adams * Observer *This second volume of biography perfectly captures the spirit of a complex genius… Bellow calls for a sensitive balance between censure and understanding, to avoid overshadowing his genius, and it is hard to imagine anyone doing it better [than Zachary Leader]. -- George Walden * Evening Standard *Book of the Week* *Zachary Leader’s monumental biography of Saul Bellow…[is] minutely researched and clear-eyed… Leader is wholly steeped in Bellow’s oeuvre and able to find all the fictional equivalents of the real people who filled his life. -- John Mullan * Guardian *Leader’s portrait manages to be both subtle and even-handed… Leader’s two-volume biography is an astonishingly detailed and thoughtful record of an important life. -- Benjamin Markovits * Spectator *

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Book SynopsisAnthony Burgess was born in Manchester in 1917 and educated at Xaverian College and Manchester University. He served in the British army from 1940 to 1946 and was a schoolteacher in England before becoming a colonial education officer in 1954. His Malayan trilogy of novels and a history of English literature were published while he was living in Malaya and Brunei.He became a full-time writer in 1959 and achieved a worldwide reputation as one of the most versatile novelists of his day. His writings include biographies of Shakespeare and Hemingway, critical studies of James Joyce, stage plays, and two volumes of autobiography. His work as a composer and librettist includes the Broadway musical, Cyrano, and Blooms of Dublin, an operetta based on Joyce's Ulysses.His 33 novels continue to be published all over the world. They include A Clockwork Orange, Nothing Like the Sun, The Complete Enderby, Earthly Powers, NapoleonTrade ReviewBright, racy...knowledgeable and humorous, alternately sensible and quirky. -- Terry EagletonAnthony Burgess's wonderfully well-stocked mind and essentially wayward spirit are just right for summoning up an apparition of the Bard which is more convincing than most -- David Holloway * Daily Telegraph *Animated by affection and an understanding of the creative imagination that only a creative writer can bring to bear * Atlantic *A smooth-flowing narrative, often enlivened by Anthony Burgess's Joycean appetite for linguistic fantasy * The Economist *

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Book SynopsisDreams are the currency of Okri''s writing, particularly in this first book of poems, An African Elegy, but also in his books of short stories and prize-winning novel The Famished Road. Okri''s dreams are made on the stuff of Africa''s colossal economic and political problems, and reading the poems is to experience a constant succession of metaphors of resolution in both senses of the word. Virtually every poem contains an exhortation to climb out of the African miasma, and virtually every poem harvests the dream of itself with an upbeat restorative ending'' - Giles Foden, Times Literary SupplementTrade ReviewAuthenticity shines out of these poems in the way it does from some East European and Russian poets * Times Literary Supplement *Accessible and affecting... Born of a big spirit that one cannot ignore -- Gillian Ferguson * Scotland on Sunday *A kaleidoscope of tersely condensed implications, with pregnant shifts of mood, tone and meaning brought to bear in the space of each line break... Most of Okri's writing is best understood as poetry, even when not laid out in broken lines -- Michael Horovitz

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Book SynopsisPatrimony is a true story about the relationship between a father and a son.Philip Roth watches as his eight-six-year-old father, famous for his vigour, his charm and his skill as a raconteur - lovingly called 'the Bard of Newark' - battles with the brain tumour that will kill him.Trade ReviewNobody writes about the American family with more tenderness and honesty * New Statesman *A simple, moving, generous work * Independent on Sunday *The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away - with words. But the Lord giveth back, miraculously, in the form of this book and this family history * Guardian *A true story, told with all the powerful authority and cunning narrative order of a major writer * Sunday Times *His best work since The Counterlife * Observer *

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Book SynopsisIn 1983 de Beauvoir published Sartre''s letters, maintaining that her own to him had been lost. They were found by de Beauvoir''s adopted daughter, and published to a storm of controversy in France. Tracing the emotional and triangular complications of her life with Sartre, the letters reveal her not only as manipulative and dependent but Simonealso as vulnerable, passionate, jealous and committed.Trade ReviewThere is more than a whiff of Les Liaisons Dangereuses about these pages * Spectator *This is a vivid piece of unexpurgated social history, and an opportunity to hear a vigorous and innovative thinker...speaking in her abrasive, touching, breathtakingly candid private voice * Sunday Times *

