Classics Library

Fiercely romantic and hugely influential, The Scarlet Letter is the tale of Hester Prynne, imprisoned, publicly shamed, and forced to wear a scarlet for committing adultery and bearing an illegitimate child, Pearl. In their small Puritan village, Hester and her daughter struggle to survive. In this searing study of the tension between private and public existence, Hester Prynne’s inner strength and quiet dignity secure her place as one of the first great heroines of American fiction.

Cruel slave traders have invaded the jungle domain of Tarzan of the Apes. Now they head toward a fabled empire of riches that no outsider has ever seen, intent on looting its great treasures. And toward the same legendary land stumbles the lost James Blake, an American whom Tarzan has vowed to rescue. Following them, the ape-man comes upon the lost Valley of the Sepulcher, where Knights Templar still fight to resume their holy crusade to free Jerusalem.

Some of us were lucky enough to have one passionate, funny, inspiring English teacher who helped us fall in love with books. Add a lifetime of teaching Dharma - authentic, traditional approaches to meditation and awakening - and you get award-winning author Dean Sluyter. With droll humor and irreverent wisdom, he unpacks the Dharma of more than twenty major writers, from William Blake to Dr. Seuss, inspiring listeners to deepen their own spiritual life and see literature in a fresh new way: as a path of awakening.

From ‘The Manchester Marriage’, in which a husband, supposedly drowned at sea, returns to find his daughter, to the two sisters who are comically adrift after the death of their domineering father in ‘The Daughters of the Late Colonel’, and a young girl who enlists the help of a sorceress to win back her boyfriend in ‘The Goodness of Saint Rocque’, Standing Her Ground showcases nine groundbreaking women writers.

Time and the Gods is a collection of short stories involving Lord Dunsany’s invented pantheon of deities who dwell in Pegana. Dunsany was a key figure in the development of the fantasy genre, and his influence was noted by a diverse assortment of later writers of speculative fiction, including H. P. Lovecraft, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Arthur C. Clarke. Evocative, poignant, and bitingly clever, the legends and fables in Time and the Gods draw the listener into a singular world of dreamlike imagination and unforgettable characters.

Penguin Classics presents William Makepeace Thackeray adapted for audio and available as a digital download as part of the Penguin English Library series. Read by Robert Hardy’s Vanitas Vanitatum! Which of us is happy in this world? Which of us has his desire? Or, having it, is satisfied? No one is better equipped in the struggle for wealth and worldly success than the alluring and ruthless Becky Sharp, who defies her impoverished background to clamber up the class ladder.

Welcome to New Vegas, a city once covered in bling, now blanketed in ice. Like much of the destroyed planet, the place knows only one temperature: freezing. But some things never change. The diamond in the ice desert is still a 24-hour hedonistic playground, and nothing keeps the crowds away from the casino floors, never mind the rumors about sinister sorcery in its shadows. At the heart of this city is Natasha Kestal, a young blackjack dealer looking for a way out. Like many, she's heard of a mythical land simply called "the Blue".

Penguin Classics presents Thomas Hardy’s The Return of the Native, adapted for audio and available as a digital download as part of the Penguin English Library series. Read by the actor Steven Pacey. Do I desire unreasonably much in wanting what is called life - music, poetry, passion, war, and all the beating and pulsing that is going on in the great arteries of the world? Tempestuous Eustacia Vye passes her days dreaming of passionate love and the escape it may bring from the small community of Egdon Heath.

Penguin Classics presents Henry Fielding’s Tom Jones, adapted for audio and available as a digital download as part of the Penguin English Library series. Read by the actor Robert Lindsay. ‘Sir, I am concerned at the Trouble I give you; nay indeed my Nakedness may well make me ashamed to look you in the Face… Jones offered her his Coat; but, I know not for what Reason, she absolutely refused the most earnest Solicitations to accept it’.

’If life had no love in it, what else was there for Maggie?’ Tragic and moving, The Mill on the Floss is a novel of grand passions and tormented lives. As the rebellious Maggie's fiery spirit and imaginative nature bring her into bitter conflict with her narrow provincial family, most painfully with her beloved brother Tom, their fates are played out on an epic scale. George Eliot drew on her own frustrated rural upbringing to create one of the great novels of childhood, and one of literature's most unforgettable heroines.

