Showing results by author "Lina" in All Categories

By turns illuminating, infuriating, bewildering, and amusing, Nietzsche's masterwork covers a lot of ground. He rejects most strands of Western thought, especially on the subject of morality, and develops his own theme demanding that individuals embrace their own 'will to power' to give life intention and direction. First published in German in 1887, this translation was produced in 1907 by Helen Zimmern, a long-standing acquaintance of Nietzsche.There is an accessible text at http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4363 but it leaves out all words in Greek, and is not in alignment with any printed ...

Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by four spirits on Christmas Eve, and it changes his life forever. - Summary by W. Blaine Dowler

The prophet Al Mustafa, before leaving the city where he has been living twelve years, stops to address the people. They call out for his words of wisdom on many sides of the human condition, and he addresses them in terms of love and care. He has much to offer from his observations of the people, and he illustrates with images they can relate to.The author, Gibran, was influenced by the Maronites, the Sufis, and the Baha’i. His philosophy, though deist, is primarily aimed at the good within ourselves, and the common-sense ways in which we can unlock it. An illustration from his chapter on ...

After hearing Mr. Enfield's account of a distressing event involving Edward Hyde, the heir of his friend, Henry Jekyll, John Utterson is convinced that Jekyll's relationship with Hyde is built on something sinister. Utterson's concern for his friend is not unfounded but the reasons aren't quite what he, at first, believes. (Summary by Kristin Hughes)

Set in a time of oppressive colonisation, when large areas of the world were still unknown to Europe, and Africa was literally on maps and minds as a mysterious shadow, Heart of Darkness famously explores the rituals of civilisation and barbarism, and the frighteningly fine line between them.We get the tale through a classic unreliable narrator, relating as Marlow, a ship’s captain, tells how he was sent by the Company to retrieve the wayward Kurtz, and was shaken to discover the true depths of darkness in that creature’s, and in his own, soul. Conrad based the work closely on his own ...

A Study in Scarlet, a short novel published in 1887, was Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's first Sherlock Holmes story. At the beginning of the book, Dr. Watson meets the detective for the first time and we ride along with them to the scene of a murder. The crime baffles the Scotland Yard detectives, but of course Holmes solves it easily. In the second half of the story, the scene shifts to Utah as we learn the murderer's history. The action returns to London in the last two chapters. In his first adventure, Holmes demonstrates many of the traits for which he later became well known: meticulous study ...

The tale begins on a Christmas Eve exactly seven years after the death of Ebenezer Scrooge's business partner. Scrooge has no place in his life for kindness, compassion, charity or benevolence. He hates Christmas, calling it "humbug", refuses his nephew Fred's dinner invitation, and rudely turns away two gentlemen who seek a donation from him to provide a Christmas dinner for the Poor... (Summary by Wikipedia and Kara)

Old miser Ebenezer Scrooge undergoes a major transformation after being visited by his deceased colleague Jacob Marley, who warns him to change his ways and has three spirits visit him on the night of Christmas Eve. (Introduction by Jeff Robinson)

Ebenezer Scrooge is a covetous, miserable old man who lives his life apart from his fellow man and is incapable of showing love or understanding towards them. On Christmas Eve he is visited by three ghosts who show him the error of his ways. (Summary by helensears)

The miserly Ebenezer Scrooge is a cold-hearted man of business and has little time for the good humor and charity of the Christmas season. But that's about to change. A visit from his deceased business partner sets in motion a night in which Scrooge is visited by the ghosts of Christmas past, present, and future. Will his listen to their messages? Will he heed their warnings? Ebenezer Scrooge is about to take a Christmas journey that he won't soon forget. (Summary by Kyle Munley)

"Come with me, ladies and gentlemen who are in any wise weary of London: come with me: and those that tire at all of the world we know: for we have new worlds here." - Lord Dunsany, the preface to "The Book of Wonder"

A delightful version of Alice's Adventures following that scurrying Rabbit with the watch that is shortened for the enjoyment of younger children. She meets all of the strange talking animals (and they are just as rude or silly as usual) and eats and drinks from all of the bottles and grows and shrinks alarmingly just like in the longer version. Enjoy. (Summary by the reader, Phil Chenevert)

Few things, even in literature, can really be said to be unique — but Moby Dick is truly unlike anything written before or since. The novel is nominally about the obsessive hunt by the crazed Captain Ahab of the book’s eponymous white whale. But interspersed in that story are digressions, paradoxes, philosophical riffs on whaling and life, and a display of techniques so advanced for its time that some have referred to the 1851 Moby Dick as the first “modern” novel.(Summary by Stewart Wills)

George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax (11 November 1633 – 5 April 1695) was an English statesman, writer, and politician who sat in the House of Commons in 1660, and in the House of Lords after he was raised to the peerage in 1668. He's noted in history for his views on Charles II among others. This compilation covers a wide range of his views which are particularly telling, coming, as they do, from a man who was singularly positioned among the powers of the time, to make them. Prepare yourself for a journey into antiquated English speech. (Summary by Wikipedia and John Greenman)

It’s a dreary February in post-World War I London when Mrs. Wilkins spots an advertisement in The Times for a small Italian castle for rent in April. She sees another member of her women’s club, Mrs. Arbuthnot, reading the same advertisement and manages to convince her that the two of them should rent it. Both are miserable and lonely in their marriages. They can’t afford the cost of the villa, San Salvatore, on their own and must advertise for two others, eventually recruiting an elderly widow named Mrs. Fisher, and Lady Caroline Dester, a beautiful young socialite desperate to escape ...

Aspects Of Love is an anthology of poetic explorations on the theme of erotic love - though one of the "poets" represented here is better known, even than as a dramatist, as the philosopher, Plato. His Symposium heads off this set of erotic explorations. In The Symposium's philosophic play, he depicts a scene of men cosing together over dinner, each describing what he finds in his experience of love. I have followed this pattern in the choice of works for this anthology - in a similar manner, each of these works deals in a radically different way with the discovery of love. Whether ...

This story follows the lives of four sisters Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy. Set in the tumultuous days of the American Civil war, readers grow to love the four sisters as they grow and mature into young women. This book has characters any girl can relate to because each of the four March sisters has a unique and different personality. A story that the young and old have enjoyed for years, this book truly is a classic. (Summary by Abigail Rasmussen)

Leo Tolstoy’s epic historical novel chronicling the Napoleonic war in Russia. Considered one of the greatest works of literature of all time. Translated by Aylmer and Louise Maude.Volume 1 includes Book 1 through Book 3, covering the year 1805.Volume 2 includes Book 4 through Book 8, covering the years 1806 to 1812.Volume 3 includes Book 9 through Book 11, covering the year 1812.Volume 4 includes Book 12 through Book 17, covering the years 1812 to 1820. - Summary by the reader

In her autobiography, Annie Besant poignantly writes of her search for the truth of what she believed in, leaving Christianity behind to embrace Atheism, and ultimately finding her peace in Theosophy, which she became interested in after meeting Helena Blavatsky. She moved to India to better study Theosophical ideas and this is where she made her home until her death. She was a gifted orator and writer, often speaking and writing on her religious beliefs, as well as women's rights and social reform. Along with Charles Bradlaugh, she published a paper in support of birth control. It proved to ...

A Christmas Carol (full title: A Christmas Carol in Prose, Being a Ghost Story of Christmas) is A Christmas Carol is a Victorian morality tale of an old and bitter miser, Ebenezer Scrooge, who undergoes a profound experience of redemption over the course of one evening. (Wikipedia)