First published in 1961, The Severed Head is regarded is one of Iris Murdoch's most entertaining works. A dark and ferocious comic masterpiece, the novel traces the turbulent emotional journey of Martin Lynch-Gibbon, a smug, well-to-do London wine merchant and unfaithful husband, whose life is turned inside out when his wife leaves him for her psychoanalyst. In The Sea, the Sea the landscape shifts to the seclusion of an isolated house on the edge of England's North Sea, where Charles Arrowby, a big name in London's glittering theatrical world, has retired to write his memoirs. Arrowby's plans begin to unravel when he meets his first love and becomes haunted by the idea of rekindling his adolescent passion. The Severed Head and Booker prize-winner The Sea, the Sea are two of Iris Murdoch's most accomplished novels, displaying all her talent for combining profundity with playful creativity. Both tragic and comic, brooding and hilarious, they brilliantly reveal how much our lives are governed by the lies we tell ourselves as well as our all-consuming desire for love, significance and, ultimately, redemption.

This beautiful hardback collection features the world's most famous detective in his most classic adventures. We begin with A Study in Scarlet, the novel that introduces the most famous characters in literature — Sherlock Holmes and Dr. watson. Then, in The Sign of Four we delve into the East India Company and a pact between four convicts. Finally, in The Hound of Baskerville, we follow Sherlock and Watson as they investigate murder with a legendary twist on the Dartmoor Moors.

It is the story of the Galactic Empire, crumbling after twelve thousand years of rule. And it is the particular story of psycho-historian Hari Seldon, the only man who can see the horrors the future has in store: a dark age of ignorance, barbarism and violence that will last for thirty thousand years. Gathering together a band of courageous men and women, Seldon leads them to a hidden location at the edge of the galaxy where he hopes they can preserve human knowledge and wisdom against all who would destroy them. Asimov went on to add numerous sequels and prequels to the trilogy, building up what has become known as the Foundation series, but it is the original three books, first published in the Forties and Fifties, which remain the most powerful, imaginative and breathtaking.

Included here are famous tales like 'Sound of Thunder', in which the carelessness of a group of time-travellers leads to disastrous consequences, and 'The Veldt', in which two seemingly innocent young children transform their nursery into a lethal trap. Here are the Martian stories, tales that vividly animate the red planet with its brittle cities and double-mooned sky. Here are stories which speak of a special nostalgia for Green Town, Illinois, the perfect setting for a seemingly cloudless childhood — except for the unknown terror lurking in the ravine. Here are the Irish stories and the Mexican stories, linked across their separate geographies by Bradbury's astonishing inventiveness. Here, too, are thrilling, terrifying stories such as 'The Fog Horn' — perfect for reading under the covers. Read for the first time, these stories are a feast for the imagination; read again — and again — they reveal new, dazzling facets of a master storyteller's extraordinary art.

Ever since Pushkin, Russian poets have been famous for their ability to combine private and public experience in lyric poetry of a comprehensiveness and intensity unmatched elsewhere. Ranging in extremes from the melting tenderness of unrequited love to the bitter comedy of political chaos, this collection of poems covering two centuries includes work by Lermontov, Tyutchev, Fet, Annensky, Mayakovsky, Bely, Mandelstam, Akhmatova, Tsvetaeva, Pasternak, Brodsky and others less celebrated but no less extraordinary. The text is divided into six sections. Russian poets constantly reflect on their art, so the first section is appropriately entitled The Muse. Their other great topic is Russia herself, explored in parts two and three. Part four presents the inner world, parts five and six traditional themes of love and mortality. Poetry has often been a matter of life and death in Russia, where Mandelstam was not the only poet to perish in the Gulag. The comfortable private domain familiar to many English and American writers barely exists in a country where political realities are exigent — one reason for the fierce intensity found in so many of these poems.

«Typical — just when Bertie thinks that God's in his heaven and all's right with the world, things start to go wrong again... There's young Bingo Little, who's in love for the umpteenth time and needs Bertie to put in a good word for him with his uncle; Aunt Agatha, who forces Bertie to get engaged to the formidable Honoria Glossop; and the troublesome twins, Claude and Eustace, whose antics when let loose in London know no bounds. Add to that some friction in the Wooster home over a red cummerbund, purple socks and some snazzy old Etonian spats, and poor Bertie's really in the soup... Only one man can save the day — the inimitable Jeeves. The characters include: Bertie Wooster — Narrator who went to school with Bingo and also won a prize at his first school for the best collection of wild flowers; Jeeves — Bertie's valet who has an aunt who loves the romantic novels of Rosie M. Banks; Bingo Little — Mortimer's nephew who loves Mabel. He tells his uncle that Bertie is really Rosie M. Banks; Mabel — waitress in a tea shop; Mortimer Little — retired fat businessman who owned Little's Liniment — «It Limbers Up the Legs.» He is a gourmet; and Jane Watson — Mortimer's cook engaged to Jeeves, but not for long.»

Everyman Guides provide a spectacular, encyclopaedic reference to each destination's history, religion, art and architecture with more than 1,000 specially commissioned illustrations and photographs including 3D architectural drawings. Divided into three sections for ease of use: the encyclopaedia, the itineraries and a section of practical advice and information. It also includes detailed maps and advice on how to get around; comprehensive listings of places to visit with addresses and opening times and a selection of well-chosen hotels and restaurants.

