Classics: 3204 books

Not only an interesting novel, but a great ethnological work with insight into Indian life, lore and character. The story grows ore powerful as it progresses and its pictures of Tahante and his devoted love are pathetic in the extreme, and as true to Indian nature as art can make them.

The narrative describes the life of an Englishman, stolen from a well-to-do family as a child and raised by Gypsies who eventually makes his way to sea.One half of the book concerns Singleton's crossing of Africa and the later half concerns his life as a pirate in the Indian Ocean and Arabian Sea....

Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 - November 28, 1859) was an American author of the early 19th century. Best known for his short stories The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Rip van Winkle (both of which appear in his book The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon), he was also a prolific essayist, biographer...

Once upon a time there was an ugly little boy called Peter, who lived in his father's castle in France. He was a restless boy, and liked always to do or to hear something new. His home was very quiet, for his father was a great fighter, and was often away at the wars for months at a time. But though...

William Dean Howells (1837-1920) was an American realist author and literary critic. He wrote his first novel, Their Wedding Journey, in 1871, but his literary reputation really took off with the realist novel A Modern Instance, published in 1882, which describes the decay of a marriage. His 1885...

William Dean Howells (1837-1920) was an American realist author and literary critic. He wrote his first novel, Their Wedding Journey, in 1871, but his literary reputation really took off with the realist novel A Modern Instance, published in 1882, which describes the decay of a marriage. His 1885...

It is a far cry from Mr. W. D. Howells's early book to his later ones, and admirers of that author ought to leave An Open-Eyed Conspiracy severely alone if they wish to preserve any still lingering taste for his stories. The scene of this colorless work is laid in Saratoga, but it might as well have...

Castle Richmond is the third of five novels set in Ireland by Anthony Trollope. Castle Richmond was written between 4 August 1859 and 31 March 1860, and was published in three volumes on 10 May 1860. Castle Richmond is set in southwestern Ireland at beginning of the Irish famine. Castle Richmond is...

After the death of his Irish wife, Phineas Finn returns to London and to the House of Commons. But though drawn back apparently irresistibly, he never approaches politics with the zest of earlier days. What Trollope describes, in some of his most powerful writing, is a sad, at times almost sombre, progress towards maturity and self-wisdom.

Joseph Conrad was a Polish novelist, writing in English, while living in England. Many critics regard him as one of the greatest novelists in the English language, despite his not having learned to speak English fluently until he was in his twenties (and then always with a strong Polish accent). He...

Andrew Lang (1844-1912) was a prolific Scots man of letters, a poet, novelist, literary critic and contributor to anthropology. He now is best known as the collector of folk and fairy tales. He was educated at the Edinburgh Academy, St Andrews University and at Balliol College, Oxford. As a journalist,...

This novel was conceived in the heated and controversial politics of Britain at the turn of the century. Arthur Granger, an aristocratic and unsuccessful novelist, betrays the ideals he prides himself on for the unrequited love of a young woman. And no ordinary woman, she, but an ethereal, goddess-like, nameless agent from a strange world.

A remarkable book, the story of Flora De Barral, daughter of the Great De Barral, a monumental swindler, and her love for the sea captain who married her. Marlow tells the story in his usual quiet manner which is so dramatic under the quiet, and shows Chance the master hand directing and interfering at any moment.

Just our luck! Gus Lafee finished wiping his hands and sullenly threw the towel upon the rocks. His attitude was one of deep dejection. The light seemed gone out of the day and the glory from the golden sun. Even the keen mountain air was devoid of relish, and the early morning no longer yielded its...