Showing titles in Literary History & Criticism

The story of the Siege of Troy from the infamous Helen and her sister Klytemnestra's points of view - a tale of secrets, passion and revenge from the women behind mythology's most devastating war. Two sisters parted. Two women blamed. Two stories reclaimed. 'Required reading for fans of Circe...

You may think you know Anthony Scaramucci: a Harvard Law School graduate who cut his teeth at Goldman Sachs, went on to build two successful businesses and had an 11-day stint in the White House. What people don’t know is he’s an avid reader, endlessly curious, history buff with a restless mind. On Open Book, listeners will hear and get to know the real Anthony: the proud son of immigrant parents, a long-suffering New York Mets fan, and a father of five. Each week, he’ll invite you into an intimate and open conversation with some of the brightest minds out there, from business, politics,...

This is a weekly podcast of funny stories for kids. There are side-splitting versions of my own fractured fairy tales. Also short stories from some of my best-selling books, featuring characters from 'The Adventures of Nanny Piggins' and 'Friday Barnes, Girl Detective'. The stories are perfect for bedtime, long car rides or even if you're just stuck waiting a really long time at the doctor's office. They're written for 7-11 year olds but these are tales the whole family can enjoy. The silliness is ageless. I hope you enjoy listening to this as much as I enjoy recording it. After years of being...

India, Josh, Peter, and AJ are reading The Malazan Book of the Fallen. A bad idea? Maybe, but we'll at least have fun along the way. Peter has read the series before, but it's Josh, India, and AJ's first time. Join us, as we talk through each book and enjoy the works of Steven Erikson.

Anna Karenina is beautiful, married to a successful man, and has a son whom she adores. But a chance meeting at a train station in Moscow sets her passionate heart alight, and she is defenceless in the face of Count Vronsky's adoration. Having defied the rules of nineteenth-century Russian society, Anna is forced to pay a heavy price.

In this biography of Count Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy, A. N. Wilson narrates the complex drama of the writer's life: his childhood of aristocratic privilege but emotional deprivation, his discovery of his literary genius after aimless years of gambling and womanizing, and his increasingly disastrous marriage. Wilson sweeps away the long-held belief that Tolstoy's works were the exact mirror of his life and instead traces the roots of Tolstoy's art to his relationship with God, with women, and with Russia.

Embark on a cultural odyssey to explore the impact of Homer’s iconic poem, from its creation in the eighth century to Christopher Nolan’s highly anticipated film adaptation in 2026. Since it was first circulated in Ancient Greece, The Odyssey has influenced literature, film, art, and much...

Drawing from the author's original, uncensored journals, Fire follows Anaïs Nin's journey as she attempts to liberate herself sexually, artistically, and emotionally. While referring to her relationships with psychoanalyst Otto Rank and author Henry Miller, as well as a new lover, the Peruvian Gonzalo More, she also reveals that her most passionate and enduring affair is with writing itself.

Bloomsbury presents For Your Eyes Only, written and read by Ben Macintyre The official history of Ian Fleming and James Bond by the bestselling author of Operation Mincemeat 'Marvellously entertaining and informative' Spectator 'Thrilling' Sunday Times 'An entertaining mix of history, espionage...

Bloomsbury presents Girlhood written and read by Melissa Febos. National Book Critics Circle Award Winner National Bestseller Lambda Literary Award Finalist NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY TIME * NPR * The Washington Post * Kirkus Reviews * Washington Independent Review of Books * The...

The Singularity of Being presents a Lacanian vision of what makes each of us an inimitable and irreplaceable creature. It argues that, unlike the "subject" (who comes into existence as a result of symbolic prohibition) or the "person" (who is aligned with the narcissistic conceits of the imaginary), the singular self emerges in response to a galvanizing directive arising from the real. This directive carries the force of an obligation that cannot be resisted and that summons the individual to a "character" beyond his or her social investments.

On Prince Edward Island, aging siblings Mathew and Marilla Cuthbert decide to adopt a boy to help with chores around the farm. But when Mathew arrives at the train platform, the only living creature in sight, legs dangling from the piles of shingles where she sits, is a freckled, green-eyed, redheaded little girl. Mathew senses immediately that life at Green Gables is going to be very different. And how right he is.

In 2010,Clive James was diagnosed with terminal leukemia. Deciding that "if you don't know the exact moment when the lights will go out, you might as well read until they do," James moved his library to his house in Cambridge, where he would "live, read, and perhaps even write". James is the award-winning author of dozens of works of literary criticism, poetry, and history, and this volume contains his reflections on what may well be his last reading list.

This frank and sometimes controversial diary details one hectic year in the eye of the showbiz storm, cut with a heavy mix of the day-to-day goings-on in Bexhill, where Harry lives at home with his mother, occasional Filipina fiancée Lay Dee and a dog who has a job at the airport. Follow Harry's attempts to become a judge on X Factor and his efforts to meet the Welsh chanteuse Duffy at Warwick Avenue.

Brought to you by Penguin. A fascinating journey into the life of H.G. Wells, from one of Britain's best biographers. How did the first forty years of H. G. Wells' life shape the father of science fiction? From his impoverished childhood in a working-class English family, to his determination to...

In a remarkable feat of biography, Matthew Hollis reconstructs the intellectual creation of the poem and brings the material reality of its charged times vividly to life. Presenting a mosaic of historical fragments, diaries, dynamic literary criticism and illuminating new research, he reveals the cultural and personal trauma that forged The Waste Land through the lives of its protagonists.

Each week we read and review some of the best Harry Potter Fanficiton

A podcast dedicated to The Wandering Inn and other web serials. Credit to SystemGlitch for our music and Enuryn for our Art.

Brought to you by Penguin. Award-winning classicist and historian Emily Hauser takes readers on an epic journey to uncover the astonishing true story of the real women behind ancient Greece’s greatest legends, and the real heroes of those ancient epics, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey . . . Contrary...

Brought to you by Penguin. 1917. Virginia Woolf arrives at Asheham, on the Sussex Downs, immobilized by nervous exhaustion and creative block. 1930. Feeling jittery about her writing career, Sylvia Townsend Warner spots a modest workman’s cottage for sale on the Dorset coast. 1941. Rosamond...