Showing results by author "ciesse" in All Categories

A group of Dubliners gather together for a Christmas celebration in James Joyce's transcendent tale of the mundanity and magic in life and death. "The Dead" is taken from Joyce's collection of short stories Dubliners. (summary by Iremonger)

Los Episodios Nacionales de Benito Pérez Galdós son una gran obra cuya colección completa consta de mas 40 títulos. La primera de las series que consta de sólo diez, ha sido extractada por el propio autor en este libro, con un lenguaje bastante ameno para la lectura infantil. De este modo esta lectura pone al alcance de los mas pequeños toda la primera serie de novelas históricas de Pérez Galdós, que en este caso, narran la guerra de la Independencia de España. (Summary by KendalRigans)

A collection of essays by Virginia Woolf, some of which originally appeared in the Times Literary Supplement or the Dial, and others were originally published for the first time in this volume. "Anything that Virginia Woolf may have to say about letters is of more than ordinary interest, for her peculiar intelligence and informed attitude set her somewhat apart. She possesses the happy faculty simultaneously of enjoying and accepting the work of Daniel De Foe and James Joyce, of Joseph Addison and T.S. Eliot, of Jane Austen and Marcel Proust. Many of these essays are excellent examples of that...

Charles Baudelaire was a French poet whose work is described as combining an exoticism inherited from the Romantics with the Realism of other French writers of his time. The Flowers of Evil (Les Fleurs du mal) is a book of lyric poetry and his most famous work. In it he expresses the changing nature of beauty in the rapidly industrialising Paris caused by Haussmann's renovation of the city during the mid-19th century. He coined the term modernity to designate the fleeting experience of life in an urban metropolis, and the responsibility of artistic expression to capture that experience.Les ...

In what I have read so far this book appears to be a humorous character study on two levels. That between the uncle and niece and that of polite society in the 19th century. Anything can happen. I for one want to find out what will happen!! - Summary by Susan Morin (solo reader)

George Eliot's own favorite among her novels, this novel tells the story of Romola, the intelligent daughter of a blind scholar, who is falling in love with a man who is going to change her life and the politics of Florence in a way she doesn't like. Set in 15th century Florence, it is "a deep study of life in the city of Florence from an intellectual, artistic, religious, and social point of view". Summary by Stav Nisser and Wikipedia.

The Europeans: A sketch is a short novel by Henry James, published in 1878. It is essentially a comedy contrasting the behaviour and attitudes of two visitors from Europe with those of their relatives living in the 'new' world of New England. The novel first appeared as a serial in The Atlantic Monthly for July-October, 1878. James made numerous minor revisions for the first book publication. (Summary by Wikipedia)

Elements of Geology is one in a Series of First Books of Natural History Prepared for the Use of Schools and Colleges. This succinct little textbook from 1846 presents an introduction to geology. The information, albeit not current, is still interesting and of use as a general overview of the subject as well as interesting look into the period. Please note that some of the information has changed considerably since this time. The author was a surgeon in the U.S. Navy and president of the Academy of Natural Sciences. - Summary by Amy Gramour

HERODOTUS was born at Halicarnassus, on the southwest coast of Asia Minor, in the early part of the fifth century, B. C. Of his life we know almost nothing, except that he spent much of it traveling, to collect the material for his writings, and that he finally settled down at Thurii, in southern Italy, where his great work was composed. He died in 424 B. C.The subject of the history of Herodotus is the struggle between the Greeks and the barbarians, which he brings down to the battle of Mycale in 479 B. C. The work, as we have it, is divided into nine books, named after the nine Muses, but ...

"Being some Account of Life and Work in the Province of Canterbury, South Island." A set fo 26 letters covering the Author's period of service in New Zealand as an Anglican priest. They cover his parochial work in Christchurch, on the West Coast, and Timaru. This is interspersed with commentary on Diocesan matters along with accounts of his journeys between New Zealand and England. - Summary by Beeswaxcandle

“Who ever lov’d, that lov’d not at first sight?”The wonder-decade of the English drama was suddenly interrupted in 1592, when serious plague broke out in London, forcing the closure of the theatres. Leading playwrights took to penning languorously erotic poetry to make ends meet: so we have Venus and Adonis, The Rape of Lucrece - and Marlowe’s blazing masterpiece, Hero and Leander.Marlowe’s poem became more notorious than either of Shakespeare’s, due not only to its homophile provocations but also to the scandal attaching to every aspect of Marlowe’s brief life, violently ended...

