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Helping Himself
Horatio Alger 试读
Part of a series of rags to riches stories of boys achieving the American dream of wealth through hard work, these works can also be seen as helpful in understanding the development of American cultural and social ideals.
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When A Mans A Man
Harold Bell Wright 试读
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
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If Any Man Sin
Hiram Alfred Cody 试读
The author of the book is Hiram Alfred Cody,there are 32 chapters, is a book worth reading.
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Hugh Selwyn Mauberley
Ezra Pound 试读
This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.
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The Forge in the Forest
Charles George Douglas Roberts 试读
If you love travel stories and this is one of the best. It has magic and it pervades the very fabric of this world. a fierce young hero, and here is one who will never take the easy way out.
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Twenty Years After
Alexandre Dumas 试读
This titleincludes an introduction by A. M. de Medeiros, University of Kentat Canterbury. A year after the publication of "The ThreeMusketeers", Alexandre Dumas produced a sequel worthy in everyrespect of the original. In "Twenty Years After" the much belovedD'Artaganan, Athos, Porthos and Aramis reunite to fight the forcesof evil. In the original novel they defeated Milady, a formidablefoe; now they need to face her vengeful son Mordaunt, as well ascountering the machinations of the sinister Cardinal Mazarin. Theiradventures also take them to England, where Cromwell is about totopple Charles I. Meanwhile, they must overcome the obstacles whichthe passing of time has placed between them. Rediscovering strengthin unity, they fight for Queen and country. "The Musketeer" novelswere a huge success in Dumas' own lifetime, and have lost none oftheir original appeal. Translated into many languages and adaptedfor cinema and television, they have helped to make Dumas arguablythe most successful exporter of French culture to the widerworld.
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The Red Romance Book
Andrew Lang 试读
Originally published in 1921. Contents include: How William of Palermo was carried off by the Werwolf - The Disenchantment of the Werwolf - The Slaying of Hallgerda's Husbands - The Death of Gunnar - Njal's Burning - The Lady of Solace - Una and the Lion - How the Red Cross Knight slew the Dragon - Amys and Amyle - The Tale of the Cid - The Knight of the Sorrowful Countenance - The Adventure of the Two Armies who turned out to be Flocks of Sheep - The Adventure of the Bobbing Lights - The Helmet of Mambrino - How Don Quixote was Enchanted while guarding the Castle - Don Quixote's Home-coming - The Meeting of Huon and Oberon, King of the Fairies - How Oberon saved Huon - Havelok and Goldborough - Cupid and Psyche - Sir Bevis the Strong - Ogier the Dane - How the Ass became a Man again - Guy of Warwick - How Bradamante conquered the Wizard - The Ring of Bradamante - The Fulfilling of the Prophecy - The Knight of the Sun - How the Knight of the Sun rescued his Father. Author: Andrew Lang Language: English Keywords: Literature (Novel) / Fairy Stories / High Adventure Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. Obscure Press are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.
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Holy Bible(KJV)
King James 试读
The Bible is a collection of texts sacred in Judaism and Christianity. It is an example of a collection of scriptures written at different times by different authors in different locations. Jews and Christians consider the Bible to be a product of divine inspiration or an authoritative record of the relationship between God and humans.
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A Honeymoon in Space
George Chetwynd Griffith 试读
About eight o'clock on the morning of the 5th of November, 1900, those of the passengers and crew of the American liner St. Louis who happened, whether from causes of duty or of their own pleasure, to be on deck, had a very strange-in fact a quite unprece ...
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A Horses Tale
Mark Twain 试读
In Mark Twain's comical satire of the art of telling tall tales in America "A Horse's Tale," there was "night so dark the cats ran against each other he wrote of "a horse so fast the wagon started thirty yards ahead of the cloudburst and made it home without a drop of..." Twain extra ordinary sense of imagination and humor makes this a classic for all ages.
