Beowulf is an Old English epic poem composed anonymously between the 8th and 11th centuries. It is the longest and most important work of Old English literature, blending Germanic pagan warrior culture with Christian themes. The epic follows the legendary hero Beowulf, a prince of the Geats (from modern-day Sweden), as he fights three catastrophic monster battles across his lifetime to protect …
Robinson Crusoe is an adventure novel by English writer Daniel Defoe, first published in 1719. Often credited as one of the first English novels, the book is presented as an autobiography of its title character—a castaway who spends 28 years on a remote tropical desert island near Trinidad, encountering isolation, savages, and cannibals before ultimately being rescued. The story was loosely i…
The Scarlet Letter is a classic 19th-century historical romance novel by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne, published in 1850. Set in the puritanical community of 17th-century Boston, Massachusetts, the novel explores deep themes of sin, guilt, legalism, repentance, and the crushing weight of public shame. It is widely considered a masterpiece of American literature.
Selected Fairy Tales refers to anthologies or canonical collections of traditional folk and fairy tales—most famously compiled by the Brothers Grimm (Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm) in the 19th century (Kinder- und Hausmärchen, originally published starting in 1812). These collections gathered oral folklore from German and European traditions, preserving magical, moral, and often dark narratives th…
The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes is the final collection of twelve short stories featuring the legendary detective Sherlock Holmes, written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Originally published in magazines between 1921 and 1927 (and collected in book form in 1927), this volume marked the definitive end of the canonical Sherlock Holmes saga. Unlike earlier collections written in the late 19th and e…
The story is set in Victorian London and follows Dorian Gray, an exceptionally handsome, innocent, and wealthy young man. While sitting for a portrait by the talented and infatuated artist Basil Hallward, Dorian meets Lord Henry Wotton, a cynical, charismatic aristocrat. Lord Henry introduces Dorian to a hedonistic philosophy centered on the worship of youth, beauty, and sensual pleasure abo…
The Picture of Dorian Gray is the only novel written by the iconic Irish author and playwright Oscar Wilde. First published in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine in 1890 (and heavily revised into a book in 1891), it is a cornerstone of Gothic and decadent literature. Fusing the Faustian bargain with acute psychological insight, the novel serves as a dazzling philosophical exploration of art, hedonis…
Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and its sequel Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There (1871) are two of the most celebrated works of literary nonsense and children’s fantasy ever written. Authored by the English mathematician and writer Charles Lutwidge Dodgson under the pseudonym Lewis Carroll, these timeless masterpieces transport readers into surreal, dreamlike wor…
The story is set during the American Civil War, in the spring of 1865. Five men—alongside a faithful dog—escape from a Confederate prison camp in Richmond, Virginia, by hijacking a massive observation balloon during a violent hurricane