Showing posts with label Novel. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Novel. Show all posts

The importance of being earnest: a trivial comedy for serious people By Oscar Wilde

The play is a satire on 19th century Mayfair society and as the title suggests the play is about the importance of being called Ernest. The play centres around the exploits of Algernon Moncrieff and John Worthing and their prospective fiancés Gwendolen Fairfax and Cecily Cardew. Throw in a governess (Miss Prism), an aunt (Lady Bracknel), butler, manservant and a reverend and you have the recipe for one of the funniest plays ever.

John and Algernon have both told their fiancés they are called Ernest, and this is almost a condition of marriage. The girls discover that Algernon and John are not called Ernest. Algernon asks the reverend to christen him Ernest so that Cecily will agree to marry him. John however discovers that he is Algernons brother and is already called Ernest. The plot is very convoluted and features a handbag quite heavily! This story is very witty and short. It is an interesting comedy that looks at the absurdity of society at the time.

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The Importance of Being Earnest The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde: 'The Importance of Being Earnest' (Cambridge Literature) The Importance of Being Earnest - Criterion Collection The Importance of Being Earnest (Penguin Popular Classics)

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Treasure Island By Robert Louis Stevenson

In this retelling of Stevenson's classic story, each spread is structured as a chapter and provides a short story arc within the larger tale. The elements of suspense or triumph that close each chapter compel readers to turn the page for the next piece of the story. However, the graphic storytelling leaves much to be desired, especially in the essential layout and presentation. The pages ... More are comprised of a series of mostly wordless panels, depicting tight close-ups of the characters as their situations are described in captions paraphrasing Stevenson's prose with none of its luster.

When dialogue does appear, it is placed artificially at the top of each panel despite the fact that it is almost universally meant to follow the caption it precedes, creating a dissonant reading experience. Vocabulary is defined in footnotes, and a handful of concluding pages provide some context for Stevenson's life and background on the novel. The volume may well provide young readers with a desired dose of pirates, but this attempt has not bent the format to fit the vintage tale. Try the version adapted and illustrated by Tim Hamilton, instead (Puffin, 2005).—Benjamin Russell, Belmont High School, NH

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Faust: a Tragedy, Part 1 by By Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Bayard Taylor

In Faust, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe builds a dramatic poem around the strengths and weaknesses of a man who under a personalized definition of a hero fails miserably. A hero is someone that humanity models themselves and their actions after, someone who can be revered by the masses as an individual of great morality and strength, a man or woman that never sacrifices his beliefs under adversity. Therefore, through his immoral actions and his unwillingness to respect others rights and privileges, Faust is determined to be a man of un heroic proportions.

It is seen early in the poem, that Faust has very strong beliefs and a tight moral code that is deeply rooted in his quest for knowledge. Sitting in his den, Faust describes his areas of instruction, "I have, alas, studied philosophy, jurisprudence and medicine, too, and, worst of all, theology with keen endeavor, through and through..." It is obvious that through his studies he has valued deep and critical thinking, however with the help of Mephisto, he would disregard his values and pursue the pleasures of the flesh.

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Free: The Call of the Wild By Jack London

Editorial Review - Cahners Business Information (c) 2002 Gr 7 Up-This Jack London classic is expertly read by Michael Kramer. His firm, yet gentle voice is a perfect choice for the adventurous biographical story of Buck, a very capable dog working the Alaskan wilderness with his many owners. Reading at a fairly quick pace, Kramer keeps listeners from bogging down in the sad or violent sections.

The novel is primarily one of narration, but Kramer alters his voice for the different accents in the men's speech, especially for the French-Canadian; he changes only slightly for the one woman. London's words alone provide the excitement and suspense because Kramer is able to remain dispassionate and uninvolved. There is emotion there, but it is kept under control. Since the track numbers are provided on the CDs for the beginning of each chapter, teachers have the choice of using only portions of the audiobook in the classroom.-Claudia Moore, W.T. Woodson High School, Fairfax, VA

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Great Expectations - Charles Dickens

My father's family name being Pirrip, and my Christian name Philip, my infant tongue could make of both names nothing longer or more explicit than Pip. So, I called myself Pip, and came to be called Pip.


I give Pirrip as my father's family name, on the authority of his tombstone and my sister - Mrs. Joe Gargery, who married the blacksmith. As I never saw my father or my mother, and never saw any likeness of either of them (for their days were long before the days of photographs), my first fancies regarding what they were like, were unreasonably derived from their tombstones. The shape of the letters on my father's, gave me an odd idea that he was a square, stout, dark man, with curly black hair. From the character and turn of the inscription, 'Also Georgiana Wife of the Above,' I drew a childish conclusion that my mother was freckled and sickly. To five little stone lozenges, each about a foot and a half long, which were arranged in a neat row beside their grave, and were sacred to the memory of five little brothers of mine - who gave up trying to get a living, exceedingly early in that universal struggle - I am indebted for a belief I religiously entertained that they had all been born on their backs with their hands in their trousers-pockets, and had never taken them out in this state of existence.

