Classic Irish Fiction

Tom Jones is a splendid Hogarthian panorama of 18th-century English life and morals, encompassing both city and country, and comprising some of the greatest comic characters in British literature. First published in 1749, it was an instant success and has gone on to become a classic of its genre. Quite simply, there has never been anything like it.

The short stories of Irish writers appeal to audiences far beyond the shores of Eire. These stories, in turn atmospheric, spookily funny, full of intriguing characters, picturesque, and touching, are steeped in the Irish delight in story-telling and cover an intriguing century of Irish city and country life.

Suite au décès de M. Dashwood, sa veuve et ses trois filles se voient contraintes de quitter le Sussex et le domaine familial de Norland. Elles se réfugient dans le Devon, à l'invitation d'un généreux parent, où une nouvelle vie, plus modeste les attend. Les sœurs aînées, Elinor et Maria, l'une plus raisonnable, l'autre plus sentimentale vont vivre leur premiers émois amoureux non sans quelques revers.

Under Western Eyes, Conrad's novel of political treachery and oppression, begins with a bomb that kills a hated Russian minister of police along with innocent bystanders. A young student named Razumov hides the perpetrator, then betrays him and becomes a spy among his exiled comrades. He faces a moral dilemma from which there is no escape. This masterwork, published six years before the Russian Revolution, is a chillingly accurate prophecy of what was to come.

Relinquishing thoughts of a materially rewarding life, the respectably educated Felix Holt returns to his native village in North Loamshire and becomes an artisan. He is a forceful young man of honor, integrity, and idealism, burning to participate in political life so that he may improve the lot of his fellow artisans.

The Irish are arguably the most literate people in the world. The number of famous Irish authors, from Joyce to Trevor and from Goldsmith to O'Brien, is a clear testimony to that. In this rich selection, we have concentrated on some of the early Irish writers who were particularly adept at the difficult art of writing good short stories.

Lord Rufford has kissed Arabella twice but she realises that much more needs to be done to win him and his estate. It is now time to tell John Morton she no longer wants to marry him? Starring Robert Glenister, Anna Maxwell Martin, Barbara Flynn, Blake Ritson, Stuart Milligan, Joanna David, Daniel Rabin, Penelope Rawlins, Carl Prekopp, Henry Devas, Elaine Claxton, Joanathan Forbes, Jane Whittenshaw, and Sean Baker. Directed by Tracey Neal. Dramatised by Martyn Wade.

Six Gaelic tales of wonder and adventure, read in an authentic brogue by actor Des Keogh, transport wee listeners to a magic world of leprechauns and giants.

The Old Wives' Tale is broken up into four parts, and the lives of two sisters are laid bare: one timid and unassuming, the other romantic and adventurous. From working as children in their family's drapery shop to their later years, Constance and Sophia's journey through life could not be more different. While one travels the world and defies male expectations, the other becomes a dutiful wife and mother.

Emma Woodhouse, "belle, intelligente et riche" a vingt-et-un ans. Elle habite la belle demeure de Hartfield, près du gros bourg de Highbury, avec son père âgé, hypocondriaque et veuf, entourée d'amis fidèles, tel Mr. Knightley, son beau-frère, propriétaire du riche domaine voisin de Donwell Abbey. Son ancienne gouvernante, Miss Taylor, vient d'épouser un veuf fortuné, Mr. Weston, dont le fils a été adopté tout jeune par son oncle et sa tante, les Churchill, avec qui il vit à Enscombe, dans le Yorkshire.

The 1660s were a time of turmoil in England: Cromwell had been defeated and Charles II, who was sympathetic to the Catholics, was restored to the throne; the Dutch declared war on England; the Plague raged; and the Great Fire of London destroyed half the city! Our hero, Cyril, at the death of his father Sir Aubrey Shenstone, inherits nothing except his father's title, and works as a bookkeeper for various London tradesmen.

The Man of Property, the first novel in Galsworthy's epic social satire The Forsyte Saga, introduces us to Soames Forsyte, a solicitor and prominent man of his important family. Accustomed to getting whatever he wants, he sets his sights with absolute determination on the beautiful Irene in spite of her pennilessness and her indifference to him.

Young, impressionable Aubrey is fascinated by the enigmatic Lord Ruthven, and accompanies him on a tour to Europe. But Aubrey develops a growing distaste for Lord Ruthven’s sinister and grotesque conduct - especially as it concerns human blood. This novella, penned during that tempestuous night in Switzerland amongst such notables as Percy Shelley, Lord Byron, and Mary Shelley, served as the great inspiration for Bram Stoker to create Dracula.

One of the best-known collections of W. B. Yeats' prose, The Celtic Twilight explores the old connection between the Irish people and the magical world of fairies. Yeats, by traveling the land in the early 20th century and talking to the common people about their experiences with the creatures, yielded a colorful overview of Celtic fairy folklore.

The follow up to best-selling audio Three Men in a Boat, Three Men on the Bummel features delightful, gentle, comic writing. First published in 1900, the story revives the three companions from Three Men in a Boat, this time taking them on a bicycle tour through the German Black Forest. Written during the Victorian era bicycle-craze, it is a light-hearted commentary on German culture at the time, told through the eyes of the hapless British tourist.

Jim, the first mate aboard a small steamer named the Patna, travels from port to port in the Pacific Ocean. When the ship hits floating wreckage, Jim and the crew are forced to abandon it, leaving hundreds of ethnic travelers onboard. However, Jim's reprehensible actions are soon discovered by the court, and he is compelled to face his guilt and redeem himself - a journey that leads him to a remote exotic location where he is revered as the Lord, "Tuan Jim".

Released in our new Young Adult Classics format, Henry James's classic ghost story is a masterpiece of the supernatural. The tale is taken from the diary of a governess, who describes her mounting sense of paranoia at the relationship between her two wards and the ghostly figures that haunt the estate.

Three tales from The Canterbury Tales, read in the original Middle English by Richard Bebb under the direction of Britain's foremost Chaucer scholar, Derek Brewer.

Bereft of his beloved wife, Glencora, and his role as prime minister, Plantagenet Palliser enters the realm of family politics as he struggles to guide and connect with his three wayward children. Lord Silverbridge, the Duke's first born and natural inheritor, expelled from Oxford, a gambler at the racetrack and an elected Conservative, further troubles his father when he becomes engaged to Isabel Boncassen. Lady Mary, his daughter, falls in love with a penniless young gentleman named Frank Tregear, while his second son, Gerald, displays similar behavior to his brother.

À Middlemarch, cité imaginaire de la province anglaise, vers 1830, la jeune et intelligente Dorothée aspire à de grandes réalisations. Elle épouse le pasteur Casaubon, beaucoup plus âgé qu'elle et espère aider son mari dans les travaux de recherche pour un livre qui devrait être son chef d'œuvre. Mais Casaubon ne la prend pas sérieux, la néglige. De plus, il prend ombrage de l'amitié qui rapproche Will Ladislaw, son cousin, et Dorothée. Ce mariage se révèle être une erreur.