Penguin Classics

Introducing Little Clothbound Classics - irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas, and essays from the world's greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith. This candid portrayal of a woman who refuses to accept her allotted role as wife and mother caused an outcry when it was published in 1899. It is the story of Edna Pontellier, who spends...

Introducing Little Clothbound Classics — irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world's greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith. Lolly Willowes, so gentle and accommodating, has depths no one suspects. When she suddenly announces that she is leaving London and moving, alone, to the depths of the countryside, her overbearing relatives are horrified. But...

Kipling's masterpiece about a boy's journey through imperial India, edited by Harish Trivedi. Kim is Kipling's epic rendition of the imperial experience in India and is also his greatest long work. Two men - Kim, a boy growing into early manhood, and the lama, an old ascetic priest - are fired by a quest. Kim is white, although born in...

Marlow, a ferry-boat captain on foreign assignment in the Congo, searches for the legendary and feared Mr. Kurtz, unprepared for what he will find. On his journey, he encounters the darkness of the wilderness; the darkness of colonisation, and ultimately, the darkness within every man. Heart of Darkness is a powerful indictment of the evils of imperialism.

Peter Carson's new translation of Turgenev's vivid and honest tale of generational conflict. When Arkady Petrovich comes home from college, his father finds his eager, naive son changed almost beyond recognition, for the impressionable Arkady has fallen under the powerful influence of the friend he has brought with him. A self-proclaimed nihilist, the ardent young Bazarov shocks Arkady's father by...

A stunning clothbound edition of John Kennedy Toole's savagely funny, satirical masterpiece. A monument to sloth, rant, and contempt, a behemoth of fat, flatulence, and furious suspicion of anything modern—this is Ignatius J. Reilly of New Orleans, noble crusader against a world of dunces. The ordinary folk of New Orleans seem to think he is unhinged as well. Ignatius ignores...

Taken from the poverty of her parents' home in Portsmouth, Fanny Price is brought up with her rich cousins at Mansfield Park, acutely aware of her humble rank and with her cousin Edmund as her sole ally. Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith, these delectable and collectible editions are bound in high-quality...

90 classic titles celebrating 90 years of Penguin Books In one of the great English war memoirs, we learn what it is to cross the Pyrenees through freezing snow to fight fascism in Spain; to narrowly escape execution by your own side; to kill a man with a borrowed rifle and feel nothing but shame. Moving and shrapnel-sharp, A Moment...

The first complete new translation for 25 years of the acknowledged masterpiece of Japanese literature. Lady Murasaki's great 11th century novel is a beautifully crafted story of love, betrayal, and death at the Imperial Court. At the core of this epic is Prince Genji, the son of an emperor, whose passionate character, love affairs, and shifting political fortunes offer an...

The Diary recorded by Lady Murasaki (c. 973 – c. 1020), author of The Tale of Genji, is an intimate picture of her life as tutor and companion to the young Empress Shoshi. Told in a series of vignettes, it offers revealing glimpses of the Japanese imperial palace: the auspicious birth of a prince, rivalries between the Emperor's consorts, with...

The forgotten second volume of Capital, Marx's world-shaking analysis of economics, politics, and history, contains the vital discussion of commodity, the cornerstone to Marx's theories. The forgotten second volume of Capital, Marx's world-shaking analysis of economics, politics, and history, contains the vital discussion of commodity, the cornerstone to Marx's theories.

A mind-expanding space opera from one of Germany's most acclaimed science-fiction writers. In the dusty wastes of a far-flung planet, strange artisans toil. Like their fathers before them, they tie intricate knots out of the hair of their wives and daughters, slowly forming carpets. Delicate and unique, each carpet requires an entire lifetime of work—and all will be sold to...

Launching a major new paperback series - Penguin English Library The Penguin English Library Edition of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain 'I'm unfavourable to killin' a man as long as you can git around it; it ain't good sense, it ain't good morals. Ain't I right?' The original Great American Novel, an incomparable adventure story and a...