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A Woman Named Smith
Marie Conway Oemler 试读
When Sophy Smith inherits a house from her Great-Aunt Sophronisba Scarlett, there is one condition. She must live in it. If she tried to sell it or rent it, she would forfeit all rights to the entire estate. So with great trepidation, Sophy Smith, along with her dear friend, Alicia, moves from the busy New York life to the slow drawn out days of South Carolina. Despite hearing music when there was no musician and suggestions that the house was haunted, they were both determined to stay at the Hyndes House. But when the house servants find an old statue buried beneath a tree, the mysterious life of the old witchy Sophronisba Scarlett begins to unfold.
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Sky Island
Lyman Frank Baum 试读
"Sky Island: being the further exciting adventures of Trot and Cap'n Bill after their visit to the sea fairies" by Lyman Frank Baum is a classic children's fairy tale! Button-Bright finds a magical umbrella that can fly him anywhere in the world.
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The Isles of Sunset
Arthur Christopher Benson 试读
About midway between the two horns of the bay, the Isles of Sunset pierced the sea. There was deep blue water all around them, and the sharp and fretted pinnacles of rock rose steeply up to heaven. The top of the largest was blunt, and covered with a litt.
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A Gentleman Vagabond and Some Others
Francis Hopkinson Smith 试读
Francis Hopkinson Smith (1838-1915) was an American author, artist and engineer. He was a descendant of Francis Hopkinson, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Smith became a contractor in New York City and did much work for the federal government including the foundation for the Bartholdi Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor. His vacations were spent sketchin...
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Little Fuzzy
H. Beam Piper 试读
The planet Zarathustra is listed as uninhabited -- which means that the entire planet can be owned by a corporation. That owner is the Zarathustra Company, rich and happy -- until a prospector named Jack Holloway comes across undocumented species, a tiny, golden-furred little biped who he dubs "Little Fuzzy." Not only are the Little Fuzzies cute, they're bright too -- in fact they may be sapient as people are. . . and that means everything the Zarathustra company owns on this world is at stake. . . .
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Vanguards of the Plains A Romance of the Old Santa Fe Trail
Margaret Hill McCarter 试读
This story of the old Santa Fé Trail would do honor to the memory of those stalwart men who defied the desert, who walked the prairies boldly, and who died bravely--vanguards in the building of a firm highway for the commerce of a westward-moving Empire.
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VANITY FAIR
William Makepeace Thackeray 试读
The incomparable Miriam Margolyes applies her story-telling and histrionic gifts to this classic satire of two young English women,one bad but clever and the other good but stupid,who come to no good during the Napoleonic Wars.The abridgers have cut a bit too much at the expense of the characterizations.Although sounding somewhat forced,Margolyes,as always,gives an excellent performance.Y.R.© AudioFile 2001,Portland,Maine—Copyright © AudioFile,Portland,Maine —This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Little Women
Louisa May Alcott 试读
The four March sisters--Meg, Amy, Beth, and feisty Jo--sharethe joys and sorrows of growing up while their father is away at war. Thefamily is poor in worldly goods, but rich in love and character.
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ANNA KARENINA安娜卡列尼娜
列夫·托尔斯泰 试读
Tolstoy's tumultuous tale of passion and self-discovery marks a turning point in the author's career. His compelling, emotional saga recounts the effects of nonconformist behavior — a society woman's adulterous affair and a landowner's unconventional quest for a meaningful existence — against a backdrop of late 19th-century Russia.
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Across China on Foot
Edwin John Dingle 试读
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
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Black Beauty
Anna Sewell 试读
One of the best loved animal stories ever written, the dramatic and heartwarming Black Beauty is told by the magnificent horse himself, from his idyllic days on a country squire's estate to his harsh fate as a London cab horse. No one can ever forget the gallant Black Beauty, a horse with a white star on his forehead and a heart of unyielding courage.
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East of the Sun and West of the Moon
Peter Christen Asbjornsen 试读
These Scandinavian fairy tales have had many interpretations through the years, but never have they been so beautifully illustrated as in this sumptuous edition. Golden Age artist Kay Nielsen, a master of fantasy, lavished the text with 25 intricately detailed color and numerous black-and-white images that glow with his phantasmagorical style. With 15 stories that include the popular "Billy Goat's Gruff," this is one of the most stunning children's books ever produced.
