11/08/2024
The Gray Mills of Farley
As contemporary today as it was over a century ago, this relatively unsentimental tale of labor relations still packs a punch. [chương_files]
Fiction155 bài viết found
155 bài viết found
11/08/2024
A Modern Utopia
H. G. Wells’s proposal for social reform was the formation of a world state, a concept that would increasingly preoccupy him throughout the remainder of his life. One of his most ambitious early attempts at portraying a world state was A Modern Utopia (1905). A Modern Utopia was intended as a hybrid between fiction and ‘philosophical discussion’. Like most utopists, he has indicated a series of modifications which in his opinion would increase the aggregate of human happiness. Basically, Wells’ idea of a perfect world would be if everyone were able to live a happy life. This book is written with an intimate knowledge of former ideal commonwealths and is a conscious attempt to describe a utopia that is not utopian. [chương_files]
10/08/2024
Trials and Confessions of a Housekeeper
Is housekeeping such a trial? Mrs. Smith thinks so and confesses all in this merry account of her escapades and near disasters! [chương_files]
10/08/2024
The People of the Abyss
Jack London lived for a time within the grim and grimy world of the East End of London, where half a million people scraped together hardly enough on which to survive. Even if they were able to work, they were paid only enough to allow them a pitiful existence. He grew to know and empathise with these forgotten (or ignored) people as he spoke with them and tasted the workhouse, life on the streets, … and the food, which was cheap, barely nutritious, and foul. He writes about his experiences in a fluid and narrative style, making it very clear what he thinks of the social structures which created the Abyss, and of the millionaires who live high on the labours of a people forced to live in squalor. “… The food this managing class eats, the wine it drinks, … the fine clothes it wears, are challenged by eight million mouths which have never had enough to fill them, and by twice eight million bodies which have never been sufficiently clothed and housed.” [chương_files]
10/08/2024
The Soul of Man
“(T)he past is what man should not have been. The present is what man ought not to be. The future is what artists are.” Published originally as “The Soul of Man Under Socialism,” this is not so much a work of sober political analysis; rather it can be summed up as a rhapsodic manifesto on behalf of the Individual. Socialism having deployed technology to liberate the whole of humanity from soul-destroying labour, the State obligingly withers away to allow the free development of a joyful, anarchic hedonism… “Is this Utopian? A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth even glancing at, for it leaves out the one country at which Humanity is always landing.” Far from abandoning the epigram in favour of the slogan, Wilde wittily assails several of his favourite targets: the misguided purveyors of philanthropy; life-denying ascetics of various kinds; the army of the half-educated who constitute themselves the enemies of Art – and those venal popular journalists who cater to them… “Behind the barricade there may be much that is noble and heroic. But what is there behind the leading-article but prejudice, stupidity, cant, and twaddle?” (Introduction by Martin Geeson) [chương_files]
30/07/2024
The Touchstone
Stephen Glennard’s career is falling apart and he desperately needs money so that he may marry his beautiful fiancee. He happens upon an advertisement in a London magazine promising the prospect of financial gain. Glennard was once pursued by Margaret Aubyn, a famous and recently deceased author, and he still has her passionate love letters to him. Glennard removes his name from the letters and sells them, making him a fortune and building a marriage based on the betrayal of another. [chương_files]
30/07/2024
Clarissa, or the History of a Young Lady
Clarissa Harlowe, the tragic heroine of Clarissa, is a beautiful and virtuous young lady whose family has become very wealthy only in recent years and is now eager to become part of the aristocracy by acquiring estates and titles through advantageous pairings. Clarissa’s relatives attempt to force her to marry a rich but heartless man (Roger Solmes) against her will and, more importantly, against her own sense of virtue. Desperate to remain free, she is tricked by a young gentleman of her acquaintance, Lovelace, into escaping with him. However, she refuses to marry him, longing — unusual for a girl in her time — to live by herself in peace. [chương_files]
29/07/2024
Love Letter Collection
By conservative estimates, more than 6.8 million out of earth’s population of 7 billion have access to cell phones. This has happened in just over 20 years. It’s safe to assume that almost all these people would prefer to communicate via their phones rather than by snail-mail, post or courier. Which leads us to the question: “Does this mean the death of the love letter?” For those of us who still remember the joys of receiving and sending romantic epistles, couched in purple prose, expressing our deepest feelings, these little messages were the most delightful way of keeping in touch with those we loved. The Love Letter Collection 2008 by Various takes us back to a more gentle and genteel time, when we used our imagination and creativity to convey our thoughts and weren’t compelled to use ugly abbreviations or acronyms, neither were we restricted to 140 characters! Receiving a handwritten letter which could be read and re-read at leisure was an experience that can never be matched by a mere e-mail or a text message! In this collection we find Abigail Adams, the wife of the second president and the mother of the sixth president of the United States of America, writing to her husband John Adams while he was in Philadelphia during the Continental Congresses in 1774. She wrote nearly 1200 letters to him, which are remarkable for their frankness, intimacy and literary skill though she was a self-educated woman. From Don Felipe to Louise is a letter […]
29/07/2024
Daddy-Long-Legs
Jerusha Abbott, an eighteen year old orphan, faces an uncertain future in the charity home where she has lived all her life. On reaching adulthood, the orphanage can no longer offer shelter to its inmates. Her anxiety leads her into wild speculation when she is summoned to the matron’s office. But a surprise awaits her. One of the visitors, a wealthy Trustee of the orphanage, has offered to fund Jerusha’s college education and fulfill her dreams of becoming a writer. The only condition he makes is that he remain anonymous and that she write to him regularly about her progress. Daddy-Long-Legs by Jean Webster was first published in 1912. It follows an epistolatory format and traces the story through a series of letters exchanged between the youthful heroine, Jerusha and her mysterious benefactor whom she has privately nicknamed Daddy-Long-Legs based on a brief glimpse she caught of him once. The book is a young girl’s classic coming-of-age tale, a genre that includes the Little Women trilogy, the Katy series and the Anne of Green Gables books. Apart from being a heart-warming story, it also reflects the author’s social concerns and her interest in women’s issues and the suffragette movement. It is in a way a Beauty and the Beast fairy tale that reflects the transformation of the characters and their attitudes towards each other and life. Jean Webster was born in New York into a literary family. Her father, Charles Webster was Mark Twain’s business manager and head of Twain’s […]
29/07/2024
Dracula
Dracula tells the tale of a sinister Transylvanian aristocrat who seeks to retain his youth and strength by feeding off human blood. The author, Bram Stoker, a young Victorian theater professional, was probably inspired by the strange epidemic of vampirism that occurred in remote parts of Eastern Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries. These stories were recounted by travelers who later arrived in England and other parts of Western Europe. Stoker initially meant the tale to be written as a play in which he wanted Sir Henry Irving, a leading Victorian actor, to play the role of the malevolent Count Dracula. However, as circumstances would have it, Irving never played the part and Stoker’s story finally took the form of a novel. The book, published in 1897, is constructed in a very interesting format. The story is told via a set of letters, diary entries, ship’s logs and newspaper reports. It begins with the journey of a young lawyer, Jonathan Harker, who is traveling to Transylvania on his legal firm’s business, to finalize the transfer of a property in England to an East European aristocrat, Count Dracula. Harker is initially charmed by the suave and debonair count’s hospitality, but gradually comes to realize Dracula’s malevolent intentions. The plot takes up the tale of various other people in the story – Harker’s fiancée Mina, her friend Lucy, a former suitor Dr Seward and his teacher, Professor Van Helsing. A host of other characters adds to the twists and turns in […]