Ancient & Medieval

Arthur Miller's classic parable of mass hysteria draws a chilling parallel between the Salem witch-hunt of 1692 - 'one of the strangest and most awful chapters in human history' - and the American anti-communist purges led by Senator McCarthy in the 1950s. The story of how the small community of Salem is stirred into madness by superstition, paranoia and malice, culminating in a violent climax, is a savage attack on the evils of mindless persecution and the terrifying power of false accusations.A depiction of innocent men and women destroyed by malicious rumour, The Crucible is also a powerful indictment of McCarthyism and the 'frontier mentality' of Cold War America.

The Penguin English Library Edition of The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle"Mr Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound!"The terrible spectacle of the beast, the fog of the moor, the discovery of a body: this classic horror story pits detective against dog, rationalism against the supernatural, good against evil. When Sir Charles Baskerville is found dead on the wild Devon moorland with the footprints of a giant hound nearby, the blame is placed on a family curse. It is left to Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson to solve the mystery of the legend of the phantom hound before Sir Charles' heir comes to an equally gruesome end. The Hound of the Baskervilles gripped readers when it was first serialised and has continued to hold its place in the popular imagination.The Penguin English Library - 100 editions of the best fiction in English, from the eighteenth century and the very first novels to the beginning of the First World War.

'The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.'When Dorian Gray has his portrait painted, he is captivated by his own beauty. Tempted by his world-weary, decadent friend Lord Henry Wotton, he wishes to stay forever young, and pledges his very soul to keep his good looks. Set in fin-de-siécle London, the novel traces a path from the studio of painter Basil Hallward to the opium dens of the East End. As Dorian's slide into crime and cruelty progresses he stays magically youthful, while his beautiful portrait changes, revealing the hideous corruption of moral decay.Ever since its first publication in 1890 Wilde's only novel has remained the subject of critical controversy. Acclaimed by some as an instructive moral tale, it has been denounced by others for its implicit immorality. Combining elements of the supernatural, aestheticism, and the Gothic, The Picture of Dorian Gray is an unclassifiable and uniquely unsettling work of fiction. ABOUT THE SERIES: For over 100 years Oxford World's Classics has made available the widest range 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, helpful notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

The forerunner to The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion tells the earlier history of Middle-earth, recounting the events of the First and Second Ages, and introducing some of the key characters, such as Galadriel, Elrond, Elendil and the Dark Lord, Sauron.The Silmarillion is an account of the Elder Days, of the First Age of Tolkien's world. It is the ancient drama to which the characters in The Lord of the Rings look back, and in whose events some of them such as Elrond and Galadriel took part. The tales of The Silmarillion are set in an age when Morgoth, the first Dark Lord, dwelt in Middle-Earth, and the High Elves made war upon him for the recovery of the Silmarils, the jewels containing the pure light of Valinor.Included in the book are several shorter works. The Ainulindale is a myth of the Creation and in the Valaquenta the nature and powers of each of the gods is described. The Akallabeth recounts the downfall of the great island kingdom of Númenor at the end of the Second Age and Of the Rings of Power tells of the great events at the end of the Third Age, as narrated in The Lord of the Rings.This pivotal work features the revised, corrected text and includes, by way of an introduction, a fascinating letter written by Tolkien in 1951 in which he gives a full explanation of how he conceived the early Ages of Middle-earth.

Dumas séduit, fascine, intéresse, amuse, enseigne.Victor Hugo.Tout le monde connaît la verve prodigieuse de M. Dumas, son entrain facile, son bonheur de mise en scène, son dialogue spirituel et toujours en mouvement, ce récit léger qui court sans cesse et qui sait enlever l'obstacle et l'espace sans jamais faiblir. Il couvre d'immenses toiles sans jamais fatiguer ni son pinceau, ni son lecteur.Sainte-Beuve.Les Trois Mousquetaires... notre seule épopée depuis le Moyen Âge.Roger Nimier.Les Trois Mousquetaires forment le plus divertissant des romans d'aventures. Leurs personnages, Athos, Porthos, Aramis et d'Artagnan, sont sortis des bibliothèques pour descendre dans la rue. Ils ont enseigné l'insolence et l'amitié à beaucoup de jeunes Français qui ont aussi découvert les fatalités de l'amour en rèvant aux belles épaules de Milady et à ses regards de perdition.Kléber Haedens.