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Emma
简·奥斯汀 试读
As daughter of the richest, most important man in the small provincial village of Highbury, Emma Woodhouse is firmly convinced that it is her right--perhaps even her "duty"--to arrange the lives of others. Considered by most critics to be Austen's most technically brilliant achievement, "Emma" sparkles with ironic insights into self-deception, self-discovery, and the interplay of love and power.
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Evelina Or the History of a Young Ladys Entrance into the World
Frances Burney 试读
Leaving the secluded home of her guardian for the first time, beautiful Evelina Anville is captivated by her new surroundings in London's beau monde--and in particular by the handsome, chivalrous Lord Orville. But her enjoyment soon turns to mortification at the hands of her vulgar and capricious grandmother, and the rakish Sir Clement Willoughby, who torments the naive young woman with his unwanted advances. And while her aristocratic father refuses to acknowledge her legitimacy, Evelina can hold no hope of happiness with the man she loves. Published anonymously in 1778, Frances Burney's epistolary novel brought her instant fame when the secret of its authorship was revealed. With its ingenious combination of romance and satire, comedy and melodrama, Evelina is a sparkling depiction of the dangers and delights of fashionable society.
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Gitanjali
泰戈尔 试读
Moving, heart-felt prose poems by the beloved and much admired Bengali poet and mystic who first achieved international fame (and a Nobel Prize) in 1913 with his translation of these moving poems. Reminiscent of Blake and Gibran, they include many works that are almost biblical in their rhythms, phrasing and images. Introduction by William Butler Yeats.
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The Mayor of Casterbridge
Thomas Hardy 试读
From its spectacular opening–the astonishing scene in whichdrunken Michael Henchard sells his wife and daughter to a passingsailor at a county fair–to the breathtaking series of discoveriesat its conclusion, The Mayor of Casterbridge claims a unique placeamong Thomas Hardy’s finest and most powerful novels. Rooted in an actual case of wife-selling in earlynineteenth-century England, the story build into an awesomeSophoclean drama of guilt and revenge, in which the strong, willfulHenchard rises to a position of wealth and power–only to suffer amost bitter downfall. Proud, obsessed, ultimately committed to hisown destruction, Henchard is, as Albert Guerard has said, “Hardy’sLord Jim…his only tragic hero and one of the greatest tragic heroesin all fiction.
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The Metaphysical Elements of Ethics
Immanuel Kant 试读
Work from the German philosopher,one of the most influential thinkers of modern Europe and the last major philosopher of the Enlightenment.
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The Princess of Cleves
Madame de La Fayette 试读
The text of this Norton Critical Edition is that of Thomas Sargent Perry's 1892 translation, indisputably the translation that has best served readers in English. Reprinted repeatedly over the last one hundred years, the Perry translation is a classic in its own right. After careful review, the editor has corrected minor infelicities of translation (necessary to remain true to Lafayette's text) and updated vocabulary. To experience the innovation of Lafayette's writing, it is necessary to understand the critical resistance it met with in seventeenth-century France. "Contemporary Reactions" includes five assessments of The Princess of Cleves by Marie-Madeleine de Lafayette herself, Roger de Bussy-Rabutin and Marie de Sevigne, Jean-Baptiste-Henry du Trousset de Valincour, Jean-Antoine de Charnes, and Du Plaisir following its controversial publication. John Lyons's translations for this Norton Critical Edition make these reactions available in English for the first time. "Criticism" includes eleven modern studies of the novel, five of which appear here in English for the first time, by Jean Fabre, Michel Butor, Jean Rousset, Helen Karen Kaps, Gerard Genette, Roger Francillon, Kurt Weinberg, Peggy Kamuf, Erica Harth, Joan DeJean, and Laurence Gregario. A Glossary of Characters and a Selected Bibliography are also included.
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The Scarlet Letter
Nathaniel Hawthorne 试读
Hailed by Henry James as "the finest piece of imaginative writing yet put forth in the country," Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter reaches to our nation's historical and moral roots for the material of great tragedy. Set in an early New England colony, the novel shows the terrible impact a single, passionate act has on the lives of three members of the community: the defiant Hester Prynne; the fiery, tortured Reverend Dimmesdale; and the obsessed, vengeful Chillingworth.With The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne became the first American novelist to forge from our Puritan heritage a universal classic, a masterful exploration of humanity's unending struggle with sin, guilt and pride.