When a disturbed young Russian man came to Freud for treatment, the analysis of his childhood neuroses — most notably a dream about wolves outside his bedroom window — eventually revealed a deep-seated trauma. It took over four years to treat him, and The 'Wolfman' and Other Cases became one of Freud's most famous cases. Alongside the case history of...

Penguin Modern Classics presents Tennessee Williams' first successful play which has continued to win audiences over ever since. Abandoned by her husband, Amanda Wingfield comforts herself with recollections of her earlier, more gracious life in Blue Mountain, when she was pursued by 'gentleman callers'. Her son Tom, a poet with a job in a warehouse, longs for adventure and escape...

The First Man offers an incredibly moving account of Camus' poverty-stricken childhood in Algeria, the love of his silent mother, and the remarkable figure of an old schoolteacher who saved him from ignorance. Camus was working on a manuscript version of the book when he was killed in a car accident with his publisher Michel Gallimard. The First Man was...

New to Penguin Modern Classics, a moving portrayal of the fragility of the human mind and an acclaimed Norwegian masterpiece. The Birds is the story of Mattis, a mentally handicapped man who lives with and is cared for by his older sister, Hege. Within their isolated, lakeside existence, Mattis cannot make sense of his tangled thoughts, frightening apparitions, surges of...

Raymond Chandler created the fast-talking, trouble-seeking Californian private eye Philip Marlowe for his first great novel, The Big Sleep, in 1939. Marlowe's entanglement with the Sternwood family—and an attendant cast of colourful underworld figures—is the background to a story reflecting all the tarnished glitter of the great American Dream. The detective's iconic image burns just as brightly in Farewell My...

A complex, psychological novel about familial loyalty, new to Penguin Modern Classics. A corporate lawyer from the House of Single & Single is shot dead in cold blood on a Turkish hillside. A children's entertainer in Devon is hauled to his local bank late at night to explain a monumental influx of cash. A Russian freighter is arrested in the...

A romantic, thrilling memoir that has become a French classic. You will be a great hero, a general, Gabriele d'Annunzio, Ambassador of France! For his whole life, Romain Gary's fierce, eccentric mother had only one aim: to make her son a great man. And she did. This, his thrilling, wildly romantic autobiography, is the story of his journey from poverty...

A PMC reissue of this collection of Kafka's greatest short fiction, translated by Michael Hofmann. A reissue of the Penguin Modern Classics edition, this collection of new translations brings together the small proportion of Kafka's works that he himself thought worthy of publication. It includes Metamorphosis, his most famous work, an exploration of horrific transformation and alienation; Meditation, a collection...

Selby Jr's controversial cult classic, new to Penguin Modern Classics. Few novels have caused as much controversy as Hubert Selby Jr.'s notorious masterpiece. Described by various reviewers as hellish and obscene, it tells the stories of New Yorkers who at every turn confront the worst excesses in human nature. Yet there are moments of exquisite tenderness in these troubled lives....

The rhapsodic, ground-breaking cult classic about a young woman's battle with schizophrenia. With a Foreword by Esme Weijun Wang and an Afterword by the author 'She fought them with her head and her teeth while the restraints were being tied, trying, doglike, to bite herself.' Sixteen-year-old Deborah's identity is shattering as she retreats further and further from the 'normal' world...

Growing up in a mining community in rural South Wales, Huw Morgan is taught many harsh lessons. Looking back, where difficult days are faced with courage and the valleys swell with the sound of Welsh voices, it becomes clear that there is nowhere so green as the landscape of his own memory. How Green Was My Valley explores themes of...

Le Carré exposes the ugly face of international relations in this spy thriller, new to Penguin Modern Classics. West Germany, a simmering cauldron of radical protests, has produced a new danger to Britain—Karfeld, the menacing leader of the opposition. At the same time, Leo Harting, a Second Secretary in the British Embassy, has gone missing—along with more than forty Confidential...

A boundary-breaking, riveting romance narrative from the seminal Brazilian writer, Clarice Lispector. A lonely woman in Rio de Janeiro makes a connection that will change her life. Ulisses, a mysterious man, has penetrated her soul and turned her inside out. An Apprenticeship or The Book of Pleasures is a devastating novel of the interior, of a woman yearning to love,...

