Prized for their lyrical qualities, the novels of Virginia Woolf favor the psychological realms inhabited by her characters, where thoughts are so revealed that actions lose much of their importance. Most are also concerned with the structure of narrative, including the present novel, in which Woolf conveys the impression of time present and of time passing in individual experience as well as in the characters' awareness of historic time.Co ...
Powerful and controversial from its 1895 publication to the present, Jude the Obscure scandalized Victorian critics, who condemned it as decadent, indecent, and degenerate. Between its frank portrayals of sexuality and its indictments of marriage, religion, and England's class system, the novel offended a broad swath of readers. Its heated reception led the embittered author to renounce fiction, turning his considerable talents ever afterwa ...
First published in 1897, The Invisible Man ranks as one of the most famous scientific fantasies ever written. Part of a series of pseudoscientific romances written by H. G. Wells (1866–1946) early in his career, the novel helped establish the British author as one of the first and best writers of science fiction.Wells' years as a science student undoubtedly inspired a number of his early works, including this strikingly original n ...
The self-interested disregard of a dying woman's bequest, an impulsive girl's attempt to help an impoverished clerk, and the marriage between an idealist and a materialist — all intersect at a Hertfordshire estate called Howards End. The fate of this beloved country home symbolizes the future of England itself in E. M. Forster's exploration of social, economic, and philosophical trends, as exemplified by three families: ...
The unique boundaries of the short story have attracted a majority of the prominent writers in the German language since the genre attained its modern form and became widely read around the turn of the 19th century.This collection, featuring stories by eight of the form's most successful practitioners, includes Arthur Schnitzler's «Lieutenant Gustl,» considered to be the first purely interior monologue in European literature; Heinrich ...
One of the towering figures of Russian literature, Fyodor Dostoyevsky depicted with remarkable insight the depth and complexity of the human soul. In this literary classic, he focuses on Prince Myshkin — a nobleman whose gentle, child-like nature, and refusal to be offended by anything has earned him the nickname of «the idiot.»Returning to Russia from Switzerland, where he underwent medical treatment for a number of years, Myshkin lea ...
A mad priest, a vagabond playwright, a social-climbing soldier, and a deformed bell-ringer — all are captivated by a gypsy girl's beauty and charm. Two of them will betray her, but the others will remain loyal, even in the shadow of the gallows. These outlaws find sanctuary within the walls of medieval Paris' greatest monument, the grand Cathedral of Notre Dame."What a beautiful thing Notre-Dame is!" declared Gustave Flaubert ...
A gloomy New England mansion provides the setting for this classic exploration of ancestral guilt and its expiation through the love and goodwill of succeeding generations.Nathaniel Hawthorne drew inspiration for this story of an immorally obtained property from the role his forebears played in the 17th-century Salem witch trials. Built over an unquiet grave, the House of the Seven Gables carries a dying man's curse that blights the lives o ...
Probably composed in the eighth century B.C. and based on an actual historical event of the thirteenth century B.C., Homer's Iliad is one of the great epics of the Western world. The poem unfolds near the end of the ten-year-long Trojan War, detailing the quarrel between the great warrior-hero Achilles and King Agamemnon, the battle between Paris and Menelaus for Helen of Troy, the Greek assault on the city and the Trojan ...
