Satire
The Unbearable Bassington
The Unbearable Bassington was the first novel written by Saki (H. H. Munro). It also contains much of the elegant wit found in his short sto…
Lucia in London
In the third book in the Mapp and Lucia series, provincial snob and social climber Mrs. Emmeline Lucas, known to her friends as Lucia, and h…
The Autobiography of Methuselah
The Autobiography of Methuselah offers a unique and humorous perspective on biblical history through the eyes of its most ancient figure. Me…
Castle Rackrent
"One of the most inspired chronicles written in English" was the verdict of William Butler Yeats on the novel Castle Rackrent by M…
Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit
Old Martin Chuzzlewit has heaps of money that has never brought him anything but misery. Estranged from his grandson and namesake, when word…
Zadig or the Book of Fate
Zadig, ou La Destinée, ("Zadig, or The Book of Fate") (1747) is a famous novel written by the French Enlightenment philosop…
The Relentless City
A satiric novel of manners written in Benson's classic style of gently poking fun at class structures and the people who fill them. This tim…
The Importance of Being Earnest
In this most popular of all Oscar Wilde’s plays, two fashionable bachelors, Jack Worthing and Algernon Moncrieff, discover that each has bee…
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
The work was composed between 1790 and 1793, in the period of radical foment and political conflict immediately after the French Revolution.…
Fifty-One Tales
Fifty-One Tales by Lord Dunsany invites listeners into a world where the boundaries of reality blur and the extraordinary becomes commonplac…
The Pickwick Papers
The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, better known as The Pickwick Papers, is the first novel by Charles Dickens. Written for publicat…
Rameau's Nephew
Rameau's Nephew is a thought-provoking philosophical dialogue by Denis Diderot that delves into the complexities of human nature and society…
The Expedition of Humphry Clinker
The Expedition of Humphry Clinker was the last of the picaresque novels of Tobias Smollett, and is considered by many to be his best and fun…
Lady Windermere's Fan
Lady Windermere's Fan, A Play About a Good Woman is a four-act comedy by Oscar Wilde, first produced 22 February 1892 at the St James's Thea…
The Gilded Age
The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today is an 1873 novel by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner that satirizes greed and political corruption in po…
Northanger Abbey
Northanger Abbey is a hilarious parody of 18th century gothic novels. The heroine, 17-year old Catherine, has been reading far too many “hor…
Penguin Island
The novel (original French title -- L'Île des Pingouins) is a satire on human nature. The first publication was in 1908. These penguin…
Still Untouched by Human Hands
Long before Douglas Adams, Robert Sheckley pioneered the sub-genre of satirical science fiction. When space operas ruled, Robert Sheckley sa…
1601: Conversation, as it was by the Social Fireside
1601: Conversation, as it was by the Social Fireside invites listeners into a lively and irreverent dialogue set in the Elizabethan era. Mar…
A Common Story
Alexander Fedoritch Adouev is the naïve, pampered son of Anna Pavlovna, a provincial landowner. He decides to go off to Saint Petersbur…