CLASSICS

Daniel Defoe's bawdy tale of a woman's struggle for independence and redemption, Moll Flanders is edited with an introduction and notes by David Blewett in Penguin Classics.Born in Newgate prison...

In this story the author recreates her own childhood through the story of the gifted Maggie Tulliver and her spoilt, selfish brother. Though tragic in its outcome, this comic novel...

Beautiful, clever, rich - and single - Emma Woodhouse is perfectly content with her life and sees no need for either love or marriage. Nothing, however, delights her more than...

The Ladies' Paradise (Au Bonheur des Dames) recounts the spectacular development of the modern department store in late nineteenth century Paris. The store is a symbol of capitalism, of the...

When the weaver Silas Marner is wrongly accused of crime and expelled from his community, he becomes a miser and vows to turn his back on the world. But an...

The epic battle between man and monster reaches its greatest pitch in the famous story of "Frankenstein". In trying to create life, the young student Victor Frankenstein unleashes forces beyond...

Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, better known as Fanny Hill, is one of the most notorious texts in English literature. As recently as 1963 an unexpurgated edition was the...

In The Book of the Courtier (1528), Baldesar Castiglione, a diplomat and Papal Nuncio to Rome, sets out to define the essential virtues for those at Court. In a lively...

Having got rid of their human master, the animals of Manor Farm look forward to a life of freedom and plenty. But as a clever, ruthless elite among them takes...

The Female Quixote (1752), a vivacious and ironical novel parodying the style of Cervantes, portrays the beautiful and aristocratic Arabella, whose passion for reading romances leads her into all manner...

In a home-made dress of flame-coloured silk, a gawky, would-be curate as an escort, Olivia Curtis' first dance is either going to be gloriously romantic or an agonizing public humiliation....

Two wonderful stories about members of the Glass family by the author of `The Catcher in the Rye'. The first story takes place in downtown New Haven during the weekend...

HarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics. 'The quality of mercy is not strain'd,It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven' Bassiano, a noble Venetian,...

One of India's greatest epics, the Ramayana pervades the country's moral and cultural consciousness. Believed to have been composed by Valmiki sometime between the eighth and sixth centuries BC, the...

One of India's greatest epics, the Ramayana pervades the country's moral and cultural consciousness. Believed to have been composed by Valmiki sometime between the eighth and sixth centuries BC, the...

Published as a 'shilling shocker', Robert Louis Stevenson's dark psychological fantasy gave birth to the idea of the split personality. The story of respectable Dr Jekyll's strange association with the...

The authoritative Riverside text is used in this case study of Hamlet - probably the most frequently studied of all Shakespeare plays. The five critical essays that follow the text...

Franz Kafka's classic 1915 novella remains one of the most widely read works of fiction in the world. This Norton Critical Edition is based on Susan Bernofsky's acclaimed new translation,...

The little priest with the large umbrella who moonlights as an amateur detective uses his intuition to untangle twelve remarkable criminal cases

A gripping tale of violent jealousy, sexual passion and treachery, Honore de Balzac's Cousin Bette is translated from the French with an introduction by Marion Ayton Crawford in Penguin Classics.Poor,...

G.K. Chesterton's quiet and unassuming little priest has long since joined the pantheon of great literary detectives. Combining the shrewdness of Miss Marple, the insight of Sherlock Holmes and the...