Penguin Classics

The History of Mr Polly tells the story of Mr Polly, an ordinary middle-aged man exhausted by his wife's nagging and his monotonous job as the owner of a regional gentleman's outfitters. Confronted with the looming threat of bankruptcy, Mr Polly decides that the only escape from his frustrating existence is to burn down his shop and take his own...

One of the most startling literary debuts of all time, now in Penguin Black Classics. As the First World War reaches its final year, an illicit love affair begins between a sixteen-year-old boy and a young woman married to a soldier at the front. They meet secretly in her flat on the outskirts of Paris, in cornfields and on river...

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. Territory of Light is the radiant story of a young woman, living alone in Tokyo with her two-year-old daughter, in her first year of separation from her husband. At once tender and lacerating, luminous and...

First time in Black Classics for this famous Victorian retelling of the stories of Shakespeare's plays - sells 8-10,000/year in its PPC edition. As children, Charles and Mary Lamb took great delight in exploring their benefactor's extensive library; as adults, they began writing children's books together that also appealed to all generations. In Tales from Shakespeare, they wished to bring...

Rousseau's final work and meditation After a period of forced exile and solitary wandering brought about by his radical views on religion and politics, Jean-Jacques Rousseau returned to Paris in 1770. Here, in the last two years of his life, he wrote his final work, the Reveries. In this eloquent masterpiece, the great political thinker describes his sense of isolation...

Coming from a society where women were barred from serious writing and teaching, Julian, an anchorite of the great medieval city of Norwich, nevertheless uses her womanliness and the English vernacular of the day to describe a series of revelations which she received from God in the year 1373. She identifies the female nature of Christ's suffering and the motherhood...

This work is far more than an eloquent piece of occasional writing. For Burke is one of the foremost conservative British political thinkers: in his support for piecemeal reform rather than revolutionary change, in his sceptical belief in expediency and practical wisdom rather than abstract theorising, and in his defence of property, religion and traditional institutions. On all these topics,...

The first of the great Greek tragedians, Aeschylus wrote a large number of plays, of which seven survive. Of the four included in this volume, The Persians is unique in Greek tragedy in having as its subject matter a recent historical event, the defeat of the Persians at the famous battle of Salamis. The other three, Prometheus, The Suppliants and...

Petersburg by Andrei Bely is a vivid, memorable, and striking story set at the heart of the 1905 Russian revolution. This colourful evocation of Russia's capital during the short, turbulent period of the first socialist revolution is considered Bely's masterpiece. The story follows Nikolai Ableukhov's journey as he is caught up in the revolutionary politics of those seminal days. Exploring...

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. Pericles, Prince of Tyre, must solve a riddle in order to marry the daughter of the King of Antioch, or be put to death. But when the answer reveals a horrific secret, the young man faces his greatest dilemma. Danger and adventure follow...

For the great Roman orator and statesman Cicero, the good life was at once a life of contentment and one of moral virtue, and the two were inescapably intertwined. This volume brings together a wide range of his reflections upon the importance of moral integrity in the search for happiness. In essays that are articulate, meditative, and inspirational, Cicero presents...

New edition of one of the most powerful of the Icelandic prose sagas Written in the thirteenth century, Njal's Saga is a story that explores perennial human problems—from failed marriages to divided loyalties, from the law's inability to curb human passions to the terrible consequences when decent men and women are swept up in a tide of violence beyond their...

A seminal work of science fiction—an unnerving vision of the consequences of unchecked overpopulation. The planet's population has exploded. The 35 million inhabitants of New York City run their TVs off pedal power, riot for water, trample for lentil 'steaks', and sweat beneath a sweltering sun. Amid it all, a city cop tries to catch a gangster's killer and vie...

A Russian heir to Charles Dickens, Leskov is one of the great, underrated voices of nineteenth-century Russia. An outsider from the literary establishment of his day, Nikolai Leskov is one of the most unique voices of nineteenth-century Russia, combining a profound religious spirit with a fascination for idiosyncratic characters, lurid crimes, comic absurdity and the joy of pure story. This...

