Classic Fiction

For centuries, evidence of queer love in the ancient world was ignored or suppressed. Even today, only a few, famous narratives are widely known - yet there's a rich literary tradition of Greek and Roman love that extends far beyond this handful of stories. Here, the poet Seán Hewitt and painter Luke Edward Hall collect together, for the first time, forty of the most exhilarating queer tales in the classical canon and bring them newly to life.

A ground-breaking anthology that changes the way we see the ancient world - and invites us to reflect on the puritanism of our own - 300,000 Kisses is a riotous celebration of desire in all its forms.

In a provincial university town, Caro Grimstone, a dissatisfied faculty wife, becomes the unwilling accomplice to her husband Alan's ambitions. When she volunteers to read to a blind, esteemed anthropologist in a nursing home, Alan seizes the opportunity to steal his papers - research that could both advance his reputation while refuting the findings of a respected colleague.

A delightful comedy of manners with a touch of mystery, An Academic Question is prime Barbara Pym territory.

Hetty Sorrel is loved by Adam Bede but she is in love with a young squire who seduces her and by whom she has a child. Hetty kills the child by abandoning it in a field and is tried and sentenced to death for murder.

When Huckleberry Finn flees from his brutal father, he meets up with an old friend, the slave Jim, who is also running away. Together they travel by raft down the Mississippi, experiencing amazing adventures, and learning of the strange ways of people in the deep south.

Set in the 1730s and 1740s, the narrative follows the life of the main protagonist and narrator, Roderick “Rory” Random, from childhood to adulthood as Roderick journeys through England, France, the Caribbean, Africa, and Latin America. It is partially based on Smollett's experience as a naval-surgeon’s mate in the Royal Navy, especially during the Battle of Cartagena de Indias in 1741.

Impish, young Tom Sawyer is a hero to his friends and a torment to his relations. Wherever there is mischief or adventure, Tom is at the heart of it. During one hot summer, Tom witnesses a murder, runs away to be a pirate, foils a devilish plot and discovers a box of gold. But can he escape his nemesis, the villainous Injun Joe?

Gathering a wide range of traditional African myths, this compelling new collection offers tales of heroes battling mighty serpents and monstrous birds, brutal family conflict and vengeance, and desperate migrations across vast and alien lands. From impassioned descriptions of animal-creators to dramatic stories of communities forced to flee monstrous crocodiles, all the narratives found here concern origins - whether of the universe, peoples or families. Together, they create a kaleidoscopic picture of the rich and varied oral traditions that have shaped the culture and society of successive generations of Africans for thousands of years, throughout the long struggle to survive and explore this massive and environmentally diverse continent.

When her family becomes impoverished after a disastrous financial speculation, Agnes Grey determines to find work as a governess in order to contribute to their meagre income and assert her independence. But Agnes's enthusiasm is swiftly extinguished as she struggles first with the unmanageable Bloomfield children and then with the painful disdain of the haughty Murray family; the only kindness she receives comes from Mr Weston, the sober young curate. Drawing on her own experience, Anne Brontë's first novel offers a compelling personal perspective on the desperate position of unmarried, educated women for whom becoming a governess was the only respectable career open in Victorian society.

Conjured up one 'golden afternoon' in 1862 to entertain Alice Liddell, the daughter of the dean of Carroll's college, the dream worlds of nonsensical Wonderland and back-to-front Looking-Glass kingdom depict order turned upside-down. Following the white rabbit into his warren, Alice falls into a world where croquet is played with hedgehogs and flamingos, a baby turns into a pig, time runs amok at a the Mad Hatter's tea-party, a chaotic game of chess makes Alice a Queen and the Mock Turtle and Gryphon dance the Lobster Quadrille. But amongst the anarchic humour and sparkling wordplay, unforgettable characters, puzzles and riddles, are poignant moments of nostalgia for a lost childhood. Original and experimental, adapted into countless film and television versions as Alice in Wonderland, the Alice books give readers a window on both child and adult worlds.

Self-made American millionaire Christopher Newman arrives in Paris brimming with hope and optimism, excited to experience the culture and, hopefully, find the perfect woman to become his wife.

Anna is a beautiful, intelligent woman whose passionate affair with the dashing Count Vronsky leads her to ruin. But her story is also about a search for meaning, and by twinning it with that of Levin, an awkward idealist whose happy marriage and domestic trials form the backdrop for a similar quest, Tolstoy creates a rich and complex masterpiece that has captured the imagination of readers for decades.

This book follows two years of Anne’s life when she teaches at Avonlea school. She is determined to inspire her pupils to great things but not all respond in the way she would like.

Delightful story of orphan Anne Shirley who goes to live with elderly farming couple in Nova Scotia and changes their life.

A long-ago murder unites two distantly-related cousins. After running away from his abusive home, Allan Armadale chases fate and reinvents himself as Ozias Midwinter. He quickly befriends his cousin, also named Allan Armadale, who inherits an estate but becomes encumbered by his newfound wealth. The cousins’ relationship is further complicated by the interference of Lydia Gwilt, a governess and fortune-hunter who was also involved in that long-ago murder.

One night in the reform club, Phileas Fogg bets his companions that he can travel across the globe in just eighty days. Breaking the well-established routine of his daily life, he immediately sets off for Dover with his astonished valet Passepartout. Passing through exotic lands and dangerous locations, they seize whatever transportation is at hand - whether train or elephant - overcoming set-backs and always racing against the clock.

A cold and ruthless literary biographer travels to Venice on the trail of personal letters belonging to the deceased American poet Jeffrey Aspern. Just how far will he go to get what he wants? Will morality confront his personal ambition and literary curiosity?

After the death of her father, Ayala is faced with a choice of three suitors, but which one will she choose?

