Jane Austen's final novel, her most mature and wickedly satirical, is the story of Anne Elliott, a woman who gets a second chance at love. To achieve happiness she must learn to trust her own feelings and resist the social pressures of family and friends.Illustrated by Hugh Thomson, with an Afterword by Henry Hitchings.

Peter Pan, the boy who refused to grow up, is one of the immortals of children's literature. J. M. Barrie first created Peter Pan as a baby, living in secret with the birds and fairies in the middle of London, but as the children for whom he invented the stories grew older, so too did Peter, reappearing in Neverland, where he was aided in his epic battles
with Red Indians and pirates by the motherly and resourceful Wendy Darling. F D Bedford's wonderful illustrations have been beautifully coloured by Barbara Frith, one of Britain's leading colourists.

A skeleton in dinner dress is wreaking havoc among singers and staff at the Paris Opera House and when new owners take over the terror escalates. Who is the mysterious figures stalking the stage at night? How can he be everywhere at once and leave locked rooms at will? What is his connection to the beautiful young musician Christine? Stage and screen adaptations of The Phantom of the Opera have maintained the book's popularity, but the novel outdoes them all in Gothic tension and horror.With an Afterword by Peter Harness.

The Pickwick Papers is Charles Dickens's first novel, and his comic masterpiece. We are introduced not just to one of the greatest writers in the English language but to some of fiction's most endearing and memorable characters, starting with the 'illustrious, immortal and colossal-minded' Samuel Pickwick himself.

On its first publication The Picture of Dorian Gray was regarded as dangerously modern in its depiction of fin-de-siecle decadence. In this updated version of the Faust story, the tempter is Lord Henry Wotton, who lives selfishly for amoral pleasure; Dorian's good angel is the portrait painter Basil Hallward, whom Dorian murders. The book highlights the tension between the polished surface of high society and the life of secret vice. Although sin is punished in the end the book has a flavour of the elegantly perverse.With an Afterword by Peter Harness.

Pinocchio is the riotous, tragicomic tale of the most well-known puppet in fiction. Both mischievous and loving, Pinocchio encounters all manner of unusual and dangerous characters on his adventures and must undergo a series of fiendishly imaginative trials - among them being swallowed by a giant dogfish and turned into a braying donkey - that will lead him to self-knowledge. Along the way he will be helped by a beautiful fairy and his adoring father Gepetto, as he learns how to become what he most longs to be; a real boy. Illustrated by Charles Folkard, with an Afterword by Anna South.

The First World War was the first industrialised war in Europe, and produced horrors undreamt of by the young men who gaily volunteered for a war that was supposed to be over by Christmas. From the patriotic enthusiasm of Rupert Brooke through the disillusionment of Charles Hamilton Sorley to the bitter denunciations of Sassoon, Owen and Rosenberg, the war produced and astonishing outpouring of powerful poetry. The major poets are all represented here, as well as many whose voices are less well known. This anthology is illustrated with contemporary motifs.

In The Portrait of a Lady Henry James tells the story of one of his most enchanting heroines, Isabel Archer, a young New York woman whose life is changed when she is visited by her aunt Mrs Touchett following the death of her father (her mother having died long before). Isabel is invited to accompany her aunt back to Europe, and fascinates everyone with her beauty, intelligence and vivacity. When she inherits money from her uncle this turns out to have unexpected and undesired consequences.With an Afterword by Sam Gilpin.

This is one of the most significant literary works of the 20th century, and one of the most innovative. Young Irish Catholic, Stephen Dedalus, rejects religion and national ties to develop unfettered as an artist. Strongly autobiographical, the novel is one of the founding texts of Modernism and the precursor of Ulysses. Its originality shocked contemporary readers on its publication in 1916, who found its treating of the minutiae of daily life indecorous, and its central character unappealing.With an Afterword by Peter Harness.

A tour de force of wit and sparkling dialogue, Pride and Prejudice shows how the headstrong Elizabeth Bennett and the aristocratic Mr Darcy must have their pride humbled and their prejudices dissolved before they canacknowledge their love for each other. Ilustrated by Hugh Thomson, with an Afterword by Henry Hitchings.

