Becky Sharp and Amelia Sedley become friends at Miss Pinkerton's school for girls. Apparently destined to rise to no higher a station in life than as a governess, Becky's beauty, cleverness, and heartlessness cause her fortunes to improve.

When Emily Wilson's translation of The Odyssey appeared in 2017-revealing the ancient poem in a contemporary idiom that was "fresh, unpretentious and lean" (Madeline Miller, Washington Post)-critics lauded it as "a revelation" (Susan Chira, New York Times) and "a cultural landmark" (Charlotte Higgins, Guardian) that would forever change how Homer is read in English. Now Wilson has returned with an equally revelatory translation of Homer's other great...

After her uncle dies, young Jane Eyre is terribly mistreated by her aunt and cousins. She is quickly sent away to a girls' school, where life is not much better. But Jane loves books and learning, and she becomes the first in her class. She becomes the first in her class. She goes on to teach, then takes a position with Mr. Rochester, working as a governess. At his mansion, life changes dramatically.

To relieve the pressure on her impoverished, overburdened family, shy young Fanny Price is sent to live with Sir Thomas and Lady Bertram, wealthy relatives who reside at Mansfield Park. Of the Bertrams' own four children, only the younger son, Edmund, shows her any real kindness, and over time Fanny falls in love with her cousin. With Sir Thomas away on overseas business, Mansfield's social circle gains two superficially attractive new members: handsome,...

Catherine is invited to spend a few weeks in Bath with a friend. While there she meets Henry Tilney and his sister Eleanor, who invite her to their family estate, Northanger Abbey. Once there, Catherine, a great reader of Gothic romances, allows her imagination to run wild, finding dreadful portents in the most prosaic events. But Austen is after something more than mere parody; she uses her rapier wit to mock not only the essential silliness of "horrid"...

Set in the magical Wessex landscape so familiar from Thomas Hardy's early work, Tess of the D'Urbervilles is unique among his great novels for the intense feeling that he lavished upon his heroine, Tess, a pure woman betrayed by love. Hardy poured all of his profound empathy for both humanity and the rhythms of natural life into this story of her beauty, goodness, and tragic fate. In so doing, he created a character who, like Emma Bovary and Anna...

When Mr. Dashwood dies, he must leave the bulk of his estate to the son by his first marriage, which leaves his second wife and three daughters (Elinor, Marianne, and Margaret) in straitened circumstances. They are taken in by a kindly cousin, but their lack of fortune affects the marriageability of both practical Elinor and romantic Marianne. When Elinor forms an attachment for the wealthy Edward Ferrars, his family disapproves and separates them....

Ship's surgeon Lemuel Gulliver is stranded on the island of Lilliput after his boat founders. In the first of many weird and wonderful adventures he meets a diminutive people prepared to wage war over the correct way to crack an egg. The castaway also visits a land full of giants, with wasps the size of partridges; a floating island where the best brains are engaged in trying to extract sunshine from cucumbers; and a land of civilized, rational-minded...

Jane Eyre ranks as one of the greatest and most perennially popular works of English fiction. Although the poor but plucky heroine is outwardly of plain appearance, she possesses an indomitable spirit, a sharp wit and great courage. She is forced to battle against the exigencies of a cruel guardian, a harsh employer and a rigid social order. All of which circumscribe her life and position when she becomes governess to the daughter of the mysterious,...

One of Shakespeare's darkest and most violent tragedies, Macbeth's struggle between his own ambition and his loyalty to the King is dramatically compelling. As those he kills return to haunt him, Macbeth is plagued by the prophecy of three sinister witches and the power hungry desires of his wife. -- from publisher.