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The Enchanted April
When four very different English women abandon their grey, constricted lives for a month in a rented Italian castle, none of them expects to be changed. Yet beneath the warm April sun, amid the scent of wisteria and the glittering Mediterranean, old grievances soften and guarded hearts begin to open. Reserved Mrs Wilkins and earnest Mrs Arbuthnot seek escape from loneliness; glamorous Lady Caroline Dester yearns for peace; and formidable Mrs Fisher clings fiercely to the past. What follows is a gently comic and deeply human story of friendship, self-discovery, and the quiet power of beauty to heal. Witty, uplifting, and infused with luminous charm, The Enchanted April is a timeless celebration of spring, renewal, and second chances.
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A Doll's House and Other Plays
The plays of Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen (1828-1906) are critically acclaimed throughout the world. The father of modern drama, Ibsen broke with theatrical conventions and created a more realistic form of drama that used the stage as a forum for debating social problems, notably the rights of the individual, and the damaging effects of orthodoxy. This collection of four plays contains, in A Doll’s House (1879) and Hedda Gabler (1890), his most striking depictions of the struggle by individuals - especially women - to realise their full potential; it also presents Peer Gynt (1867), an early verse tour de force, not originally intended for the stage, on the nature of the self, and The Master Builder (1892), a play that explores the clash between the old and the new in richly metaphorical language. This collection returns to the acclaimed translations of William Archer (1856-1924), who through these renditions played a major role in promoting Ibsen’s reputation outside Norway. Archer was also a critic, who with actress Elizabeth Robbins and dramatist George Bernard Shaw was central in the modernisation of English theatre.
Frankenstein
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 quicken the beatings of the heart.’ The tale is a superb blend of science fiction, mystery and thriller. Victor Frankenstein driven by the mad dream of creating his own creature, experiments with alchemy and science to build a monster stitched together from dead remains. Once the creature becomes a living breathing articulate entity, it turns on its maker and the novel darkens into tragedy. The reader is very quickly swept along by the force of the elegant prose, the grotesque, surreal imagery, and the multi-layered themes in the novel. Although first published in 1818, Shelley’s masterpiece still maintains a strong grip on the imagination and has been the inspiration for numerous horror movies, television and stage adaptations.
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Frankenstein (Wordsworth Empress Collection)
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 quicken the beatings of the heart.’ The tale is a superb blend of science fiction, mystery and thriller. Victor Frankenstein driven by the mad dream of creating his own creature, experiments with alchemy and science to build a monster stitched together from dead remains. Once the creature becomes a living breathing articulate entity, it turns on its maker and the novel darkens into tragedy. The reader is very quickly swept along by the force of the elegant prose, the grotesque, surreal imagery, and the multi-layered themes in the novel. Although first published in 1818, Shelley’s masterpiece still maintains a strong grip on the imagination and has been the inspiration for numerous horror movies, television and stage adaptations. This edition uses the 1831 version of the text. This edition includes a new afterword by Dr Sally Minogue
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Jane Eyre (Wordsworth Empress Collection)
Jane Eyre ranks as one of the greatest and most perennially popular works of English fiction. Although the poor but plucky heroine is outwardly of plain appearance, she possesses an indomitable spirit, a sharp wit and great courage. She is forced to battle against the exigencies of a cruel guardian, a harsh employer and a rigid social order. All of which circumscribe her life and position when she becomes governess to the daughter of the mysterious, sardonic and attractive Mr Rochester. However, there is great kindness and warmth in this epic love story, which is set against the magnificent backdrop of the Yorkshire moors. Ultimately the grand passion of Jane and Rochester is called upon to survive cruel revelation, loss and reunion, only to be confronted with tragedy. This edition includes an introduction by Dr Sally Minogue.
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Wuthering Heights (Wordsworth Empress Collection)
Wuthering Heights is a wild, passionate story of the intense and almost demonic love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff, a foundling adopted by Catherine’s father. After Mr Earnshaw’s death, Heathcliff is bullied and humiliated by Catherine’s brother Hindley and wrongly believing that his love for Catherine is not reciprocated, leaves Wuthering Heights, only to return years later as a wealthy and polished man. He proceeds to exact a terrible revenge for his former miseries. The action of the story is chaotic and unremittingly violent, but the accomplished handling of a complex structure, the evocative descriptions of the lonely moorland setting and the poetic grandeur of vision combine to make this unique novel a masterpiece of English literature. This edition includes an afterword by Dr Sally Minogue.
Epigrams of Oscar Wilde
There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about', said Oscar Wilde more than a hundred years ago. But this remark seems perhaps even more relevant to our present world where so many seek publicity at any cost. Wilde's well-turned phrases and spontaneous insults still cause much amusement and admiration. Most of us miss the opportunities for bon mots, finding them long after the moments have passed, but Wilde seems never to have been short of suitable words - flattering, witty and on occasions savagely cruel. Many of the quotes in this book are taken from Wilde's plays, novels and essays which were also packed with witticisms amounting to an outrageous philosophy. Wilde's extravagance and unconventional behaviour earned him loyal friends but also bitter enemies and in 1895 after a series of unfortunate events and court cases he was gaoled for two years with hard labour for indecent behaviour. Though from prison came a few last brilliant works, Wilde was never to recover his health or standing in society. He died in Paris bankrupt, broken and alone. He is buried at Cimetiere du Pere Lachaise - one of Paris's finest cemeteries - where today many pilgrims from all parts of the world come to pay their respects and leave tokens in recognition of his genius.