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The Secret Garden
Frances Hodgson Burnett 试读
The story of an unhappy little girl, her invalid cousin, andthe healing power of friendship and love.
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The Time Machine
赫伯特·乔治·威尔斯 试读
Two classic science fiction novels in one handsome volume. Here are two masterpieces of irony and imaginative vision from the father of science fiction. The Time Machine propels the Time Traveller into a distant, dismal, Darwinian future. The Invisible Man tells of a brash young scientist who becomes invisible, then insane.
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The Yellow Wallpaper
Charlotte Perkins Gilman 试读
The story is written in the first person as a series of journal entries, the narrator a woman whose physician husband has confined her to the upstairs bedroom of a house he has rented for the summer. She is forbidden from working, and has to hide her journal entries from him, so she can recuperate from what he calls a "temporary nervous depression—a slight hysterical tendency," a diagnosis common to women in that period. The windows of the room are barred, and there is a gate across the top of the stairs, allowing her husband to control her access to the rest of the house.
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Through the Looking-Glass
Lewis Carroll 试读
"I wish I could get through into looking-glass house,"Alice said. "Let's pretend that the glass has gone soft and . . . Why, I do believe it has! It's turning into a kind of cloud!" A moment later Alice is inside the looking-glass world. There she finds herself part of a great game of chess, travelling through forests and jumping across brooks. The chess pieces talk and argue with her, give orders and repeat poems . . . It is the strangest dream that anyone ever had......
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Venus and Adonis
William Shakespeare 试读
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was an English poet and playwright, now widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon" (or simply "The Bard"). His surviving works consist of 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and several other poems. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. Between 1585 and 1592 he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part owner of the playing company the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men. He produced most of his known work between 1590 and 1613. His early plays were mainly comedies and histories, genres he raised to the peak of sophistication and artistry by the end of the sixteenth century. Next he wrote mainly tragedies until about 1608, producing plays, such as Hamlet, King Lear, and Macbeth, considered some of the finest in the English language. In his last phase, he wrote tragicomedies and collaborated with other playwrights.
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Walden
Henry David Thoreau 试读
By virtue of its casual, off-handedly brilliant wisdom and the easy splendor of its nature writing, Thoreau's account of his adventure in self-reliance on the shores of a pond in Massachusetts is one of the signposts by which the modern mind has located itself in an increasingly bewildering world. Deeply sane, invigorating in its awareness of humanity's place in the moral and natural order, Walden represents the progressive spirit of nineteenth-century America at its eloquent best. (Book Jacket Status: Jacketed)
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A Book-Lovers Holidays in the Open
Theodore Roosevelt 试读
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
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Fairy Tales from the Arabian Nights
E.Dixon 试读
There once was a king of Persia who at the beginning of his reign had distinguished himself by many glorious and successful conquests and had afterwards enjoyed such profound peace and tranquillity as rendered him the happiest of monarchs.
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Persuasion
简·奥斯汀 试读
This volume, first published in 2006, is a comprehensive scholarly edition of Jane Austen's innovative final novel.
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Poems and Songs of Robert Burns
Robert Burns 试读
Robert Burns (1759-1796) (also known as Rabbie Burns, Scotland's favourite son, the Ploughman Poet, the Bard of Ayrshire and in Scotland as simply The Bard), was a poet and a lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide. He is the bestknown of the poets who have written in the Scots language, although much of his writing is also in English and a 'light' Scots dialect, accessible to an audience beyond Scotland. He is regarded as a pioneer of the Romantic Movement and after his death became an important source of inspiration to the founders of both liberalism and socialism. Burns also worked to collect and preserve Scottish folk songs, sometimes revising, expanding, and adapting them. His poem (and song) Auld Lang Syne is often sung at Hogmanay (New Year), and Scots Wha Hae served for a long time as an unofficial national anthem of the country. Other poems and songs of Burns that remain well-known across the world today, include A Red, Red Rose, A Man's A Man for A' That, To a Louse, To a Mouse, The Battle of Sherramuir, and Ae Fond Kiss.