Nabokov's other great love story, following an extraordinary relationship across decades and continents. Written in mischievous and magically flowing prose, Ada or Ardor is a romance that follows Ada from her first childhood meeting with Van Veen on his uncle's country estate, in a 'dream-bright' America, through eighty years of rapture, as they cross continents, are continually parted and reunited....

Pale Fire is a novel constructed around the last great poem of a fictional American poet, John Shade, and an account of his death. The poem appears in full, and the narrative develops through the lengthy, and increasingly eccentric, notes by his posthumous editor.

Twenty new titles in the much-loved and hugely successful Penguin English Library series. Nineteen Eighty-Four 'Who controls the past controls the future - who controls the present controls the past.' Hidden away in the Record Department of the sprawling Ministry of Truth, Winston Smith skilfully rewrites the past to suit the needs of the Party. Yet he inwardly rebels against...

Sagan's stylish, shimmering and amoral tale of adolescence and betrayal on the French Riviera. Published when she was only eighteen, Françoise Sagan's astonishing first novel Bonjour Tristesse became an instant bestseller. It tells the story of Cecile, who leads a carefree life with her widowed father and his young mistresses until, one hot summer on the Riviera, he decides to...

Fully restored edition of Anthony Burgess' original text Edited by Andrew BiswellWith a Foreword by Martin Amis Fifteen-year-old Alex likes lashings of ultraviolence. He and his gang of friends rob, kill, and rape their way through a nightmarish future, until the State puts a stop to his riotous excesses. But what will his re-education mean? A dystopian horror, a black...

"You have talked so often of going to the dogs - and well, here are the dogs, and you have reached them." George Orwell's vivid memoir of his time among the desperately poor and destitute in London and Paris is a moving tour of the underworld of society. Here he painstakingly documents a world of unrelenting drudgery and squalor. Sleeping...

Holly Golightly, glittering socialite traveller, generally upwards, sometimes sideways and once in a while down. She's up all night drinking cocktails and breaking hearts. She's a shoplifter, a delight, a drifter, a tease. She hasn't got a past. She doesn't want to belong to anything or anyone. Not to 'Rusty' Trawler, the blue-chinned, cuff-shooting millionaire man about women about town....

The Art of War is the ultimate guide to winning. Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves - and each other. They have inspired debate, dissent, war, and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked, and comforted. They have enriched lives - and destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the works of...

A Victorian scientist propels himself into the future. Entranced at first by the Eloi, an elfin species descended from man, he soon realises that this beautiful people are simply remnants of a once-great culture—now weak and childishly afraid of the dark. They have reason to be afraid: in tunnels beneath their paradise lurks another race—the sinister Morlocks. When the scientist's...

Beautiful Star is the novel Yukio Mishima considered to be one of his best works— a tale of family, nuclear war, love, and UFOs. The Osugi family have come to a realization. Each of them hails from a different planet: Father from Mars, Mother from Jupiter, Son from Mercury, and Daughter from Venus. Already seen as oddballs in their small...

Orwell's peerless satire, in Penguin Clothbound Classics for the first time. When the downtrodden animals of Manor Farm overthrow their master, Mr Jones, and take over the farm themselves, they imagine it is the beginning of a life of freedom and equality. But gradually a cunning, ruthless elite among them, masterminded by the pigs Napoleon and Snowball, starts to take...

In 1940, John Steinbeck sailed in a sardine boat with his friend, the biologist Edward F. Ricketts, to collect marine invertebrates from the beaches of the Gulf of California. The day-to-day story of the trip is given in the log, which combines science, philosophy, and high-spirited adventure. This edition also includes Steinbeck’s profile of his fellow traveller.

The heroic Greek dramas that have moved theatre-goers and readers since the fifth century B.C. Towering over the rest of Greek tragedy, the three plays that tell the story of the fated Theban royal family—Antigone, Oedipus the King, and Oedipus at Colonus—are among the most enduring and timeless dramas ever written. Robert Fagles's authoritative and acclaimed translation conveys all of...

