The Picture of Dorian Gray (with an Essay by Jules Barbey D'Aurevilly) PDF Download
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Author: Oscar Wilde
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691812
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 168
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Book Description
Perhaps the book that created the most general discussion and criticism at this period was "The Picture of Dorian Gray," which appeared originally in Lippincott's Magazine in July, 1890, as the complete novel for that issue... Wilde at first demurred on the ground that he had not tried his hand on a long and sustained story, but fi nally gave his consent. The story seems to have simmered in his mind for some time, though after he had once begun it, it was quickly completed. Wilde has himself said that he wrote it in a few days. --- In a preface to this story, written for a later edition in book form, Mr. Basil Ward, the artist, tells of the genesis of the story. It goes back to the year 1884, when Oscar Wilde was often in Mr. Ward's studio. One of Mr. Ward's sitters was a young man of such peculiar beauty that his friends had nicknamed him "The Radiant Youth." Each afternoon Wilde watched the work advance, enchanting everybody meanwhile with brilliant talk, until at last the portrait was fi nished and its original had gone his way - rejoicing, without doubt, to be at liberty. "What a pity," sighed Wilde, "that such a glorious creature should ever grow old!" - "Yes, it is indeed," answered Mr. Ward. "How delightful it would be if 'Dorian' could remain exactly as he is while the portrait aged and withered in his stead. I wish it might be so!" - And that was all. "I occupied myself," says Mr. Ward, "with the picture for perhaps a quarter of an hour, during which Wilde smoked refl ectively, but uttered not one word. He arose presently and sauntered to the door, merely nodding as he left the room." Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly
Author: Oscar Wilde
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691812
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 168
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Book Description
Perhaps the book that created the most general discussion and criticism at this period was "The Picture of Dorian Gray," which appeared originally in Lippincott's Magazine in July, 1890, as the complete novel for that issue... Wilde at first demurred on the ground that he had not tried his hand on a long and sustained story, but fi nally gave his consent. The story seems to have simmered in his mind for some time, though after he had once begun it, it was quickly completed. Wilde has himself said that he wrote it in a few days. --- In a preface to this story, written for a later edition in book form, Mr. Basil Ward, the artist, tells of the genesis of the story. It goes back to the year 1884, when Oscar Wilde was often in Mr. Ward's studio. One of Mr. Ward's sitters was a young man of such peculiar beauty that his friends had nicknamed him "The Radiant Youth." Each afternoon Wilde watched the work advance, enchanting everybody meanwhile with brilliant talk, until at last the portrait was fi nished and its original had gone his way - rejoicing, without doubt, to be at liberty. "What a pity," sighed Wilde, "that such a glorious creature should ever grow old!" - "Yes, it is indeed," answered Mr. Ward. "How delightful it would be if 'Dorian' could remain exactly as he is while the portrait aged and withered in his stead. I wish it might be so!" - And that was all. "I occupied myself," says Mr. Ward, "with the picture for perhaps a quarter of an hour, during which Wilde smoked refl ectively, but uttered not one word. He arose presently and sauntered to the door, merely nodding as he left the room." Jules Barbey d'Aurevilly
Author: Alphonse Daudet
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691057
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 226
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Book Description
Little What's-His-Name (Le Petit Chose) - Alphonse Daudet's (1840-1897) first published, though not his first written, novel - appeared in 1868. The first part was composed in that Southern France it describes so charmingly; its first chapters form one of the most touching of autobiographies. In the second part Daudet has to tell of the struggles of an idealistic young poet in the selfish, devouring whirlpool of Paris. The whole book seems to bear the impress of the circumstances under which it was written. It is full of the milk of human kindness. --- When Daudet wrote Le Petit Chose in his early manhood, he succeeded in producing one of the most delightfully idyllic of his works, one that will probably continue to be read as long as any of the more powerful novels of his prime. It is one of the most perfect representations in literature of childhood's hopes and fears and of youth's aspirations and defeats. It is perfect because it is real. --- Enjoy to the full one of the purest and most exquisite stories of youthful experience to be found in French or in any other literature. (W. P. Trent)
Author: Heinrich Von Kleist
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 159569076X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 106
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Book Description