90 classic titles celebrating 90 years of Penguin Books<BR><BR>'Assuming that I was sane and awake, my experience on that night was such as has befallen no man before'<BR><BR>After five years of 'strange amnesia', Nathaniel Wingate Peaslee remains haunted by madness and memories that cannot be real. Desperate for answers he travels to Western Australia, joining an archaeological excavation into Earth's deep past.<BR><BR>Journey with Peaslee to discover his fate in the story described by author Lin Carter as 'Lovecraft's single greatest achievement in fiction'.

Um Gilgamesch, den König der sumerischen Stadt Uruk in Mesopotamien, rankt sich ein Bestand mythisch-sagenhafter Erzählungen, die berichten, wie er nach allerhand großen Heldentaten dem Schicksal seiner Endlichkeit zu entgehen versucht. Unsterblichkeit aber, das muss der Held einsehen, ist nur den Göttern gegeben, Sterben dagegen Teil der menschlichen Natur. Das Gilgamesch-Epos stammt aus dem babylonischen Raum und ist eine der ältesten überlieferten Dichtungen der Menschheit. Hier geht es gewaltige viertausend Jahre zurück in die Vergangenheit und hinab zu den tiefsten Wurzeln literarischer Gestaltungskraft.- Die älteste Dichtung der Welt- Das Gilgamesch-Epos ist das bekannteste Werk der akkadischen und der sumerischen Literatur. Es stammt vor allem aus dem babylonischen Raum und ist eine der ältesten überlieferten, schriftlich fixierten Dichtungen - Thomas Mann hat in 'Joseph und seine Brüder' Elemente der Gilgamesch-Mythologie in die Josephs-Legende verwoben

A.I. Kuprin (1870-1938) - odin iz samyh izvestnyh prozaikov HH veka, realist, master psihologicheskogo analiza. V sostav toma vkljucheny povesti o ljubvi. Odno iz luchshih proizvedenij mirovoj literatury o ljubvi "Granatovyj braslet" raskryvaet nravstvennuju chistotu velikogo chuvstva. V "Olese", stavshej osnovoj znamenitogo fil'ma "Koldun'ja", pokazany krasota i sila cheloveka, ne utrativshego svoej svjazi s prirodoj, umejushhego ljubit' iskrenne, bez rascheta. Gimn ljubvi zvuchit v zhizneutverzhdajushhej "Sulamifi", napisannoj po motivam biblejskoj "Pesni pesnej".<BR>