The Collector's Library in Colour takes the favourite illustrated titles of The Collector's Library and presents them in full colour. Jane Austen's best-loved novel is a memorable story about the inaccuracy of first impressions, about the power of reason, and above all about the strange dynamics of human relationships and emotions. Here, where Hugh Thomson's delightful period illustrations were originally black-and-white, they have been sensitively coloured by Barbara Frith, one of Britain 's most accomplished colourists. A tour de force of wit and sparkling dialogue, Pride and Prejudice shows how the headstrong Elizabeth Bennett and the aristocratic Mr Darcy must have their pride humbled and their prejudices dissolved before they can acknowledge their love for each other."With an Afterword by Henry Hitchings.

Written in the sixteenth century and almost immediately a subject of controversy, The Prince presents Machiavelli's advice to a ruler who would seek to maintain his power most effectively. Pragmatism and expediency are seen to be more important considerations than ethical ones, and a ruler must be prepared to take actions in the interest of public order that might conflict with purely private ethical concerns. A good ruler must avoid being hated by his subjects however. In The Art of War Machiavelli examines ancient military practices for their relevance to modern political issues, and asserts that military power is at the base of all civil order.With an Afterword by Oliver Francis.

The Prophet is a book of 26 poetic essays written in English by the Lebanese artist, philosopher and writer Khalil Gibran. The prophet Al-Mustafa is about to board a ship which will carry him home. He is stopped by a group of people, with whom he discusses many issues of life and the human condition. The book is divided into chapters dealing with love, marriage, children, giving, eating and drinking, work, joy and sorrow, houses, clothes, buying and selling, crime and punishment, laws,freedom, reason and passion, pain, self-knowledge, teaching, friendship, talking, time, good and evil, prayer, pleasure, beauty, religion, and death. Cover illustration by Khalil Gibran.

Peter, Roberta and Phyllis' lives change overnight when suddenly Father is taken away by two strangers. They move from the comfort of their London residence to a modest country cottage, and find that Mother is no longer able to entertain them as she must write slavishly to support the family. Once fairly wealthy, they are now 'poor' and must adapt accordingly. But with this change comes more freedom than they could ever have dreamt of, as they learn to entertain themselves and forge their own moral code. So begins a tale of blissful independence and adventures aplenty with the railway line at the bottom of their garden becoming central to the children's lives.

Regarded by many as one of the finest American novels, The Red Badge of Courage tells the story of one soldier's experience in the American Civil War, presenting war in a direct, impressionistic way that was innovative at the time and is still influential today. Henry Fleming enlists in the Union Army with dreams of military glory, and discovers real warfare is very different from its fictional portrayal.

Ten years after the supposed death of Sherlock Holmes at the Reichenbach Falls, Arthur Conan Doyle was to bow to popular pressure and the large fees offered by publishers to revive the detective's career. To the astonishment of Dr Watson and the delight of his readers Holmes returns to Baker Street, explains how he escaped death at the Falls and is ready to commence detective work once more. Doyle provided a rich and fascinating set of mysteries to challenge his sleuth in this collection.As before, Watson is the superb narrator and his magic remains unchanged and undimmed. In His Last Bow, the final story of this collection, we are told how Sherlock Holmes is brought out of retirement to help the Government fight the German threat at the approach of the First World War.

The bitter, deformed brother of the King is secretly plotting to seize the throne of England. Charming and duplicitous, powerfully eloquent andviciously cruel, he is prepared to go to any lengths to achieve his goal - and, in his skilful manipulation of events and people, Richard is a chilling incarnation of the lure of evil and the temptation of power.Illustrated throughout by Sir John Gilbert (1817-1897, famous for his depictions of historical scenes; as well as Shakespeare, he illustrated works of Sir Walter Scott, Cervantes, Wilkie Collins and Wordsworth.With an Introduction by Ned Halley

Robinson Crusoe is among the first novels written in English. Thanks to its extraordinary realism and drama, it is easily the longest-enduring work of popular fiction in the language. The story, probably based on the Pacific-island ordeal of castaway Alexander Selkirk, was presented by Daniel Defoe as a true account, and is utterly convincing in its topography, action and character, even 300 years after its first publication. Robinson Crusoe is a true page-turner: Dr Samuel Johnson said it was one of only three books he had read that would have been better for being longer. Illustrated by George Cruikshank, with an Afterword by Ned Halley.