In the exotic South American republic of Costaguana, the San Tomé silver mine provides opportunities for untold wealth and power. Yet amid the turbulence and brutality of Latin American politics, everyone associated with it - from the compromised English mine-owner Gould to the grasping businessman Holroyd, from the revolutionary Montero to the loyal and seemingly incorruptible worker Nostromo - becomes somehow irrevocably tainted. Nostromo is a grandiose epic, startlingly modern in its technique.

The marriage of Gertrude and Walter Morel has become a battleground. Repelled by her uneducated and sometimes violent husband, delicate Gertrude devotes her life to her children, especially to her sons, William and Paul - determined they will not follow their father into working down the coal mines. But conflict is evitable when Paul seeks to escape his mother’s suffocating grasp through relationships with women his own age. Set in Lawrence’s native Nottinghamshire, Sons and Lovers is a highly autobiographical and compelling portrayal of childhood, adolescence and the clash of generations.

Penguin Classics presents the audiobook adaptation of Martin Chuzzlewit, a tale of inheritance and destiny and the story Dickens considered his best. Read by John Wells. The greed of his family has led wealthy old Martin Chuzzlewit to become suspicious and misanthropic, leaving his grandson and namesake to make his own way in the world.

Henry Fielding’s riotous tale of innocents in a corrupt world was one of the earliest English novels, blending bawdy slapstick, philosophical musing, and pointed social satire to create a work of moral complexity and generous, life-affirming humanity. Published in 1742, it tells the story of the chaste servant Joseph Andrews who, after being sacked for spurning the advances of the lascivious Lady Booby, takes to the road, accompanied by his beloved Fanny Goodwill and the absent-minded, much put-upon Parson Adams.

Laurence Sterne’s great masterpiece of bawdy humour and rich satire defies any attempt to categorize it. Part novel, part digression, its gloriously disordered narrative interweaves the birth and life of the unfortunate "hero" Tristram Shandy, the eccentric philosophy of his father Walter, the amours and military obsessions of Uncle Toby, and a host of other characters, including Dr Slop, Corporal Trim and the parson Yorick. A joyful celebration of the endless possibilities of the art of fiction, Tristram Shandy is also a wry demonstration of its limitations.

The Trustees of the Pooh Properties have commissioned four authors to write in the timeless style of A.A. Milne to create a quartet of charming new adventures for Winnie-the-Pooh, Christopher Robin, and their friends. Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall: take a trip back to the Hundred Acre Wood with a collection of tales sure to delight year-round. Listeners of all ages will love rediscovering old friends and making new ones in this essential new volume of Pooh stories.

Jude Fawley, the stonemason excluded not by his wits but by poverty from the world of Christminster privilege, finds fulfilment in his relationship with Sue Bridehead. Both have left earlier marriages. Ironically, when tragedy tests their union it is Sue, the modern emancipated woman, who proves unequal to the challenge. Hardy’s fearless exploration of sexual and social relationships and his prophetic critique of marriage scandalised the late Victorian establishment and marked the end of his career as a novelist. Part of a series of vintage recordings taken from the Penguin Archives.

They tell Jip he tumbled off the back of a wagon when he was small, and no one ever came back for him. He never had a reason to question this tale - but then a stranger shows up and begins asking about him around town. Who is this man, and could he possibly know something about Jip's past?

In 17th century England, a terrible accident forces orphaned Philip Marsham to flee London in fear for his life. Bred to the sea, he signs on with the Rose of Devon, a dark frigate bound for the quiet shores of Newfoundland.Philip's bold spirit and knowledge of the sea soon win him his captain's regard. But when the Rose of Devon is seized in mid-ocean by a devious group of men plucked from a floating wreck, Phlip is forced to accompany these "gentlemen of fortune" on their murderous expeditions. Like it or not, Philip Marsham is now a pirate - with only the hangman awaiting his return to England.With its bloody battles, brutal buccaneers, and bold, spirited hero, this rousing tale will enthrall all listeners in search of seafaring adventure.

Whether it's the adventures of Greek gods and goddesses or Norse trickster tales, we all love to hear a good story. Best-selling author Kenneth C. Davis gives readers a taste of these enchanting myths and the diverse people who tell them. In his trademark question-and-answer style peppered with entertaining sidebars and quotes, he also shows how almost every civilization's mythology shares common themes.