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Waiting for Godot

Samuel Beckett

1952

Poetry, Drama, Fiction, Absurdist fiction, Play

Waiting for Godot follows a pair of men who divert themselves while waiting expectantly, vainly for someone named Godot to arrive. They claim he's an acquaintance but in fact hardly know him, admitting that they would not recognize him when they do see him. To occupy the time they eat, sleep, converse, argue, sing, play games, exercise, swap hats, and contemplate suicide – anything "to hold the terrible silence at bay". The play opens with Estragon struggling to remove a boot. Estragon eventually gives up, muttering, "Nothing to be done." His friend Vladimir takes up the thought and muses on it, the implication being that nothing is a thing that has to be done and this pair is going to have to spend the rest of the play doing it. When Estragon finally succeeds in removing his boot, he looks and feels inside but finds nothing. Just prior to this, Vladimir peers into his hat. The motif recurs throughout the play. The pair discuss repentance, particularly in relation to the two thieves crucified alongside Jesus, and that only one of the Four Evangelists mentions that one of them was saved. This is the first of numerous Biblical references in the play, which may be linked to its putative central theme of the search for and reconciliation with God, as well as salvation: "We're saved!" they cry on more than one occasion when they feel that Godot may be near. Presently, Vladimir expresses his frustration with Estragon's limited conversational skills: "Come on, Gogo, return the ball, can't you, once in a while?" Estragon struggles with this throughout the play, and Vladimir generally takes the lead in dialogue and encounters with others. Vladimir is at times hostile towards his companion, but in general they are close, frequently embracing and supporting one another. Estragon peers out into the audience and comments on the bleakness of his surroundings. He wants to depart but is told that they cannot because they must wait for Godot. The pair cannot agree, however, on whether or not they are in the right place or that this is the arranged day for their meeting with Godot; they are not even sure what day it is. Throughout the play, experienced time is attenuated, fractured or eerily non-existent. The only thing that they are fairly sure about is that they are to meet at a tree: there is one nearby. Estragon dozes off, but, after rousing him, Vladimir is not interested in hearing about his dream. Estragon wants to hear an old joke about a brothel, which Vladimir starts but cannot finish, as he is suddenly compelled to rush off and urinate. He does not finish the story when he returns, asking Estragon instead what else they might do to pass the time. Estragon suggests that they hang themselves, but they abandon the idea when it seems that they might not both die: leaving one of them alone, an intolerable notion. They decide to do nothing: "It's safer," explains Estragon, before asking what Godot is going to do for them when he arrives. For once it is Vladimir who struggles to remember: "Oh ... nothing very definite," is the best that he can manage. When Estragon declares that he is hungry, Vladimir provides a carrot, most of which, and without much relish, the former eats. The diversion ends as Estragon announces that they still have nothing to do. Their waiting is interrupted by the passing through of Pozzo and his heavily-laden slave Lucky. "A terrible cry" from the wings heralds the initial entrance of Lucky, who has a rope tied around his neck. His master appears holding the other end. Pozzo barks orders at his slave and frequently calls him a "pig", but is civil towards the other two. They mistake him at first for Godot and clearly do not recognise him for the self-proclaimed personage he is. This irks him, but, while maintaining that the land that they are on is his, he acknowledges that "the road is free to all". Deciding to rest for a while, Pozzo enjoys chicken and wine. Finished, he casts the bones aside, and Estragon jumps at the chance to ask for them, much to Vladimir's embarrassment, but is told that they belong to the carrier. He must first, therefore, ask Lucky if he wants them. Estragon tries, but Lucky only hangs his head, refusing to answer. Taking this as a "no", Estragon claims the bones. Vladimir takes Pozzo to task regarding his mistreatment of his slave, but his protestations are ignored. When the original pairing tries to find out why Lucky does not put down his load (at least not unless his master is prevailing on him to do something else), Pozzo explains that Lucky is attempting to mollify him to prevent him from selling him. At this, Lucky begins to cry. Pozzo provides a handkerchief, but, when Estragon tries to wipe his tears away, Lucky kicks him. Before he leaves, Pozzo asks if he can do anything for the pair in exchange for the company they have provided during his rest. Estragon tries to ask for some money, but Vladimir cuts him short, explaining that they are not beggars. They nevertheless accept an offer to have Lucky dance and to think. The dance is clumsy and shuffling. Lucky's "think", induced by Vladimir's putting his hat on his head, is a lengthy and disjointed verbal stream of consciousness. The soliloquy begins relatively coherently but quickly dissolves into logorrhoea and only ends when Vladimir rips off Lucky's hat. Once Lucky has been revived, Pozzo has him pack up his things and they leave. At the end of the act (and its successor), a boy arrives, purporting to be a messenger sent from Godot, to advise the pair that he will not be coming that "evening but surely tomorrow." During Vladimir's interrogation of the boy, he asks if he came the day before, making it apparent that the two men have been waiting for an indefinite period and will likely continue to wait ad infinitum. After the boy departs, they decide to leave but make no attempt to do so, an action repeated in Act II, as the curtain is drawn. Act II opens with Vladimir singing a recursive round about a dog, which could illustrate the cyclical nature of the play's universe, and also point toward the play's debt to the carnivalesque, music hall traditions, and vaudeville comedy (this is only one of a number of canine references and allusions in the play). There is a bit of realisation by Vladimir that the world they are trapped in evinces convoluted progression (or lack thereof) of time. He begins to see that although there is notional evidence of linear progression, basically he is living the same day over and over. Eugene Webb has written of Vladimir's song that "Time in the song is not a linear sequence, but an endlessly reiterated moment, the content of which is only one eternal event: death." Once again Estragon maintains he spent the night in a ditch and was beaten – by "ten of them" this time – though he shows no sign of injury. Vladimir tries to talk to him about what appears to be a seasonal change in the tree and the proceedings of the day before, but he has only a vague recollection. Vladimir tries to get Estragon to remember Pozzo and Lucky, but all he can call to mind are the bones and getting kicked. Vladimir realises an opportunity to produce tangible evidence of the previous day's events. With some difficulty he gets Estragon to show him his leg. There is a wound which is beginning to fester. Only then Vladimir notices that Estragon is not wearing any boots. He discovers the pair of boots, which Estragon insists are not his but nevertheless fit when he tries them on. With no carrots left, Vladimir offers Estragon the choice between a turnip and a radish. He opts for the radish but it is black and he hands it back. He decides to try to sleep again and adopts the same fetal position as the previous day. Vladimir sings him a lullaby. Vladimir notices Lucky's hat, and tries it on. This leads to a frenetic hat-swapping scene. They play at imitating Pozzo and Lucky, but Estragon can barely remember having met them and simply does what Vladimir asks. They fire insults at each other and then make up. After that, they attempt some physical routines which do not work out well, and even attempt a single yoga position, which fails miserably. Pozzo and Lucky arrive, with Pozzo now blind and insisting that Lucky is dumb. The rope is much shorter, and Lucky – who has acquired a new hat – leads Pozzo, rather than being driven by him. Pozzo has lost all notion of time, and assures them he cannot remember meeting them the day before, and does not expect to remember the current day's events when they are over. They fall in a heap. Estragon sees an opportunity to extort more food or to exact revenge on Lucky for kicking him. The issue is debated. Pozzo offers them money but Vladimir sees more worth in their entertainment since they are compelled to wait to see if Godot arrives. Eventually though, they all find their way onto their feet. Whereas Pozzo in Act I is a windbag, he now (as a blind man) appears to have gained some insight. His parting words – which Vladimir expands upon later – eloquently encapsulate the brevity of human existence: "They give birth astride of a grave, the light gleams an instant, then it's night once more." Lucky and Pozzo depart. The same boy returns to inform them not to expect Godot today, but promises he will arrive the next day. The two again consider suicide but their rope, Estragon's belt, breaks in two when they tug on it. Estragon's trousers fall down, but he does not notice until Vladimir tells him to pull them up. They resolve to bring a more suitable piece and hang themselves the next day, if Godot fails to arrive. Again, they agree to leave but neither of them makes any move to go.

