Classic Gutenberg

Sketches New and Old is a group of fictional stories by Mark Twain. It was published in 1875. It includes the short story "A Ghost Story", among others. Preface My Watch Political Economy The Jumping Frog Journalism in Tennessee The Story of the Bad Little Boy The Story of the Good Little Boy A Couple of Poems by Twain and Moore Niagara Answers to Correspondents To Raise...

The Mudfog Papers was written by Victorian era novelist Charles Dickens and published from 1837–38 in the monthly literary serial Bentley's Miscellany, which he then edited. They were first published as a book as The Mudfog Papers and Other Sketches. The Mudfog Papers relates the proceedings of the fictional “The Mudfog Society for the Advancement of Everything”, a Pickwickian...

This is a collection of short "stories", describing different types of young couples. As always, Dickens' scatterings of humour help make it an enjoyable read. It's mainly an exercise in characterisation, but each little chapter reads like a story, or part of a story. This book would be a useful tool to someone wanting to learn how to write. It may have been written quite some time ago, but human...

Mugby Junction is a set of short stories written in 1866 by Charles Dickens and collaborators Charles Collins, Amelia B. Edwards, Andrew Halliday, and Hesba Stretton. It was first published in a Christmas edition of the magazine All the Year Round. Dickens penned a majority of the issue, including the frame narrative in which "the Gentleman for Nowhere," who has spent his life cloistered in the...

Two collections of rarely published early sketches by Dickens, one about Young Gentleman (including items like The Bashful Young Gentleman, The Military Young Gentleman and The Theatrical Young Gentleman) and one about (mostly) young couples (including items like The Young Couple, The Loving Couple and The Old Couple). The sketches are short with occasional illustrations and combine humor,...

Hugo's Napoleon the Little is a satirical comparison of Napoleon I and II, published in 1852. Earlier was monument of leadership, while latter a complete failure. During his reign, France went to an edge of ruin. This conscience-shaking work with references from other sources is illuminating for readers of all times!

The Cricket on the Hearth. A Fairy Tale of Home is a novella by Charles Dickens, published by Bradbury and Evans, and released 20 December 1845 with illustrations by Daniel Maclise, John Leech, Richard Doyle, Clarkson Stanfield and Edwin Henry Landseer. Dickens began writing the book around 17 October 1845 and finished it by 1 December. Like all of Dickens's Christmas books, it was published in...

Nicholas Nickleby; or, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby is a novel by Charles Dickens. Originally published as aserial from 1838 to 1839, it was Dickens' third novel. The novel centres on the life and adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, a young man who must support his mother and sister after his father dies. Nicholas Nickleby's father dies unexpectedly after losing all of his money in...

Collection of short pieces. Includes: The Curious Republic of Gondour, A Memory, Introductory to "Memoranda," About Smells, A Couple of Sad Experiences, Dan Murphy, The "Tournament" in A.D. 1870, Curious Relic For Sale, A Reminiscence of the Back Settlements.

No Thoroughfare is a stage play and novel by Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins, both released in December 1867. In 1867 Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins collaborated to produce a stage play titled No Thoroughfare: A Drama: In Five Acts. This was the last stage production to be associated with Dickens, who died in June 1870. The play opened at the Adelphi Theatre on 26 December 1867. The novel...

The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today is an 1873 novel by Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner that satirizes greed and political corruption in post-Civil War America in the era now referred to as the Gilded Age. Although not one of Twain's best-known works, it has appeared in more than one hundred editions since its original publication. Twain and Warner originally had planned to issue the novel with...

Northanger Abbey /ˈnɔrθˌæŋɡər/ was the first of Jane Austen's novels to be completed for publication, though she had previously made a start on Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice. According to Cassandra Austen's Memorandum, Susan (as it was first called) was written circa 1798-99. It was revised by Austen for the press in 1803, and sold in the same year for £10...

Transcribed from the 1894 Chapman and Hall edition of “Christmas Stories” by David Price

The simple truth, and everybody knows it really, is that collars squeak for some people and not for others. A squeaky collar round the neck of a man is a comment, not upon the collar, but upon the man. That man is unlucky. Things are against him. Nature may have done all for him that she could, have given him a handsome outside and a noble inside, but the world of inanimate objects is against...

The Innocents Abroad, or The New Pilgrims' Progress is a travel book by American author Mark Twain published in 1869 which humorously chronicles what Twain called his "Great Pleasure Excursion" on board the chartered vessel Quaker City (formerlyUSS Quaker City) through Europe and the Holy Land with a group of American travelers in 1867. It was the best-selling of Twain's works during his...

Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc, by the Sieur Louis de Conte is an 1896 novel by Mark Twain about Joan of Arc. It was Twain's last completed novel. The novel is presented as a translation (by "Jean Francois Alden") of memoirs by Louis de Conte. The novel describes itself as Freely Translated out of the Ancient French into Modern English from the Original Unpublished Manuscript in the...

On the Origin of Species, published on 24 November 1859, is a work of scientific literature by Charles Darwin which is considered to be the foundation of evolutionary biology. Its full title was On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. For the sixth edition of 1872, the short title was changed to The Origin of Species....

Pictures from Italy is a travelogue by Charles Dickens, written in 1846. The book reveals the concerns of its author as he presents, according to Kate Flint, the country "like a chaotic magic-lantern show, fascinated both by the spectacle it offers, and by himself as spectator." In 1844, Dickens took a respite from writing novels and for several months traveled through France and Italy with his...

Written in a plain and popular manner, and illustrated with explanatory wood-cuts. Being a comprehensive Book of Reference for the Merchant, Manufacturer, Artisan, Amateur and Housekeeper, embracing valuable information in the Arts, Professions, Trades, Manufactures, including Medicine, Pharmacy and Domestic Economy. It is certainly the most useful book of reference for practical information...

Our Mutual Friend (written in the years 1864–65) is the last novel completed by Charles Dickens and is one of his most sophisticated works, combining psychological insight with social analysis. It centres on, in the words of critic J. Hillis Miller, "money, money, money, and what money can make of life", but is also about human values. In the opening chapters a body is found in theThames...