This is undoubtedly the greatest love story ever written, spawning a host of imitators on stage and screen, including Leonard Bernstein's smash musical West Side Story and Franco Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet filmed in 1968. A young man and woman meet by chance and fall instantly in love. But their families are bitter enemies, and in order to be together the two lovers must be prepared to risk everything. Set in a city torn apart by feuds and gang warfare, Romeo and Juliet is a dazzling combination of passion and hatred, bawdy comedy and high tragedy.

This rare collection is a must for all Jane-ites. It represents what Richard Church regarded as Jane Austen's literary work-basket, and contains some Austen's earliest work - her hilarious brief History of England, illustrated by her favourite sister, which is a worthy forerunner of 1066 & All That, to the unfinished Sanditon, the novel of her maturity on which she was working at her death aged 42. Also included are the two epistolary novels, Lady Susan and Love and Freindship (sic), and other Juvenilia: The Watsons, Catharine, Lesley Castle, Evelyn, Frederic and Elfrida, Jack and Alice, Edgar and Emma, Henry and Eliza and The Three Sisters.With an Introduction by Kathryn White.

Mary Lennox is sent from an India as an orphan to live at Misselthwaite Manor. She arrives as a sour-faced, sickly and ill-tempered little madam but becomes friends with local lad Dickon and her poorly cousin Colin. In their restoration of a secret garden all their lives are changed for the better.With an Afterword by Anna South.

In his lifetime, Kipling was widely regarded as the unofficial Poet Laureate, and he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907. His poetry is striking for its many rhythms and popular forms of speech, and Kipling was equally at home with dramatic monologues and extended ballads. He is often thought of as glorifying war, militarism, and the British Empire, but an attentive reading of the poems does not confirm that view. This edition has an introduction by Lizzy Welby and the endorsement of the Kipling Society, of which Dr Welby is a Council Member.

No thinker has had a more profound influence on Western civilisation than Aristotle. In the Middle Ages many questions were settled by appeal to his authority alone, and his position was so pre-eminent that he was often referred to simply as 'the philosopher'. His work represents a vast, encyclopaedic treatment of virtually every field of knowledge: logic, rhetoric, ethics, politics, metaphysics, poetry, biology, zoology, physics and psychology. The depth and clarity of his understanding are remarkable, and nowhere more so than in the Nicomachean Ethics and Politics.With an Introduction by Hugh Griffith.

Plato is outstanding among philosophers, more or less inventing philosophy as we know it in the West. In the Republic he begins with the question 'What is justice?', but this question soon broadens into an investigation of what is real and how we can know it, so defining the three main areas of philosophy - ethics, metaphysics and epistemology (the theory of the method or grounds of knowledge). But Plato is remarkable also for the beauty of his writing. The allegory of the cave at the beginning of Republic Book 7 is among the most powerful images in the history of literature. And in the Protagoras and Gorgias his portraits of the intellectual elite of the Greek world in the 5th century BCE are without parallel. Translated by Benjamin Jowett, with an Introduction by Tom Griffith.

Two sisters of opposing temperament but who share the pangs of tragic love provide the subjects for Sense and Sensibility. Elinor, practical and conventional, the epitome of sense, desires a man who is promised to another woman. Marianne, emotional and sentimental, the epitome of sensibility, loses her heart to a scoundrel who jilts her. True love finally triumphs when sense gives way to sensibility. Illustrated by Hugh Thomson, with an Afterword by Henry Hitchings.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had a lasting interest in the supernatural, and in Sherlock Holmes: The Dark Mysteries, Sherlock Holmes expert David Stuart Davies has selected the Holmes and Watson cases that best reflect this. The first is that classic novella, the terrifying The Hound of the Baskervilles, followed by nine Gothic adventures: The Sussex Vampire, The Creeping Man, Shoscombe Old Place, The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax, The Veiled Lodger, The Devil's Foot, The Blanched Soldier, and The Cardboard Box, all with the original illustrations.Illustrated by Sidney Paget and others, the illustrators of the original stories in The Strand magazine.With an Introduction by David Stuart Davies, writer and editor.Designed to appeal to the booklover, the Collector's Library is a series of beautifully bound hardback gift editions of much loved classic titles. Bound in real cloth, printed on high quality paper, and featuring ribbon markers and gilt edges, Collector's Library are books to love and treasure.

