Literary Fiction
Tales from Ariosto
The object of the present venture is to do something to revive the interest of the ordinary English reader in Ariosto. The present volume is…
Harmer John
Hjalmar Johanson (novel, 1926) is a boyish unworldly Swedish body builder come to Walpole’s fictional cathedral town of Polchester. His name…
The Shadow-Line
In this engaging and well-crafted novella, an older man recalls how a combination of obscure personal impulses and diabolical co-incidences …
Colonel Chabert
The short novel “Colonel Chabert” (1832) is part of Balzac’s great life work, the sprawling novel series titled “The Human Comedy.” Chabert,…
The Judgment of Eve
May Sinclair was a prolific author, literary critic, and feminist activist, famous in Britain and the US in the 1910’s and 20’s. The Judgmen…
Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship
The novel is in eight books. The eponymous hero undergoes a journey of self-realization. The story centers upon Wilhelm's attempt to escape …
The Story of a Modern Woman
“The Story of a Modern Woman” (1894) is a work of feminist social realism. In its time it was one of the most famous and influential novels …
Lolly Willowes
Laura Willowes, forced to move from her family home due to the death of her father, endures her role as Aunt Lolly in her new home with her …
The Unknown Masterpiece
“The Unknown Masterpiece” (“Le Chef-d’œuvre inconnu”) is a novella by Honoré de Balzac, published with revisions in 1845, after earli…
Mr. Moffatt
Mr. Moffatt owns a chemist's business in suburban Sydney, Australia, where he lives with his wife, Florence, and adult daughter, Naomi. The …
The Adventure of the Broad Arrow
When a few men decide to go for looking for gold in the outback of Australia, days of extreme heat with no water and no rain in sight, make …
Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern
The Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, is a work of enormous proportions. Setting out with the simple goal of offer…
Parodies on Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade
This extract, taken from Parodies of the works of English and American Authors, vol 1, of parodies of Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade…
The Rover
"The Rover: A weekly magazine of tales, poetry and engravings, original and selected" was a magazine started in 1843 by Seba Smith…
The Fortune of the Rougons
The first book in the 20-novel Rougon-Macquart Cycle. A monument of French naturalism. The sprawling tale of a family in Provence, during …
The Murder of Delicia
The following slight and unelaborated sketch of a very commonplace and everyday tragedy will, I am aware, meet with the unqualified disappro…
The Pinafore Picture Book
Pinafore’s sublimely silly story is made even sillier by this (ostensibly for children) 1908 story version of the 1878 Gilbert and Sullivan …
The Gardener and The Burden
Helen Turrell’s life has been one of respectability and duty, and she adopts and raises her illegitimate nephew upon her scapegrace brother’…
The Quest of the Golden Girl
The main character fears that he will never get married and performs a long pilgrimage whose goal is the perfect companion, the girl God mea…
The Later Life
Set in the stifling world of turn of the century Dutch aristocracy, the second volume of the 'Books of the Small Souls' quartet, begins wher…