«The garrulous and empty-headed Mrs Bennet has only one aim — that of finding a good match for each of her five daughters. In this, she is mocked by her cynical and indolent husband. This is an ironic novel of manners. «Pride and Prejudice», which opens with one of the most famous sentences in English Literature, is an ironic novel of manners. In it, the garrulous and empty-headed Mrs Bennet has only one aim — that of finding a good match for each of her five daughters. In this, she is mocked by her cynical and indolent husband. With its wit, its social precision and, above all, its irresistible heroine, «Pride and Prejudice» has proved one of the most enduringly popular novels in the English language.»

The moment I first met you, I noticed your pride, your sense of superiority, and your selfish disdain for the feelings of others. You are the last man in the world whom I could ever be persuaded to marry, said Elizabeth Bennet. And so Elizabeth rejects the proud Mr Darcy. Can nothing overcome her prejudice against him? And what of the other Bennet girls — their fortunes, and misfortunes, in the business of getting husbands? This famous novel by Jane Austen is full of wise and humorous observation of the people and manners of her times.

One of Jane Austen's finest works. Emma is the story of a wealthy and beautiful girl whose favorite hobby is matchmaking. But when she tries to bring her friend Harriet together with Mr Elton, a young widower, the results are disastrous. Emma is the amusing and wonderful story of a young woman's journey towards self-knowledge and true love.

Emma is the culmination of Jane Austen's genius, a sparkling comedy of love and marriage. Emma Woodhouse is introduced to us as 'handsome, clever and rich' and, according to Jane Austen, a heroine 'which no one but myself would like'. Yet such is Emma's spirited wit that, despite her superior airs and egotism, few readers have failed to succumb to her charm. The comedy turns on Emma's self-appointed role as energetic match-maker for her sweet, silly friend immune to the charms of the male sex. Her emotional coming of age is woven into what Ronald Blythe has called 'the happiest of love stories, the most fiendishly difficult of detective stories and a matchless repository of English wit'.

Here is quite simply the most handsome edition of one of the finest and most popular novels of all time. It features an elegant cloth binding, attractive full-color dust wrapper, handsome typography, and more than 100 delightful illustrations (plus 61 witty illustrated initial letters at chapter openings) by famed English Victorian artist Hugh Thomson.

Mansfield Park is a novel about town and country, surface dazzle and lasting values. Fanny Price, a poor relation, is brought up at the wealthy Bertrams' country house and fallls for Edmund, the younger son. Their lives are disrupted, however, by the arrival of the worldly Mary Crawford and her brother Henry. With her usual psychological insight and attention to detail, Jane Austen paints an irresistibly lifelike portrait of shifting values and split loyalties.

Northanger Abbey tells the story of Catherine Morland, a naive young woman whose perceptions of the world around her are greatly influenced by the romantic gothic novels to which she is addicted. When she moves to Bath she sees mystery and intrigue all around her. This is one of Austen's early works, a broad comedy about learning to distinguish between fiction and reality.

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.

When Emma Woodhouse sets out on a career of match-making in the little town of Highbury she manages to cause confusion at every step. Jane Austen was particularly proud of Emma, in which she takes apart the desires and foibles of small-town society with unnerving accuracy.

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.

In a remote Hertfordshire village, a country squire of no great means must marry off his five vivacious daughters. At the heart of this all-consuming enterprise lies the erratic courtship of his second headstrong daughter, Elizabeth Bennet and her aristocratic suitor — Fitzwilliam Darcy.

Three of the author's most popular works — widely admired for their satiric wit, subtlety, and perfection of style — brilliantly re-create the provincial world of the early-19th-century English countryside, focusing, respectively, on husband-hunting mothers and daughters, the humbling of proud lovers, and the return of a once-rejected lover.

Полный, неадаптированный текст произведения. Jane Austen teased readers with the idea of a 'heroine whom no one but myself will much like', but Emma is irresistible. 'Handsome, clever, and rich', Emma is also an 'imaginist', 'on fire with speculation and foresight'. She sees the signs of romance all around her, but thinks she will never be married. Her matchmaking maps out relationships that Jane Austen ironically tweaks into a clearer perspective. Judgement and imagination are matched in games the reader too can enjoy, and the end is a triumph of understanding.

This popular series of readers has now been completely revised and updated, using a new syllabus and new word structure lists. Readability has been ensured by means of specially designed computer software. Words that are above level but essential to the story are explained within the text, illustrated, and then reused for maximum reinforcement.

Полный, неадаптированный текст произведения. What does persuasion mean — a firm belief, or the action of persuading someone to think something else? Anne Elliot is one of Austen's quietest heroines, but also one of the strongest and the most open to change. She lives at the time of the Napoleonic wars, a time of accident, adventure, the making of new fortunes and alliances. A woman of no importance, she manoeuvres in her restricted circumstances as her long-time love Captain Wentworth did in the wars. Even though she is nearly thirty, well past the sell-by bloom of youth, Austen makes her win out for herself and for others like herself, in a regenerated society.

This popular series of readers has now been completely revised and updated, using a new syllabus and new word structure lists. Readability has been ensured by means of specially designed computer software. Words that are above level but essential to the story are explained within the text, illustrated, and then reused for maximum reinforcement.

Полный, неадаптированный текст произведения. 'Young women who have no economic or political power must attend to the serious business of contriving material security'. Jane Austen's sardonic humour lays bare the stratagems, the hypocrisy and the poignancy inherent in the struggle of two very different sisters to achieve respectability. Sense and Sensibility is a delightful comedy of manners in which the sisters Elinor and Marianne represent these two qualities. Elinor's character is one of Augustan detachment, while Marianne, a fervent disciple of the Romantic Age, learns to curb her passionate nature in the interests of survival.