Clarissa Dalloway is having a party. Join her and a web of connections in exploring London, their memories and their innermost thoughts and feelings. This novel explores relationships, mental health, nostalgia, regret, and the multitude of reasons for which people make decisions which change the course of their life. (Summary by Hannah Dormor)

In three parts, this modern classic explores the life of an English family, the Ramsays, at their Scottish summer house both before and after The Great War. Difficult to categorize and including elements of feminist and psychological literature as well as stream of consciousness, Woolf's novel reads, at times, almost like a prose poem. At its heart, it examines what it means to be a woman and an artist at the start of the 20th century. (Summary by WendyKatzHiller)

"The Stories in this little book have been set down almost in the same words in which they were told. How the telling of them came about is a very simple matter. Having three children, each of whom loved a Fairy Tale, it somehow became the fashion, on Sunday evenings, to tell them a story.On one occasion, when the youngest member was just about to be taken to bed, his sister said; “None of the books about Fairies ever say a word about Australia! Are there any Australian Fairies, Father?”Somewhat hastily, perhaps, I answered: “Why, yes, of course! Whole tribes of them!”Instantly the ...

"Mrs. Dalloway" recounts a day in the life of Clarissa Dalloway in the middle of June 1923. Clarissa Dalloway is a high society London lady. On that day, she is hosting a party, meeting people, going to the park, and reflecting on her choices. Where would she have been if she married Peter Walsh and not Richard Dalloway? What if she would not invite this or that person to her party? Her feelings about Peter Walsh grow because on that particular day he returns from India to settle some affairs in London. Other people also reflect on their choices. Mr. Smith who cannot move on from the horrors ...

The extended title of these volumes is 'Inculcating Morality by Entertaining Narratives”, and in the preface the Author indicates she offered them for approval to a friend who required works for girls aged twelve to seventeen that were not “too serious nor too childish....a mirror of truth and nature in which my girls may see themselves without danger to their native simplicity and without checking too harshly their natural curiosity and fancy.”By using examples supposedly from her own experience,“ Mrs Palmerstone” provides her daughter with the moral advice thought necessary to help...

In this enduring Victorian classic written in 1876, two stories weave in and out of each other: The first is about Gwendolen, one of Eliot's finest creations, who grows from a self-centered young beauty to a thoughtful adult with an expanded vision of the world around her. The second is about Daniel Deronda, adopted son of an aristocratic Englishman who becomes fascinated with Jewish traditions when he meets an ailing Jewish philosopher named Mordecai and his sensitive sister, Mirah. (Summary by Becky Miller) Alt-BC: Lucy Burgoyne

This book is a biography of four woman authors whose names were well known by readers at the time of its publication (1883) : Anna Barbaud, Maria Edgeworth, Amelia Opie, and Jane Austen. Though most of us today are only familiar with the writings of Austen, all four of these women are well worth taking the time to get to know. The author, Anne Thackeray Ritchie, was the eldest daughter of William Makepeace Thackeray. - Summary by Ciufi Galeazzi

Lyrical Ballads, with a Few Other Poems is a collection of poems by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, first published in 1798 and generally considered to have marked the beginning of the English Romantic movement in literature. The immediate effect on critics was modest, but it became and remains a landmark, changing the course of English literature and poetry. Most of the poems in the 1798 edition were written by Wordsworth, with Coleridge contributing only four poems to the collection, including one of his most famous works, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. (Additionally, ...

A man who has been condemned to death writes down his cogitations, feelings and fears while he is waiting for his execution. He does not betray his name to the reader or what he has done. He describes his life in prison, everything from what his cell looks like to the personality of the prison priest. (Introduction by Wikipedia)Part of Section 2 read by Nadine Eckert-BouletThis project was proof listened by lh, Barry Eads, and Chieko.