Literary Criticism
Companionable Books
Many books are dry and dusty, there is no juice in them; and many are soon exhausted, you would no more go back to them than to a squeezed o…
The Tysons
Another frank May Sinclair exploration of fin de siècle English love and sex, marriage and adultery, "The Tysons" is the st…
To The Lighthouse
The Ramsey family, with house guests, visit the Isle of Skye at least twice. The plot is not at all the point though, as this is a book abou…
The Dark
The Dark is a novella about a desperate young man, a “terrorist and nihilist”, trying to avoid arrest by taking refuge in a brothel. The sto…
Peccavi
How does a man who as committed a heavy sin — not a crime, but a sin with terrible consequences — atone for his behaviour? What if the man i…
Pan
Pan tells the story Lieutenant Glahn and his summer in a forest north in Norway. He lives in a hut with his dog Aesop and they spend their d…
Better Angel
In 1933, Forman Brown wrote, under the pseudonym Richard Meeker, a controversial novel called Better Angel, about a young man coming to term…
The Bohemians of the Latin Quarter
As much as any other work of literature, Henri Murger’s 1851 collection of witty sketches Scènes de la vie de bohème shaped th…
Tales From Dickens
Tales From Dickens offers a unique opportunity to explore the essence of Charles Dickens' most cherished works through the lens of Hallie Er…
William, An Englishman
William – an Englishman is a 1919 novel by Cicely Hamilton. The novel explores the effect of the First World War on a married couple during …
The Plain Speaker
The Plain Speaker is a thought-provoking collection of essays by the renowned English essayist William Hazlitt, curated posthumously by his …
The Morgesons
Stoddard’s novel traces the education and development of a young female in American middle-class society. The protagonist, Cassandra Morgeso…
A Far Country
The book follows the career of Hugh Paret from youth to manhood, and how his profession as a corporation lawyer gradually changes his values…
The Birthplace
Neither the name of Shakespeare nor that of Stratford appears directly in this short piece by James, and yet both are absolutely central to …
Madame Bovary
Published in book form in April 1857, the novel focuses on a doctor's wife, Emma Bovary, who has adulterous affairs and lives beyond her mea…
Our Mutual Friend
Our Mutual Friend (written in the years 1864–65) is the last novel completed by Charles Dickens and is one of his most sophisticated works, …
Shakespeare
William Shakespeare: actor, poet, playwright. He is often called England's greatest writer, the Bard of Avon, a national treasure. But who w…
Jenny
Jenny Winge is a Norwegian expatriate studying art in Rome, part of a Bohemian group of friends who explore the ancient City in an intoxicat…
Joseph Conrad
This is a literary biography of Joseph Conrad (1857 – 1924) who is regarded as one of the greatest novelists in English. He was granted Brit…
On the Sublime
This is a classical text on aesthetics and proper style in writing and rhetoric, including commentary on various ancient Greek works such as…