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Ragged Dick, Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot-Blacks
Horatio Alger 试读
Part of a series of rags to riches stories of boys achieving the American dream of wealth through hard work, these works can also be seen as helpful in understanding the development of American cultural and social ideals.
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Sons and Lovers
David Herbert Lawrence 试读
Lawrence's first major novel was also the first in the English language to explore ordinary working-class life from the inside. Using the first edition text, which Lawrence approved, this edition also offers a fresh and stimulating introduction - particularly in its treatment of Lawrence's language and imagery.
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The Blue Fairy Book
Andrew Lang 试读
Once upon a time there lived a king who was deeply in love with a princess, but she could not marry anyone, because she was under an enchantment. So the King set out to seek a fairy, and asked what he could do to win the Princess's love .The Blue Fairy Book is the first in a series of fairy-tale anthologies beloved of children in the last century. Each fairy book is a veritable treasure trove of stories for children and adults alike, spellbinding and special. Hesperus is very proud to present the first anthology, The Blue Fairy Book, which includes wonderful renditions of the old favourites such as Cinderella and Hansel and Gretel, as well as some intriguing fairy tales that modern audiences have yet to discover such as Why the Sea is Salt, Prince Hyacinth and The Dear Little Princess.
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In Freedoms Cause – a Story of Wallace and Bruce
G.A.Henty 试读
This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original.Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks,notations,marginalia and flawed pages.Because we believe this work is culturally important,we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting,preserving,and promoting the world's literature in affordable,high quality,modern editions that are true to the original work.
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Queen Mary and Harold
Alfred Tennyson Tennyson 试读
Alfred Lord Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (1809-1892) was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom and is one of the most popular English poets. Much of his verse was based on classical mythological themes. One of Tennyson's most famous works is Idylls of the King (1859), a series of narrative poems based entirely on King Arthur and the Arthurian tales. During his career, Lord Tennyson attempted drama, but his plays enjoyed little success even in his lifetime. His first publication entitled Poems by Two Brothers was published in 1827. He published his first solo collection of poems, Poems Chiefly Lyrical in 1830. In 1833, Tennyson published his second book of poetry, which included his well-known poem, The Lady of Shalott. In 1842 Tennyson published two volumes of Poems. The Princess, a satire of women's education, which came out in 1847, was also popular. It was in 1850 that Tennyson reached the pinnacle of his career, being appointed Poet Laureate until his death. Amongst his other works are Becket and Other Plays (1884) and Lady Clare (1884).
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Gargantua
Francois Rabelais 试读
Biting and bawdy, smart and smutty, lofty and low, Gargantua and Pantagruel is fantasy on the grandest of scales, told with an unquenchable thirst for all of human experience. Rabelais's vigorous examination of the life of his timesfrom bizarre battles to great drinking bouts, from satire on religion and education to matter-of-fact descriptions of bodily functions and desiresis one of the great comic masterpieces of literature.Parts of Gargantua and Pantagruel were banned upon their publication, and the whole of it has suffered in our century at the hands of translators too timid to say in modern English what Rabelais so frankly wrote in Middle French. Master translator Burton Raffel unapologetically brings to life in today's American idiom all the gusto of Rabelais's language. Raffel succeeds in making Gargantua and Pantagruel, so long a great unread classic, accessible and alive to the contemporary reader.
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Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs
W. S. (William Schwenck) Gilbert 试读
A book of ballads and songs by W.S.Gilbert, English dramatist and writer of humorous verse, he is best remembered as librettist of the Gilbert and Sullivan comic operas. I collected the most popular of the songs and ballads which I had written for the series of light operas with which my name is associated, and published them under the title of "Songs of a Savoyard". It recently occurred to me that these songs had so much in common with "The Bab Ballads" that it might be advisable to weld the two books into one. This is, briefly, the history of the present volume. Gilbert wrote a large number of ballads for the magazine Fun using his pen-name Bab. These Bab Ballads became famous on their own, as well as being a source for plots and songs for the Grand Operas. Contains 'The Yarn of The Nancy Bell', 'Captain Reece', 'The Bishop and the Busman' and many others.
