Book picks similar to
Our Little Swiss Cousin by Mary Hazelton Blanchard Wade
our-little-cousin
geography-picture-books
gutenberg
Tales of Three Hemispheres by Edward J. M. D. Plunkett, Fiction, Classics, Fantasy, Horror
Lord Dunsany - 1919
In any case he was overdue to die, but hitherto his amazing resolution, and that terrible strength of character that so astounded his porters, had kept him alive and moved his safari on.There is not doubt that he was a fearful man. . . .*This peculiar collection is a very real treat: we envy you the reading of it. Among the treasures in this volume are "The Last Dream of Bwona Khubla," "How the Office of Postman Fell Vacant in Offord-Under-the-Wold," "The Prayer of Boob Aheera," "East and West," "A Pretty Quarrel," "How the Gods Avenged Meoul Ki Ning," "The Gift of the Gods," "The Sack of Emeralds," "The Old Brown Coat," "An Archive of the Older Mysteries," and "A City of Wonder," and a section he called Beyond the Fields We Know, which included "Publisher's Note," "Idle Days on the Yann," "A Shop in Go-By Street," and "The Avenger of Perd�ndaris."
The Trampling of the Lilies
Rafael Sabatini - 1906
At a young age, Rafael was exposed to many languages. By the time he was seventeen, he was the master of five languages. He quickly added a sixth language - English - to his linguistic collection. After a brief stint in the business world, Sabatini went to work as a writer. He wrote short stories in the 1890s, and his first novel came out in 1902. Sabatini was a prolific writer; he produced a new book approximately every year. He consciously chose to write in his adopted language, because, he said, "all the best stories are written in English." In all, he produced thirty one novels, eight short story collections, six nonfiction books, numerous uncollected short stories, and a play. He is best known for his world-wide bestsellers: The Sea Hawk (1915), Scaramouche (1921), Captain Blood (1922) and Bellarion the Fortunate (1926). Other famous works by Sabatini are The Lion's Skin (1911), The Strolling Saint (1913) and The Snare (1917).
A Defence of Poetry and Other Essays
Percy Bysshe Shelley - 2001
His major works were long visionary poems including, Alastor, The Revolt of Islam, Prometheus Unbound and the unfinished The Triumph of Life. Shelley was a strong advocate for social justice for the 'lower classes'. He witnessed many of the mistreatments occurring in the domestication and slaughtering of animals and he became a fighter for the rights of all living things. This collection contains On Love, On Life in a Future State, On the Punishment of Death Speculations, On Metaphysics Speculations, On Morals on the Literature, the Arts and the Manners of the Athenians, On the Symposium, or Preface to the Banquet of Plato, and A Defence of Poetry.
Quality Street: A Comedy
J.M. Barrie - 1902
Pheobe Throssel and Valentine Brown are a young couple separated by the Neopoleonic wars for ten years, only to find themselves the unfortunate victims of time and age upon their reunion. This story of lost love, spinsters, secret disguises, and the complexities of human emotion will enchant readers today as much as it did the audiences of New York and London over a century ago.
Manalive
G.K. Chesterton - 1912
Innocent Smith, a bubbly, high-spirited gentleman who literally falls into their midst. Later accused of murder and denounced for philandering everywhere he goes, Smith prompts his newfound acquaintances to recognize an important idea in most unexpected ways.
The Lady of the Lake
Walter Scott - 1810
Scottish novelist and poet Sir Walter Scott (1771 - 1832), a literary hero of his native land, turned to writing only when his law practice and printing business foundered. Among his most beloved works are Rob Roy (1818), and Ivanhoe (1820). American writer William Vaughn Moody (1869 - 1910) served as co-editor of the Harvard Monthly and assistant professor of English at the University of Chicago. He authored several verse plays, books of poetry, and histories and criticisms of English literature.
The Circle - A Comedy in Three Acts
W. Somerset Maugham - 1921
It is not what we do; it is what we are that is decisive. People with weak, trivial natures will be unhappy, no matter who they are with, or what they are doing. Instead of improving their character, they will always long for that someone or something or some place to make it all better. Those with stronger characters have a greater chance of happiness no matter what their choices have been.
