The Tang dynasty (618-907 AD) was a period of extraordinary flourishing of the Chinese civilisation in all domains, notably art and literature.
No other civilisation has ever placed poetry on such an elevated pedestal in its scale of values : everyone with an education wrote poetry from the Emperor on downwards, and the most famous poets were honoured in the streets and in the palaces like the stars of popular culture are today.
A thousand years later, when the Qing dynasty published in (…)
Articles les plus récents
-
A selection of Tang Dynasty poems
25 mai 2020, par Ray -
More of Jack London’s best Far North stories
21 mai 2020, par Jack LondonTABLE OF CONTENTS
1. THE WIFE OF A KING (1899) A prospector has left his half-Indian wife to join the flood of gold-seekers in Dawson, and when he fails to return word comes back about his dallying with a casino dancer, the plucky wife sets off for Dawson in the thick of winter to see for herself what is going on. She is taken in hand by several old hands who prepare her for a surprise confrontation with the erring husband at the city’s annual masked ball. (5,700 words).
2. AT THE (…) -
"The Night" and other stories by Guy de Maupassant
16 mai 2020, par Guy de MaupassantA selection of nine memorable tales by Guy de Maupassant, all in new English translations — two for the first time — that have been done specially for this site.
An e-book, with the original French texts in an annex, is available for downloading below.
The original French texts can also be seen here. TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. SOUVENIR (1882) A detachment of French soldiers is retreating in winter at nighttime through enemy-occupied territory during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 when they (…) -
The Great Baseball Scandal - how the Mob won the 1919 World Series, by Nelson Algren
29 avril 2020, par Nelson AlgrenBorn and bred in Chicago, a life-long fan of baseball in general and of his home team, the Chicago White Sox in particular, Nelson Algren (1909-1981), one of the finest American authors of his time, was particularly qualified to analyse the inner workings of the most sensational scandal in the history of professional sports, the corruption of of the most important event in the American sporting calendar, the World Series of baseball, in 1919.
To quote from his vivid account :
"There was (…) -
"War" : Luigi Pirandello’s memorable story about parenthood in wartime (1918)
1er mars 2020, par Luigi PirandelloLuigi Pirandello (1867-1936) was celebrated in his native Italy as a short-story writer before he achieved international acclaim towards the end of his career for ground-breaking modern plays such as Six Characters in Search of an Author (1921), Henry IV (1922) and Tonight We Improvise (1930).
He was one of the most prolific short-story writers of all time, with a total of 237 stories published during his long and fruitful career.
He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1934. (…) -
The Lyrical Ballads (1798) version of Coleridge’s "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" – the original and arguably most authentic text
19 février 2020, par Samuel Taylor Coleridge“Lyrical Ballads”, no doubt the most famous book of poetry in the English language, was jointly published in 1798 by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
This book, generally considered to have ushered in the age of romanticism in English literature, contained two of the greatest poems in the language, Wordsworth’s Tintern Abbey [1] and Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.
The version of Coleridge’s masterpiece that is generally available today is however not the (…) -
"The Mutiny of the Elsinore" (1913) - an adventure novel on the high seas by Jack London
3 février 2020, par Jack LondonJohn Pathurst is a rich, very successful and very blasé 30-year-old writer who has taken passage on a big four-masted sailing-ship carrying coals from Baltimore to Seattle, with the aim of resting his jaded nerves. Right away there are signs that the trip is not going to be an easy one – the crew is a gang of drunken, incompetent landlubbers, his quarters are not the best on the ship much to his annoyance, the captain and first mate are strange fellows indeed and, especially, there is a (…)
-
"The Most Dangerous Game" by Gavin Lyall (1964)
1er février 2020, par Gavin LyallThe most dangerous game of the title of this very classy adventure novel with a strong espionage tinge is far more dangerous than any bear or other wild beast – it’s a man with a gun who knows how to use it.
With Geoffrey Household’s Rogue Male (1939), it is our choice for the best man-hunt story – in the literal sense – of all time.
(74,000 words) An e-book of this well-paced and well-written thriller is available for downloading below. THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME
1
They were ripping (…) -
The adventures of the Marquise and the Baroness — three of Guy de Maupassant’s most amusing (and amoral) stories
1er février 2020, par Guy de MaupassantThe Marquise de Rennedon and her intimate friend the Baroness de Grangerie are two of Maupassant’s most memorable heroines. They both feature in these three sparkling, amusing and amoral stories about their amorous adventures. TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. THE SECRET (1885) The Baroness of Grangerie is resting when the Marquise de Rennedon rushes in to tell her how utterly fed up she had become not only with her husband’s ugliness but especially with his insane jealousy and surveillance. But she (…) -
"Who Goes There ?" (1938) - an iconic sci-fi story by John Campbell
16 janvier 2020, par John CampbellA scientific expedition in Antarctica discovers the remnants of an alien spaceship that had crashed there millions of years ago, and decides – unwisely – to melt the frozen remnants of one of the forms found nearby. When the alien being revives and reveals incredible shape-changing abilities and other stupendous powers, the race is on not only to save themselves but also and especially to save the whole human race from destruction.
First published in the August 1938 issue of Astounding (…)