"Michael Kohlhaas" is a novella written by famed writer Heinrich von Kleist (1777-1811). The story is based upon the historical figure of Hans Kohlhase, a 16th century merchant who turned violent after being attacked and victimized by the authorities. As a result, he gathered around him a band of criminals and spread terror throughout the whole of Saxony. --- "The novella is a good example of Kleist's excellent narrative art: The action can be summed up in a few words, such as the formula for this story, given expressly on its first page: 'His sense of justice made him a robber and a murderer.' There is no leisurely exposition of time, place, or situation; all the necessary elements are given concisely in the first sentences. The action develops logically, with effective use of retardation and climax, but without disturbing episodes; and the reader is never permitted to forget the central theme. The descriptive element is realistic, with only pertinent details swiftly presented, often in parentheses, while the action moves on. The characterization is skilfully indirect, through unconscious action and speech. The author does not shun the trivial or even the repulsive in detail, nor does he fear the most tragic catastrophes ... The whole work in all its parts is firmly and finely forged by a master workman. --- Kleist has remained a solitary figure in German literature. Owing little to the dominant literary influences of his day, he has also found few imitators. Two generations passed before he began to come into his heritage of legitimate fame. Now ... his place is well assured among the greatest dramatic and narrative authors of Germany." (John S. Nollen)
Author: Andrew Muir
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691901
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 238
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Book Description
"The Last Mistress" is the story of Richard Brown, who leaves an English boarding school at the end of World War II to find his way in the world. Believing that he might have a vocation to take Holy Orders, he decided to travel to Jerusalem and then onto Rome. A brief stay in Paris opens a new world to him. On arrival in Palestine, he gets caught up in the war between Jews and Arabs and is conscripted into the Palestine Police. Posted on the border between Palestine and Lebanon, he gets the opportunity to visit Beirut and enjoy its pleasures before being demobilized and sent back to London. --- His journey through life does not stop there. Graduating from Imperial College, London University, he enters the business world, and as a high-flying investment banker he decides that the sky's the limit. He travels around the world, continuing with his lighthearted erotic romp through life before a tragic event brings him back to earth and allows him to find his true vocation. --- Though by no means an autobiography, much of the background, especially the events in Palestine, are factual and well authenticated. However, as with his previous novels, the author draws on his personal experiences and titillates us with descriptions of gastronomic delights and seductive and sensual pleasures of love.
Author: Victor Hugo
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595690956
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 142
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Book Description
"Bug-Jargal" (1826; first published as a short story in 1819) is an early novel by French writer Victor Hugo (1802-1885). It describes the friendship between the enslaved African prince Bug-Jargal and Leopold D'Auverney, a French military officer, during the slave revolt in Santo Domingo of August, 1791, that would eventually lead to the creation of the republic of Haiti in 1804. --- Bug-Jargal, black slave and son of a king, is a man "of the noblest moral and intellectual character, passionately in love with a white woman, yet tempering the wildest passion with the deepest respect... There is no reader of the tale, who can forget the entrancing interest of the scenes in the camp of the insurgent chief Biassou, or the death-struggle between Habibrah and D'Auverney, upon the brink of the cataract. The latter, in particular, is drawn with such intense force, that the reader seems almost to be a witness of the changing fortunes of the fight, and can hardly breathe freely till he comes to the close." (The Edinburgh Review)
Author: Theodor Fontane
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691251
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 142
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Book Description
The gentle melancholy of two people coming together in a way which can never lead to full satisfaction, the quiet tragedy of a separation not forced by external powers but by the constant pressure of circumstances-this is what sounds through this splendid story. "Trials and Tribulations" is built entirely on this motive. An honest sturdy young officer and a decent pretty girl get to know each other on an excursion. Unconsciously they drift into a relation where heart meets heart, the breaking of which causes the deepest pain. But both see clearly from the beginning that there is no other end. For they know that the world is stronger than the individual, and the many small moments than the one supreme. They know it, for they are, like their creator, resigned realists. They shut their eyes only in order not to see the end too near. (Richard M. Meyer)---The interest of Fontane's novels lies rather in character than in action. While he portrays many types characteristic of Berlin and the surrounding region, and is very successful in rendering local color and the atmosphere of the particular circle described in each book, his penetration into universal human nature is sufficiently deep to raise him far above provincialism. His effort is to represent people vividly and naturally in their normal relations, not to strain after sensational or even dramatic situations. "Trials and Tribulations" ("Irrungen Wirrungen", 1887) gives an excellent idea of his power. In a gently moving story, told without the forcing of emotion or the contriving of exciting scenes, he deals with the pathos of the relation between a man and a woman, alike in an attractive simplicity of character, but forced apart by difference of rank. The situation is laid before us without expressed censure or protest, and is allowed to have its effect by the sober truth of its presentation. Fontane's is an honest and sincere art, none the less great because unpretentious. (W.A.N.)