Fridthjof's Saga
Esaias Tegnér - 1825
After writing Fridthjof's Saga Tegner was considered the father of modern Swedish poetry. Fridthjof's Saga dates back to the 8th century in Iceland. King Beli had two sons, Helgi and Halfdan, and a daughter named Ingeborg. On the other side of the fjord, lived the king's friend whose son Frithjof was called "the bold" and he was the bravest among men. Frithjof had been raised together with Ingeborg by their foster-father Hilding. Both Beli and �orsteinn died in war whereupon Helgi and Halfdan ruled the kingdom. The two kings were jealous of Frithjof's excellent qualities and so they refused to let him marry Ingeborg. When Frithjof returned he burnt down Baldr's temple and went away and became a Viking. After three years, he came to king Ring. Just before the old king died, Frithjof's identity was apparent to everybody and the dying king appointed Frithjof Earl and made him the care-taker of Ring and Ingeborg's child. When Ring died, Frithjof and Ingeborg married and he became the king of Ringerike. Then he declared war on Ingeborg's brothers killing one of them and making the second his vassal.
The Nebuly Coat
John Meade Falkner - 1903
M. Forster, John Betjeman, Henry Newboldt, and A. N. Wilson; while Lady Violet Bonham Carter, visiting a munitions works in 1915, fell into conversation with one of the directors, with whom she began discussing books. She told him that there was one book that he must read; 'I cannot tell you why, because its quality is indescribable—it is called The Nebuly Coat..' 'I wrote it,' replied the director.The novel tells of the experiences of a young architect, Arthur Westray, who is despatched to the sleepy Dorset town of Cullerne to oversee restoration work on the once splendid, but now sadly deteriorated, Cullerne Minster. The project would seem to offer little by way of excitement: Cullerne is quietly dying, and Westray fears that any restoration efforts are doomed through lack of finance. He soon finds himself, rather unwillingly, caught up in the current of Cullerne life, and hears rumours about a mystery surrounding the claim to the title of Lord Blandamer, whose family vault is sited in Cullerne Minster, and whose arms—the Nebuly Coat—adorn the Minster's great transept window. When the new Lord Blandamer arrives, promising to pay all the costs of the restoration, the inhabitants rejoice—all except Westray, who suspects that the new Lord is not what he seems, and the gone-to-seed organist, Sharnall, who seems close to sovling the mystery of the Blandamer inheritance.Part social comedy, part Hardyesque tragedy, and part murder mystery, The Nebuly Coat stands unique among English novels, and Ash-Tree Press is pleased to be able to bring it back into print. Mark Valentine's introduction illuminates the life of the author of three fine novels (Moonfleet, The Lost Stradivarius, and The Nebuly Coat), and shows how Falkner's interests contributed to this, his final and wonderfully atmospheric novel, a classic tale of suspense, intrigue, and deception.The Nebuly Coat is truly the mystery novel that M. R. James might have written!
Bread Overhead by Fritz Leiber, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror
Fritz Leiber - 1958
In this toasted tomorrow, the highly-mechanized Puffy Products is bent on producing the supremely lightest loaf. The story is what happens if bread isn't just airy, but pumped full of lighter-than-air helium. Leiber (Ships to the Stars) didn't often bake up such a souffle of spoof, but he's a master in the kitchen. And "Bread Overhead" has just enough to say about human nature to be filling, besides.
The Hand of Ethelberta
Thomas Hardy - 1876
Turning the male-dominated literary world to her advantage, she happily exploits the attentions of four very different suitors. Will she bestow her hand upon the richest of them, or on the man she loves? Ethelberta Petherwin, alias Berta Chickerel, moves with easy grace between her multiple identities, cleverly managing a tissue of lies to aid her meteoric rise. In "The Hand of Ethelberta" (1876), Hardy drew on conventions of popular romances, illustrated weeklies, plays, fashion plates, and even his wife's diary in this comic story of a woman in control of her destiny.
Preface to a Dictionary of the English Language
Samuel Johnson - 2004
You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
Shallow Soil
Knut Hamsun - 1893
Hamsun was a leading Norwegian author who saw humankind and nature united in a strong, sometimes mystical bond. This connection between the characters and their natural environment is exemplified in the novels Pan, and the epic Growth of the Soil, for which Hamsun received the Nobel Prize in literature in 1920.
Justice
John Galsworthy - 1910
He is viewed as one of the first writers of the Edwardian era; challenging in his works some of the ideals of society depicted in the preceeding literature of Victorian England. He won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1932. Notable works include The Forsyte Saga (1906-1921) and its sequels, A Modern Comedy and End of the Chapter. From the Four Winds was Galsworthy's first published work in 1897, a collection of short stories. These, and several subsequent works, were published under the pen name John Sinjohn and it would not be until The Island Pharisees (1904) that he would begin publishing under his own name. His first play, The Silver Box (1906) became a success, and he followed it up with The Man of Property (1906), the first in the Forsyte trilogy. Along with other writers of the time such as Shaw his plays addressed the class system and social issues, two of the best known being Strife (1909) and The Skin Game (1920).