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. Henry VI Part Two tells the story of Henry VI, who is tricked into marrying Margaret, the lover of the Earl of Suffolk. Suffolk hopes to rule the kingdom through her influence. There is one great obstacle in Suffolk's path, however—the noble Lord...

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. Angered by the loss of his son in battle, the Earl of Northumberland supports another rebellion against King Henry IV, bringing the country to the brink of civil war. Sick and weary, the old King sends out his forces, including the unruly Sir...

When the young nobleman Harold Transome returns to England from the colonies with a self-made fortune, he scandalises the town of Treby Magna with his decision to stand for Parliament as a Radical. But after the idealistic Felix Holt also returns to the town, the difference between Harold's opportunistic values and Holt's profound beliefs becomes apparent. Forthright, brusque and driven...

A major new translation of Goethe's Faust, Part Two - one of the greatest dramatic-poetic works in all of German literature - by award-winning poet and translator David Constantine. In this sequel to Faust, Mephistopheles takes Faust on a journey through ancient Greek mythology, conjuring for him the insurpassably beautiful Helen of Troy, as well as the classical gods. Faust...

Byron's exotic poem on the love life and adventures of Don Juan. Byron's exuberant masterpiece tells of the adventures of Don Juan, beginning with his illicit love affair at the age of sixteen in his native Spain and his subsequent exile to Italy. Following a dramatic shipwreck, his exploits take him to Greece, where he is sold as a slave,...

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. Celebrating the range and diversity of Penguin Classics, they take us from snowy Japan to springtime Vienna, from haunted New England to a sun-drenched Mediterranean island, and from a game of chess on the ocean to...

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. Karen Blixen, author of the acclaimed memoir Out of Africa, was also a master of the short story form. Her tales offer luminous meditations on rebirth and redemption, and on the mystery and unexpectedness of...

Aspects of the Novel is a collection of literary lectures by E.M. Forster, published in 1927. For the purposes of his study, Forster defines the novel as "any fictitious prose work over 50,000 words." Forster's wit and lively, informed originality have made this study of the novel a classic. Avoiding the chronological approach of what he calls "pseudoscholarship," Forster freely...

This new translation, the first to be based on the latest critical edition of Ibsen's works, offers the best version available in English. Four of Ibsen's most important plays in superb modern translations, part of the new Penguin Ibsen series. With her assertion that she is 'first and foremost a human being', Nora Helmer sent shockwaves throughout Europe when she...

This collection of Chekhov's finest early writing reveals a young writer mastering the art of the short story. The Steppe, which established his reputation, is the unforgettable tale of a boy's journey to a new school in Kiev, travelling through majestic landscapes towards an unknown destiny. Gusev depicts an ocean voyage, where the sea takes on a terrifying, primeval power;...

The greatest classic of Vietnamese literature in a stunning new verse translation. "This manuscript is ancient, priceless, bamboo-rolled, perfumed with musty spices. Sit comfortably by this good light, that you may learn the hard-won lesson that these characters contain." The Song of Kieu is the greatest classic of Vietnamese literature. It tells the story of the beautiful Vuong Thoy Kieu,...

First time in Black Classics Nonsense is the breath of my nostrils, wrote Edward Lear (1812-88), and this collection demonstrates the wonderfully varied ways in which he pursued his philosophy of life. He created an extraordinary world filled with bizarre creatures - from the Dong with a luminous nose to the Pobble who has no toes - who misbehave with...

The plays in this volume all contain Aristophanes' trademark bawdy comedy and dazzling verbal agility. In The Birds, two frustrated Athenians join the birds to build the utopian city of 'Much Cuckoo in the Clouds'. The Knights is a venomous satire on Cleon, a prominent Athenian demagogue, while The Assembly Women deals with the battle of the sexes as the...

