Novel

Hailed by George Bernard Shaw as 'useful [corrective] to the romantic conception of war', R.C. Sherriff's Journey's End is an unflinching vision of life in the trenches towards the end of the First World War, published in Penguin Classics. Set in the First World War, Journey's End concerns a group of British officers on the front line and opens in a dugout in the trenches in France. Raleigh, a new eighteen-year-old officer fresh out of English public school, joins the besieged company of his friend and cricketing hero Stanhope, and finds him dramatically changed. Laurence Olivier starred as Stanhope in the first performance of Journey's End in 1928; the play was an instant stage success and remains a remarkable anti-war classic. R.C. Sherriff (1896-1975) joined the army shortly after the outbreak of the First World War, serving as a captain in the East Surrey regiment. After the war, an interest in amateur theatricals led him to try his hand at writing. Following rejection by many theatre managements, Journey's End was given a single performance by the Incorporated Stage Society, in which Lawrence Olivier took the lead role. The play's enormous success enabled Sherriff to become a full-time writer, with plays such as Badger's Green (1930), St Helena (1935), and The Long Sunset (1955); though he is also remembered as a screenplay writer, for films such as The Invisible Man (1933), Goodbye Mr Chips (1933) and The Dam Busters (1955). If you enjoyed Journey's End, you might like Robert Graves's Goodbye to All That, available in Penguin Modern Classics. 'Its unrelenting tension, and its regard for human decency in a vast world of human waste, are impressive and, even now, moving'Clive Barnes

Introduction and Notes by Norman Vance, Professor of English, University of Sussex. Jude Fawley is a rural stone mason with intellectual aspirations. Frustrated by poverty and the indifference of the academic institutions at the University of Christminster, his only chance of fulfilment seems to lie in his relationship with his unconventional cousin, Sue Bridehead. But life as social outcasts proves undermining, and when tragedy occurs, Sue has no resilience and Jude is left in despair. Hardy's portrait of Jude, the idealist and dreamer who is a prisoner of his own physical nature, is one of the most haunting and desperate of his creations. Jude the Obscure is a dark yet compassionate account of the insurmountable frustrations of human existence which reflect Hardy's yearning for the spiritual values of the past and his despair at their decline.

Powerful and controversial from its 1895 publication to the present, "Jude the Obscure" scandalized Victorian critics, who condemned it as decadent, indecent, and degenerate. Between its frank portrayals of sexuality and its indictments of marriage, religion, and England's class system, the novel offended a broad swath of readers. Its heated reception led the embittered author to renounce fiction, turning his considerable talents ever afterward to writing poetry. Hardy's last novel depicts a changing world, where a poor stonemason can aspire to a university education and a higher place in society -- but where in reality such dreams remain unattainable. Thwarted at every turn, Jude Hawley abandons his hopes, is trapped into an unwise marriage, and pursues a doomed relationship with his free-spirited cousin, Sue Bridehead. The lovers find themselves equally incapable of living within the conventions of their era and of transcending its legal and moral strictures. Hailed by modern critics as a pioneering work of feminism and socialist thought, Hardy's tragic parable continues to resonate with readers.

‘An ode to love, to the families we build when our own families fail us. It broke my heart’ Douglas Stuart, author of Shuggie BainJuno loves Legs. She always has, ever since she fought the bullies for him in their first encounter at school. Growing up on the estate is tough for them both, but as they emerge into the possibilities and underground parties of 1980s Dublin, they find a breathing space to begin their real lives. The two of them against the world. But what if the world has other ideas?‘A heartbreaker, and absolutely unforgettable’ Donal Ryan, author of The Queen of Dirt Island‘One of the finest writers that Ireland has produced. Juno Loves Legs will break your heart and stitch it right back up again’ Irish Sunday Independent

A #1 "New York Times" bestseller, this is the classic thriller of science run amok that took the world by storm. Available for the first time in a tall Premium Edition. Reissue.

The Camel gets his Hump, the Whale his Throat, and the Leopard his Spots in these bewitching stories that conjure up distant lands, the beautiful gardens of splendid palaces, and the jungle and its creatures. Inspired by Rudyard Kipling's delight in human eccentricities and the animal world, and based on bedtime stories he told to his daughter, these strikingly imaginative fables explore the myths of creation, the nature of beasts, and the origins of language and writing. They are linked by poems and scattered with Kipling's illustrations, which contain hidden jokes, symbols, and puzzles.

Rudyard Kipling's epic rendition of the imperial experience in India is also his greatest long work. Born in India and growing into early manhood, Kim wants to play the "great game" of imperialism. He is also spiritually bound to the lama, an old ascetic priest. As the two men become fired by a quest that takes them across the country, Kim tries to reconcile these opposing impulses. A celebration of their friendship in an often hostile environment, Kim captures at once the opulence of India's exotic landscape and the uneasy presence of the British Raj.

Octavia E. Butler's ground-breaking masterpiece, with an original foreword by Ayobami Adebayo. 'The marker you should judge all other time-travelling narratives by' GUARDIAN'[Her] evocative, often troubling, novels explore far-reaching issues of race, sex, power and, ultimately, what it means to be human' NEW YORK TIMES'No novel I've read this year has felt as relevant, as gut-wrenching or as essential . . . If you've ever tweeted "All Lives Matter", someone needs to shove Kindred into your hand, and quickly' CAROLINE O'DONOGHUE--In 1976, Dana dreams of being a writer. In 1815, she is assumed a slave. When Dana first meets Rufus on a Maryland plantation, he's drowning. She saves his life - and it will happen again and again. Neither of them understands his power to summon her whenever his life is threatened, nor the significance of the ties that bind them. And each time Dana saves him, the more aware she is that her own life might be over before it's even begun. This is the extraordinary story of two people bound by blood, separated by so much more than time.

Portée par le développement de la presse, apparaît en Grèce, à la fin du XIXème siècle, une éclosion du genre de la nouvelle qui s’enracinera dans la littérature du pays et qui y demeure florissant. A côté de l’étude mœurs et de l’écriture réaliste se fait jour chez certains nouvellistes, sous l’influence de modèles étrangers comme Poe ou Maupassant, un attrait pour les diverses formes de l’irrationnel. C’est surtout au cours de la période qui va de 1880 à la fin des années 1920 que prend place dans les lettres grecques une «⁠ ⁠Grèce de l’étrange », envers du décor de l’image solaire et du ra­tionalisme généralement associés à cette terre méditerranéenne. La présente anthologie vise à donner un aperçu de cet aspect méconnu de sa littérature. Constantin Cavafis A la lumière du jour ♦ Nicolaos Episcopopoulos Ut dièse mineur ♦ Andréas Karkavitsas Le corail noir ♦ Ioannis Kondylakis Le chat noir ♦ Napoléon Lapathiotis L’ami mystérieux ♦ Pavlos Nirvanas Histoire d’un crime ♦ Alexandre Papadiamantis L’île d’Ouranitsa ♦ Zacharias Papantoniou Le faucon blessé ♦ Constantin Théotokis Caïn ♦ Dimitrios Vikélas Philippos Marthas ♦ Démosthène Voutyras Le chant du pendu

The flaxen-haired beauty of the childlike Lady Audley would suggest that she has no secrets. But M.E. Braddon's classic novel of sensation uncovers the truth about its heroine in a plot involving bigamy, arson and murder.