George Eliot's own favourite novel centres on Silas Marner, the linen weaver of Raveloe, a village on the brink of industrialization. He was once a respected member of a narrow congregation, but the events that took place during one of his cataleptic fits led to the loss of everything that he valued. Now he lives a withdrawn half-life and is an object of suspicion to his new neighbours; he exists only for his work and his golden guineas. But when his precious money is stolen and, shortly after, seemingly and mysteriously replaced by the child Eppie, Silas is awakened to life by the redemptive power of love With an Afterword by John Grant.

William Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience contain some of Blake's finest and best-loved poems, which are presented here in the form which best satisfied the high expectations of his poetic and artistic aspirations. The fifty-four plates which Blake originally etched and coloured by hand are beautifully reproduced, and each has the text of the poem printed on the facing page. Here the reader will find "The Lamb", "The Little Black Boy", "The Chimney Sweeper", "Infant Joy","The Sick Rose", "The Tyger" and "Infant Sorrow".With an Afterword by Peter Harness.

The Sonnets of William Shakespeare, a cycle of 154 linked poems, were first published or 'entered' at Stationers' Hall by the publisher Thomas Thorpe on 20th May 1609. This 400th-anniversary edition contains all of the poems and they deal with many of Shakespeare's most common themes: jealousy, betrayal, melancholy, and are written in the same beautiful and innovative language that we have come to know from his plays. They ache with unfulfilled longing, and for many they are the most complete and moving meditations on love ever written.With an Afterword by Peter Harness.

"They're my houses, those two," said the mother-in-law. "And not clear either. It's as much as I can do to keep the mortgage interest paid." Gertrude sat white and silent. She was her father now. -- "Then we ought to be paying you rent," she said coldly. -- "Walter is paying me rent,"replied the mother. -- "And what rent?" asked Gertrude. -- "Six and six a week," retorted the mother. It was more than the house was worth. Gertrude held her head erect, looked straight before her. -- "It is lucky to be you," said the elder woman, bitingly, "to have a husband as takes all the worry of the money, and leaves you a free hand." The young wife was silent. She said very little to her husband, but her manner had changed towards him. Something in her proud, honourable soul had crystallized out hard as rock.

The Collector's Library volumes of short stories - "Best Ghost Stories","Best Fairy Stories", "Celtic Fairy Tales" and "Tales of the Macabre" have proved popular throughout the world. This new collection of chilling tales is designed to be read as autumn nights draw in as Hallowe'en approaches. Stories from famous writers such as Henry James, Robert Louis Stevenson and Elizabeth Gaskell are matched with equally terrifying tales from E.F. Benson, Edith Wharton, W.W. Jacobs, W.F. Harvey, F. Marion Crawford, Ambrose Bierce and many others.

A Study in Scarlet introduced the great scientific detective Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson, his friend and chronicler, to the reading public. This novel, a cornerstone in the annals of crime fiction, tells of their first meeting and how they set up in rooms together in Baker Street. It is not long before the charismatic sleuth and his faithful companion are plunged into a dramatic mystery which starts with the discovery of a corpse in a deserted house and the letters RACHE scrawledon the wall in blood. The Sign of the Four, the second Holmes novel, presents the detective with one of his greatest challenges - solving thetheft of the great Agra treasure in India.

A Tale of Two Cities is one of Dickens's most exciting books, set against the backdrop of the French revolution, in which two generations struggle against the injustices of first a corrupt aristocracy and then the mindless rule of the mob.Illustrated by H K Browne 'Phiz', with an Afterword by Sam Gilpin.