The Honourable Schoolboy, the second book in John le Carré's revered 'Karla Trilogy' and a distinguished addition to Penguin Modern Classics, delves deep into the shadowy world of espionage with its gripping and intricate narrative. In the aftermath of a shocking betrayal, the once-mighty British Secret Service is left in shambles, and the responsibility of reviving it falls to George...

The Constant Gardener by John le Carré is a masterfully crafted tale of love, loss, and the quest for justice, set against a backdrop of political intrigue and corporate corruption. This gripping narrative begins with the brutal murder of Tessa Quayle, a passionate and determined humanitarian, on the remote shores of Lake Turkana in Northern Kenya. The enigmatic circumstances surrounding...

The Consolation of Philosophy by Ancius Boethius is a profound philosophical work that intricately weaves together prose and verse to explore some of the most enduring questions of human existence. The narrative centres around Boethius himself, once a prominent public figure and a distinguished scholar, who finds solace in philosophy during a period of great personal adversity. Imprisoned on charges...

Letters from a Stoic by Seneca is a timeless philosophical work that dives deep into the heart and mind of one of Ancient Rome's greatest thinkers. Through a collection of epistolary writings, Seneca, the eminent Stoic philosopher, shares his wisdom and insights on how to lead a meaningful and virtuous life. These letters, originally penned to his friend Lucilius, discuss...

Discipline and Punish by Michel Foucault delves deeply into the history and development of modern penal systems. It explores the transformations in Western societies' approach to punishment, shifting from a grotesque and public spectacle of torture to a more civilised, seemingly humane practice of incarceration. Foucault meticulously traces the evolution of social control mechanisms, presenting a compelling argument that modern...

In the uproarious sequel to Life Among the Savages, the beloved author of The Haunting of Hill House confronts the most vexing demons yet—her own children. Shirley Jackson, with her trademark wit and uncanny precision, skewers the trials of domestic life in 1950s America. In Raising Demons, Jackson's four offspring have now grown into fully-fledged little devils, turning everyday family...

Notes of a Native Son is a seminal work of social and cultural criticism by James Baldwin, one of the most distinguished intellectuals of the twentieth century. First published in 1955, this powerful collection of essays captures Baldwin's reflections on the intricate dynamics of race and identity during the formative years of the civil rights movement. Written when Baldwin was...

The acclaimed bestseller and international sensation, reissued with a new PMC jacket. Survivor, genius, perfumer, killer - this is Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. He is abandoned on the filthy streets as a child, but grows up to discover he has an extraordinary gift: a sense of smell more powerful than any other human's. Soon, he is creating the most sublime fragrances in...

The Unwomanly Face of War by Svetlana Alexievich is a hauntingly powerful oral history that delves into the seldom-heard experiences of Soviet women during the Second World War. Through meticulous storytelling and unwavering commitment to truth, Alexievich illuminates the profound and often heart-wrenching realities faced by these women, transcending the boundaries of conventional war narratives. This extraordinary book presents the...

In this novel, Antoine Roquentin, an introspective historian, records the disturbing shifts in his perceptions and his struggle to restore meaning to life in a continuing present and without lies. This is Sartre's first published novel and his first extended essay on existential philosophy.

George Eliot's masterful classic, in a gorgeous new clothbound edition. Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith, these delectable and collectible editions are bound in high-quality colourful, tactile cloth with foil stamped into the design. Middlemarch, George Eliot's most ambitious novel, is a masterly evocation of diverse lives and changing fortunes in a...

Written in 1908, A Room with a View is one of E.M. Forster's earliest and most celebrated works. Forster's social comedy is a witty observation of the English middle classes as they holiday abroad in Florence. One of these tourists is Lucy Honeychurch, a young girl whose heart is awakened by her experiences in Italy.

A new translation of Sade's most notorious, shocking and influential novel. This horrible but hugely important text has influenced countless individuals throughout history. Flaubert and Baudelaire both read Sade; the surrealists were obsessed with him; filmmakers like Pasolini saw parallels with twentieth-century history in his writings; and feminists such as Simone de Beauvoir and Angela Carter clashed over him. This...