On Love and Barley by Matsuo Basho presents the work of one of the greatest Japanese poets, a master of haiku. Known not only for his literary genius, Basho was also a Buddhist monk and a lifelong traveller. His poems embody 'karumi', or lightness of touch, and embrace the Zen ideal of oneness with creation. Each verse beautifully evokes aspects...

One Hundred Poets, One Poem Each offers a new translation of the most widely known and popular collection of Japanese poetry. The best-loved and most widely read of all Japanese poetry collections, the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu contains 100 short poems on nature, the seasons, travel, and, above all, love. Dating back to the seventh century, these elegant, precisely observed waka...

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. Thirteen ingeniously crafted stories make up Vladimir Nabokov's baker's dozen. In some of these stories, shadowy people pass through, cooped up by life, with nowhere to escape. In others, elusive glimpses of fleeting happiness, which...

In Youth is Pleasure is a gay classic coming-of-age novel and an unforgettable slice of British interwar upper-middle-class life. Orvil Pym does not fit in. A waifish, eccentric, sensitive fifteen-year-old, he hates school and longs to be alone. Spending his Summer holidays in a genteel Surrey hotel with his mysterious father and two brothers who don't understand him, he explores...

A wonderful collection of Housman's much-loved poetry, new to Penguin Classics. A. E. Housman was one of the best-loved poets of his day, whose poems conjure up a potent and idyllic rural world imbued with a poignant sense of loss. They are expressed in simple rhythms, yet show a fine ear for the subtleties of metre and alliteration. His scope...

In The War with Hannibal, Livy (59 BC – AD 17) chronicles the events of the Second Punic War between Rome and Carthage, until the Battle of Zama in 202 BC. He vividly recreates the immense armies of Hannibal, complete with elephants, crossing the Alps; the panic as they approached the gates of Rome; and the decimation of the Roman...

A major anthology of great Japanese short stories, now in Penguin Classics. This fantastically varied and exciting collection celebrates the great Japanese short story, from its modern origins in the nineteenth century to the remarkable works being written today. Short story writers already well-known to English-language readers are all included here—Tanizaki, Akutagawa, Murakami, Mishima, Kawabata—but also many surprising new finds....

Composed for recitation at festivals, these 33 songs were written in honour of the gods and goddesses of the ancient Greek pantheon. They recount the key episodes in the lives of the gods and dramatise the moments when they first appear before mortals. Together, they offer a vivid picture of the Greek view of the relationship between the divine and...

The Garden of the Gods by Gerald Durrell is a cherished account of his childhood in Corfu, now available in Penguin Modern Classics for the first time. "My collection of animals swelled to a point where even Mother occasionally grew alarmed." The island of Corfu, where the Durrell family live in agreeable chaos, is paradise for aspiring naturalist Gerald. His...

Few figures in intellectual history have proved as notorious and ambiguous as Niccolo Machiavelli. For while his treatise The Prince made his name synonymous with autocratic ruthlessness and cynical manipulation, The Discourses (c.1517) shows a radically different outlook on the world of politics. In this carefully argued commentary on Livy's history of republican Rome, Machiavelli proposes a system of government...

In her introduction, Janet Gezari discusses issues of dating and authenticity that arise with Brontë's poems, and the ways in which the Gondal poems relate to the lost prose narratives on the same subject. The poems of Emily Jane Brontë are passionate and powerful works that convey the vitality of the human spirit and of the natural world. Only twenty-one...

This is a definitive collection of Christopher Marlowe's plays. His seven plays dramatise the fatal lure of potent forces, religious, occult and erotic. In the victories of Tamburlaine, Faustus's encounters with the demonic, the irreverence of Barabas, and the humiliation of Edward, Marlowe explores the shifting balance between power and helplessness, the sacred and its desecration. The Complete Plays offers...

New to Classics The Book of Chuang Tzu draws together the stories, tales, jokes and anecdotes that have gathered around the figure of Chuang Tzu. One of the great founders of Taoism, Chuang Tzu lived in the fourth century BC and is among the most enjoyable and intriguing personalities in the whole of Chinese philosophy.

