Must Read Classics

The novel that put the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Handmaid's Tale on the literary mapMargaret Atwood’s first novel is both a scathingly funny satire of consumerism and a heady exploration of emotional cannibalism.Marian McAlpin is an...

With an Introduction and Notes by Michael Irwin, Professor of English Literature, University of Kent at Canterbury. The Diary of a Nobody is so unassuming a work that even its author, George Grossmith, seemed unaware that he had produced a masterpiece...

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERWinner of the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for biography and hailed by critics as both “monumental” (The Boston Globe) and “utterly romantic” (New York magazine), Stacy Schiff’s Véra (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov) brings to shimmering life one...

As Mrs Dalloway works on the preparations for a dinner party, her thoughts throughout the day wander from memories of the past to interrogations about the present and lead her to assess the choices she has made in life and love. Her monologue interweaves...

'I'm not afraid of storms, for I'm learning how to sail my ship.'Meg, Jo, Amy and Beth - four "little women" enduring hardships and enjoying adventures in Civil War New England The charming story of the March sisters, Little Women has been adored by...

"Upon the whole, he added nothing to his own happiness by all the dangers, the fatigues, and the perpetual anxiety which he had incurred in the pursuit of unlimited power," - Suetonius on Julius Caesar. "Nothing is more unpredictable than the mob,...

‘The power of Dickens is so amazing, that the reader at once becomes his captive' WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY The story of the orphan Oliver, who runs away from the workhouse to be taken in by a den of thieves, shocked readers with its depiction of a...

It is 1880: after visiting his mistress in the London suburbs, Colonel Pargiter returns home to his children and his dying wife. In a series of snapshots we meet all the Pargiter siblings: twenty-year-old Eleanor, whose concern is to help the poor; her...

Through a series of connected monologues, The Waves tells the story of six very different friends - Bernard, Louis, Neville, Jinny, Susan and Rhoda - as they progress from childhood to middle age. Interspersed with evocative descriptions of the...

Orlando, a young nobleman and one of Queen Elizabeth I's court favourites, is the object of many ladies' attentions, but after suffering heartbreak he prefers literary pursuits to entertaining any thoughts of marriage. Having obtained an ambassadorial...

From his childhood on the wild, windswept shores of Cornwall and his college days at Cambridge to his life as a lawyer in London and a fateful journey to the Mediterranean, Jacob Flanders's story is told by the women in his life, whether through his...

(Available after February 30th, 2022)As Katherine Hilbery is helping her mother write the biography of her grandfather, a famous man of letters buried in Poets' Corner, she becomes engaged to William Rodney, a budding writer with an exaggerated opinion...

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, The Grapes of Wrath is an epic human drama, with a stunning new cover by renowned artist Bijou Karman.'To the red country and part of the gray country of Oklahoma, the last rains came gently, and they did not cut the scarred...

George, a disillusioned academic, and Martha, his caustic wife, have just come home from a faculty party. When a handsome young professor and his mousy wife stop by for a nightcap, an innocent night of fun and games quickly turns dark and dangerous...

Tolstoy's epic masterpiece intertwines the lives of private and public individuals during the time of the Napoleonic wars and the French invasion of Russia. The fortunes of the Rostovs and the Bolkonskys, of Pierre, Natasha, and Andrei, are intimately...

Gillian Cross's brilliant retellings and Neil Packer's clever illustrations bring to life Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, two of the greatest stories ever told. When first published Walker's versions of the Iliad and the Odyssey attracted attention both for...

Introduction and Notes by Gene M. Moore, Universiteit van Amsterdam. Generally regarded as the pre-eminent work of Conrad's shorter fiction, Heart of Darkness is a chilling tale of horror which, as the author intended, is capable of many interpretations...

'The Alices are the greatest nonsense ever written, and far greater, in my view, than most sense.' - Philip Pullman Collecting Alice's complete adventures, a source of delight to children and adults alike for generations, the Penguin Classics edition of...

One of the BBC's '100 Novels That Shaped Our World'Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith, these delectable and collectible editions are bound in high-quality colourful,...

Introduction and Notes by Michael Irwin, Professor of English Literature, University of Kent at Canterbury. Set in Hardy's Wessex, Tess is a moving novel of hypocrisy and double standards. Its challenging sub-title, A Pure Woman, infuriated critics when...