One of Williams' best-loved plays, this emotional rollercoaster tells the tale of the iconic Blanche DuBois and her demise by Stanley Kowalski. Fading southern belle Blanche DuBois depends on the kindness of strangers and is adrift in the modern world. When she arrives to stay with her sister Stella in a crowded, boisterous corner of New Orleans, her delusions of...

One of the greatest classics of Chinese literature One of China's Four Great Classical Novels, Monkey King was written anonymously during the Ming dynasty and is most commonly attributed to Wu Cheng'en, the son of a silk-shop clerk from east China. It recounts a Tang-dynasty monk's quest for Buddhist scriptures, accompanied by an omni-talented kung-fu Monkey King called Sun Wukong;...

The Collected Stories of Katherine Mansfield comes with a new introduction by Ali Smith. Katherine Mansfield's clear, sparkling, and perceptive short stories revolutionised the genre, and this collection represents the whole range of her writing. Moving and resonant, full of light and colour, they span from short, sharp studies to longer, richer tales. This volume encompasses her three major works:...

The Wretched of the Earth by Frantz Fanon is a profoundly influential text that delves into the pervasive impacts of colonisation and the relentless drive for liberation. Set against the backdrop of the Algerian struggle for independence from French colonial rule, the book dissects the psychological, cultural, and political effects of colonialism on both the oppressed and the oppressor. Published...

Set at the height of the tulipomania that gripped Holland in the 17th century, this is the story of Cornelius van Baerle, a humble grower whose sole desire is to grow the perfect specimen of the tulip negra. When his godfather is murdered, Cornelius finds himself caught up in the deadly politics of the time, imprisoned and facing a death...

Beyond Good and Evil demonstrates that the world is steeped in false piety and infected with a 'slave morality'. With wit and subversive energy, Nietzsche demands that the individual impose their own 'will to power' upon the world. One of the most iconoclastic philosophers of all time, Nietzsche dramatically rejected notions of good and evil, truth and God. Beyond Good...

This collection captures the essence of a remarkable woman, one of the foremost thinkers of our century. Simone Weil was one of the foremost thinkers of the twentieth century—a philosopher, theologian, critic, sociologist and political activist. This anthology spans the wide range of her thought and includes an extract from her best-known work The Need for Roots, exploring the ways...

Writing at the time of Napoleon's greatest campaigns, Prussian soldier and writer Carl von Clausewitz created this treatise on the art of warfare, which presented war as part of a coherent system of political thought. He is best remembered for his pronouncement that war is a continuation of politics by other means and for his observations on total war. Clausewitz...

Philip K. Dick's cult novel—now in an official tie-in edition to accompany the new TV series. Imagine the world if the Allies had lost the Second World War... Philip K. Dick trips the switches of our minds with his vision of the world as it might have been—the African continent virtually wiped out, the Mediterranean drained to make farmland, the...

The Birth of Tragedy by Friedrich Nietzsche delves into the heart of ancient Greek culture, shedding light on its glorious artistic achievements, particularly in the realm of tragedy. In this profound exploration, Nietzsche grapples with the sombre beauty that lies within Greek tragedies, examining the interplay between two opposing artistic forces: the Apollonian, representing order and rationality, and the Dionysian,...

One of the major poets of Romanticism, Wordsworth epitomized the spirit of his age with his celebration of the natural world and the spontanous expression of feeling. This volume contains a rich selection from the most creative phase of his life, including extracts from his masterpiece, The Prelude, and the best-loved of his shorter poems such as 'Composed Upon Westminster...

Nicholas Nickleby is relaunched as part of Penguin Classics, showcasing the work of a young novelist at the height of his powers. This book is truly one of the touchstones of the English comic novel. At the heart of the story is Nicholas Nickleby and the misfortunes of his family, around which Dickens created a cast of some of his...

The tale of Little Nell gripped the nation when it first appeared in 1841. Described as a "tragedy of sorrows", the story tells of Nell uprooted from a secure and innocent childhood and cast into a world where evil takes many shapes, the most fascinating of which is the stunted, lecherous Quilp. Blending realism with non-realistic genres such as fairy-tale,...

The four years that Dostoevsky spent in a Siberian prison camp were nasty, brutish and long, the most agonising of his life. Its documentary detail—the convicts and their fascinating stories, the wooden plank bed that they sleep on, the cabbage soup swimming with cockroaches that they eat—is made all the more vivid by the controlled, oddly impersonal tone of the...

