I was born on the 2nd September, 1886, in a small, dull, country town. When I say the town was dull, I mean, of course, that the inhabitants were unenterprising, for in itself Muddleton was a picturesque place, and though it laboured under the usual disadvantage of a dearth of bachelors and a superfluity of spinsters, it might have been pleasant enough had it not been a favourite resort for my kith and kin. My father has long enjoyed a world-wide notoriety; he is not, however, as a rule na...

People who have been brought up in the country, or in small places where every neighbor is known by sight, are apt to think that life in a large town must lack many of the interests which they have learned to find in their more limited communities. In a somewhat bewildered way, they gaze at the shifting crowd of strange faces, and wonder whether it would be possible to feel completely at home where all the surroundings of life seem ever changing and unfamiliar. But those who have lived lon...

“I wonder what will become of Ralph Denmead,” said Lady Tresidder, “it is one of the saddest cases I ever heard of; the poor boy seems to be left without a single relation.” “Yes,” said Sir John, musingly. “Just the way with these old decayed families, they dwindle slowly away and then become extinct. There was no spirit or energy in poor Denmead, the man was a mere hermit and knew nothing of the world or he wouldn’t have made such a mull of his affairs.” “Yet Ralph seems to have the energ...

To attempt a formal biography of Derrick Vaughan would be out of the question, even though he and I have been more or less thrown together since we were both in the nursery. But I have an odd sort of wish to note down roughly just a few of my recollections of him, and to show how his fortunes gradually developed, being perhaps stimulated to make the attempt by certain irritating remarks which one overhears now often enough at clubs or in drawing-rooms, or indeed wherever one goes. “Derrick...

Roy Boniface turned away with a smile, understanding her feeling well enough, and Cecil, with her back to the chattering tourist throng, let her eyes roam over the shining waters of the fjord to the craggy mountains on the further shore, whose ever-varying forms had been delighting her since the early morning. She herself made a fair picture, though her beauty was not of the order which quickly draws attention. There was nothing very striking in her regular features, fair complexion, and l...

There was no more skipping that day for Nan and Meg; frightened out of their senses, they made their way home, and were just crossing the stable-yard when their father caught sight of them. “I have stabled that bay horse as Vicar said,” he remarked, “and do you two little maids keep a still tongue in your heads or we may get into trouble. Why, what’s amiss with you both?” “Oh, father,” said Nan, sobbing, “our wounded Puritan is going to fight the officer from Canon Frome, who is in the orc...

This special edition of Them Days Magazine from 1982 is all about toys, games, amusements and pastimes. Dive into dozens of short stories about dolls, balls, and boats; learn how to slide on seal skins; listen to memories of specialty holiday games and so much more!

The acclaimed author of Lolita offers unique insight into works by James Joyce, Franz Kafka, Jane Austen, and others—with an introduction by John Updike.In the 1940s, when Vladimir Nabokov first embarked on his academic career in the United States, he brought with him hundreds of original lectures on the authors he most admired. For two decades those lectures served as the basis for Nabokov's teaching, first at Wellesley and then at Cornell, as he introduc...

Elizabeth von Arnim (31 August 1866 – 9 February 1941), born Mary Annette Beauchamp, was an Australian-born British novelist. By marriage she became Gräfin (Countess) von Arnim-Schlagenthin, and by a second marriage, Countess Russell. Although known in her early life as Mary, after the publication of her first book, she was known to her readers, eventually to her friends, and finally even to her family as Elizabeth and she is now invariably referred to as Elizabeth von Arnim. She also wrot...

If you love Bridgerton, you'll love Georgette Heyer!'The greatest writer who ever lived' Antonia Fraser'Georgette Heyer will not let you down' Jenny Colgan'One of my perennial comfort authors' Joanne Harris**_________Dispossessed of crown and kingdom, the young Charles II is forced to flee for his life.**Out of the heat of battle, the outlaw King and his tiny party must...

Nine mystery tales starring lexicographer Dr. Samuel Johnson in "the finest series of historical detective stories ever written" (Ellery Queen).For over two hundred years, devotees of English literature have lost themselves in James Boswell's Life of Johnson, a biography of the great eighteenth-century thinker and writer, chronicling everything from kitchen chemistry experiments to tackling a pickpocket to his legendary investigation of the Cock Lane ghost....

Twenty ghost stories from the supernatural masters of the Victorian age. Wimbourne Books presents the third in a series of rare or out-of-print ghost stories from Victorian authors. With an introduction by author Alastair Gunn, Volume 3 in the series contains stories published anonymously in America and Britain between 1839 and 1896. Most of these tales are here anthologised for the very first time. Readers new to this genre will discover its pleasures; the Victorian quaintness, the someti...