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Johannes is an aesthete, dedicated to creating the possibility of seduction through the careful manipulation of young women. He stealthily pursues the innocent Cordelia until she becomes increasingly drawn to him. But when she is ready to give herself completely, she realises she may have got everything wrong.
Wu Cheng’en’s 16th-century novel Journey to the West is widely regarded as one of the most important Chinese novels ever written. Here, in Julia Lovell’s witty and charismatic translation, we meet one of its heroes: Sun Wukong, or Monkey King, whose powers include shape-shifting, immortality and being incredibly rude. Though he rises to a position of power in the heavenly bureaucracy, Monkey King’s arrogant exploits attract the attention of the Buddha – with very unfortunate consequences.
Her name means sadness, yet Tristessa, a prostitute and morphine addict, lives without cares in her shabby room with a menagerie of pets and an altar to the Virgin Mary. Based on Jack Kerouac’s own real-life love affair in Mexico city, this is the story of a man’s ill-fated relationship with a woman he portrays with tenderness and dignity, even as her life spirals out of control.
There was something coming to her and she was waiting for it, fearfully. What was it? She did not know; it was too subtle and elusive to name. Nuns, maidens, adventurers – with electricity, ‘The Story of an Hour’ collects stories of female freedom, as Kate Chopin asks the question: what will emancipation feel like for her, looking at the horizon and the future, to the frontier?
What would happen if a doctor implanted the pituitary gland and testicles of a man into the body of a stray dog? In Mikhail Bulgakov’s topsy-turvy world, the dog starts to walk on two legs, drink, smoke, thieve, chase women and recite every swear word in Russian. The perfect candidate for a government official, in other words. This rude, riotous send-up of the Soviet Union, banned immediately on publication, is satire red in tooth and claw.
Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. In this glittering new selection of Fitzgerald’s short stories, we meet Anson Hunter, ‘The Rich Boy’, whose opulent, haunting world paints a vivid portrait of the American elite. ‘Absolution’ offers a poignant glimpse into the soul of a young boy grappling with sin, whilst ‘May Day’ captures the whirling hysteria at the dawn of the Jazz Age.
Marian Forrester arrives in the prairie town of Sweet Water as a young bride – beautiful, aristocratic, and spirited. To Captain Daniel Forrester, her pioneer husband, she’s a precious jewel, and in the eyes of her new neighbour, young Niel Herbert, she’s the perfect lady. But like the burgeoning promise of the American frontier, Marian’s charms decline with the passing of time, and the world’s admiration curdles into pity and contempt.
It’s terribly important that I get in touch with a gentleman who may have stopped in here to buy flowers this morning. Terribly important. Sometimes, the person you think you love isn’t who they seem. And sometimes, you can be your own deception. Spanning Shirley Jackson’s entire career, these devilish tales of love, death, and despair show us how all that keeps us safe in suburbia can strike up, leave, and instantly disappear.
A Nottinghamshire coal miner’s wife waits for her abusive husband Walter to come home. She blames his drinking for his absence, but in reality he has been killed in a pit accident. Laying out his corpse makes her realise they never really knew each other.
Fabien tonight was wandering over the vast splendour of a sea of clouds, but below him lay eternity. Inspired by his career as an aviator, Saint-Exupéry’s soaring novel follows the journeys of three pilots delivering mail overnight. The author’s prose is as haunting as his own disappearance in flight, eerily foreshadowed by his protagonist Fabien, who becomes lost in otherworldly darkness.
In 1666, Margaret Cavendish had a vision – there was a crack in reality at the North Pole leading to a utopian parallel universe, where gender roles, scientific orthodoxy and political norms had been razed to the ground. She slipped through the portal and returned with the first science fiction novel in English – an explosive account of ‘The Blazing World’.
The Major and his fragile wife dine and play cards with Captain Penderton and his flamboyant wife, watched at a distance by Private Williams. Quiet and unfathomable, he is fascinated by the captain’s wife.
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