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Book SynopsisTrade ReviewEssentials of Young Adult Literature has become the best text for blending the online instruction world with the traditional classroom world through its careful discipline. While brief, the text has focused upon key issues and illustrated the practice of 7-12 classroom English teachers without drifting into personal reminiscence or academic fluff. Its structure allows for creative development of online mediums while its cautious and concise chapters set the stage for traditional classroom interaction, giving this text the versatility to engage in several learning environments. Its approach is such that it offers insights for the classroom English teacher while still providing background for the literature major planning on teaching college literature, or the creative writer with an eye on the young adult market. Essentials of Young Adult Literature has gleaned the key elements that present young adult literature as a gateway toward more advanced reading of “classical literature” by demonstrating that young adult literature connects young readers to a wider literary world. —- Dr. Thomas Eaton, Southern Missouri State University This text is the perfect one for college students. It is engaging, accessible, and informative. This text is a smart combination of genre study and author biography and self-identity. I believe my students welcome using a text that is inviting, informative, and relevant to their teaching lives. The authors beckon their readers to learn so much through its many ancillaries and critical thinking questions and activities. This is the perfect text for college students and teachers eager to learn about good books for teens and how best to motivate lifelong readers. -- Jeffrey Stuart Kaplan, University of Central Florida This text is excellent for providing an overview of young adult literature. It offers comprehensive recommended reading lists organized in meaningful ways to assist students in selecting appropriate materials in the young adult genre. The organization of the text itself makes it very useful because novice readers of young adult novels can easily familiarize themselves with the subgenres simply by looking at the Table of Contents and skimming the chapters. By using this text, students have a balance between reading about young adult novels and reading young adult novels for themselves. -- Dr. Charlotte Pass, SUNY CortlandTable of ContentsBrief Table of Contents Preface Part One: Young Adults and Young Adult Literature CHAPTER ONE: Understanding Young Adults and Their Literature CHAPTER TWO: Learning about Literature Part Two: Genres of Literature CHAPTER THREE: Realistic Fiction CHAPTER FOUR: Fantasy and Science Fiction CHAPTER FIVE: Historical Fiction CHAPTER SIX: Nonfiction: Biography and Informational Books CHAPTER SEVEN: Poetry and Plays CHAPTER EIGHT: Literature for a Diverse Society Part Three Literature in the Schools CHAPTER NINE: Literature in the Curriculum CHAPTER TEN: Experiencing Literature APPENDIX A: Book Awards APPENDIX B: Magazines Index to Books and Authors &nbs

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Book SynopsisThe National Book Award-winning novel—and contemporary classic—that launched the brilliant career of Gloria Naylor, now with a foreword by Tayari Jones “[A] shrewd and lyrical portrayal of many of the realities of black life . . . Naylor bravely risks sentimentality and melodrama to write her compassion and outrage large, and she pulls it off triumphantly.” —The New York Times Book Review“Brims with inventiveness—and relevance.” —NPR's Fresh Air In her heralded first novel, Gloria Naylor weaves together the stories of seven women living in Brewster Place, a bleak-inner city sanctuary, creating a powerful, moving portrait of the strengths, struggles, and hopes of black women in America. Vulnerable and resilient, openhanded and openhearted, these women forge their lives in a place that in turn threatens and protects—a common prison and a shared home. Naylor rende

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Book SynopsisThe Mortgaged Heart is an important collection of Carson McCullerss work, including stories, essays, articles, poems, and her writing on writing. These pieces, written mostly before McCullers was nineteen, provide invaluable insight into her life and her gifts and growth as a writer. The collection also contains the the working outline of The Mute, which became her best-selling novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter.

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Book Synopsis''Impeccable ... The most impressive of her novels'' Atlantic MonthlyIn this thoughtful and moving novel, four men find themselves inextricably bound together by their past histories. The aged Judge Clane dreams of resurrecting the confederacy, while his grandson, Jester, is involuntarily drawn to Sherman, a volatile black orphan who feels the sharp sting of racial injustice, especially when he finds out the truth about his parentage. Through the eyes of these individuals Carson McCullers explores the roots of racial prejudice and the dual moralities of the town''s leading whites.Trade ReviewThe greatest prose writer that the South produced ... She has examined the heart of man with an understanding that no other writer can hope to surpass -- Tennessee WilliamsOf all the Southern writers, she is the most apt to endure -- Gore VidalAgain [McCullers] shows a sort of subterranean and ageless instinct for probing the hidden in men's hearts and minds * New York Herald-Tribune *

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Book SynopsisFrom Modernist/Postmodernist perspective, leading critics Richard Ruland (American) and Malcolm Bradbury (British) address questions of literary and cultural nationalism. They demonstrate that since the seventeenth century, American writing has reflected the political and historical climate of its time and helped define America's cultural and social parameters. Above all, they argue that American literature has always been essentially modern, illustrating this with a broad range of texts: from Poe and Melville to Fitzgerald and Pound, to Wallace Stevens, Gwendolyn Brooks, and Thomas Pynchon.From Puritanism to Postmodernism pays homage to the luxuriance of American writing by tracing the creation of a national literature that retained its deep roots in European culture while striving to achieve cultural independence.

