Classics

Major Barbara

by George Bernard Shaw

Major Barbara is thought to be one of Shaw's most controversial works. While trying to give a realistic presentation of how he saw Christianity, many accused him of blasphemy. Major Barbara Undershaft thought...

John Barleycorn

by Jack London

John Barleycorn is an autobiographical novel by Jack London dealing with his enjoyment of and struggles with alcoholism. It was published in 1913. The title is taken from the British folksong "John Barleycorn."...

Mansfield Park

by Jane Austen

Fanny Price is a young girl from a relatively poor family, raised by her rich uncle and aunt, Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram, at Mansfield Park. She grows up with her four cousins, Tom, Edmund, Maria, and Julia,...

Sense and Sensibility

by Jane Austen

A work of romantic fiction, Sense and Sensibility is set in southwest England in 1792 through 1797, and portrays the life and loves of the Dashwood sisters, Elinor and Marianne, daughters of their father Henry's...

The Short Stories 1904

by Lucy Maud Montgomery

Lucy Maud Montgomery was born at Clifton (now New London), Prince

Edward Island, Canada, on November 30, 1874. She achieved

international fame in her lifetime, putting Prince Edward Island and

Canada on the world...

The Short Stories from 1902-1903

by Lucy Maud Montgomery

Lucy Maud Montgomery was born at Clifton (now New London), Prince

Edward Island, Canada, on November 30, 1874. She achieved

international fame in her lifetime, putting Prince Edward Island and

Canada on the world...

Shirley

by Charlotte Bronte

The novel is set in Yorkshire in the period 1811-12, during the industrial depression resulting from the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812. The novel is set against a backdrop of the Luddite uprisings in the...

She Stoops to Conquer

by Oliver Goldsmith

Wealthy countryman Mr. Hardcastle arranges for his daughter Kate to meet Charles Marlow, the son of a wealthy Londoner, hoping the pair will marry. Unfortunately Marlow is nervous around upper-class women, yet...

Right Ho, Jeeves

by P. G. Wodehouse

Right Ho, Jeeves is the second full-length novel featuring the popular characters Jeeves and Bertie Wooster, after Thank You, Jeeves. It also features a host of other recurring Wodehouse characters, and is mostly...

Memoirs of Carwin the Biloquist

by Charles Brockden Brown

Memoirs of Carwin, the Biloquist follows the life of a young man by the name of Carwin as he realizes his biloquial, ventriloquist talents. Carwin develops this ability to perfection, being able to manipulate...

Maggie: A Girl of the Street

by Stephen Crane

Maggie is "regarded as the first work of unalloyed naturalism in American fiction." According to the naturalistic principles, a character is set into a world where there is no escape from one's biological heredity....

The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano

by Olaudah Equiano

Olaudah Equiano was one of the most prominent people of African heritage involved in the British debate for the abolition of the slave trade. He wrote an autobiography that depicted the horrors of slavery and...

Moll Flanders

by Daniel Defoe

Moll, which she emphasizes is not her birth name, though she never does reveal what it was, is raised until she is teenager in America by a foster mother. She then gets a job as a household servant where she...

Moby Dick

by Herman Melville

"Call me Ishmael," Moby Dick begins, in one of the most recognizable opening lines in Western literature. The name has come to symbolize orphans, exiles, and social outcasts-- in the opening paragraph of Moby...

Middlemarch

by George Elliot

This novel is set in the fictitious Midlands town of Middlemarch during the period 1830-32. It has a multiple plot with a large cast of characters, and in addition to its distinct though interlocking narratives,...

Life is a Dream

by Pedro calderon de Barca

Life is a Dream is a philosophical allegory regarding the human situation and the mystery of life. Focusing on Segismundo, Prince of Poland, the central argument is the conflict between free will and fate. The...

The House of Seven Gables

by Nathaniel Hawthorne

The house of the title is a gloomy New England mansion, haunted from its foundation by fraudulent dealings, accusations of witchcraft, and sudden death. The current resident, the dignified but desperately poor...

The House of Mirth

by Edith Wharton

Like most Wharton novels, The House of Mirth examines the conflict between rigid social expectation and personal desire. Lily Bart is adept at playing society's games, which expect her to achieve an advantageous...

The House by the Church-Yard

by J. Sheridan LeFanu

The novel begins with a prologue in the voice of an old man, Charles de Cresseron, that is set in Chapelizod, Ireland, roughly a century after the events of the novel proper. This prologue details how, during...

Hedda Gabler

by Henrick Isben

Hedda's married name is Hedda Tesman; Gabler is her maiden name. On the subject of the title, Ibsen wrote: "My intention in giving it this name was to indicate that Hedda as a personality is to be regarded rather...