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Back to Billabong
Mary Grant Bruce 试读
Mary Grant Bruce (1878-1958), also known as Minnie Bruce, was an Australian children's author and journalist. While all her thirty-seven books enjoyed popular success in Australia and overseas, particularly in the United Kingdom, she was most famous for the Billabong series, focussing on the adventures of the Linton family on Billabong Station in Victoria and in England and Ireland during World War I. Her writing was considered influential in forming concepts of Australian national identity, especially in relation to visions of the Bush. It was characterised by fierce patriotism, vivid descriptions of the beauties and dangers of the Australian landscape, and humorous, colloquial dialogue celebrating the art of yarning. Her books were also notable and influential through championing of what Bruce held up as the quintessentially Australian Bush values of independence, hard physical labour (for women and children as well as men), mateship, the ANZAC spirit and Bush hospitality against more decadent, self-centred or stolid urban and British values. Among her most famous works are: A Little Bush Maid (1910), Mates at Billabong (1911) and Back to Billabong (1921).
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Wake-Robin
John Burroughs 试读
1871. Volume One of Twenty Three, Riverby Edition. John Burroughs emerged from an obscure boyhood in the Catskill Mountains to write more than thirty books, create the genre of the nature essay, and become the preeminent nature writer of his day. Through his essays in books and popular magazines, John Burroughs taught countless Americans to appreciate nature. His first book, Wake-Robin, is mainly a book about about the Birds, or more properly an invitation to the study of Ornithology, and the purpose of the author will be carried out in proportion as it awakens and stimulates the interest of the reader in this branch of Natural History. Contents: The Return of the Birds In the Hemlocks The Adirondacks Birds'-Nests Spring at the Capital Birch Browsings The Bluebird and The Invitation. See other titles by this author available from Kessinger Publishing.
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Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece
Homer 试读
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor ictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturaly important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
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Baldy of Nome
Esther Birdsall Darling 试读
At all events, Tom had resented the entrance of the Eskimo, Wolf, into the Kennel; and never failed, when "Scotty" was not about, to manifest an enmity that would have told a civilized dog not to attempt any liberties with him. But Wolf was only an ignorant puppy, taken from a native igloo, where all of the dogs and all of the family lived in happy harmony; and so, one day when he was particularly joyous, he nipped, in a spirit of mischief, the end of Tom's wagging stump of a tail. Tom wheeled instantly, his hair bristling and his jaws apart, but the timely arrival of Matt made further demonstration impossible; and Tom's instinctive dislike for Wolf grew into an obsession after that direct and personal insult.
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Lady Mary and her Nurse
Catharine Parr Strickland Traill 试读
The nurse smiled, and said, "It is not a fish at all, my dear;it is a dried beaver's tail. I brought it from the back lakes whenI was at home, that you might see it. See, my lady, how curiouslythe beaver's tail is covered with scales; it looks like some sortof black leather, stamped in a diaper pattern. Before it is dried,it is very heavy, weighing three or four pounds. I have heard mybrothers and some of the Indian trappers say, that the animal makesuse of its tail to beat the sides of the dams and smoothe the mudand clay, as a plasterer uses a trowel.
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Mrs. Warrens Profession
George Bernard Shaw 试读
Written in 1893, Mrs. Warren's Profession skewers the hypocrisy of British society. The wealthy, respectable title character's "profession" is the world's oldest, but Mrs. Warren is unprepared for the reaction of her daughter Vivie when she discovers her mother's occupation. Shaw brings new life to the woman-with-a-past theme with wit and a defense of his heroine.
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The Black Tulip
Alexandre Dumas 试读
A deceptively simple story and the shortest of Dumas's most famous novels, The Black Tulip (1850) weaves historical events surrounding a brutal murder into a tale of romantic love. Set in Holland in 1672, this timeless political allegory draws on the violence and crimes of history, making a case against tyranny and creating a symbol of justice and tolerance: the fateful tulipa negra.