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Book SynopsisThis volume, edited and with a superb introduction by W.H. Auden and Norman Holmes Pearson, presents the greatest of the Romantics in all the fullness and ardor of their vision, including William Blake, Robert Burns, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, William Wordsworth, Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, and Edgar Allan Poe. What emerges is a panoramic view of a generation of artists struggling to remake the world in their own image—and miraculously succeeding.Table of ContentsThe Portable Romantic PoetsIntroductionGeneral PrinciplesA Calendar of British and American PoetryWilliam Blake (1757-1827)Song: Memory hither comeMad SongSong: How sweet I roam'd from field to fieldTo SpringFrom Songs of Innocence:Introduction: Piping down the valleys wildThe Little Black BoyThe Divine ImageOn Another's SorrowFrom Songs of Experience:Introduction: Hear the voice of the Bard!The TygerA Poison TreeThe Sick RoseAh! Sun-FlowerLondonInfant SorrowThe Human AbstractNever seek to tell thy loveMock on, Mock on, Voltaire, RousseauThe Mental TravellerThe Crystal CabinetAuguries of InnocenceFor the Sexes: The Gates of ParadiseFrom Milton: And did those feet in ancient timeThe Book of ThelRobert Burns (1759-1796) The Jolly Beggars: A CantataAddress to the DeilHoly Willie's PrayerTam Samson's ElegyOpen the Door to Me, Oh!The Poet's Welcome to His Love-begotten DaughterA Red, Red RoseYe flowery banksSimmer's a pleasant timeO whistle, and I'll come to you, my ladIt was a' for our rightfu' kingAe fond kissGeorge Crabbe (1754-1832) From The Village: Village LifeFrom The Borough: Peter GrimesFrom Sir Eustace Grey: Peace, peace, my friendPhilip Freneau (1752-1832) From The House of Night: By some sad meansThe Wild HoneysuckleThe Indian Burying GroundThe Adventures of Simon Swaugum, a Village MerchantFitz-Greene Halleck (1790-1867) On the Death of Joseph Rodman DrakeThe Field of the Grounded ArmsSir Walter Scott (1771-1832) The Eve of Saint JohnFrom Marmion:Song: Where shall the lover restThe BattleFrom The Lady of the Lake:The western waves of ebbing dayBoat SongPibroch of Donuil DhuProud MaisieSamuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) PhantomThe Rime of the Ancient MarinerKubla Khan: or, A Vision in a DreamDejection: An OdeThis Lime-Tree Bower My PrisonFrost at MidnightWilliam Wordsworth (1770-1850) There was a BoyTo H. C.It is a beauteous evening, calm and freeThe world is too much with usComposed upon Westminster BridgeLondon, 1802Where lies the LandRuthResolution and IndependenceThe Affliction of MargaretThree years she grew in sun and showerA slumber did my spirit sealShe was a Phantom of delightStepping WestwardThe Solitary ReaperA ComplaintGreat men have been among usMutabilityLines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern AbbeyOde: Intimations of ImmortalityFrom The Prelude (1850):Introduction - Childhood and School-TimeSummer VacationBooksCambridge and the AlpsResidence in LondonResidence in FranceResidence in France (continued)Imagination and TasteConclusionHartley Coleridge (1796-1849) Long time a child, and still a child, when yearsTo a Deaf and Dumb Little GirlLines -: I have been cherished and forgivenWilliam Cullen Bryant (1794-1878) To a WaterfowlSummer WindThe PrairiesWalter Savage Landor (1775-1864) Lately our poets Rose AylmerIanthe Grateful Acacia!To Our House-Dog CaptainDirceDeath stands above me AgeIzaac Walton, Cotton, and William OldwaysMimnermus incert.Ternissa! You are fled Dull is my verseThomas Moore (1779-1852) The Meeting of the WatersBelieve me, if all those endearing young charmsIll OmensAt the mid hour of nightOft, in the stilly night'Tis the last rose of summerTo ladies' eyesThey may rail at this lifeI wish I was by that dim LakeGeorge Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824) So, we'll go no more a rovingShe walks in beautyAnd thou art deadFare thee wellDarknessFrom Childe Harold's Pilgrimage:Lake LemanThe OceanFrom Don Juan:Donna JuliaGulbeyazLady Adeline AmundevillePercy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) Lines Written Among the Euganean HillsFrom Charles the First: A widow birdFrom Prometheus Unbound: Life of lifeOde to the West WindThe CloudHymn of PanTo -: Music, when soft voices dieFrom Hellas: ChorusAdonaisLines: When the lamp is shatteredThe Triumph of LifeGeorge Darley (1795-1846) From Nepenthe: The UnicornThe Mermaidens' Vesper HymnFrom Ethelstan: O'er the wild gannet's bathJohn Keats (1795-1821) On First Looking into Chapman's HomerSonnet: Keen fearful gusts are whisperingTo SleepSonnet: Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou artA Song About MyselfOde to a NightingaleOde on a Grecian UrnOde to PsycheTo AutumnOde on MelancholyFragment of an Ode to MaiaFrom Endymion: Hymn to PanLa Belle Dame Sans MerciThe Eve of St. AgnesFrom Hyperion: Deep in the shady sadness of a valeLeigh Hunt (1784-1859) The Fish, the Man, and the SpiritThomas Hood (1799-1845) Sonnet to VauxhallA Friendly AddressSilence I remember, I rememberThe Sea of DeathOde: AutumnWinthrop Mackworth Praed (1802-1839) From Every Day Characters:The VicarPortrait of a LadyGood-Night to the SeasonJohn Clare (1793-1864) I Am The Ploughboy Birds' LamentEmmonsail's Heath in WinterSchoolboys in Winter BadgerThe Frightened PloughmanGipsies AutumnClock-a-clay (The Ladybird)Secret LoveInvitation to EternityFragment: Language has not the powerRalph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) HamatreyaWater The SnowstormParks and pondsGive all to loveBacchusDaysMerlin: IIOde to BeautyLimits ExperienceThe PastTerminusHenry David Thoreau (1817-1862) The Old Marlborough RoadWhat's the railroad to me?I am a parcel of vain strivings tiedWho sleeps by day and walks by nightI was born upon thy bank, riverOn the Sun Coming Out in the AfternoonThe moon now rises to her absolute ruleTo a Marsh Hawk in Spring Great FriendAt midnight's hour I raised my headAmong the worst of men that ever livedTall AmbrosiaForever in my dream and in my morning thoughtFor though the caves were rabbitedI was made erect and loneTo the MountainsBetween the traveller and the setting sunI'm thankful that my life doth not deceiveWilliam Barnes (1801-1886) Zun-zetThe Clote (Water-Lily)The Wind at the DoorThe Lost Little SisterMy Love's Guardian AngelTo MeTokensThe FallJohn Greenleaf Whittier (1807-1892) IchabodFor Righteousness' SakeFrom Among the Hills: PreludeThe Dead Feast of the Kol-FolkThe Brewing of SomaJones Very (1813-1880) YourselfThe hand and footThy Brother's BloodThomas Lovell Beddoes (1803-1849) From Death's Jest-Book:Dirge: If thou wilt ease thine heartSong: Old Adam, the carrion crowEpithalamiaDirge: The swallow leaves her nestFrom Torrismond: How many times do I love thee dearDream-PedlaryEdgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) The City in the SeaThe SleeperThe Valley of UnrestThe Haunted PalaceTo HelenIsrafelFrom childhood's hourIndex of Titles and First LinesBiographical Notes0

