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Whenever two Russians come together, the shadow of autocracy is with them...haunting the secret of their silences.' First published in 1911, Under Western Eyes traces the experiences of Razumov, a young Russian student of philosophy who is uninvolved in politics or protest. Against his will he finds himself caught up in the aftermath of a terrorist bombing directed against the Tsarist authorities. He is pulled in different directions - by his conscience and his ambitions, by powerful opposed pol itical forces, but most of all by personal emotions he is unable to suppress. Set in St Petersburg and Geneva, the novel is in part a critical response to Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment but it is also a startlingly modern book. Viewed through the 'Western eyes' of Conrad's English narrator, Razumov's story forces the reader to confront the same moral issues: the defensibility of terrorist resistance to tyranny, the loss of individual privacy in a surveillance society, and the demands thrown u p by the interplay of power and knowledge. This new edition is based on the first English edition text, and has a new chronology and bibliography.

HEART OF DARKNESS*AN OUTPOST OF PROGRESS*KARAIN*YOUTH The finest of all Conrad's tales, 'Heart of Darkness' is set in an atmosphere of mystery and menace, and tells of Marlow's perilous journey up the Congo River to relieve his employer's agent, the renowned and formidable Mr Kurtz. What he sees on his journey, and his eventual encounter with Kurtz, horrify and perplex him, and call into question the very bases of civilization and human nature. Endlessly reinterpreted by critics and adapted for film, radio, and television, the story shows Conrad at his most intense and sophisticated. The other three tales in this volume depict corruption and obsession, and question racial assumptions. Set in the exotic surroundings of Africa, Malaysia. and the east, they variously appraise the glamour, folly, and rapacity of imperial adventure. This revised edition uses the English first edition texts and has a new chronology and bibliography.

TYPHOON * FALK * AMY FOSTER *THE SECRET SHARER The four tales in this volume share autobiographical origins in Conrad's experience at sea and his exile from Poland, the country of his birth. 'Typhoon' is the story of a steamship and her crew beset by tempest, and of the stolid captain whose dogged courage is tested to the limit. In 'Falk' a taciturn young woman is bizarrely courted by a tug-boat master who is haunted by a terrible secret. 'Amy Foster' tells of an emigrant Pole struggling to over come isolation and prejudice in England. The final tale, 'The Secret Sharer', is Conrad's most famous short story, a masterpiece of suspense and ambiguity. Giving sanctuary to a fugitive sailor, a young sea-captain risks his ship and his command in o rder to save him. This revised edition uses the English first edition texts and has a new chronology and bibliography.

no consideration, no delicacy, no tenderness, no scruples should stand in the way of a woman ... from taking the shortest cut towards securing for herself the easiest possible existence' Chance(1914) was the first of Conrad's novels to bring him popu lar success and it holds a unique place among his works. It tells the story of Flora de Barral, a vulnerable and abandoned young girl who is 'like a beggar,without a right to anything but compassion'. After her bankrupt father is imprisoned, she lear ns the harsh fact that a woman in her position 'has no resources but in herself. Her only means of action is to be what she is.' Flora's long struggle to achieve some dignity and happiness makes her Conrad's most moving female character. Reflecting t he contemporary interest in the New Woman and the Suffragette question, Chance also marks the final appearance of Marlow, Conrad's most effective and wise narrator. This revised edition uses the English first edition text and has a new chronology and bibliography.

'Victory, don't forget, has come out of my innermost self.' Victory was the last of Conrad's novels to be set in the Malay Archipelago. Sub-titled 'An Island Tale', it tells the story of Axel Heyst who, damaged by his dead father's nihilistic philosophy, has retreated from the world of commerce and colonial exploration to live alone on the island of Samburan. But Heyst's solitary existence ends when he rescues an English girl from her rapacious patron and takes her off to his retreat. She in turn recalls him to love and life, until the world breaks in on them once more with tragic consequences. In this love story Conrad created two of his psychologically most complex and compelling characters in a narrative of great erotic power. This new edition uses the English first edition text and has a new chronology and bibliography.