The ten stories collected in this volume demonstrate Tolstoy's artistic prowess displayed over five decades, experimenting with prose styles and drawing on his own experiences with humour, realism, and compassion. Inspired by his experiences in the army, The Two Hussars contrasts a dashing father and his mean-spirited son. Illustrating Tolstoy's belief that art must serve a moral purpose, What Men...

The Castle is Kafka's last great, unfinished novel— the book that hangs over the whole modern era like a nightmare. The Castle tells the story of K., the unwanted Land Surveyor who is never to be admitted to the Castle nor accepted in the village, and yet cannot go home. As he encounters dualities of certainty and doubt, hope and...

Sweet Thursday reads as a post-war continuation of Cannery Row. Set on the Californian coast, amongst the junk heaps and flop houses of Monterey, the book brings to life the denizens of a netherworld of laughter and tears. From Fauna, who runs the local brothel, to Hazel, a bum whose mother must have wanted a daughter, the rich tapestry of...

Since the original, prewar translation, there has been no completely new rendering of the French original into English. This translation brings to the fore a more sharply engaged, comic, and lucid Proust, creating one of the greatest, most entertaining reading experiences in any language. As the great story unfolds from its magical opening scenes to its devastating end, Penguin makes...

Declarations of War is Len Deighton's only collection of short stories, examining the experiences of soldiers across two millennia of war. This collection of thirteen stories offers an inside view of fighting men poised at the edge of death. It is a dazzling array of stories that spans twenty-three centuries of warfare. From Hannibal's march on Rome—when strange, moving objects...

Twenty new titles in the much-loved and hugely successful Penguin English Library series. I will not read it; I should never sleep again A doctor performs an experiment on a young woman that goes horribly wrong, and a series of increasingly strange events follow—sinister woodland rituals, disappearances, suicides... Viewed as immoral and decadent on first publication in 1894, Machen's weird...

Launching a major new paperback series - Penguin English Library. The Penguin English Library edition of North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell. 'How am I to dress up in my finery, and go off and away to smart parties, after the sorrow I have seen today?' Elizabeth Gaskell's compassionate, richly dramatic novel features one of the most original and fully-rounded...

The new paperback series - Penguin English Library 'Every night as I gazed up at the window I said softly to myself the word paralysis. It had always sounded strangely in my ears ... But now it sounded to me like the name of some maleficent and sinful being. It filled me with fear, and yet I longed to be...

One of the greatest philosophical works of all time, in a new translation for the twenty-first century. Widely regarded as one of the most influential philosophical works of the twentieth century, Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus is a succinct yet wide-ranging exploration of language and logic, science and mysticism, which has inspired generations of thinkers, artists and poets. In a series...

In God is Dead. God Remains Dead. And We Have Killed Him., renowned philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche explores profound and controversial themes central to the existential movement. The work is a searing critique of religion, morality, and the profound shift in human consciousness that ensues with the death of God. Nietzsche posits a world where traditional beliefs are no longer tenable,...

Stefan Zweig's classic novella of obsession, madness and chess. In 1941, a cruise ship is heading to Buenos Aires, and on board, a group of eager passengers challenge the reigning world chess champion to a match. At first, they lose pitifully, until a kind stranger aids them by whispering instructions. He is a masterful chess player, and as they play,...

46 new books in the bestselling Little Black Classics series, to celebrate the first ever Penguin Classic in 1946 'It's coming - the postponeless Creature'

When Kino, an Indian pearl-diver, finds The Pearl of the World, he believes that his life will be magically transformed. He will marry Juana in church and their little boy, Coyotito, will attend school. Obsessed by his dreams, Kino is blind to the greed, fear and violence the pearl arouses in him and his neighbours. Written with lyrical simplicity The...

The Little Black Classics series introduces 46 new books to celebrate the first-ever Penguin Classic in 1946. Love That Moves the Sun and Other Stars by Dante Alighieri evokes happiness beyond all words, portraying a life filled with peace and love, entire and whole.