Bantam classic

A young slave woman attempting to protect her son from the horrors of slavery, switches her light-skinned infant with the master's white son. This novel features a literary first — the use of fingerprinting to solve a crime.

Hardy's last work of fiction, Jude the Obscure is also one of his most gloomily fatalistic, depicting the lives of individuals who are trapped by forces beyond their control. Jude Fawley, a poor villager, wants to enter the divinity school at Christminster. Sidetracked by Arabella Donn, an earthy country girl who pretends to be pregnant by him, Jude marries her and is then deserted. He earns a living as a stonemason at Christminster; there he falls in love with his independent-minded cousin, Sue Bridehead. Out of a sense of obligation, Sue marries the schoolmaster Phillotson, who has helped her. Unable to bear living with Phillotson, she returns to live with Jude and eventually bears his children out of wedlock. Their poverty and the weight of society's disapproval begin to take a toll on Sue and Jude; the climax occurs when Jude's son by Arabella hangs Sue and Jude's children and himself. In penance, Sue returns to Phillotson and the church. Jude returns to Arabella and eventually dies miserably. The novel's sexual frankness shocked the public, as did Hardy's criticisms of marriage, the university system, and the church. Hardy was so distressed by its reception that he wrote no more fiction, concentrating solely on his poetry.Please Note: This book is easy to read in true text, not scanned images that can sometimes be difficult to decipher. The Microsoft eBook has a contents page linked to the chapter headings for easy navigation. The Adobe eBook has bookmarks at chapter headings and is printable up to two full copies per year. Both versions are text searchable.

a novel

During a series of hearings Mr. Wizzey Jones is forced to reveal the shocking activities of a corporation which deals in children.

The notorious jumping frog of Calaveras County -- The story of the bad little boy -- Cannibalism in the cars -- A day at Niagara -- Legend of the Capitoline Venus -- Journalism in Tennessee -- A curious dream -- The facts in the great beef contract -- How I edited an agricultural paper -- A medieval romance -- My watch -- Political economy -- Science vs. Luck -- The story of the good little boy -- Buck Fanshaw's funeral -- The story of the old ram -- Tom Quartz -- A trial -- The trials of Simon Erickson -- A true story -- Experience of the McWilliamses with membranous croup -- Some learned fables for good old boys and girls -- The canvasser's tale -- The loves of Alonzo Fitz Clarence and Rosannah Ethelton -- Edward Mills and George Benton: a tale -- The man who put up at Gadsby's -- Mrs. McWilliams and the lightning -- What stumped the bluejays. CONTINUED: A curious experience -- The invalid's story -- The McWilliamses and the burglar alarm -- The stolen white elephant -- A burning brand -- A dying man's confession -- The professor's yarn -- A ghost story -- Luck -- Playing courier -- The Californian's tale -- The diary of Adam and Eve -- The Esquimau maiden's romance -- Is he living or is he dead? -- The £1,000,000 bank-note -- Cecil Rhodes and the shark -- The joke that made Ed's fortune -- A story without an end -- The man that corrupted Hadleyburg -- The death disk -- Two little tales -- The belated Russian passport -- A double-barreled detective story -- The five boons of life -- Was it heaven? or hell? -- A dog's tale -- The $30,000 bequest -- A horse's tale -- Hunting the deceitful turkey -- Extract from Captain Stormfield's visit to heaven -- A fable -- The mysterious stranger.

Following the tale of Tod Hackett - a brilliant young artist who is brought to an LA studio as a set designer - 'The Day of the Locust' is an exposure of the sordid reality beneath the surface of Hollywood.

Oedipus the King - Antigone - Electra - AjaxTrachinian Women - Philoctetes - Oedipus at ColonusThe greatest of the Greek tragedians, Sophocles wrote over 120 plays, surpassing his older contemporary Aeschylus and the younger Euripides in literary output as well as in the number of prizes awarded his works. Only the seven plays in this volume have survived intact. From the complex drama of Antigone, the heroine willing to sacrifice life and love for a principle, to the mythic doom embodied by Oedipus, the uncommonly good man brought down by the gods, Sophocles possessed a tragic vision that, in Matthew Arnold's phrase, "saw life steadily and saw it whole."This one-volume paperback edition of Sophocles' complete works is a revised and modernized version of the famous Jebb translation, which has been called "the most carefully wrought prose version of Sophocles in English."Moses HadasFrom the Paperback edition.

Henrik Ibsen's place as the creator of the modern social drama of ideas is unquestioned. His unremitting attacks on the outworn institutions of society and the stifling hypocrisy of those who pretended to subscribe to them, brought storms of nervous protest from his critics. "Revoltingly suggestive and blasphemous," "scandalous," "noisome corruption," "foul and filthy," they said. Yet Ibsen persisted; he shocked the unthinking into thinking and blasted through the thick fog of convention to the restless human passions hidden underneath. Today, his plays continue to throw the bright light of reason into some murky corners of the Victorian mind.