Barnes Noble: 2826 books

This second of a two-volume study of the literature of Shakespeare's time covers the dramatic works, leaving the verse and prose for another volume. Here, the authors consider the state of pre-Shakespearean drama in works by writers such as Kyd, Lyly, and Marlowe; then the plays of the Bard himself are...

The writer states in her introduction, “Louisa May Alcott occupies a niche peculiarly her own in the hearts of American girls”—aptly capturing the enduring admiration that Alcott inspires even today. This beguiling 1909 biography of the author of Little Women examines her simple yet stimulating childhood, her life and influences, as well as her phenomenal talent and success.

The world examined by the ancient Greek philosophers and poets was distinctly different from our own. And that context, the author argues, has been missing from later evaluations of their work. Here is the Greek view of life in the classical age—perspectives on the state, the individual, religion,...

This 1872 meditation on religious issues grapples with questions of faith, science, and belief. Asserting “I do not say I know there is a God; I only say that I observe and infer much that forces that conviction upon me,” the author considers Christianity, omnipotence, Malthus, Darwin, and human development.

This 1891 volume of essays, in the words of its editor, Fred Scott, "is just the work to go into the hands of those that hope and despair of the teacher of rhetoric—the callow young man with a sneaking ambition for literature…"  Lewes examines how such elements as vision, sincerity, beauty, and style determine literary success or failure.

In this renowned work, poet Percy Bysshe Shelley expands on his celebrated statement that “poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world,” and assiduously and lyrically rebuts the assertion made in the essay “Four Ages of Poetry” (written by his contemporary Thomas Love Peacock) that poetry has no place in a world of technology and science.

First performed in 1910, Deirdre of the Sorrows is based on Irish mythology. It was unfinished at time of the author’s death and completed by the poet William Butler Yeats and Synge’s fiancée, the actress Molly Allgood.  Deirdre, a beautiful young woman, is desired by a powerful but older king, Conchubor, whose pursuit of her leads to tragedy.

What is a short story? This 1913 study defines the genre, tracing the development of the English-language short story from medieval to modern times—accompanied by some stellar examples by Chaucer, Samuel Johnson, Sir Walter Scott, Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, John Brown, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Rudyard Kipling.

Written in Warner’s humorous and elegant style, Relation of Literature to Life (1896) is a collection of essays emphasizing the author's belief that all enduring literature is the result of the time in which it is produced and that it responds to that time’s general sentiment. In other words, these...

Beginning with the Middle Ages, this 1909 literary history considers all variations of the English-language short story: those told for instruction and pleasure, the writings of the heirs of Chaucer—John Lydgate and Thomas Occleve—the writings from the Renaissance, the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and those of such modern masters as Poe, Hawthorne, Stevenson, and Kipling.

Published in 1919, this study of the novelist's art, intended for lay readers wishing to deepen their understanding and appreciation of novels, contains the chapters "The Novel in Modern Life," "The Sources of Interest," "The Fable," "Character," "Tragedy and Comedy," "Setting," and "The Point of View."

A self-analyzing piece of literature, this volume demonstrates a critic turning his sharp eye inward. John Cowper wrote his section because he “is always engaged in analyzing the minds of clever artists; let [him] for once, undertake the less pleasing task of analyzing the mind of a clever critic.”...

This 1898 collection is split into two parts:  The first, "Exotics," consists of Hearn's Japanese journalism; the second, "Retrospectives," contains his personal essays and reflections.  Standouts are "Fuji no Yama," recounting the author's grueling ascent of Mt. Fuji, and "Insect Musicians," relating the now-vanished market in music-making insects. 

Kokoro, meaning "heart," "spirit," and “way of being” is a fitting title for this 1896 collection, for these fifteen essays focus on the interior life of Japan and its people.  Hearn's insights into Japan’s soul are unmatched by any Westerner, and his portraits of individual Japanese are as profound as his long essays on the civilization.