News from Nowhere(1890) is the best-known prose work of William Morris and the only significant English utopia to be written since Thomas More's. The novel describes the encounter between a visitor from the nineteenth century, William Guest, and a de centralized and humane socialist future. Set over a century after a revolutionary upheaval in 1952, these "Chapters from a Utopian Romance" recount his journey across London and up the Thames to Kelmscott Manor, Morris's own country house in Oxfordsh ire. Drawing on the work of John Ruskin and Karl Marx, Morris's book is not only an evocative statement of his egalitarian convictions but also a distinctive contribution to the utopian tradition. Morris's rejection of state socialism and his ambitio n to transform the relationship between humankind and the natural world, give News from Nowhere a particular resonance for modern readers. This text is based on the 1891 version, incorporating the extensive revisions made by Morris to the first editi on. About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

In one of her personal letters, Jane Austen wrote "Little Matters they are to be sure, but highly important." In fact, letter-writing was something of an addiction for young women of Jane Austen's time and in her social position, and Austen's letters have a freedom and familiarity that only intimate writing can convey. Wiser than her critics, who were disappointed that her correspondence dwelt on gossip and the minutiae of everyday living, Austen understood the importance of "Little Matters," of the emotional and material details of individual lives shared with friends and family through the medium of the letter. Ironic, acerbic, always entertaining, Jane Austen's letters are a fascinating record not only of her own day-to-day existence, bu t of the pleasures and frustrations experienced by women of her social class which are so central to her novels. Vivien Jones's selection includes nearly two-thirds of Austen's surviving correspondence, and her lively introduction and notes set the n ovelist's most private writings in their wider cultural context. About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commi tment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Emma Woodhouse is the lovely, lively, willful, and fallible heroine of Jane Austen's fourth published novel. Confident that she knows best, Emma schemes to find a suitable husband for her pliant friend Harriet, only to discover that she understands t he feelings of others as little as she does her own heart. As Emma puzzles and blunders her way through the mysteries of her social world, Austen evokes for her readers a cast of unforgettable characters and a detailed portrait of a small town underg oing historical transition. Written with matchless wit and irony, judged by many to be her finest novel, Emma has been adapted many times for film and television. This new edition contains lively notes and an introduction that shows how Austen brilli antly turns the mundane into the exceptional. Emma is considered by many to be Austen's finest and most representative novel. The story of Emma Woodhouse's matchmaking, and her awakening to the true feelings of others as well as herself, is told with consummate wit and humour. This new edition contains lively notes and an introduction that explores how Austen transmutes the everyday into the revelatory.

Raymond Carver called Anton Chekhov "the greatest short story writer who has ever lived." This unequivocal verdict on Chekhov's genius has been echoed many times by writers as diverse as Katherine Mansfield, Somerset Maugham, John Cheever and Tobias Wolf. While his popularity as a playwright has sometimes overshadowed his achievements in prose, the importance of Chekhov's stories is now recognized by readers as well as by fellow authors. Their themes--alienation, the absurdity and tragedy of hum an existence--have as much relevance today as when they were written, and these superb new translations capture their modernist spirit. Elusive and subtle, spare and unadorned, the stories in this selection are among Chekhov's most poignant and lyric al. The book includes well-known pieces such as "The Lady with the Little Dog," as well as less familiar work like "Gusev," inspired by Chekhov's travels in the Far East, and "Rothschild's Violin," a haunting and darkly humorous tale about death and loss. The stories are arranged chronologically to show the evolution of Chekhov's art. About the Series: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume r eflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

Wherefore is light given to him that is in misery, and life unto the bitter in soul?' Jude Fawley, poor and working-class, longs to study at the University of Christminster, but he is rebuffed, and trapped in a loveless marriage. He falls in love wit h his unconventional cousin Sue Bridehead, and their refusal to marry when free to do so confirms their rejection of and by the world around them. The shocking fate that overtakes them is an indictment of a rigid and uncaring society. Hardy's last an d most controversial novel, Jude the Obscure caused outrage when it was published in 1895. This is the first truly critical edition, taking account of the changes that Hardy made over twenty-five years. It includes a new chronology and bibliography a nd substantially revised notes.