The Epic of Gilgamesh is an epic poem from ancient Mesopotamia, regarded as the earliest surviving notable literature and the second oldest religious text, after the Pyramid Texts. The literary history of Gilgamesh begins with five Sumerian poems about Bilgamesh (Sumerian for "Gilgamesh"), king of Uruk, dating from the Third Dynasty of Ur (c.¿2100 BC). These independent stories were later used as source material for a combined epic in Akkadian. The first surviving version of this combined epic, known as the "Old Babylonian" version, dates back to the 18th century BC and is titled after its incipit, Sh¿tur eli sharr¿ ("Surpassing All Other Kings"). Only a few tablets of it have survived. The later Standard Babylonian version compiled by Sîn-l¿qi-unninni dates from the 13th to the 10th centuries BC and bears the incipit Sha naqba ¿muru ("He who Saw the Abyss", in unmetaphoric terms: "He who Sees the Unknown"). Approximately two-thirds of this longer, twelve-tablet version have been recovered. Some of the best copies were discovered in the library ruins of the 7th-century BC Assyrian king Ashurbanipal. The first half of the story discusses Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, and Enkidu, a wild man created by the gods to stop Gilgamesh from oppressing the people of Uruk. After Enkidu becomes civilized through sexual initiation with Shamhat, he travels to Uruk, where he challenges Gilgamesh to a test of strength. Gilgamesh wins the contest; nonetheless, the two become friends. Together, they make a six-day journey to the legendary Cedar Forest, where they plan to slay the Guardian, Humbaba the Terrible, and cut down the sacred Cedar. The goddess Ishtar sends the Bull of Heaven to punish Gilgamesh for spurning her advances. Gilgamesh and Enkidu kill the Bull of Heaven after which the gods decide to sentence Enkidu to death and kill him. In the second half of the epic, distress over Enkidu's death causes Gilgamesh to undertake a long and perilous journey to discover the secret of eternal life. He eventually learns that "Life, which you look for, you will never find. For when the gods created man, they let death be his share, and life withheld in their own hands". Nevertheless, because of his great building projects, his account of Siduri's advice, and what the immortal man Utnapishtim told him about the Great Flood, Gilgamesh's fame survived well after his death, with expanding interest in the his story. It has been translated into many languages and is featured in several works of popular fiction. The epic is regarded as a foundational work in religion and the tradition of heroic sagas, with Gilgamesh forming the prototype for later heroes like Heracles (Hercules), and the epic itself serving as an influence for Homeric epics. (wikipedia.org)

Die Revolution der poetischen Sprache: Dafür steht der Name Mallarmé. Mit ihm begann die Verskunst ebenso reflexiv wie abstrakt zu werden. Mit Mallarmé hat in der Poesie die Herrschaft der Kunst im Allgemeinen begonnen, das heißt der individuelle, autonome Menschen, losgelöst von jedem vorgegeben System (einschließlich dem des Individualismus). Auch in der deutschsprachigen Lyrik des 20. Jahrhunderts wurde dieses erste wirklich moderne dichterische Werk breit und kontrovers rezipiert. Von den über 3300 überlieferten Briefen aus der Feder Mallarmés sind rund 200 in diese erste deutschsprachige Edition seiner Korrespondenz aufgenommen worden. Es werden Fragen der Literatur diskutiert, die nicht selten in regelrechte Abhandlungen zu einer möglichen Dichtkunst münden. In den Briefen wird aber auch ein Leben anschaulich, das in seinem Werk ebenso aufging, wie jenes aus seinem Leben bestand. Lesbar werden in dieser Ausgabe auch die zahlreichen Missverständnisse und Angleichungen eines im Laufe des 20. Jahrhunderts entstandenen 'deutschen' Mallarmé. Seine vermeintlich weltabgewandte Poetik erscheint in einem ganz anderen Licht. Der Dichter kommt ebenso zu Wort wie der mitten im Zeitgeschehen stehende gesellige Zeitgenosse, der Mensch, der er war - eine schwindelerregende Chronik zu einem halben Jahrhundert überbordender Kreativität, alltäglicher Sorgen und Beschäftigungen, Ambivalenzen und Leidenschaften. Ein verbrieftes Leben, das die Kunst nicht weniger nachahmt als diese das Leben.

Verachtet mir die Glockengasse nicht! Ich weiß wohl, es ist eine trübe, freudlose Gasse, in ganz Wien ist keine, die sich so quälend ins Gemüt und in die Träume legt. Wenn sie noch eine rechtschaffene schwarze, kasernenhohe Proletariergasse wäre! Aber es ist die Gasse der Gecken der Armut, der Modedamen der Powerte. Hier wohnen Hausierer, deren Töchter heimlich Kreuzer auf Kreuzer legen, um drei Tage in einem protzigen Sommerbad, als »Reiche« verkleidet, zubringen zu können, hier wohnen abgemagerte Beamte mit fünf oder sechs grünbleichen Kindern, die aber Sonntags Matrosenanzüge mit großen weißen Kragen tragen müssen, hier wohnen im ersten Stock Börsianer, die zwei Winter lang reich sind und den armen Verwandten um die Ecke zeigen wollen, daß sie jetzt eine Französin zu den Kindern halten und ihnen Raketts und Tennisbälle geben, mit denen die Töchter ausgehen, obwohl es weit und breit kein Stückchen Rasen gibt.