This companion volume to Tales of Mystery & Imagination contains Poe's best-known poetry and a selection of his very best stories, including some fine tales from the last decade of his tragically short life. Many of these stories and poems reflect familiar Poe themes of murder, obsession and love, but there are also tales of the fantastic, black comedies, parodies and hoaxes.With an Afterword by David Pinching.

Some of the most exciting and haunting stories ever written are to be found in this collection of Poe's work, ranging from the poetic to the mysterious to the darkly comic, and all with the quality of the grotesque that defined Poe's writing. 'The Tell-Tale Heart' and 'The Fall of the House of Usher' are key works in the horror canon, while in the 'The Murders in the Rue Morgue' and 'The Mystery of Marie Roget' we find the origins of modern detective fiction.With an Afterword by Jonty Claypole.

Published in 1922, the eleven Tales of the Jazz Age feature the flappers and lost young men of the period as well as a great variety of characters and scenes. Among them, the critically acclaimed novella 'MayDay' contrasts drunken debutantes with a mob of war veterans battling socialists in the streets, 'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button', filmedwith Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett and Tilda Swinton, is a fantasy about a man who ages in reverse, and 'A Diamond as Big as the Ritz' is a surreal fable of excess.With an Afterword by Ned Halley.

Controversial and sexually charged, The Taming of the Shrew is possibly Shakespeare's first play, and certainly among the most performed. Is it a mere saga of brute male domination or a passionate love story with a powerful moral punch? To read this play is to gain unique insight into a portrait of a marriage created by a true master. Illustrated throughout by Sir John Gilbert (1817-1897), famous for his depictions of historical scenes. As well as Shakespeare, he illustrated works of Sir Walter Scott, Cervantes, Wilkie Collins and Wordsworth.With an Afterword by Ned Halley.

The most poetic and magical of Shakespeare's comedies, The Tempest contrasts lyrical fantasy surrounding the spirit Ariel and the savage Caliban, with a tale of political intrigue focused around Prospero, the banished Duke of Milan, now a wizard living on a remote island. Illustrated throughout by Sir John Gilbert (1817-1897), famous for his depictions of historical scenes. As well as Shakespeare, he illustrated works of Sir Walter Scott, Cervantes, Wilkie Collins and Wordsworth.With an Introduction by Ned Halley.

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall is one of few nineteenth-century novels to address alcoholism, psychological abuse, violence and the inequality of women's property rights. In a powerful psychological narrative, Anne Bronte tells the strange tale of the disintegration of the marriage of Helen Graham, the mysterious tenant of Wildfell Hall. When it was first published in 1848, Anne Bronte's second novel was attacked by the Spectator for its 'morbid love of the coarse, if not the brutal'. In her defence, Anne stated that she 'wished to tell the truth, for truth always conveys its own moral to those who are able to receive it'.

Set in the South of France in the decade after World War I, Tender is the Night is the story of a brilliant and magnetic psychiatrist named Dick Diver; the bewitching, wealthy, and dangerously unstable mental patient, Nicole, who becomes his wife; and the beautiful, harrowing ten-year pas de deux they act out along the border between sanity and madness.

The Machine Stops was first published in November of 1909 and is the one science fiction story in this collection, pre-dating both Brave New World and 1984. It tells of a dystopian future - 'the machine' has taken over the lives of men and it has an uncomfortable resonance today when so much human activity depends on computers. Forster referred to his stories as 'fantasies' and they contrast the freedom of paganism with the restraints of English civilization, the personal, sensual delights of the body with the impersonal, inhibiting rules imposed by society. Rich in irony and alive with sharp observations on the surprises life holds, the stories often feature violent events, discomforting coincidences. This volume includes all twelve stories published during Forster's lifetime.

The Collectors Library series presents some of the greatest works of literature, complete and unabridged, with either a short introduction or an afterword by a literary scholar. Under their dust jackets, these pocket-sized hardbacks are bound in maroon linen, with gilt-edged pages and silk markers.