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Book Synopsis“A man is born into the world with his own pair of eyes, and he is not responsible for his vision—he is merely responsible for his quality of personal honesty.” In the course of his tragically abbreviated career, Stephen Crane (1871–1900) saw things that his contemporaries preferred to overlook—the low life of New York’s Irish slums; the tedium, brutality, and chaos that were the true conditions of the Civil War; the ambiguous contract that binds a terrified man to his killer and the damned to their human judges. He communicated what he saw with the same laconic factuality that characterized his journalism and, in the process, laid the foundations for the unblinking realism of Hemingway and Dos Passos.   The Portable Stephen Crane allows us to appreciate the full scope and power of this writer’s vision. It contains three complete novels—Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, George’s Mother, and Crane&rsquoTable of ContentsIntroductionEditor's NoteCrane ChronologyPart One: The World of MaggieThe Maggie Inscription to Hamlin GarlandA Letter from Stephen Crane to Catherine HarrisMaggie: A Girl of the StreetsA Great MistakeAn Ominous BabyA Dark-Brown DogGeorge's MotherThe Men in the StormAn Experiment in MiseryAn Experiment in LuxuryHeard on the Street Election NightAbove All ThingsPart Two: The World of Henry FlemingA Letter from Stephen Crane to Mrs. Olive Brett ArmstrongThe Red Badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil WarAn Episode of WarThe VeteranPart Three: A World of ShipwreckA Letter from Stephen Crane to Cora E. StewartStephen Crane's Own StoryFlanagan and His Short Filibustering AdventureThe Open BoatPart Four: A World of IroniesA Letter from Stephen Crane to Lily Brandon MonroeA Letter from Stephen Crane to Willis Brooks HawkinsTwo Letters from Stephen Crane to Nellie CrouseThe Bride Comes to Yellow SkyThe Five White MiceThe Blue HotelThe MonsterHis New MittensThe KnifePart Five: A World in MiniatureA Letter from Stephen Crane to Copeland & DayA Letter from Stephen Crane to De Morest's Family MagazineFrom The Black Riders and Other Lines (1895)From the Uncollected PoemsFrom War Is Kind (1899)From the Posthumously PUblished PoemsA Prologue

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Book SynopsisIndispensable to students of antebellum culture.—Philip F. Gura, Univ. of North Carolina. A highly valuable resource for students of American Studies and Women's Studies alike.—Donald Pease, UC-Riverside.Table of ContentsIntroductionChronologyA Note on the TextsAutobiographical Sketch(Initially published in Memoirs)Bettine Brentano and Her Friend Günderode(Initially published in the Dial)Summer on the Lakes, During 1843Woman in the Nineteenth CenturyNew-York Daily Tribune ColumnsEmerson's Essays: Second SeriesOur City Charities. Visit to Bellevue Alms House, to the Farm School, the Asylum for the Insane, and Penitentiary on Blackwell's IslandPrevalent Idea that Politeness Is Too Great a Luxury to Be Given to the PoorNarrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by HimselfAsylum for Discharged Female ConvictsWhat Fits a Man to Be a Voter? Is it to Be White Within, or White WithoutNew-York Daily Tribune DispatchesParis, Nov. 1846Paris [Undated][Undated][Undated]Rome, 29th March, 1848Rome, December 2, 1848Rome, December 2, 1848Rome, Evening of Feb. 20, 1849Rome, 6th May, 1849Rome, May 27, 1849Rome, June 10, 1849Rome, July 6, 1849LettersSuggested Reading

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Book Synopsis''Sermon, ultimatum, confession, deposition, testament, and chronicle ... all presented in searing, brilliant prose'' The New York Times Book Review We, the black and the white, deeply need each other here if we are really to become a nationJames Baldwin''s impassioned plea to ''end the racial nightmare'' in America was a bestseller when it appeared in 1963, galvanising a nation and giving voice to the emerging civil rights movement. Told in the form of two intensely personal ''letters'', The Fire Next Time is at once a powerful evocation of Baldwin''s early life in Harlem and an excoriating condemnation of the terrible legacy of racial injustice.''A seminal meditation on race by one of our greatest writers'' Barack Obama''Baldwin writes with great passion ... it reeks of truth, as the ghettoes of New York and London, Chicago and Manchester reek of our hypocrisy'' Sunday Times''The great poet-prophet of the civil rights movement ... his seminal work'' GuardianTrade ReviewRiveting . . . part of Baldwin's enduring power is that he was not a political thinker. He was interested in the soul's dark spaces much more than in the body politic. -- Colm Toibin * Telegraph *The great poet-prophet of the civil rights movement ... his seminal work * Guardian *Sermon, ultimatum, confession, deposition, testament, and chronicle . . . all presented in searing, brilliant prose * The New York Times Book Review *Baldwin writes with great passion ... it reeks of truth, as the ghettoes of New York and London, Chicago and Manchester reek of our hypocrisy * Sunday Times *A true prophet . . . his thought and its utterance are nothing less than majestical -- Mario Puzo * The New York Times *

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Book Synopsis''Only when one has lost all curiosity about the future has one reached the age to write an autobiography.'' Waugh begins his story with heredity, writing of the energetic, literary and sometimes eccentric men and women who, unknown to themselves, contributed to his genius. Save for a few pale shadows, his childhood was warm, bright and serene. The Hampstead and Lancing schooldays which followed were sometimes agreeable, but often not. His life at Oxford - which he evokes in Brideshead Revisited - was essentially a catalogue of friendship. His cool recollection of those hedonistic days is a portrait of the generation of Harold Acton, Cyril Connolly and Anthony Powell. That exclusive world he recalls with elegant wit and precision. He closes with his experiences as a master at a preparatory school in North Wales which inspired Decline and Fall.

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Book Synopsis“Nobody ever read [the great old books] like Lawrence did—as madly, as wildly or as insightfully. . . . You will be jolted awake.” —A. O. Scott, The New York TimesA Penguin ClassicLawrence asserted that 'the proper function of a critic is to save the tale from the artist who created it'. In these highly individual, penetrating essays he has exposed 'the American whole soul' within some of that continent's major works of literature. In seeking to establish the status of writings by such authors as Poe, Melville, Fenimore Cooper and Whitman, Lawrence himself has created a classic work. Studies in Classic American Literature is valuable not only for the light it sheds on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century American consciousness, telling 'the truth of the day', but also as a prime example of Lawrence's learning, passion and integrity of judgement.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classTrade Review“Nobody ever read [the great old books] like Lawrence did—as madly, as wildly or as insightfully. . . . With its one-sentence paragraphs (“Flop goes spiritual love.”), jabbing exclamations (“Freedom!”), semi-rhetorical questions (“But what of Walt Whitman?”) and heavy use of italics and all-caps, the book can read like a scroll of social-media rants. Its manner is neither respectable nor respectful. . . . Lawrence’s bristling, inflamed, impertinent language provides a reminder that criticism is not just the work of the brain, but of the gut and the spleen as well. The intellectual refinement of his argument—fine-grained evaluations of style and form that still startle with their incisiveness; breathtaking conceptual leaps from history to myth and back again—is unthinkable without the churn of instinct and feeling beneath it. . . . You will be jolted awake.” —A. O. Scott, The New York TimesTable of Contents1. The Spirit of Place2. Benjamin Franklin3. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur4. Fenimore Cooper's White Novels5. Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Novels6. Edgar Allan Poe7. Nathaniel Hawthorne and The Scarlet Letter8. Hawthorne's Blithedale Romance9. Dana's Two Years Before the Mast10. Herman Melville's Typee and Omoo11. Herman Melville's Moby Dick12. Whitman

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Book Synopsis''These essays ... live and grow in the mind'' James Campbell, IndependentBeing a writer, says James Baldwin in this searing collection of essays, requires ''every ounce of stamina he can summon to attempt to look on himself and the world as they are''. His seminal 1961 follow-up to Notes on a Native Son shows him responding to his times and exploring his role as an artist with biting precision and emotional power: from polemical pieces on racial segregation and a journey to ''the Old Country'' of the Southern states, to reflections on figures such as Ingmar Bergman and André Gide, and on the first great conference of African writers and artists in Paris.''Brilliant...accomplished...strong...vivid...honest...masterly'' The New York Times''A bright and alive book, full of grief, love and anger'' Chicago Tribune