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Romola
Edward Dicey 试读
George Eliot, the pen named used by Mary Anne Evans, wrote popular works that mirrored the settings and ideology of contemporary Victorian England. She was brought up in the Church of England, where she developed strong moral convictions that carried over into her fiction. During a visit to Florence in 1860 it was suggested to Eliot that the historical Fra Girolamo Savonarola would make a good subject for a novel, so Eliot spent her visit, and many months after, exhaustively researching Florentine history and culture. Her effort is undeniably evident within the pages of "Romola," however Eliot has been criticized for using a 15th Century setting to deal with the 19th Century issues of Victorian England. Romola is the female protagonist through which the story is rendered; her intellectual and religious growth, often painful, reflects the religious and cultural transitions of the Italian Renaissance in Florence.
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On the Choice of Books
Thomas Carlyle 试读
ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. Gentlemen, I have accepted the office you have elected me to, and have now the duty to return thanks for the great honour done me. Your enthusiasm towards me, I admit, is very beautiful in itself, however undeserved it may be in regard to the object of it. It is a feeling honourable to all men, and one well known to myself when I was in a position analogous to your own. I can only hope that it may endure to the end? that noble desire to honour those whom you think worthy of honour, and come to be more and more select and discriminate in the choice of the object of it; for I can well understand that you will modify your opinions of me and many things else as you go on. (Laughter and cheers.) There are now fifty-six years gone last November since I first entered your city, a boy of not quite fourteen?fifty-six years ago? to attend classes here and gain knowledge of allkinds, I know not what, with feelings of wonder and awe-struck expectation; and now, after a long, long course, this is what we have come to. (Cheers.) There is something touching and tragic, and yet at the same time beautiful, to see the third generation, as it were, of my dear old native land, rising up and saying, " Well, you are not altogether an unworthy labourer in the vineyard: you have toiled through a great variety of fortunes, and have had many judges." As the old proverb says, " He that builds by the wayside has many masters." We must expect a variety of judges; but the voice of young Scotland, through you, is really of some value to me, and I return you many thanks for it, though I cannot describe my emotions to, you, and perhaps they will be much more conceivable if expressed in silence. (Cheers.) When this office was first p...
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Guns of the Gods
Talbot Mundy 试读
Talbot Mundy was an early 20th century English writer who often wrote under the pseudonym Walter Galt. At age 19 he left London to travel to India and parts of the Near and Far East. Most of Mundy's novels are set in India under British Occupation in which the loyal British officers encounter ancient Indian mysticism. Guns of the Gods is the story of the youth of Yasmini. It begins, "She never made any secret of the scorn with which she regards those who singe wings at her flame. Rather she boasts of it with limit-overreaching epithets. Her respect is reserved for those rare men and women who can meet her in unfair fight and, if not defeat her, then come close to it. She asks no concessions on account of sex. Men's passions are but weapons forged for her necessity; and as for genuine love-affairs, like Cleopatra, she had but two, and the second ended in disaster to herself. This tale is of the first one that succeeded, although fraught with discontent for certain others."
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Sally of Missouri
Rose E. Rose Emmet) Young 试读
"Hoo-ee-ow-ohme!"It was half a sob, half a laugh, and, half sobbing, half laughing, the young man stopped his horse on the crest of the Tigmore Hills, in the Ozark Uplift, raised in his stirrups, and looked the country through and through, as though he must see into its very heart.
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My Brilliant Career
Miles Franklin 试读
The story of a young girl's dreams, aspirations and melodramas told with zest and verve by the 16-year-old author.
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Black Jack
Max Brand 试读
It was characteristic of the two that when the uproar broke out Vance Cornish raised his eyes, but went on lighting his pipe. Then his sister Elizabeth ran to the window with a swish of skirts around her long legs. After the first shot there was a lull. The little cattle town was as peaceful as ever with its storm-shaken houses staggering away down the street.A boy was stirring up the dust of the street, enjoying its heat with his bare toes, and the same old man was bunched in his chair in front of the store. During the two days Elizabeth had been in town on her cattle- buying trip, she had never see him alter his position. But she was accustomed to the West, and this advent of sleep in the town did not satisfy her. A drowsy town, like a drowsy-looking cow-puncher, might be capable of unexpected things.(This paragraph from the first chapter)