Available for the first time in Black Classics Species of Spaces and Other Pieces by Georges Perec showcases some of the most entertaining and spirited essays of his age. Perec's literary output was remarkably varied in form and style. This generous selection of his non-fictional work also demonstrates his characteristic lightness of touch, wry humour, and accessibility.

A new edition of the finest poems by Tennyson Tennyson's poetry epitomises the Victorian age, for which he became a spokesman. His finest poems are often steeped in a sensuous melancholy, as in Maud, or are chivalric, heroic and allegorical, as in The Lady of Shalott and Morte d'Arthur.

With an introduction that discusses Blake's life and career, his reputation, and the major themes of his work, and explores the relationship between the poetry and the illustrations. Writer and religious rebel, William Blake (1757-1827) sowed the seeds for Romanticism in his innovative poems concerning faith and the visions that inspired him throughout his life. Whether describing his own spirituality,...

Blending Danish folklore with magical storytelling, Hans Christian Andersen's unique fairy tales describe a world of beautiful princesses and sinister queens, rewarded virtue and unresolved desire. Rich with popular tales such as The Ugly Duckling, The Emperor's New Clothes, and the darkly enchanting The Snow Queen, this revelatory new collection also contains many lesser-known but intriguing stories. Among these is...

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. Filled with rich description and luxurious beauty, these ten tales of loss and longing from one of Japan's greatest writers show the pull between duty and desire, ecstasy and death. Experience stories of a mother lost...

Two of Virginia Woolf's most striking essays are published together in a new Black Classics edition. A Room of One's Own, based on a lecture given at Girton College, Cambridge, is one of the great feminist polemics. It ranges in its themes from Jane Austen and Charlotte Brontë to the silent fate of Shakespeare's gifted (imaginary) sister, and the effects...

One of the most celebrated works of classic literature for children, Wind in the Willows follows Mole, Rat, Toad and Badger from one adventure to the next—in gipsy caravans, stolen sports cars, to prison and back to the Wild Wood. A story of animal cunning and human camaraderie, this remains a timeless tale nearly 100 years after its publication.

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. An embittered Roman General returns from war, having captured the Queen of the Goths and her three sons. Sacrificing the eldest in memory of his own sons killed in battle, he provokes the queen's unending hatred. And when she is made empress by...

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. The jealous King of Sicily becomes convinced that his wife is carrying the child of his best friend. Imprisoned and put on trial, the Queen collapses when the King refuses to accept the divine confirmation of her innocence. The child is abandoned to...

This is the Classics edition of one of the greatest works created by any culture, and overwhelmingly the most influential of all Tibetan Buddhist texts in the West. The most graceful English translation of this masterpiece of world literature—prepared with the participation of the Dalai Lama and eminent contemporary masters of this tradition appointed by the Dalai Lama. One of...

A beautiful edition of Anne Brontë's most enduring novel, to accompany her sisters' greatest books in Penguin Clothbound Classics. Gilbert Markham is deeply intrigued by Helen Graham, a beautiful and secretive young woman who has moved into nearby Wildfell Hall with her young son. He is quick to offer Helen his friendship, but when her reclusive behaviour becomes the subject...

Writing in the eleventh century, Khayyam was one of the most accomplished masters of the new and increasingly popular ruba'i, or two-line stanza, that had been adopted by poets to help them shake off the artifice of conventional court poetry and express their personal feelings with wit and clarity. Khayyam ranges in his stanzas through the most fundamental aspects of...

Penguin Classics relaunch The Moonstone, a priceless yellow diamond, is looted from an Indian temple and maliciously bequeathed to Rachel Verinder. On her eighteenth birthday, her friend and suitor Franklin Blake brings the gift to her. That very night, it is stolen again. No one is above suspicion, as the idiosyncratic Sergeant Cuff and Franklin piece together a puzzling series...