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Book SynopsisA Penguin ClassicFirst published in 1938, this volume of stories collected with the encouragement of his longtime editor Pascal Covici serves as a wonderful introduction to the work of Nobel Prize winner John Steinbeck. Set in the beautiful Salinas Valley of California, where simple people farm the land and struggle to find a place for themselves in the world, these stories reflect Steinbeck’s characteristic interests: the tensions between town and country, laborers and owners, past and present. Included here are the O. Henry Prize-winning story “The Murder”; “The Chrysanthemums,” perhaps Steinbeck’s most challenging story, both personally and artistically; “Flight,” “The Snake,” “The White Quail,” and the classic tales of “The Red Pony.” With an introduction and notes by John H. Timmerman.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in

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Book SynopsisLike the characters in the popular dime novels of the time, London's heroes display such manly virtues as courage, loyalty, and steadfastness as they conftont the merciless frozen expanses of the north. Yet London breaks free of stereotypical figures and one-dimensional plots to explore deeper psychological and social questions of self-mastery, masculinity, and racial domination. The uneasy relationship between the Native Americans and whites lies at the heart of many of the stories, while others reflect London's growing awareness of the destruction wrought by the white incursion on Indian culture.Northland Stories comprises nineteen of Jack London's greatest short works, including An Odyssy of the North (London's major breakthrough as a young author), The White Silence, The Law of Life, The League of the Old Men, and the world classic To Build a Fire.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaTable of ContentsEdited with an Introduction and Notes by Jonathan AuerbachIntroduction by Jonathan AuerbachSuggestions for Further ReadingA Note on the TextNorthland StoriesThe White SilenceThe Son of the WolfIn a Far CountryTo the Man on TrailThe Wisdom of the TrailAn Odyssey of the NorthThe God of His FathersSiwashGrit of WomenWhere the Trail ForksThe Law of LifeKeesh, the Son of KeeshThe Death of LigounLi Wan, the FairThe League of the Old MenThe Story of Jees UckLove of LifeThe Sun-Dog TrailTo Build a FireExplanatory NotesAppendix

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Book SynopsisRobin Lane Fox''s Travelling Heroes: Greeks and their Myths in the Epic Age of Homer proposes a new way of thinking about ancient Greeks, showing how real-life journeys shaped their mythical tales. The tales of the ancient Greeks have inspired us for thousands of years. But where did they originate? Esteemed classicist Robin Lane Fox draws on a lifetime''s knowledge of the ancient world, and on his own travels, to open up the age of Homer. His acclaimed history explores how the intrepid seafarers of eighth-century Greece sailed around the Mediterranean, encountering strange new sights - volcanic mountains, vaporous springs, huge prehistoric bones - and weaving them into the myths of gods, monsters and heroes that would become the cornerstone of Western civilization: the Odyssey and the Iliad. ''A beautiful evocation of a tantalizing world ... Travelling Heroes is a tour de force''  R

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Book Synopsis“Reminiscent of All Quiet on Western Front and The Red Badge of Courage. . . .  A breathtakingly original work.—San Francisco ChronicleTwenty-eight-year-old Quan has been fighting for the Communist cause in North Vietnam for a decade. Filled with idealism and hope when he first left his village, he now spends his days and nights dodging stray bullets and bombs, foraging scraps of food to feed himself and his men. Quan seeks comfort in childhood memories as he tries to sort out his conflicting feelings of patriotism and disillusionment. Then, given the chance to return to his home, Quan undertakes a physical and mental journey that brings him face to face with figures from his past—his angry father, his childhood sweetheart, his boyhood friends now maimed or dead—and ultimately to the shattering reality that his innocence has been irretrievably lost in the wake of the war. In a voice both lyrical and stark, Duong Thu Huong, one o

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Book SynopsisThe true biography of Shakespeare - and the only one we really need to care about - is in the plays. Sir Frank Kermode, Britain''s most distinguished literary critic, has been thinking about them all his life. This book is a distillation of that lifetime''s thinking. The great English tragedies were all written in the first decade of the seventeenth century. They are often in language that is difficult to us, and must have been hard even for contemporaries. How and why did Shakespeare''s language develop as it did? Kermode argues that the resources of English underwent major change around 1600. The originality of Kermodes''s writing, and the intelligence of his discussion, make this book a landmark.

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Book Synopsis''A landmark, bringing together a lifetime''s work on Lewis Carroll by writer and mathematician Martin Gardner. He dazzles on Carroll''s puzzles and games of logic and entertains on everything from Alice''s influence on the Beat poet Jack Kerouac to howmercury in hat linings turned hatters mad...it is unsurpassed'' - Jackie Wullschlager, Financial Times ''The indispensable guide to a classic of English literature...no one who has ever wondered about the meaning of ''Jabberwocky'' should fail to include on their Christmas list'' - Robert McCrum, ObserverTrade Review'A landmark, bringing together a lifetime's work on Lewis Carroll by writer and mathematician Martin Gardner. He dazzles on Carroll's puzzles and games of logic and entertains on everything from Alice's influence on the Beat poet Jack Kerouac to how mercury in hat linings turned hatters mad...it is unsurpassed' - Jackie Wullschlager, Financial Times 'The indispensable guide to a classic of English literature...no one who has ever wondered about the meaning of 'Jabberwocky' should fail to include on their Christmas list' - Robert McCrum, Observer

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Book SynopsisA vital resource for scholars, students and actors, this book contains glosses and quotes for over 14,000 words that could be misunderstood by or are unknown to a modern audience. Displayed panels look at such areas of Shakespeare''s language as greetings, swear-words and terms of address. Plot summaries are included for all Shakespeare''s plays and on the facing page is a unique diagramatic representation of the relationships within each play.

