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
Agnes Grey is a trenchant expose of the frequently isolated, intellectually stagnant and emotionally starved conditions under which many governesses worked in the mid-nineteenth century. This is a dee
Edited, introduced and annotated by Cedric Watts, Research Professor of English, University of Sussex. The Wordsworth Classics' Shakespeare's Series presents a newly-edited sequence of William Shakesp
When Jerry, Jimmy and Cathy discover a tunnel that leads to a castle, they pretend that it is enchanted. But when they discover a Sleeping Princess at the centre of a maze, astonishing things begin to
Heidi is the heart-warming tale of a small girl's power for good, and it has remained a firm favourite since it was published over 100 years ago. It has been filmed and televised several times. It tel
The magical Peter Pan comes to the night nursery of the Darling children, Wendy, John and Michael. He teaches them to fly, then takes them through the sky to Never-Never Land, where they find Red Indi
All decent people live beyond their incomes nowadays, and those who aren't respectable live beyond other people's'. Saki (H.H. Munro) stands alongside Anton Chekhov and O Henry as a master of the shor
Introduction and Notes by Norman Vance, Professor of English, University of Sussex.Far from the Madding Crowd is perhaps the most pastoral of Hardy's Wessex novels. It tells the story of the young far
Introduction and Notes by Susan Jones, St Hilda's College, Oxford. First published in 1900, Lord Jim established Conrad as one of the great storytellers of the twentieth century. Set in the Malay Arch
Introduction and Notes by Laurence Davies, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire. Living overseas but writing, always, about his native city, Joyce made Dublin unforgettable. The stories in Dubliners show
Lively and mischievous, idle and brave, Tom Brown is both the typical boy of his time and the perennial hero celebrated by authors as diverse as Henry Fielding (in Tom Jones) and Alec Waugh (in The Lo
Frankenstein is the classic gothic horror novel which has thrilled and engrossed readers for two centuries. Written by Mary Shelley, it is a story which she intended would 'curdle the blood and quicke
Translated by P. A. MotteuxWith an Introduction and Notes by Stephen Boyd, University College, CorkCervantes’ tale of the deranged gentleman who turns knight-errant, tilts at windmills and battles wit
Introduction and Notes by Doreen Roberts, Rutherford College, University of Kent at Canterbury. Tom Jones is widely regarded as one of the first and most influential English novels. It is certainly th
Edited, Introduced and Annotated by Cedric Watts, Professor of English Literature, University of Sussex. The Wordsworth Classics' Shakespeare Series presents a newly-edited sequence of William Shakesp
Edited, Introduced and Annotated by Cedric Watts, Research Professor of English, University of Sussex. The Wordsworth Classics' Shakespeare's Series presents a newly-edited sequence of William Shakesp
George Orwell is a difficult author to summarize. He was a would-be revolutionary who went to Eton, a political writer who abhorred dogma, a socialist who thrived on his image as a loner, and a member
Black Beauty is a perennial children's favourite, one which has never been out of print since its publication in 1877. It is a moralistic tale of the life of the horse related in the form of an autobi
Little Women is one of the best-loved children's stories of all time, based on the author's own youthful experiences. It describes the family of the four March sisters living in a small New England co
Little Women is one of the best-loved children's stories of all time, based on the author's own youthful experiences. It describes the family life of the four March sisters living in a small New Engla
eng 'Everyone in Greenall Bridge knew Sam Carraclough's Lassie. In fact, you might say that she was the best-known dog in the village ...because nearly every man in the village agreed she was the fine
The Sea-Wolf belongs in the honorific tradition of American sea fiction where the voyage motif became a means of exploring the meaning of life, as in Richard Henry Dana's Two Years Before the Mast (18
engHuman, All Too Human (1878) marks the point where Nietzsche abandons German romanticism for the French Enlightenment. At a moment of crisis in his life (no longer a friend of Richard Wagner, forced
When Princess Irene and her nursemaid stay out too late one night and are chased home by goblins, a young miner boy called Curdie comes to their rescue. So begins a fantastic adventure in which Irene
Selected & Introduced by David Stuart Davies. Traumatised by ghost stories in her youth, Pulitzer Prize winning author Edith Wharton (1862 -1937) channelled her fear and obsession into creating a seri
In 1888 Henry James wrote 'There was the customary novel by Mr Le Fanu for the bedside; the ideal reading in a country house for the hours after midnight'. Madam Crowl's Ghost & Other Stories are
M.R. James is probably the finest ghost-story writer England has ever produced. These tales are not only classics of their genre, but are also superb examples of beautifully-paced understatement, conv
Translated by Abdullah Yusuf Ali, The Holy Qur'an (also known as The Koran) is the sacred book of Islam. It is the word of God whose truth was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad through the angel Gabrie
Aristotle (384-322BC) is the philosopher who has most influence on the development of western culture, writing on a wide variety of subjects including the natural sciences as well as the more strictly
Introduction and Notes by Doreen Roberts, Rutherford College, University of Kent at Canterbury.Middlemarch is a complex tale of idealism, disillusion, profligacy, loyalty and frustrated love. This pen
My name is Sherlock Holmes. It is my business to know what other people don't know'. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes first introduced Arthur Conan Doyle's brilliant detective to the readers of The S
eng With an Introduction by Nicola Bradbury, University of Reading Une Vie (1883) and Bel-Ami (1885) seem almost diametrically opposed in tone and temper. The 'Life' of the first is poignantly restric
Translated by C. K. Scott Moncrieff (revised by Moya Longstaffe).With an Introduction and Notes by Moya Longstaffe. The Red and the Black has been hailed as the first great 'realist' novel of the nine
With an Introduction, Notes and Bibliography by Michael Irwin, Emeritus Professor of English, University of Kent, Canterbury. The young Thomas Hardy, working as an architect, but fired with literary a
With an Introduction by David Stuart Davies. The Gothic novel, featuring dark tales of tragedy, romance, revenge, torture and ancient villainies, tinged with horror and the supernatural, became the vo
With an Introduction by Nicola Bradbury, University of Reading.The Wings of the Dove is a tale of desire and possession, of love and death. It is in essence a simple story, but one that opens up the g
Edited and with an Introduction by Aidan Arrowsmith, Manchester Metropolitan University. The literary and dramatic work of J.M. Synge is most famous for the 'riots' provoked by his 1907 play The Playb
Whiston's translation, with an Introduction by Brian McGing. The works of the Jewish writer Flavius Josephus represent one of the most important records of Judaism and the Jews that survive from the a
Translated by F Max-Muller, revised and with an Introduction by Suren Navlakha. Upanishads are mankind's oldest works of philosophy, predating the earliest Greek philosophy. They are the concluding pa