Odin iz samyh izvestnyh prozaikov HH veka, realist, master psihologicheskogo analiza A. Kuprin legko uvlekaet chitatelja povestvovaniem i zastavljaet s interesom sledit' za sud'boj geroev. V "Olese", stavshej osnovoj znamenitogo fil'ma "Koldun'ja", pokazany krasota i sila cheloveka, ne utrativshego svoej svjazi s prirodoj, umejushhego ljubit' iskrenne, bez rascheta. V "Poedinke" pisatel' opisyvaet poshlost', beznravstvennost' nravov provincial'noj oficerskoj sredy, ubivajushhej vse iskrennee i zhivoe vokrug sebja. Temna ili svetla priroda ljubvi? Vo mnogih svoih proizvedenijah pisatel' otvechaet na jetot vopros. Ljubov', po predstavleniju A. Kuprina - sila, sozdajushhaja lichnost', sobirajushhaja v edinoe celoe luchshie kachestva cheloveka, odna iz samyh vysokih cennostej v zhizni cheloveka.

Il testo dantesco, accompagnato dal rigoroso e aggiornato commento di Anna Maria Chiavacci Leonardi, è affiancato da scritti di Jorge Luis Borges, Massimo Scorsone, Fabio Camilletti e Giacomo Berchi.

Assembling at the Tabard Inn in Southwark, twenty-nine pilgrims begin their journey to Canterbury Cathedral. To entertain themselves on their long road, their host suggests that they regale each other with stories, with the teller of the best tale set to earn a free supper. The pilgrims correspond to all sections of medieval society, from the crusading knight to the drunken cook, and their tales span a range of genres, including the comic ribaldry and deception of `The Miller's Tale' and the story of chivalry and courtly romance told by the Franklin. Unfinished at the time of his death, The Canterbury Tales are here presented in their original Middle-English. <BR><BR>This edition contains a wealth of material and over 3,000 notes which will help all students of Chaucer's masterpiece.

Classic mystery enthralls readers with a vividly retold Baskerville legend, pairing witty illustrations and iconic lines to spark curiosity, suspense, and playful, accessible engagement for new and seasoned fans alike.The world's greatest classic stories come to life in these expert retellings. Baker Street Readers give an enchanting taste of the original tales, quoting best-known lines and most memorable moments, all supported with wonderfully witty illustrations.

"Gentle reader, may you never feel what I then felt!"Throughout the hardships of her childhood - spent with a severe aunt and abusive cousin, and later at the austere Lowood charity school - Jane Eyre clings to a sense of self-worth, despite of her treatment from those close to her. At the age of eighteen, sick of her narrow existence, she seeks work as a governess. The monotony of Jane's new life at Thornfield Hall is broken up by the arrival of her peculiar and changeful employer, Mr Rochester. Routine at the mansion is further disrupted by mysterious incidents that draw the pair closer together but which, once explained, threaten Jane's happiness and integrity. A flagship of Victorian fiction, Jane Eyre draws the reader in by the vigour of Jane's voice and the novel's forceful depiction of childhood injustice, of the restraints placed upon women, and the complexities of both faith and passion. The emotional charge of Jane's story is as strong today as it was more than 150 years ago, as she seeks dignity and freedom on her own terms. In this new edition, Juliette Atkinson explores the power of narrative voice and looks at the striking physicality of the novel, which is both shocking and romantic.