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Book SynopsisAs Malcolm Cowley says in his introduction, the first edition of Leaves of Grass ''might be called the buried masterpiece of American writing'', for it exhibits ''Whitman at his best, Whitman at his freshest in vision and boldest in language, Whitman transformed by a new experience.'' Mr Cowley has taken the first edition from its narrow circulation among scholars, faithfully edited it, added his own introduction and Whitman''s original introduction (which never appeared in any other edition during Whitman''s life), and returned it to the common readership to whom the great poet really speaks.Trade Review“Whitman, the great poet, has meant so much to me. Whitman the one man breaking a way ahead. Whitman the one pioneer . . . Ahead of Whitman, nothing. Ahead of all poets, pioneering into the wilderness of unopened life, Whitman. Beyond him, none.” —D. H. Lawrence

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Book SynopsisSocial convention may have prevented Renaissance women writers from openly taking part in the political and religious debates of their day, but they found varied and innovative ways to intervene. Collecting the work of three great poets-Isabella Whitney, Mary Sidney, and Aemilia Lanyer-this volume repositions women writers of the Renaissance by presenting their poems in the context of their history and culture. Whitney's poems offer the only glimpse into her life, express a concern for women's lack of social and economic power, and powerfully evoke sixteenth-century London. Sidney produced potent translations of Petrarch's works and the Psalms, as well as original verse. Lanyer wrote poems that advocate and praise female virtue and Christian piety, but reflect a desire for an idealized, classless world. The strong and original voices of these three women-each from different social, cultural, and historical strata-demonstrate the emergence of a new female identity during the RenTable of ContentsEdited by Danielle ClarkeAcknowledgmentsIntroductionFurther ReadingTable of DatesA Note on the TextsIsabella Whitneyfrom A SWEET NOSGAYTo the worshipfull and right vertuous yong Gentylman, George Mainwaring Esquier...The Auctor to the ReaderCertain familier Epistles and friendly Letters by the Auctor: with RepliesTo her Brother. G.W.To her Brother. B. W.A modest meane for Maides... to two of her yonger Sisters servinge in LondonTo her Sister Misteris. A.B.To her CosenA carefull complaynt by the unfortunate AuctorIS. W. to C.B. in bewalylynge her mishappesTo my Friend Master T.L. whose good nature I see abusdeIS W. beyng wery of wrtyng, sendeth this for AnswereThe Auchtour (though loth to leave the Citie) upon her Friendes procurement, is constrained to departe...and maketh her Wyll and Testament...A comunication which the Auctor had to London, before she made her WyllThe maner of her Wyll, and what she left to London: and all those in it: at her departing***THE COPY OF A LETTER, lately written in meeter, by a yonge Gentilwoman: to her unconstant Lover...I.W. To her unconstant LoverThe admonition by the Auctor, to all yong Gentilwomen: And to al other Maids being in Love***The lamentation of a Gentilwoman upon the death of her late deceased frend William Gruffith Gent.Mary Sidney, Countess of PembrokeTHE SIDNEY PSALTER"Even now that Care"To the Angell spirit of the most excellent Sir Phillip SidneyThe Psalmes of Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke***A Dialogue betweene two shepheards, Thenot, and Piers, in praise of Astrea...***THE TRIUMPH OF DEATH TRANSLATED OUT OF ITALIAN BY THE COUNTESS OF PEMBROOKEThe first chapterThe second chapterAemilia LanyerSALVE DEUS REX JUDAEORUMTo the Queenes most Excellent MajestieTo all vertuous Ladies in generallThe Authors Dreame to the Ladie Marie, the Countesse Dowager of PembrookeTo the Ladie Lucie, Countesse of BedfordTo the Ladie Margaret, Countesse Dowager of CumberlandTo the Ladie Anne, Countesse of DorcetTo the Vertuous ReaderSalve Deus Rex JudaeorumThe Description of Cooke-hamAbbreviations and Short Titles Used in the Notes and Textual ApparatusNotesTextual Apparatus

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Book SynopsisIncludes tightly argued lyrics, erotic and libertine considerations of love, divine poems and elegies of lament by such great figures as John Donne, George Herbert, Andrew Marvell and John Milton, alongside pieces from many other less well known but equally poets of the age, such as Anne Bradstreet, Katherine Philips and Thomas Traherne.

