Drawn on by his eagerness for the open sky, he left his guide and soared upwards...'Ovid tells the tales of Theseus and the Minotaur, Daedalus and Icarus, the Calydonian Boar-Hunt, and many other fam
A collection of cantos from Paradiso, the most original and experimental part of the Divina Commedia.
One of 46 new books in the bestselling Little Black Classics series, to celebrate the first ev
'Meanwhile, let us have a sip of tea. The afternoon glow is brightening the bamboos, the fountains are bubbling with delight, the soughing of the pines is heard in our kettle.'
In this charming bo
'There sat the dog with eyes as big as mill wheels'Though criticised for their anarchic immorality when first published, Hans Christian Andersen's tales made him an international star, taken to the h
'Mind you, it was a pukka, respectable opium-house, and not one of those stifling, sweltering chandoo-khanas that you can find all over the City.'Kipling first became famous for his pungent, harsh an
The vessel drove before her bows two billows of liquid phosphorus'
A selection of Darwin's extraordinary adventures during the voyage of the Beagle
Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books f
'Things are not simple but complex. If he bit Mr. Browning he bit her too. Hatred is not hatred; hatred is also love.'
Virginia Woolf's delightful biography of the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning'
'Nothing more lonely -'
A selection of Basho's most magical haiku
Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little Black Classics celebrate the huge range and div
"I did have hallucinations, but did they harm anyone? Who did they harm, that's what I'd like to know!'
From the supreme artist of the short story, three disturbing tales of supernatural hallucina
'An ass, clothed in the skin of a lion...'Aesop's animal fables are some of the earliest stories ever told, thought to have been composed by a slave in Greek antiquity and giving glimpses of a world
'It was as if the sea, breaking down the wall protecting all the homes of the town, had sent a wave over her head'
One of Conrad's most powerful, gripping stories
Introducing Little Black Class
'All nations, colors, barbarisms, civilizations, languages...'
A selection taken from Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass
Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Lit
A selection of Maupassant's brilliant, glittering stories set in the Parisian beau monde and Normandy countryside.
Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th birthday. Little B
Exuberant and ingenious, Lear's best-loved poems tell of jumblies, quangle wangles and luminous noses.
One of 46 new books in the bestselling Little Black Classics series, to celebrate the first e
'Reader, if you're ready, so am I.'
These witty vignettes, set in Charlotte Brontë's imaginary world of Angria, feature debauched aristocrats, high-society courtesans and the rakish, brooding hero
'Brave Frenchmen, will you not surrender?'
Cambronne answered, 'Merde!'
A tense, dramatic account of the Battle of Waterloo - and how a rain shower changed history - from Victor Hugo's epic novel
' "You are not my first passion, my divine friend, but you shall be my last." '
In this episode from his infamous memoirs, swashbuckling serial seducer Casanova falls for a beautiful nun on the Ve
We must learn to love, learn to be kind, and this from our earliest youth ... Likewise, hatred must be learned and nurtured, if one wishes to become a proficient hater'
This volume contains a sele
'It is a most wonderful comfort to sit alone beneath a lamp, book spread before you, and commune with someone from the past whom you have never met...'
Moonlight, sake, spring blossom, idle moment
I could see that she was still terribly afraid, but I didn't soften anything; instead, seeing that she was afraid I deliberately intensified it.'
In this short story, Dostoyevsky masterfully depic
'Strangely enough, I mistook it for a gentleman at first. Fortunately I had my spectacles with me so I could see it was really a nose.
.Introducing Little Black Classics: 80 books for Penguin's 80th
'I'll stop doing it as soon as I understand what I'm doing.'
Somewhere between a historical account and work of philosophy, Socrates' Defence details the final plea of Plato's beloved mentor.
I
'What is the life of a human being - a drop of dew, a flash of lightning? This is so sad, so sad.' Autobiographical stories from one of Japan's masters of modernist story-telling.Introducing Little B
'The pleasure is twice as sweet
When you cheat a cheat.'
An illustrated collection of fables from one of France's most vital writers.
One of 46 new books in the bestselling Little Black Classi
'Cut iron with iron,
What makes iron valuable,
Big kuku tree and big silk-cotton tree,
Fari and Kaunju -'
Told and retold since the fourteenth century, this West African epic chronicles the sto
It was like walking along the knife-edge of the highest possible mountain range, seeing life on one side and death on the other in the form of two deep, gorgeous and gleaming seascapes.'
This asto