The High Window by Raymond Chandler introduces us to Philip Marlowe, a private investigator entangled in a seemingly straightforward case. His client, a dried-up husk of a woman, has tasked him with retrieving a rare gold coin, the Brasher Doubloon, that has disappeared from her late husband's collection. It sounds simple enough. Maybe too simple. However, with every reappearance of...

A new translation by Valerie Roebuck of this seminal work of Buddhist literature. One of the best-known and best-loved works of Buddhist literature, The Dhammapada forms part of the oldest surviving body of Buddhist writings and is traditionally regarded as the authentic teachings of the Buddha himself. These teachings were spoken by him during his lifetime and memorised and handed...

Keats' poetic genius was first seen in 1816 when he published the first of a series of great works. He was variously hailed as an important poetical figure, the natural heir to the Romantic throne and, like Shelley before him, criticised for his politics. In his short life, he proved to be one of the greatest and most original thinkers...

Classic science-fiction tales from the twentieth century's master of the weird. In the deep glens of Massachusetts, in the wild hills of Vermont, and in Australia's sandy wastes, unfathomable things lurk. Things that shine with an unnatural light, that speak and buzz strangely in the night, that prowl in the mind. Things not of our Earth. Widely considered to be...

The Analects are a collection of Confucius's sayings brought together by his pupils shortly after his death in 497 BC. Together, they express a philosophy, or a moral code, by which Confucius, one of the most humane thinkers of all time, believed everyone should live. Upholding the ideals of wisdom, self-knowledge, courage, and love of one's fellow man, he argued...

From the award-winning translator of The Iliad and The Odyssey comes a brilliant new translation of Virgil's great epic. Fleeing the ashes of Troy, Aeneas, Achilles' mighty foe in the Iliad, begins an incredible journey to fulfil his destiny as the founder of Rome. His voyage will take him through stormy seas, entangle him in a tragic love affair, and...

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. Emerging from their smoke-filled rooms at 21B Baker Street, Holmes and Watson grapple with the forces of crime that stalk the streets of London. From the first story, A Scandal in Bohemia, where Holmes is foiled by...

New translation of Dante's masterpiece by acclaimed Robin Kirkpatrick In Purgatorio Dante, having described his journey into Hell, narrates his ascent of Mount Purgatory with Virgil, as he encounters penitents who toil through physical agonies, starvation and flames to assuage their earthly vices. Only by learning from them can he achieve his final enlightened transition to the lost Earthly Paradise...

Innocents abroad are drawn into the darkest recesses of the financial world in this urgent and electrifying thriller, now in the giftable hardback series. An English couple, Perry and Gail, are taking an off-peak holiday on the Caribbean island of Antigua. By seeming chance they bump into a Russian millionaire called Dima who owns a peninsula and a diamond-encrusted gold...

Metamorphoses by Ovid is a deliciously clever and exuberant epic, presented in a gorgeous new clothbound edition. Ovid's sensuous and witty poetry brings together a dazzling array of mythological tales, ingeniously linked by the idea of transformation—often as a result of love or lust—where men and women find themselves magically changed into new and sometimes extraordinary beings. Beginning with the...

Aristophanes was a contemporary of Socrates and the last and greatest of the old Attic comedians, but unfortunately, only 11 of his plays survive. Of these, Lysistrata and Other Plays contains three: Lysistrata, The Acharnians, and The Clouds. Aristophanes was sceptical about the democratic system of government and was critical of the eagerness with which the people committed themselves to...

Regarded as little more than a stammering fool, the nobleman Claudius quietly survives the intrigues, bloody purges, and mounting cruelty of the imperial Roman dynasties. He watches and records the activities of the wise Augustus and his villainous wife Livia, the sadistic Tiberius, and the insane excesses of Caligula. Written in the form of Claudius' autobiography, this is the first...

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. Young King Henry wages war on France. But, tainted by his father's crimes, and with enemies among his own men, he must confront the difficult responsibilities of kingship. In rousing speeches, first at the siege of Harfleur where he urges his men 'Once...

