Edgar Poe was born the son of itinerant actors on January 19th, 1809 in Boston, Massachusets. Abandoned by his father and the later death of his mother, he was taken into the foster care of John Allan
Selected and Edited with an Introduction and Notes by David Blair, University of Kent at Canterbury. Late in the eighteenth century authors began to write 'Gothic' stories as a way of putting literatu
Translated by Antony M. Ludovici. With an Introduction by Ray Furness.The three works in this collection, all dating from Nietzsche's last lucid months, show him at his most stimulating and controvers
Edited, introduced and annotated by Cedric Watts, Professor of English Literature, University of Sussex. Shakespeare's Macbeth is one of the greatest tragic dramas the world has known. Macbeth himself
Translated by W.H.White and A.K.Stirling. With an Introduction by Don Garrett. Benedict de Spinoza lived a life of blameless simplicity as a lens-grinder in Holland.And yet in his lifetime he was expe
With a new Introduction by Cedric Watts, Research Professor of English, University of Sussex. W. B.Yeats was Romantic and Modernist, mystical dreamer and leader of the Irish Literary Revival, Nobel pr
With an Introduction, Notes and Bibliography by Anne Varty, Royal Holloway, University of London. WILDE, GLAMOROUS AND NOTORIUS, more famous as a playwright or prisoner than as a poet, invites readers
Translated by George Chapman, with Introductions by Jan Parker. Hector bidding farewell to his wife and baby son, Odysseus bound to the mast listening to the Sirens, Penelope at the loom, Achilles dra
With an Introduction and Notes by Anne Varty, Royal Holloway, University of London. Oscar Wilde took London by storm with his first comedy, Lady Windermere's Fan. The combination of dazzling wit, subt
With an Introduction and Notes by Dinny Thorold, University of Westminster Gaskell's last novel, widely considered her masterpiece, follows the fortunes of two families in nineteenth century rural Eng
Translated, with an Introduction and Notes by John R. Williams. Goethe's Faust is a classic of European literature.Based on the fable of the man who traded his soul for superhuman powers and knowledge
Selected and Introduced by David Stuart Davies. Short Stories from the Nineteenth Century is a wonderful collection of classic stories specially selected and introduced by David Stuart Davies. These a
With an Introduction and Notes by Anne Varty, Royal Holloway, University of London. De Profundis is Wilde's eloquent and bitter reproach from prison to his lover, Lord Alfred Douglas. He contrasts his
Translated by H.F. Cary With an Introduction by Claire Honess. Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) is one of the most important and innovative figures of the European Middle Ages.Writing his Comedy (the epith
Translated by Constance Garnett, with an Introduction and Notes by Agnes Cardinal, Honorary Senior Lecturer in Comparative Literature at the University of Kent.Prince Myshkin returns to Russia from an
Jacob Grimm (1785-1863) and his brother Wilhelm (1786-1859) were philologists and folklorists. The brothers rediscovered a host of fairy tales, telling of princes and princesses in their castles, witc
Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) was born in Odense, the son of a shoemaker. His early life was wretched, but he was adopted by a patron and became a short-story writer, novelist and playwright, th
Wilde's works are suffused with his aestheticism, brilliant craftsmanship, legendary wit and, ultimately, his tragic muse. He wrote tender fairy stories for children employing all his grace, artistry
Introduction and Notes by Dr Adrienne Gavin, Canterbury Christ Church University College. Illustrations by Hablot K. Browne (Phiz).Dickens wrote of David Copperfield: 'Of all my books I like this the
With an Introduction and Notes by Lionel Kelly, Senior Lecturer in English, University of Reading. Transplanted to Europe from her native America, Isabel Archer has candour, beauty, intelligence, an i
Translated by Lee M. Hollander, with an Introduction by Thorsteinn Gylfason. Njal's Saga is the finest of the Icelandic sagas, and one of the world's greatest prose works.Written c.1280, about events
Introduction and Notes by Dr Claire Seymour, University of Kent at Canterbury. The proverbial phrase 'life's little ironies' was coined by Hardy for his third volume of short stories. These tales and
With an Introduction by David Amigoni. Charles Darwin's travels around the world as an independent naturalist on HMS Beagle between 1831 and 1836 impressed upon him a sense of the natural world's beau
Translated with Notes by George Rawlinson. With an Introduction by Tom Griffith. Herodotus (c480-c425) is 'The Father of History' and his Histories are the first piece of Western historical writing.Th
With an Introduction by Professor Stuart Sim. John Bunyan was variously a tinker, soldier, Baptist minister, prisoner and writer of outstanding narrative genius which reached its apotheosis in this, h
Translated by Elizabeth S. Haldane and G.R.T. Ross.Edited with an Introduction by Enrique Chavez-Arvizo. Rene Descartes (1569-1650), the 'father' of modern philosophy, is without doubt one of the grea
With an Introduction and Notes by David Blair, University of Kent at Canterbury James Hogg's most ambitious prose work, The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, is now widely acclaim
Introduction and Notes by Robert Hampson, Royal Holloway College, University of London. Nostromo is the only man capable of the decisive action needed to save the silver of the San Tome mine and secur
With an Introduction and Notes by Merry M. Pawlowski, Professor and Chair, Department of English, California State University,Bakersfield. Virginia Woolf's singular technique in Mrs Dalloway heralds a
The father of science fiction, Jules Verne, invites you to join the intrepid and eccentric Professor Liedenbrock and his companions on a thrilling and dramatic expedition as they travel down a secret
With illustrations by Edward Landseer, Daniel Maclise, Clarkson Stanfield, Frank Stone, Richard Doyle, John Leech and John Tenniel, and with a new Introduction by Cedric Watts, Research Professor of E
The Aeneid is Virgil's Masterpiece. His epic poem recounts the story of Rome's legendary origins from the ashes of Troy and proclaims her destiny of world dominion. This optimistic vision is accompani
With an Introduction and Notes by Peter Merchant. Canterbury Christ Church College. The tough-mindedness of the social satire in and its air of palpable integrity give this novel a special place in An
With an Introduction and Bibliography by Stephen Matterson, Trinity College, Dublin. Walt Whitman's verse gave the poetry of America a distinctive national voice. It reflects the unique vitality of th
The Phoenix and the Carpet is E. Nesbit's second fantasy novel and is the sequel to Five Children and It. From Robert, Anthea, Jane and Cyril's new nursery carpet there falls a mysterious egg which is
With an Introduction and Notes by Katherine McGowran. Christina Rossetti is widely regarded as the most considerable woman poet in England before the twentieth century. No reading of nineteenth centur
Introduction and Notes by Dinny Thorold, University of Westminster. Illustrated by F. Walker and Maurice Greiffenhagen.Unusually for Dickens, Hard Times is set, not in London, but in the imaginary mid
Tom, a poor orphan, is employed by the villainous chimney-sweep, Grimes, to climb up inside flues to clear away the soot. While engaged in this dreadful task, he loses his way and emerges in the bedro
With an Introduction and Notes by Owen Knowles, University of Hull. In his draft Preface, Wilfred Owen includes his well-known statement 'My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the p
