Tag: Classics Club Review

Book Review: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas by Jules Verne
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Book Review: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas by Jules Verne

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Title: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas Author: Jules Verne Translator: William Butcher Publisher: Oxford University Press Date: 2009 (1863) Genre: Adventure Fiction / Science Fiction / Classics Summary: French naturalist Dr Aronnax embarks on an expedition to hunt down a sea monster, but discovers instead the Nautilus, a self-contained world built by its enigmatic captain. Together Nemo and… Continue reading Book Review: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas by Jules Verne

Book Review: Memoirs from the House of the Dead by Fyodor Dostoevsky
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Book Review: Memoirs from the House of the Dead by Fyodor Dostoevsky

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Title: Memoirs from the House of the Dead Author: Fyodor Dostoevsky Translator: Jessie Coulson  Publisher: Oxford University Press Date: 2008 (1862) Genre: Semi-autobiographical / Philosophical Fiction / Classics Summary: In this almost documentary account of his own experiences of penal servitude in Siberia, Dostoevsky describes the physical and mental suffering of the convicts, the squalor and the degradation,… Continue reading Book Review: Memoirs from the House of the Dead by Fyodor Dostoevsky

Book Review: Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell
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Book Review: Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell

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Title: Wives and Daughters Author: Elizabeth Gaskell Publisher: Oxford University Press Date: 2009 (1863) Genre: Fiction / Classics Summary: Molly Gibson is the daughter of the doctor in the small provincial town of Hollingford. Her widowed father marries a second time to give Molly the woman’s presence he feels she lacks, but until the arrival of Cynthia,… Continue reading Book Review: Wives and Daughters by Elizabeth Gaskell

Mini Book Review: The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches by Matsuo Bashō
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Mini Book Review: The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches by Matsuo Bashō

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Title: The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches Author: Matsuo Bashō Translator: Nobuyuki Yuasa Publisher: Penguin Classics Date: 1966 (1702) Genre: Classics / Poetry Summary: In his perfectly crafted haiku poems, Basho described the natural world with great simplicity and delicacy of feeling. When he composed “The Narrow Road to the Deep North” he was… Continue reading Mini Book Review: The Narrow Road to the Deep North and Other Travel Sketches by Matsuo Bashō

Book Review: Mary & The Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft
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Book Review: Mary & The Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft

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Title: Mary & The Wrongs of Woman Author: Mary Wollstonecraft Publisher: Oxford University Press Date: 2009 (1788) Genre: Classics / Fiction / Philosophy Summary: Mary Wollstonecraft is best known for her pioneering views on the rights of women to share equal rights and opportunities with men. Expressed most forcefully in her Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792), her forthright opinions… Continue reading Book Review: Mary & The Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft

Book Review: Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth
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Book Review: Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth

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Title: Castle Rackrent Author: Maria Edgeworth Publisher: Oxford University Press Date: 2009 (1800) Genre: Classics / Historical Summary: With her satire on Anglo-Irish landlords in Castle Rackrent (1800), Maria Edgeworth pioneered the regional novel and inspired Sir Walter Scott’s Waverley (1814). Politically risky, stylistically innovative, and wonderfully entertaining, the novel changes the focus of conflict in Ireland from religion to class, and… Continue reading Book Review: Castle Rackrent by Maria Edgeworth

Book Review: Constellation Myths: with Aratus’s Phaenomena by Eratosthenes, Hyginus, and Aratus
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Book Review: Constellation Myths: with Aratus’s Phaenomena by Eratosthenes, Hyginus, and Aratus

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Title: Constellation Myths: with Aratus’s Phaenomena Author: Eratosthenes, Hyginus, and Aratus Translator: Robin Hard Publisher: Oxford University Press Date: 2015 (c.200 BC) Genre: Classics / Mythology Summary: Athena seized the writhing serpent and hurled it into the sky, and fixed it to the very pole of the heavens. The constellations we recognize today were first mapped by the ancient Greeks,… Continue reading Book Review: Constellation Myths: with Aratus’s Phaenomena by Eratosthenes, Hyginus, and Aratus

Book Review: The Old English Baron by Clara Reeve
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Book Review: The Old English Baron by Clara Reeve

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Title: The Old English Baron Author: Clara Reeve Publisher: Oxford University Press Date: 2008 (1778) Genre: Gothic / Classic Summary: When Sir Philip Harclay returns to England after a long absence, he finds that his childhood friend, Arthur, Lord Lovel, is no longer alive, and that the castle and estates of the Lovel family have twice changed hands. But a… Continue reading Book Review: The Old English Baron by Clara Reeve

Book Review: The Complete Poems by Sir Thomas Wyatt
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Book Review: The Complete Poems by Sir Thomas Wyatt

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Title: The Complete Poems Author: Sir Thomas Wyatt Publisher: Penguin Classics Date: 1978 (c.1530s) Genre: Classics / Poetry Summary: As a diplomat in Renaissance Europe, and a luminary at the court of Henry VII, Sir Thomas Wyatt wrote in an incestuous world where everyone was uneasily subject to the royal whims and rages. Wyatt had himself survived… Continue reading Book Review: The Complete Poems by Sir Thomas Wyatt

Book Review: Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes
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Book Review: Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes

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Title: Don Quixote Author: Miguel de Cervantes Publisher: Penguin Classics Date: 2003 (1615) Genre: Classics / Fiction Summary: ‘Didn’t I tell you they were only windmills? And only someone with windmills on the brain could have failed to see that!’ Don Quixote has become so entranced by reading romances of chivalry that he determines to become a knight… Continue reading Book Review: Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes