Classics

Many years ago there lived an Emperor who was so terribly fond of beautiful new clothes that he spent all his money on dressing elegantly...Jewels in storytelling, these magical fairytales by Hans Christian Andersen were inspired by his own life as an...

Mitch and Yonko haven’t spoken in a year. As children, they were inseparable, raised together in an orphanage outside Tokyo—but ever since the sudden death of Mitch’s brother, they’ve been mourning in their private ways,...

A Leopard-Skin Hat may be Anne Serre’s most moving novel yet. A masterpiece of simplicity, emotion and elegance, it is the story of an intense friendship between the Narrator and his close childhood friend, Fanny, who suffers from profound...

I want to write a book about Vilhelm’s room and the events which took place in it, or arose from it; those that led to Lise’s death, which I have survived only so that I might write down the story of her and Vilhelm...The ripples from a...

'Let us go on, then! And I will tell you the story of my sister and her daughter, from beginning to end.'Alis al—Bustani's Sa'iba (1891) is one of the earliest known novels authored in Arabic by a female writer. Written when the Arabic...

In these stories, Dostoevsky explores both the figure of the dreamer divorced from reality, and also his own ambiguous attitude toward utopianism, themes central to his great novels. In White Nights, the apparent idyll of the dreamer's romantic...

'I treat the narrative of the Lives as a kind of mirror...The experience is like nothing so much as spending time in their company and living with them: I receive and welcome each of them in turn as my guest.'In the eight lives of this collection...

"All men by nature are actuated with the desire of knowledge," declared Aristotle. The philosopher's works are foundational to the history of science, and his treatise on metaphysics, or "first philosophy," is divided into sections of previous...

Jane Austen’s sass and satire are always wonderful companions, and nowhere are they more prominent than in Emma, the story of a hapless matchmaker and her genuine attempts to spark love. It’s heartfelt, hilarious and an endearing...

A blustering interloper and a meek aristocrat struggle for control of a country estate, in this comic novel by the author of Crime and Punishment.“Avsey's excellent translation and stimulating introduction and notes enable the reader to...

From magical steam trains to objectionable rodents, Miyazawa's sublimely written fairy tales mine the disturbing elements of the classics with rare skill and dark beauty. Japanese fairy tales - enchanting, enigmatic stories of animals, human beings...

Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic Socialism as I understand it. Thus wrote Orwell following his experiences as a militiaman in the Spanish Civil...

“These brief Ficciones have to be read one at a time, and slowly; then they throb with uncanny and haunting power.” —The Atlantic Monthly. The seventeen pieces in Ficciones demonstrate the gargantuan powers of...

A widowed writer begins to work on a biography of a novelist and artist—and soon uncovers bizarre parallels between her life and her subject’s—in this chilling and singularly strange novella by a contemporary master of horror and...

One of the BBC's '100 Novels that Shaped the World'A Hay Festival and The Poole VOTE 100 BOOKS for Women Selection Muriel Spark's classic The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie features a schoolmistress you'll never forget, in this beautifully...

Thirteen-year-old Agostino is spending the summer at a Tuscan seaside resort with his beautiful widowed mother. When she takes up with a cocksure new companion, Agostino, feeling ignored and unloved, begins hanging around with a group of local young...

Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Dolores Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita,...

Winner of both the Hugo and Nebula Awards, the powerful, classic story about a man who receives an operation that turns him into a genius...and introduces him to heartache. Charlie Gordon is about to embark upon an unprecedented journey. Born...

'The classic and gripping spy novel of Cold War Berlin' Guardian. 1963 Berlin is dark and dangerous. The anonymous hero of The IPCRESS File has been sent to help arrange the defection - in an elaborate mock coffin - of a leading Soviet...

Playtime in paradise is officially over. Al Rosen was doing just fine, hiding out in Israel – until he decided to play Good Samaritan and rescue some elderly tourists from a hotel fire. Now his picture’s been published in the press, and the...