Author: Adam Mickiewicz
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691340
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 238
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Book Description
Historical prose translation of the famous Polish verse epic. In the book, Tadeusz tells the story of two feuding noble families; it takes place in a fictional idyllic village, in 1811 and 1812, after the division of Poland-Lithuania between Russia, Prussia, and Austria. --- "No European nation of our day has such an epic as Pan Tadeusz. In it Don Quixote has been fused with the Iliad. ... Pan Tadeusz is a true epic. No more can be said or need be said." (Zygmunt Krasinski) --- "No play of Shakespeare, no long poem of Milton or Wordsworth or Tennyson, is so well known or so well beloved by the English people as is Pan Tadeusz by the Poles. To find a work equally well known one might turn to Defoe's prosaic tale of adventure, Robinson Crusoe; to find a work so beloved would be hardly possible." (George Rapall Noyes)
Author: Rudyard Kipling
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691324
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 118
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Book Description
"This is not exactly a book of downright ghost-stories as the cover makes belief. It is rather a collection of facts that never quite explained themselves. All that the collector is certain of is, that one man insisted upon dying because he believed himself to be haunted; another man either made up a wonderful lie and stuck to it, or visited a very strange place; while the third man was indubitably crucified by some person or persons unknown, and gave an extraordinary account of himself." (Rudyard Kipling) --- The tales are quite as grisly as any one will demand, although Mr. Kipling makes fun of all of them, and insinuates that they can be traced back to some variety of Indian fever or to the high spirits which are absorbed from bottles with popular labels. (N.Y. Herald)
Author: Romain Rolland
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595691332
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 154
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Book Description
"Colas Breugnon" is a charming romance of life in Burgundy three hundred years ago. It is an "autobiographical" novel, the story being told in the first person by Colas, who reviews his fifty years of life, and describes all its joys and sorrows. The story is gay and humorous, and full of wise observations about life. --- "Colas Breugnon is the jovial Burgundian, the lusty wood-carver, the practical joker always fond of his glass, the droll fellow. Before everything, Colas Breugnon is a free man. He loves his king, but only so long as the king leaves him his liberty; he loves his wife, but follows his own bent; he is on excellent terms with the priest of a neighboring parish, but never goes to church; he idolizes his children, but his vigorous individuality makes him unwilling to live with them. He is friendly with all, but subject to none; he is freer than the king; he has that sense of humor characteristic of the free spirit to whom the whole world belongs. From the artistic point of view, 'Colas Breugnon' may perhaps be regarded as Rolland's most successful work. This is because it is woven in one piece, because it flows with a continuous rhythm, because its progress is never arrested by the discussion of thorny problems. It is written throughout in the same key. The first sentence gives the note like a tuning fork, and thence the entire book takes its pitch. Throughout, the same lively melody is sustained. The writer employs a peculiarly happy form. His style is poetic without being actually versified; it has a melodious measure without being strictly metrical. This work is unlike any of Rolland's other writings. It is not an historic study, a critical appreciation, a philosophic essay, nor yet even, in the strictest sense of the word, a novel. It is rather a volume of reminiscences as told by a man of fifty; and the very aimlessness with which this man talks is in itself a pleasure; for Breugnon is himself the one subject of the book, holding our attention by the display of a wayward, sympathetic, and aggressive personality." (Stefan Zweig)
Author: Bruce Kellner
Publisher: Mondial
ISBN: 1595692304
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 252
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Book Description
In this comedy of bad manners, the ill-matched parents of too-young newly-weds Billy and Ann Richardson politely collide in a series of encounters guaranteed to insure catastrophe, when a wry college professor, a glamorous real estate agent, a randy plumber, and a frustrated housewife politely face off on some social and sexual battlefields. The confrontations may begin politely, but they are guaranteed to end in chaos when a husband and a wife - not each other's - find themselves embroiled in an affair that proves to be equally passionate and ridiculous. What begins as a test between social classes ends in a series of sexual confrontations. Billy and Ann find themselves forced to grow up in a hurry to begin to accept their parents as people who are just as vulnerable as everybody else. -- Far from the pastoral romance of "Winter Ridge" (published by Mon-dial in 2008) and the grim landscape of "The Prettiest Girls in Euphoria, Kansas" (Mondial, 2010), Bruce Kellner's novel "The Honesties of Love" turns a baleful eye on the minefield of marriage.
