The Essence of the Thing by Madeleine St John; Helen Trinca (Introduction by)

$12.95 AUD

Category: Classics | Series: Text Classics Ser.

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize In The Essence of the Thing, Madeleine St John takes us deep into the territory of the human heart. Nicola should never have stepped out to buy that pack of cigarettes, because the man she discovers in her living room on her return is not the Jonathan she has been sharin g her life with for the past six years. This new Jonathan, suddenly tired of people peering into his soul, decides that she should move out. Now a shocked, grief-stricken Nicola is forced to set out on the course that will take her from the hellish end of an affair to the essence of the thing. Wry, witty and exquisite, here is another masterpiece from the author of The Women in Black. 'he Essence of the Thinggrabs the reader's sympathy and attention from the startling first pages and doesn't let go.' Newsday ...Show more

The Women in Black - Text Classics by Madeleine St John; Bruce Beresford (Introduction by)

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Category: Classics | Series: Text Classics Ser.

A classic novel by a superb observer of contemporary manners, The Women in Blackilluminates on every page the extraordinariness of ordinary lives. It's Sydney in the late 1950s, and the Ladies' Cocktail Frocks department of the famous F.G. Goode department store is bracing itself for the Christmas rush. The women that make up its staff-in their regulation black dresses-are run off their feet, but there's just enough time left to dream and scheme. By the time the last marked-down frock has been sold, most of the staff will have been launched into different careers. Madeleine St Johnwas born in Sydney. She graduated from Sydney University in 1963 and lived in London for most of the succeeding years, until her death in 2006. The Women in Blackwas her first novel, followed by A Pure Clear Light, 1996, The Essence of the Thing(shortlisted for the Booker Prize), 1997, and A Stairway to Paradise, 1999. 'Seductive, hilarious, brilliantly observed, this novel shimmers with wit and tenderness.' Helen Garner 'Funny, affectionate, moving and written with a light, comic touch.' Monica McInerney, Australian Women's Weekly 'This glorious, witty snapshot of Australia in the 1950s...it really is a gem in the rough....This is no nostalgia piece for a lost way of life, but a clever, funny argument for why things had to change.' Sunday Times 'An excellent read.' Starts at 60 ...Show more

Fahrenheit 451 [FTI] by Ray Bradbury

$19.99 AUD

Category: Classics

Stoner by John Williams; John McGahern (Introduction by)

$14.99 AUD

Category: Classics

Colum McCann once called Stoner one of the great forgotten novels of the past century, but it seems it is forgotten no longer - in 2013 translations of Stoner began appearing on bestseller lists across Europe. Forty-eight years after its first, quiet publication in the US, Stoner is finally finding the wide and devoted readership it deserves. Have you read it yet? William Stoner enters the University of Missouri at nineteen to study agriculture. A seminar on English literature changes his life, and he never returns to work on his father's farm. Stoner becomes a teacher. He marries the wrong woman. His life is quiet, and after his death his colleagues remember him rarely. Yet with truthfulness, compassion and intense power, this novel uncovers a story of universal value. Stoner tells of the conflicts, defeats and victories of the human race that pass unrecorded by history, and reclaims the significance of an individual life. A reading experience like no other, itself a paean to the power of literature, it is a novel to be savoured. ...Show more

Stairway to Paradise - Text Classics by Madeleine St John

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Category: Classics | Series: Text Classics Ser.

Alex and Andrew are friends. And Barbara...Barbara is a goddess. Here is the eternal triangle, the story of three people in an unhappy tangle of emotions, none able to articulate the precise quality of their longing and dissatisfaction.Are any of them truly interested in reaching the 'paradise' they cla im to be seeking, or are they actually trying to avoid it?In St. John's hands, what is commonplace is transformed and transcendent. This is the work of an extraordinary writer. ...Show more

The New York Stories by John O'Hara

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Category: Classics

'Superb... These thirty-two stories inhabit the Technicolor vernaculars of taxi drivers, barbers, paper pushers and society matrons... O'Hara was American fiction's greatest eavesdropper, recording the everyday speech and tone of all strata of mid-century society' Wall Street Journal John O'Hara remain s the great chronicler of American society, and nowhere are his powers more evident than in his portraits of New York's so-called Golden Age. Unsparingly observed, brilliantly cutting and always on the tragic edge of epiphany, the stories collected here are among O'Hara's finest work, and show why he still stands as the most-published short story writer in the history of the New Yorker. ...Show more

Flush by Virginia Woolf

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Category: Classics | Series: Vintage Lives Ser.

