Classics World Literature

Young, impressionable Aubrey is fascinated by the enigmatic Lord Ruthven, and accompanies him on a tour to Europe. But Aubrey develops a growing distaste for Lord Ruthven’s sinister and grotesque conduct - especially as it concerns human blood. This novella, penned during that tempestuous night in Switzerland amongst such notables as Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and Mary Shelley, served as the great inspiration for Bram Stoker to create Dracula.

The Letters of Abelard and Heloise is one of the most extraordinary correspondences in European history. Written in the 12th century, the letters document the love affair between Peter Abelard, a revolutionary philosopher and biblical scholar, and his beautiful and precocious student, Heloise. Eviscerated by his religious opponents and castrated by Heloise’s family, Abelard is haunted by ill fortune, and the star-crossed lovers are forced into separate lives, as monk and nun respectively, with letters being their only form of communication.

The Knight's Tale of medieval wars and chivalry is the first tale told to the pilgrims as they set out to Canterbury. It concerns Theseus, returning from fighting at Thebes, and two brother knights Palamon and Arcite, imprisoned but yearning for their loves. But the real hero of this recording is Richard Bebb who, with the help of Professor Derek Brewer, the leading expert on Chaucerian pronunciation, make the original Middle English not only comprehensible to the modern ear, but exciting.

The Origin of Species sold out on the first day of its publication in 1859. It is the major book of the 19th century and one of the most readable and accessible of the great revolutionary works of the scientific imagination. Though, in fact, little read, most people know what it says—at least they think they do. The Origin of Species was the first mature and persuasive work to explain how species change through the process of natural selection. Upon its publication, the book began to transform attitudes about society and religion.

Generations of young readers continue to fall in love with Marguerite Henry’s “horse stories.” In one of her most famous, King of the Wind, the author traces the ancestry of the great Kentucky Derby winner, Man o’ War, whose mysterious pedigree is linked to the noble line leading from the Godolphin Arabian.

A veteran of the Great War, Jake Barnes is both physically and emotionally wounded, leaving him unable to be intimate. Even so, he pines after Lady Brett Ashley, a promiscuous twice-divorced woman. As feelings are hurt and punches are thrown, their lives and the lives of their friends and lovers become tangled as they journey from Paris to Spain and struggle with the repercussions that come from surviving the First World War.

Wives and Daughters, Elizabeth Gaskell's last novel, is regarded by many as her masterpiece. Molly Gibson is the daughter of the doctor in the small provincial town of Hollingford. Her widowed father marries a second time to give Molly the woman's presence he feels she lacks, but until the arrival of Cynthia, her dazzling stepsister, Molly finds her situation hard to accept. Intertwined with the story of the Gibsons is that of Squire Hamley and his two sons.

The Trustees of the Pooh Properties have commissioned four authors to write in the timeless style of A.A. Milne to create a quartet of charming new adventures for Winnie-the-Pooh, Christopher Robin, and their friends. Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall: take a trip back to the Hundred Acre Wood with a collection of tales sure to delight year-round. Listeners of all ages will love rediscovering old friends and making new ones in this essential new volume of Pooh stories.

Hostile invading Martians wreak havoc and destruction in England. This science-fiction classic has terrified generations of readers!

Elegant, profound, and riveting, Mad, Bad, Dangerous to Know illuminates not only the complex relationships between three of the greatest writers in the English language and their fathers, but also illustrates the surprising ways these men surface in their work. Through these stories of fathers and sons, Tóibín recounts the resistance to English cultural domination, the birth of modern Irish cultural identity, and the extraordinary contributions of these complex and masterful authors.

Legends tell of an ancient sorceress who has learned the secrets of immortality. She rules over a lost people deep in unexplored Africa. She can slay at a glance, and her beauty is so legendary that no man can look upon her and keep his own will. Leo Vincey learns of a quest that has haunted his family for generations. He is to go to find this all powerful woman, and discover the secret of eternal life.

All Loves Excelling is John Bunyan's sermon on Ephesians 3:18-19: "That ye...may be able to comprehend with all saints, what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge." It was first titled The Saints' Knowledge of Christ's Love, is worthy of being ranked alongside Sibbes, and deals with a much neglected subject area.

In East Prussia, January 1945, the German forces are in retreat, and the Red Army is approaching. The von Globig family's manor house, the Georgenhof, is falling into disrepair. Auntie runs the estate as best she can since Eberhard von Globig, a special officer in the German army, went to war, leaving behind his beautiful but vague wife, Katharina, and her bookish 12-year-old son, Peter. As the road fills with Germans fleeing the occupied territories, the Georgenhof begins to receive strange visitors - a Nazi violinist, a dissident painter, a Baltic baron, even a Jewish refugee.

This Jules Verne Collection will carry you away to underwater adventures, will take you deep inside the earth, and pull you on a journey around the world. Are you ready to travel to faraway lands, to be tracked by the authorities, and to encounter prehistoric monsters? If you are ready for adventure, then join us along with the protagonists of each of the three stories in this collection of science fiction and surreal tales.

“This is not a book to promote tranquility, and readers in quest of peace of mind should look elsewhere,” writes Paul Fussell in the foreword to this original, sharp, tart, and thoroughly engaging work. The celebrated author focuses his lethal wit on habitual euphemizers, artistically pretentious third-rate novelists, sexual puritans, and the “Disneyfiers of life”. He moves from the inflammatory title piece on the morality of dropping the bomb on Hiroshima to a disquisition on the “naturist movement”, and more.

Мы адресуем этот сборник не только всем ценителям русской классической литературы конца 19 начала 20 веков, но и учащимся общеобразовательных школ, гимназий и лицеев. Надеемся, что эти рассказы в прочтении популярных актеров театра и кино позволят вам лучше узнать русскую классическую литературу.

Experience the horror when 19th-century London is invaded by an alien race from the red planet Mars. This 1898 science-fiction novel comes to life as narrated by Scott R. Pollak, the voice of NPR radio's WABE-FM, Atlanta. Scott's talents as an actor and narrator come to the forefront as he brings us The War of the Worlds.

Que celui qui pourrait écrire un tel livre serait heureux, pensais-je, quel labeur devant lui ! Pour en donner une idée, c'est aux arts les plus élevés et les plus différents qu'il faudrait emprunter les comparaisons ; car cet écrivain, qui d'ailleurs pour chaque caractère en ferait apparaître les faces opposées, pour montrer son volume, devrait préparer son livre, minutieusement, avec de perpétuels regroupements de force, comme une offensive, le supporter comme une fatigue.

A deeply influential novel from one of America's greatest authors, White-Jacket presents a view of life aboard a 19th-century navy ship that is equal parts humorous and sobering. Published a year before his masterpiece Moby-Dick, White-Jacket is based on Herman Melville's own experiences aboard the USS United States from 1843 to 1844.

What really happened in the Marabar caves? Adela Quested arrives in Chandrapore, India, prepared to marry a British magistrate who exemplifies the narrow-minded, anti-Indian projudices of the imperial bureaucracy. But she soon meets the charming and mercurial Dr. Aziz, who offers to show her the "real" India. An expedition to the famed Marabar caves ends in explosive accusations and a schism that foreshadows the eventual end of British rule in India.