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. Henry IV Part One follows Prince Hal, the son of King Henry IV, as he spends his time in idle pleasure with dissolute friends, among them the roguish Sir John Falstaff. However, when the kingdom is threatened by rebellious forces, Prince Hal must...

Part of the authoritative and acclaimed Penguin Shakespeare series, now rejacketed in the celebrated Penguin Classics livery. The King of Britain, enraged by his daughter's disobedience in marrying against his wishes, banishes his new son-in-law. Having fled to Rome, the exiled husband makes a foolish wager with a villain he encounters there—gambling on the fidelity of his abandoned wife. Combining...

Cranford, Gaskell's best-known work, is set in a small rural town inhabited largely by women. This is a community that runs on cooperation and gossip, at the very heart of which are the daughters of the former rector: Miss Deborah Jenkyns and her sister Miss Matty. However, domestic peace is constantly threatened by financial disaster, imagined burglaries, tragic accidents, and...

A seminal text in the history of modern art, from one of the most famous artists of the twentieth century. In Concerning the Spiritual in Art, Wassily Kandinsky, one of the most famous abstract painters of all time, urges the reader to free themselves from art's traditional bonds to material reality. In this radical theoretical work, he calls for a...

Alexander's translation is marked by a conviction that it is possible to be both ambitious and faithful and...communicates the poem with a care which goes beyond fidelity-to-meaning and reaches fidelity of implication. May it go on ...to another half-million copies." - Tom Shippey, Bulletin of the International Association of University Professors of English

A new selection of Swift's witty, acerbic and polemical prose. The political dilemma of Ireland; the state of faith in England; the charms of the Beggar's Opera; the importance of puns... This selection gathers together some of Swift's most brilliant prose, from high politics to social gossip, from savage tirades to lighthearted social satire. In addition to his classic essays,...

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. Published when she was only eighteen, Françoise Sagan's astonishing novella, 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...

Set in English society before the 1832 Reform Bill, Wives and Daughters centres on the story of youthful Molly Gibson, brought up from childhood by her father. When he remarries, a new stepsister, Cynthia, enters Molly's quiet life. Loveable but worldly and troubling, Cynthia's arrival alters Molly's daily life. The narrative traces the development of the two girls into womanhood...

In the years following the First World War, a new generation emerges, wistful and vulnerable beneath the glitter. The Bright Young Things of twenties Mayfair, with their paradoxical mix of innocence and sophistication, exercise their hedonistic whims and vile bodies in every kind of capricious escapade. In a quest for treasure, a favourite party occupation, a vivid assortment of characters...

Vanity Fair is Thackeray's gloriously satirical epic of love and social adventure, presented in a gorgeous new clothbound edition. Part of Penguin's beautiful hardback Clothbound Classics series, this edition is 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. No one is better equipped in...

Martyrs to hypochondria and general seediness, J. and his friends George and Harris decide that a jaunt up the Thames would suit them to a T. But when they set off, they can hardly predict the troubles that lie ahead with tow-ropes, unreliable weather forecasts and tins of pineapple chunks—not to mention the devastation left in the wake of J.'s...

Beautifully designed, 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. The Woman in White famously opens with Walter Hartright's eerie encounter on a moonlit London road. Engaged as a drawing master to the beautiful...

The new paperback series - Penguin English Library The Penguin English Library Edition of The Time Machine by H. G. Wells 'Great shapes like big machines rose out of the dimness, and cast grotesque black shadows, in which dim spectral Morlocks sheltered from the glare' Chilling, prophetic, and hugely influential, The Time Machine sees a Victorian scientist propel himself into...

Penguin Classics relaunch. The Return of the Native was written towards the beginning of Hardy's career as a novelist and can be considered one of his most representative works. In this novel, Hardy's tragic vision is powerfully and narrowly focused on Egdon Heath and the men and women who live on it. Set against the backdrop of the Heath and...