One of the most famous and successful writers of his day, Oscar Wilde was celebrated as much for his flamboyant personality and his prodigious wit as for his provocative essays, touching fairy stories and satirical plays. But in May of 1895, he was sentenced to two years' hard labour for gross indecency.

Towards the end of the end of his sentence, Wilde wrote a long and terrible letter to his lover, meditating on their disastrous relationship and on the spiritual journey he had undergone while in prison. Given the title De Profundis when it was published five years after Wilde's death, it is one of the greatest, most far-ranging letters ever written.

During his imprisonment, Wilde also felt intense compassion for his fellow prisoners, which found expression in the poem The Ballad of Reading Gaol which was finally published anonymously in 1898.

When evangelical Dr Proudie is appointed Bishop of Barchester a struggle develops for control of the diocese. Mrs Proudie's overbearing behaviour makes matters worse.  Book 2 of series.

Barnaby Rudge, pathetic and half-witted son of a murderer, and his raven Grip play unwitting parts in the Gordon riots of 1780 and in the family feud of the Haredale and Chester families.

Flamboyant, theatrical and ambitious, Margaret Cavendish was one of the seventeenth century's most striking figures: a woman who ventured into the male spheres of politics, science, philosophy and literature. The Blazing World is a highly original work: part Utopian fiction, part feminist text, it tells of a lady shipwrecked on the Blazing World where she is made Empress and uses her power to ensure that it is free of war, religious division and unfair sexual discrimination.

This volume also includes The Contract, a romance in which love and law work harmoniously together, and Assaulted and Pursued Chastity, which explores the power and freedom a woman can achieve in the disguise of a man.

This is Dickens at his best. A book full of characters, twists and turns, with a deep understanding of human nature. It is both tragic and romantic at the same time.

A collection of three ghoulish tales by Robert Louis Stevenson. Perfect for long winter nights, these stories have been specially selected to create an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty, and will be enjoyed by fans of the macabre.

Taliesin's is one of the most important names in all Welsh literature - and one of its greatest mysteries. He has fascinated and inspired some of our greatest poets, including Tennyson and Robert Graves. He is a poet; a shapeshifter; a seer; a chronicler of battles fought, by sword and with magic, between the ancient kingdoms of the fifth- and sixth-century British Isles; a bridge between old Welsh mythologies and the new Christian theology; and a figure whose literary legend culminated with the compilation in thirteenth-century North Wales of The Book of Taliesin, an anthology gathering the work of some 700 years of anonymous hands.

In the first volume since 1915 to gather the The Book of Taliesin in its entirety, Gwyneth Lewis and Rowan Williams's artfully accessible translation makes these outrageous, swaggering and joyful poems available to a new generation of readers.

Bride to the Mountain is teh stroy of Anna Mary who had put her heart and soul into th erunning of Rugog before getting married. But now she worked from a sense of the land, which she loved and the farm carried her husband as a passenger. Sheep were diappearing. The faithful shepherds of Rugog had their suspicionns of who the sheep-stealers were but though they kept a careful watch they could never catch the culprits. A traveller and author then came to the valley and took a hand in the affairs. Between him and the shepherds they worked together to throw some light onto the mystery. 

A passionate, philosophical novel set in 19th century Russia, that enters deeply into the ethical debates of God, free will, and morality. It is a spiritual drama of moral struggles concerning faith, doubt, judgement, and reason, set against a modernizing Russia, with a plot which revolves around the subject of patricide.

Naive Camilla Tyrold is in love with Edgar Mandlebert, a noble young man, but must suffer a series of misunderstandings that threaten their happy union. Her sister Eugenia, destined to inherit her uncle’s great wealth, is plagued with misfortune as she is left disfigured by smallpox and men court her for financial gain only. Meanwhile their cousin, beautiful but selfish Indiana, never finds a fortune for her good looks.

Alice Vavasor is reluctant to marry the man she truly loves because his style of life doesn't fit with her idea that people should make something useful of their lives. She becomes engaged to her cousin but can't forget the man she truly loves.  Book 1 of series.

Candide's belief that this is the best of all possible worlds is tested when he ventures out into the world to see for himself.

Brought up in the household of a powerful Baron, Candide is an open-minded young man, whose tutor, Pangloss, has instilled in him the belief that 'all is for the best'. But when his love for the Baron's rosy-cheeked daughter is discovered, Candide is cast out to make his own way in the world. And so he and his various companions begin a breathless tour of Europe, South America and Asia, as an outrageous series of disasters befall them - earthquakes, syphilis, a brush with the Inquisition, murder - sorely testing the young hero's optimism.

There is no peace for the malevolent Canterville ghost when an unruly American family takes over his ancestral home.

A compulsive tale of obsessive love and deceit by the author of "Little Women". Published over 100 years after it was written.

This narrative poem describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man who, disillusioned with a life of pleasure and revelry, looks for distraction in foreign lands

Mostly set in the imaginary county of Barsetshire, this collection of stories depict the festive period with all Trollope's trademark zest, humour, and cheerfulness. They offer rich and psychologically acute portrayals of the middle class and gentry of Victorian England at Christmas time.

Ebenezer Scrooge is a heartless old miser who doesn't enjoy Christmas and doesn't think anyone else should, either. But, one Christmas Eve, some ghostly visitors take Scrooge on a journey that changes his mind for ever.

Dickens's story of solitary miser Ebenezer Scrooge, who is taught the true meaning of Christmas by a series of ghostly visitors, has had an enduring influence on the way we think about the season. Dickens's other Christmas writings collected here include 'The Story of the Goblins who Stole a Sexton'; 'The Haunted Man'; and shorter pieces, some drawn from the 'Christmas Stories' that Dickens wrote annually for his weekly journals. In all of them Dickens celebrates Christmas as a time of geniality, charity and remembrance.