It is often said that Rumi (aka Jalal al-Din, 1207-73) is now the most popular poet in the United States. This conquest of the new world by a middle-eastern medieval writer who died before Chaucer was even born has been achieved with extraordinary speed in less than thirty years. The main key to Rumi's success is the spiritual appeal of his work. It combines lyrical beauty with philosophical profundity, a sense of rapture and an acute awareness of human suffering in ways which speak directly to contemporary audiences. Like the metaphysical poets, Donne, Vaughan and Herbert, Rumi yokes together everyday images with complex ideas. He talks about divine love in vivid human terms. As a religious teacher of the Dervish order, he expounds the mystical doctrines of Sufism which focus on the notion of union with the Beloved to whom many of the poems are addressed. Persian poetry of this period is not easy to translate. In order to give the greatest possible access to a wonderful poet this selection draws on a variety of translations from the early 20th century to the present, ranging from scholarly renderings to free interpretations.

Many of these stores are now so famous from film and television adaptations that they need no introduction. Roald Dahl is well known as a master of the macabre and the unexpected in the tradition of Saki, and this volume does not disappoint. He began his literary career by writing about his own experiences in the RAF during World War II but soon developed this talent in a series of short-story collections. He is perhaps even more celebrated as an author of children's books, but the best of his short stories represent a claim for him to be numbered among the most remarkable story writers of the 20th century. The present volume includes for the first time all the stories in chronological order as established by Dahl's biographer, Jeremy Treglown, in consultation with the Dahl estate.

«Mr Sampath — The Printer of Malgudi» is the story of a businessman who adapts to the collapse of his weekly newspaper by shifting to screenplays, only to have the glamour of it all go to his head. In «The Financial Expert», a man of many hopes but few resources spends his time under a banyan tree dispensing financial advice to those willing to pay for his knowledge. In «Waiting for the Mahatma», a young drifter meets the most beautiful girl he has ever seen, an adherent of Mahatma Gandhi, and commits himself to Gandhi's Quit India campaign, a decision that will test the integrity of his ideals against the strength of his passions.»

Northern Lights introduces Lyra, an orphan, who lives in a parallel universe in which science, theology and magic are entwined. Lyra's search for a kidnapped friend uncovers a sinister plot involving stolen children and turns into a quest to understand a mysterious phenomenon called Dust. In The Subtle Knife she is joined on her journey by Will, a boy who possesses a knife that can cut windows between worlds. As Lyra learns the truth about her parents and her prophesied destiny, the two young people are caught up in a war against celestial powers that ranges across many worlds and leads to a thrilling conclusion in The Amber Spyglass . The epic story Pullman tells is not only a spellbinding adventure featuring armoured polar bears, magical devices, witches and daemons, it is also an audacious and profound re-imagining of Milton's Paradise Lost . An utterly entrancing blend of metaphysical speculation and bravura storytelling, His Dark Materials is a monumental and enduring achievement.

In this edition of his collected shorter fiction we can see why Somerset Maugham, celebrated as the author of Cakes and Ale and Of Human Bondage, is also regarded as a master of the short story. Open this substantial volume at any page and you will find evidence of his extraordinary art. Without narrative tricks and in a plain prose style, Maugham introduces us to the enormous range of characters and experiences he encountered in an unusually long life and recorded with the cool accuracy of a good doctor diagnosing disease. There are many famous stories here; some of them made into films such as The Force of Circumstance, Rain, P & O and The Colonel's Lady; others, less famous, charting mundane but mysterious events in all four quarters of the world.

Including all of Hemingway's shorter fiction, this collection is introduced by the poet James Fenton. The stories touch on the same themes as his novels: war, love, the nature of heroism, renunciation and the writer's life. They are arranged chronologically.

A series with silk-ribbon markers and headbands, gold stamping on front and spine, and the original colour illustrations on the jackets. First published in 1890, this collection of fairy tales contains the well-known English ones as well as British variants of stories common to many cultures.

The story of an obsessive middle-aged scholar who pursues an exquisite nymphet.

Lewis Carroll's two Alice stories are renowned for their fantastic plots and use of nonsense. The edition, containing both stories, features John Tenniel's original illustrations.

A complete and annotated edition of Shakespeare's non-dramatic verse, including the sonnets, Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece.

This narrative chronicles the decline of the American South through the experiences of Benjy Compson, who struggles to articulate his vision of life. William Faulkner is the author of As I Lay Dying and Sanctuary and he won the Nobel Prize in 1949.

Set in the Caucasus, the scene of Russia's military campaigns in the 19th century, this is both an adventure story and a sardonic look at the heroic ideals of the author's contemporaries — which makes it all the more ironic that the main character, Pushkin, (like the author) was killed in a duel.

This second volume of Chekhov's stories draws from his work of the 1880s and 90s and comprises A Daughter of Albion, An Incident, A Dreary Story, The Duel, The Chorus Girl, Ward 6, The Teacher of Literature, An Artist's Story, My Life, The Darling and The Lady with the Dog.