The Warden introduces us to the lives of some of the most beloved characters in all literature. Septimus Harding, the warden of the title, is a kindly and naive clergyman who finds himself caught between the forces of entrenched tradition and radical reform amid the burgeoning materialism of Britain in the 1850s. The deeply insightful portrayals of figures such as the booming Archdeacon Grantly and the beautiful Eleanor Bold at the heart of this moving and deliciously comical tale launched the enduringly popular Barsetshire Chronicles series of six novels, and won Anthony Trollope an eternal seat in the pantheon of great literary figures.

Graham Greene was one of the greatest story-tellers of the twentieth century. This anthology contains the novella The Third Man, on which Carol Reed's chilling film starring Orson Wells was based, as well as the story The Fallen Idol which Reed also filmed. Greene's often bleak view of humanity is leavened by the somewhat camp May We Borrow Your Husband? with its hilarious ending, the tragic-comic A Shocking Accident and ten more stories that illustrate the author's mastery of the short story.

John Buchan wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps at the beginning of the First World War. In it he introduces his most famous hero, Richard Hannay, who, despite claiming to be an 'ordinary fellow', is caught up in the dramatic race against a plot to devastate the British war effort. Hannayis hunted across the Scottish moors by police and spy-ring alike, and must outwit his intelligent and pitiless enemy in the corridors of Whitehall and, finally, at the site of the mysterious thirty-nine steps.The best-known of Buchan's thrillers, The Thirty-Nine Steps has been continuously in print since first publication and has been filmed three times, most notably by Alfred Hitchcock in 1935.With an Afterword by David Stuart Davies.

This is Scott Fitzgerald's debut novel, written when he was twenty-four,appeared in 1920 and immediately established him as a leading literary figure in the brilliant and dangerous world of 1920s America. Its instant appeal could be compared to the success of The Catcher in the Rye thirty years later. The novel tells the story of a spoilt child in search of happiness. Pampered, wealthy, brilliant at school, Amory Blaine looks for the love of others but only finds himself. A short, sharp masterpiece with an intriguing religious undertow, this is also a touchingly autobiographical novel which reflects ominously on Fitzgerald's own future.With an Afterword by Ned Halley.

The Three Musketeers follows the career of an impoverished young gentleman, D'Artagnan, who sets off to Paris to seek fortune as a member of the King's guard. Once there, he meets Porthos, Athos and Aramis, the musketeers of the book's title, and embarks on a daring and exciting series of adventures. France is under threat, and the friends must use all their guile and ingenuity to outwit the dastardly schemes of Cardinal Richelieu and the glamorous spy, Milady. The Three Musketeers is as fresh and entertaining today as when it was first written. This edition has been sensitively abridged.With an Afterword by Peter Harness.

To the Lighthouse, considered by many to be Virginia Woolf's finest novel, is a remarkably original work, showing the thoughts and actions of the members of a family and their guests on two separate occasions ten years apart. The setting is Mr and Mrs Ramsay's house on a Scottish island, where they traditionally take their summer holidays, overlooking a bay with a lighthouse. As a modernist author Woolf explored the ways in which fiction could represent reality, and To the Lighthouse can be seen as an experimental work that pushes the limits of what we know about the world and ourselves. It is one of the most beautifully crafted of all novels written in the English language.With an Afterword by Sam Gilpin.

A classic of Victorian literature, and one of the earliest books written specifically for boys, Tom Brown's Schooldays has long had an influence well beyond the middle-class, public school world that it describes. The book describes Tom's time at Rugby School from his first football match, through his troubled adolescence when he is savagely bullied by the unspeakable Flashman, to his departure for a wider world as a confident young man.

One of the most irrepressible and exuberant characters in the history of literature, Tom Sawyer explodes onto the page in a whirl of bad behaviour and incredible adventures. Whether he is heaving clods of earth at his brother, faking a gangrenous toe, or trying to convince the world that he is dead, Tom's infectious energy and good humor shine through. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer is Mark Twain's joyful and nostalgic recollection of tall tales from his own boyhood by the Mississippi some 'thirty or forty years ago', an instant success on first publication in 1876 and a delight to children of all ages ever since.