Irish Ghost Stories (Mystery & Supernatural)
He told more about it to the priest than to others. He certainly had a secret to tell. He might as well have divulged it frankly, for the neighbours all knew well enough that it was the face of dead Ellen Coleman that he had seen. – J.S. Le FanuI felt a strange creeping sensation as I looked up the vast black staircase, wide enough for a coach to drive down, and at the heavy darkness bending over it like a curse. – Rosa MulhollandOn and on he glided, like an evil shadow, the very darkness seeming to loathe him as he passed. – Oscar WildeTo walk through Irish history is to pass through a haunted landscape. Perhaps that’s why so many of Ireland’s finest writers found themselves drawn to the ghost story. This collection includes the work of canonical figures like Bram Stoker, J.S. Le Fanu, Oscar Wilde, and W.B. Yeats, but also a wealth of lesser-known authors like Charlotte Riddell and Rosa Mulholland who were once bestsellers but are now unjustly neglected, all with a keen sense of Ireland’s haunted character. Each story in this collection is presented with its original publication details, so readers can see exactly where and when it first appeared, and a brief biography of its author. Together, they offer a fascinating cross-section of Ireland’s literary relationship with the supernatural.
The Fall of the House of Usher (Collector's Edition)
“The Fall of the House of Usher” is a gothic short story by Edgar Allan Poe that explores themes of madness, isolation, and decay. The narrator visits the gloomy, crumbling mansion of his childhood friend, Roderick Usher, who is suffering from a mysterious illness alongside his equally strange sister, Madeline. As strange and terrifying events unfold, the line between reality and the supernatural blurs, leading to a chilling and tragic climax. Poe’s tale is a haunting exploration of the human mind and the inescapable grip of fear and doom.
Jacob's Room / Night and Day
Virginia Woolf’s second novel, Night and Day (1919), portrays the gradual changes in a society,the patterns and conventions of which are slowly disintegrating; where therepresentatives of the younger generation struggle to forge their own way, for ‘... life has to be faced: to be rejected; then accepted on new terms with rapture’. Woolf begins to experiment with the novelform while demonstrating her affection for the literature of the past. Jacob’s Room (1922), Woolf’s third novel, marks the bold affirmationof her own voice and search for a new form to express her view that ‘the humansoul … orientates itself afresh everynow & then. It is doing so now. No one can see it whole therefore.’ Jacob’s life is presented in subtle, delicateand tantalising glimpses, the novel’s gaps and silences are as replete withmeaning as the wicker armchair creaking in the empty room.
White Nights; Poor Folk; The Double
''White Nights'' is one of Dostoevsky’s earlier short stories but one of his most enduringly popular. It tells the story of four nights in the life of the lonely narrator, who meets and falls in love with the mysterious and beautiful Nastenka.Poor Folk was Dostoevsky’s first novel, written to try and alleviate his financial plight, and was a commercial success. It tells the story of Makar Devushkin, a clerk, and Varvara Dobroselova, a seamstress, by means of the letters they exchange; they are in love, but too poor to marry. Its exploration of humanitarian themes led to it being described as Russia’s first ‘social novel’.By contrast, Dostoevsky’s second novel, The Double was not well received. First published in 1846, it was revised and republished by Dostoevsky in 1866, but he did not consider it a success. By contrast, Vladimir Nabokov called it ''the best thing he ever wrote’ and described it as ’a perfect work of art’.
Anne of Green Gables (Heritage Collection)
Anne Shirley is an eleven-year-old orphan who has hung on determinedly to an optimistic spirit and a wildly creative imagination through her early deprivations. She erupts into the lives of aging brother and sister Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert, a girl instead of the boy they had sent for. Thus begins a story of transformation for all three; indeed the whole rural community of Avonlea comes under Anne’s influence in some way. We see her grow from a girl to a young woman of sixteen, making her mistakes, and not always learning from them. Intelligent, hot-headed as her own red hair, unwilling to take a moral truth as read until she works it out for herself, she must also face grief and loss and learn the true meaning of love. Part Tom Sawyer, part Jane Eyre, by the end of Anne of Green Gables, Anne has become the heroine of her own story.
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Oliver Twist
Contains many Dickensian themes - poverty, desperation, fear, temptation and the eventual triumph of good in the face of adversity. This book features some of the characters, such as Oliver himself (Who dares to ask for more), the tyrannical Bumble, the diabolical Fagin, the menacing Bill Sikes, Nancy and 'the Artful Dodger'.
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Robinson Crusoe
From its first publication in 1719, Robinson Crusoe has been printed in over 700 editions. It has inspired almost every conceivable kind of imitation and variation, and been the subject of plays, opera, cartoons, and computer games. The character of Crusoe has entered the consciousness of each succeeding generation as readers add their own interpretation to the adventures so thrillingly 'recorded' by Defoe.
Praised by eminent figures such as Coleridge, Rousseau and Wordsworth, this perennially popular book was cited by Karl Marx in Das Kapital to illustrate economic theory. However it is readers of all ages over the last 280 years who have given Robinson Crusoe its abiding position as a classic tale of adventure.
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The Complete Fairy Tales
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, witches in their towers and forests, of giants and dwarfs, of fabulous animals and dark deeds.Together with the well-known tales of Rapunzel, The Goose Girl, Sleeping Beauty, Hansel and Gretel and Snow White, there are the darker tales such as Death's Messengers which deserve to be better known, and which will appeal not only to all who are interested in the history of folklore, but also to all those who simply love good story-telling.
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A Christmas Carol
Ebenezer Scrooge is a miserly old skinflint. He hates everyone, especially children.But at Christmas three ghosts come to visit him, scare him into mending his ways, and he finds, as he celebrates with Bob Cratchit, Tiny Tim and their family, that geniality brings its own reward.This finest of all Christmas stories is beautifully illustrated with Arthur Rackham's superb line drawings.
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