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Book SynopsisThe inspiration for the major motion picture The Green Knight starring Dev Patel.An early English poem of magic, chivalry and seduction Composed during the fourteenth century in the English Midlands, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight describes the events that follow when a mysterious green-coloured knight rides into King Arthur's Camelot in deep mid-winter. The mighty knight presents a challenge to the court: he will allow himself to be struck by one blow, on the condition that he will be allowed to return the strike on the following New Year's Eve. Sir Gawain takes up the challenge, decapitating the stranger - only to see the Green Knight seize up his own severed head and ride away, leaving Gawain to seek him out and honour their pact. Blending Celtic myth and Christian faith, Gawain is among the greatest Middle English poems: a tale of magic, chivalry and seduction.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the

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Book SynopsisSir Thomas Malory's richly evocative and enthralling version of the Arthurian legendRecounting Arthur's birth, his ascendancy to the throne after claiming Excalibur, his ill-fated marriage to Guenever, the treachery of Morgan le Fay and the exploits of the Knights of the Round Table, it magically weaves together adventure, battle, love and enchantment. Le Morte D'Arthur looks back to an idealized Medieval world and is full of wistful, elegiac regret for a vanished age of chivalry. Edited and published by William Caxton in 1485, Malory's prose romance drew on French and English verse sources to give an epic unity to the Arthur myth, and remains the most magnificent re-telling of the story in English.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 d

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Book SynopsisVolume two of Le Morte D''Arthur, Sir Thomas Malory''s powerful and elegaic version of the Arthurian legend, recounts the adventures of Sir Tristram de Liones and the treachery of Sir Mordred, and follows Sir Launcelot''s quest for The Holy Grail, his fatally divided loyalties, and his great, forbidden love for the beautiful Queen Guenever. Culminating in an account of Arthur''s final battle against the scheming, deceitful Mordred, this is the definitive re-telling of the Arthurian myth, weaving a story of adultery, treachery and ultimately - in its tragic finale - death. Edited and published by William Caxton in 1485, Malory''s moving prose romance looks back to an idealised Medieval age of chivalry, drawing on French and English verse sources to create an epic masterpiece of passion, enchantment, war and betrayal.

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Book SynopsisOh thou savage-hearted monster! What work hast thou made in one guilty hour, for a whole age of repentance!Pressured by her unscrupulous family to marry a wealthy man she detests, the young Clarissa Harlowe is tricked into fleeing with the witty and debonair Robert Lovelace and places herself under his protection. Lovelace, however, proves himself to be an untrustworthy rake whose vague promises of marriage are accompanied by unwelcome and increasingly brutal sexual advances. And yet, Clarissa finds his charm alluring, her scrupulous sense of virtue tinged with unconfessed desire. Told through a complex series of interweaving letters, Clarissa is a richly ambiguous study of a fatally attracted couple and a work of astonishing power and immediacy. A huge success when it first appeared in 1747, and translated into French and German, it remains one of the greatest of all European novels.In his introduction, Angus Ross examines characterization, the epistTrade Review“Harrowing, unforgiving and extreme . . . A graphic study of the pathologies endemic to a culture that treats women as property. It’s also a passionate celebration of female friendship and of the written word—storytelling as means of power and transcendence.” —Jennifer Egan, Lit Hub

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Book SynopsisThe first book by the author of the classic philosophical text Beyond Good and Evil. The youthful faults of this work were exposed by the author himself in the brilliant Attempt at a Self-Criticism, which he added to the new edition of 1886. But the book, whatever its excesses, remains one of the most relevant statements on tragedy ever penned. It exploded the conception of Greek culture that was prevalent down through the Victorian era, and it analyzed themes developed in the twentieth century by classicists, existentialists, psychoanalysts, and others.Table of ContentsIntroduction; further reading; "The Birth of Tragedy"; attempt at self-criticism; preface to Richard Wagner; the birth of tragedy.

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Book SynopsisFirst published in July 1850, shortly after Wordsworth''s death, The Prelude was the culmination of over fifty years of creative work. The great Romantic poem of human consciousness, it takes as its theme ''the growth of a poet''s mind'': leading the reader back to Wordsworth''s formative moments of childhood and youth, and detailing his experiences as a radical undergraduate in France at the time of the Revolution. Initially inspired by Coleridge''s exhortation that Wordsworth write a work upon the French Revolution, The Prelude has ultimately become one of the finest examples of poetic autobiography ever written; a fascinating examination of the self that also presents a comprehensive view of the poet''s own creative vision.

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Book Synopsis‘Kissing, Joseph, is but a Prologue to a Play. Can I believe a young Fellow of your Age and Complexion will be content with Kissing?’Joseph Andrews, Henry Fielding’s first full-length novel, depicts the many colourful and often hilarious adventures of a comically chaste servant. After being sacked for spurning the lascivious Lady Booby, Joseph takes to the road, accompanied by his beloved Fanny Goodwill, a much-put-upon foundling girl, and Parson Adams, a man often duped and humiliated, but still a model of Christian charity. In the boisterous short tale Shamela, a brilliant parody of Richardson’s Pamela, the spirited and sexually honest heroine uses coyness and mock modesty to catch herself a rich husband. Together these works anticipate Fielding’s great comic epic Tom Jones, with their amiable good humour and pointed social satire.Judith Hawley’s introduction compares the works of FiTrade Review"Hawley's introduction is a model of what such a thing should be (for an undergraduate audience): full of information, but not too pushy. She manages to touch on a truly remarkable number of important bases in just a few pages—an impressive accomplishment. The notes are good, too. This is the best edition out there for college students." — Douglas Patey, Sophia Smith Professor of English, Smith College

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