Begun in 1811 at the height of Jane Austen's writing powers and published in 1814, "Mansfield Park" marks a conscious break from the tone of her first three novels, "Northanger Abbey", "Sense and Sensibility", and "Pride and Prejudice", the last of w hich Austen came to see as 'rather too light.' Fanny Price is unlike any of Austen's previous heroines, a girl from a poor family brought up in a splendid country house and possessed of a vast reserve of moral fortitude and imperturbability. She is v ery different from Elizabeth Bennet, but is the product of the same inspired imagination.

Manu was seated, when the great seers came up to him: "Please, Lord, tell us the Laws of all the social classes, as well as of those born in between..."' The Law Code of Manu is the most authoritative and the best-known legal text of ancient India. F amous for two thousand years it still generates controversy, with Manu's verses being cited in support of the oppression of women and members of the lower castes. A seminal Hindu text, the Law Code is important for its classic description of so many social institutions that have come to be identified with Indian society. It deals with the relationships between social and ethnic groups, between men and women, the organization of the state and the judicial system, reincarnation, the workings of ka rma, and all aspects of the law. Patrick Olivelle's lucid translation is the first to be based on his critically edited text, and it incorporates the most recent scholarship on ancient Indian history, law, society, and religion.

Some of our greatest blessings come from madness Phaedrus is widely recognized as one of Plato's most profound and beautiful works. It takes the form of a dialogue between Socrates and Phaedrus and its ostensible subject is love, especially homoeroti c love. Socrates reveals it to be a kind of divine madness that can allow our souls to grow wings and soar to their greatest heights. Then the conversation changes direction and turns to a discussion of rhetoric, which must be based on truth passiona tely sought, thus allying it to philosophy. The dialogue closes by denigrating the value of the written word in any context, compared to the living teaching of a Socratic philosopher. The shifts of topic and register have given rise to doubts about t he unity of the dialogue, doubts which are addressed in the introduction to this volume. Full explanatory notes also elucidate issues throughout the dialogue that might puzzle a modern reader.

'Though I have been dead these fifteen years, I still command here, and none can enter these gates without my permission.' When Sir Philip Harclay returns to England after a long absence, he finds that his childhood friend, Arthur,Lord Lovel, is no longer alive, and that the castle and estates of the Lovel family have twice changed hands. But a mysteriously abandoned set of rooms in the castle of Lovel promises to disclose the secrets of the past. After a series of frantic episodes and surprising revelations, culminating in a trial by combat, the crimes of the usurper and the legitimacy of the true heir are finally discovered. 'The literary offspring of the castle of Otranto', as Reeve described it, The Old English Baron provides an ambitious rewriting of Horace Walpole's groundbreaking work, transporting the trappings of the Gothic to medieval England. Innovative and original in its day, Reeve's historical romance is increasingly recognized as a major influence on the development of Gothic fiction.

As I walk'd through the wilderness of this world, I lighted on a certain place, where was a Denn; And I laid me down in that place to sleep: And as I slept I dreamed a Dream.' So begins one of the best-loved and most widely read books in English lite rature.

To the English, I am "shocking"...What's more, French, which is disgusting; republican, which is abominable; exiled, which is repulsive; defeated, which is infamous. To top it all off, a poet...' Victor Hugo dominated literary life in France for over half a century, pouring forth novels, poems, plays, and other writings with unflagging zest and vitality. Here, for the first time in English, all aspects of his work are represented within a single volume. Famous scenes from the novels Notre-Dame, Les Miserables, and The Toilers of the Sea are included, as well as excerpts from his intimate diaries, poems of love and loss, and scathing denunciations of the political establishment. All the chosen passages are self-contained and can be enjoyed w ithout any previous knowledge of Hugo's work. Much of the material is appearing in English for the first time, and most of it has never before been annotated thoroughly in any language.