Ours was the marsh country, down by the river, within, as the river wound, twenty miles of the sea. My first most vivid and broad impression of the identity of things, seems to me to have been gained on a memorable raw afternoon towards evening. At such a time I found out for certain, that this bleak place overgrown with nettles was the churchyard; and that Philip Pirrip, late of this parish, and also Georgiana wife of the above, were dead and buried; and that Alexander, Bartholomew, Abraham, Tobias, and Roger, infant children of the aforesaid, were also dead and buried; and that the dark flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with dykes and mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes; and that the low leaden line beyond, was the river; and that the distant savage lair from which the wind was rushing, was the sea; and that the small bundle of shivers growing afraid of it all and beginning to cry, was Pip.

'Hold your noise!' cried a terrible voice, as a man started up from among the graves at the side of the church porch. 'Keep still, you little devil, or I'll cut your throat!'

A fearful man, all in coarse grey, with a great iron on his leg. A man with no hat, and with broken shoes, and with an old rag tied round his head. A man who had been soaked in water, and smothered in mud, and lamed by stones, and cut by flints, and stung by nettles, and torn by briars; who limped, and shivered, and glared and growled; and whose teeth chattered in his head as he seized me by the chin.

'O! Don't cut my throat, sir,' I pleaded in terror. 'Pray don't do it, sir.'

'Tell us your name!' said the man. 'Quick!'

'Pip, sir.'

'Once more,' said the man, staring at me. 'Give it mouth!'

'Pip. Pip, sir.'

'Show us where you live,' said the man. 'Pint out the place!'

I pointed to where our village lay, on the flat in-shore among the alder-trees and pollards, a mile or more from the church.

The man, after looking at me for a moment, turned me upside down, and emptied my pockets. There was nothing in them but a piece of bread. When the church came to itself - for he was so sudden and strong that he made it go head over heels before me, and I saw the steeple under my feet - when the church came to itself, I say, I was seated on a high tombstone, trembling, while he ate the bread ravenously.

'You young dog,' said the man, licking his lips, 'what fat cheeks you ha' got.'

I believe they were fat, though I was at that time undersized for my years, and not strong.

'Darn me if I couldn't eat em,' said the man, with a threatening shake of his head, 'and if I han't half a mind to't!'

I earnestly expressed my hope that he wouldn't, and held tighter to the tombstone on which he had put me; partly, to keep myself upon it; partly, to keep myself from crying.

'Now lookee here!' said the man. 'Where's your mother?'

'There, sir!' said I.

He started, made a short run, and stopped and looked over his shoulder.

Great Expectations

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Women in Love

Ursula and Gudrun Brangwen sat one morning in the window-bay of their father's house in Beldover, working and talking. Ursula was stitching a piece of brightly-coloured embroidery, and Gudrun was drawing upon a board which she held on her knee. They were mostly silent, talking as their thoughts strayed through their minds.


'Ursula,' said Gudrun, 'don't you REALLY WANT to get married?' Ursula laid her embroidery in her lap and looked up. Her face was calm and considerate.

'I don't know,' she replied. 'It depends how you mean.'

Women in Love


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Jane Eyre

There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. We had been wandering, indeed, in the leafless shrubbery an hour in the morning; but since dinner (Mrs. Reed, when there was no company, dined early) the cold winter wind had brought with it clouds so sombre, and a rain so penetrating, that further out-door exercise was now out of the question.


I was glad of it: I never liked long walks, especially on chilly afternoons: dreadful to me was the coming home in the raw twilight, with nipped fingers and toes, and a heart saddened by the chidings of Bessie, the nurse, and humbled by the consciousness of my physical inferiority to Eliza, John, and Georgiana Reed.

Jane Eyre

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The Lost World

Mr. Hungerton, her father, really was the most tactless person upon earth, -- a fluffy, feathery, untidy cockatoo of a man, perfectly good-natured, but absolutely centered upon his own silly self. If anything could have driven me from Gladys, it would have been the thought of such a father-in-law. I am convinced that he really believed in his heart that I came round to the Chestnuts three days a week for the pleasure of his company, and very especially to hear his views upon bimetallism, a subject upon which he was by way of being an authority.

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Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson

SQUIRE TRELAWNEY, Dr. Livesey, and the rest of these gentlemen having asked me to write down the whole particulars about Treasure Island, from the beginning to the end, keeping nothing back but the bearings of the island, and that only because there is still treasure not yet lifted, I take up my pen in the year of grace 17 and go back to the time when my father kept the Admiral Benbow inn and the brown old seaman with the sabre cut first took up his lodging under our roof.

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Ulysses - James Joyce

Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed. A yellow dressinggown, ungirdled, was sustained gently behind him on the mild morning air. He held the bowl aloft and intoned:

--Introibo ad altare Dei.


Halted, he peered down the dark winding stairs and called out coarsely:

--Come up, Kinch! Come up, you fearful jesuit!

Ulysses

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Frankenstein

You will rejoice to hear that no disaster has accompanied the commencement of an enterprise which you have regarded with such evil forebodings. I arrived here yesterday, and my first task is to assure my dear sister of my welfare and increasing confidence in the success of my undertaking.

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Grimm's Fairy Tales

A certain king had a beautiful garden, and in the garden stood a tree which bore golden apples. These apples were always counted, and about the time when they began to grow ripe it was found that every night one of them was gone. The king became very angry at this, and ordered the gardener to keep watch all night under the tree. The gardener set his eldest son to watch; but about twelve o'clock he fell asleep, and in the morning another of the apples was missing. Then the second son was ordered to watch; and at midnight he too fell asleep, and in the morning another apple was gone. Then the third son offered to keep watch; but the gardener at first would not let him.

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