FlushA Biographyby Virginia WoolfVirginia Woolf's humorous biography of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's spaniel is charming yet also radical. A work of sensuous imagination, it opens up a range of questions about class, society, and cultural attitudes which are woven throughout the whole of Woolf's writing .We are delighted to publish this classic book as part of our extensive Classic Library collection. Many of the books in our collection have been out of print for decades, and therefore have not been accessible to the general public. The aim of our publishing program is to facilitate rapid access to this vast reservoir of literature, and our view is that this is a significant literary work, which deserves to be brought back into print after many decades. The contents of the vast majority of titles in the Classic Library have been scanned from the original works. To ensure a high quality product, each title has been meticulously hand curated by our staff. Our philosophy has been guided by a desire to provide the reader with a book that is as close as possible to ownership of the original work. We hope that you will enjoy this wonderful classic work, and that for you it becomes an enriching experience. ...Show more

Vanity Fair TV tie-in by William Makepeace Thackeray

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Category: Classics

Becky Sharp is a poor orphan when she first makes friends with the lovely Amelia Sedley at Miss Pinkerton?s Academy for Young Ladies. She may not have the natural advantages of her companion but she more than makes up for it with her wit, charm, deviousness and determination to make a success of herself whatever the cost. Vanity Fair is the story of Becky?s spectacular rise and fall as she gambles, manipulates and seduces her way through high society and the Napoleonic wars. ...Show more

The Odyssey by Homer; Emily Wilson (Translator)

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Category: Classics

The Odyssey is a poem mainly focuses on the Greek hero Odysseus (known as Ulysses in Roman myths) and his journey home after the fall of Troy. It takes Odysseus ten years to reach Ithaca after the ten-year Trojan War. In his absence, it is assumed Odysseus has died, and his wife Penelope and son Telemac hus must deal with a group of unruly suitors, the Mnesteres (Greek) or Proci, who compete for Penelope's hand in marriage. ...Show more

1915: A Novel of Gallipoli by Roger McDonald

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Category: Classics

The year young Australians sailed off to war in high hopes of adventure, only to find themselves faced with disaster. The tragedy and violence of Gallipoli provide the climax to this very personal, moving and surprisingly romantic story. With remarkable skill and in achingly beautiful prose, Roger McDo nald takes the reader on an archetypal Australian journey which parallels the nation's progress from its country childhood, through the adolescent exuberance of its young cities, to initiation on one of the world's ancient battlefields. It is a vital journey, haunted by menace and disillusionment, one embedded in our national mythology. This astonishing first novel, published to great critical acclaim in 1979 and since then selling over 100,000 copies, tells the story of two boys from the bush, the thoughtful and awkward Walter and his knowing friend Billy Mackenzie, and their girls Frances and Diana. Together they discover a future which seems full of promise, drawing them into the exciting turmoil of passion and war. But theirs is a fateful alliance, in a world all too quickly passing, with an outcome they never could have foreseen. ...Show more

I'd Die for You: and Other Lost Stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald; Anne Margaret Daniel (Editor)

$22.99 AUD

Category: Classics

**THE SUNDAY TIMES TOP TEN BESTSELLER** 'This belated collection shows us the depths of Fitzgerald's vision and talent. Only now are we beginning to appreciate what was lost' The Pool I'd Die for You is a collection of the last remaining unpublished short stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald, iconi c author of The Great Gatsby and Tender Is the Night.  All eighteen short fictions collected here were lost in one sense or another: physically lost, coming to light only recently; lost in the turbulence of Fitzgerald's later life; lost to readers because his editors sometimes did not understand what he was trying to write. These fascinating stories offer a new insight into the arc of Fitzgerald's career, and demonstrate his stylistic agility and imaginative power as a writer at the forefront of Modern literature.  Praise for I'd Die for You: 'Superbly edited and annotated, this richly fascinating miscellany is a marvellous reminder of what was lost when, at forty-four, a coronary killed Fitzgerald' Sunday Times 'Forward-thinking for their time . . . Fitzgerald was a master of short story writing' The Times 'This much-vaunted collection of stories . . . is a ragtag bundle of surprises, curios, irrelevancies and delights . . . We can marvel at the strength of his imagination, his display of elegance and precision' Sunday Telegraph 'Readers will find much to enjoy in this gorgeously produced book' New York Times 'A beguiling meditation on the dark side of wealth and the American dream' Independent ...Show more

Lord of the Flies by William Golding

$19.99 AUD

Category: Classics

If you're looking for an explanation of Lord of the Flies's themes, plot points, character actions and motivations, plus discussions of William Golding's unique literary style and point of view, reach for the Literature Made Easy Series. This enlightening guide uses meaningful text, extensive illustrat ions and imaginative graphics to make this novel clearer, livelier, and more easily understood than ordinary literature plot summaries. An unusual feature, "Mind Map" is a diagram that summarizes and interrelates the most important details about Lord of the Flies that students need to understand. Appropriate for middle and high school students. ...Show more