/m/08524

The Wanderer

Fritz Leiber

1964

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Novel

The novel is set in a future a few decades ahead of the 1960s, when it was written. The USA is still competing with the Soviet Union. Both have functioning bases on the Moon, and the Soviets have gained the lead in sending an expedition to Mars. From the point of view of most of the population of the Earth, a new planet appears out of nothing close to the Moon, shortly after a total lunar eclipse. Over a period of few days the planet appears to consume the Moon. On Earth, the new planet's gravity causes death and destruction as it raises huge ocean tides and causes earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. Flying saucers appear in the skies, apparently trying to mitigate some of the disastrous effects. Then after a spectacular battle in space between the new planet and another, the skies are empty again. Earth is left without a Moon. The novel follows the lives of people around the globe. There is a man attempting a solo crossing of the Atlantic ocean, a smuggler operating off the coast of Vietnam, two friends in England, a trio of drug addicts in New York City, and the military controllers of the USA Moon mission, deep in a bunker somewhere near Washington DC. The new planet is referred to by everybody as simply "the Wanderer". The main protagonists are three longtime friends. Paul Hagbolt is escorting Margo Gelhorn (and her cat, Miaow) to observe the lunar eclipse at an observatory in California. Their friend, and Margo's fiance, is Don Merriam, one of the American astronauts at the Moon base. Following on a whim a sign advertising a "flying saucer symposium", Paul and Margo fall in with a group of intellectuals, dreamers, charlatans and misfits. At that point events overtake them. The new planet appears and triggers an earthquake that buries their cars in a landslide. They must avoid tsunamis, more earthquakes, roving mobs and flying saucers to survive. On the Moon Don Merriam is the only one to escape the destruction of the moonbase. He tries to take off in one of the base's spaceships, only to fall through the Moon itself as it splits into two under the influence of the new planet. His ship is eventually captured by the inhabitants of the new planet. Events take a bizarre turn when the group of saucer enthusiasts is faced with a tsunami. A flying saucer appears, and a cat-like being uses some kind of gun to repel the waves. Then the being uses the same device to pull Paul, who is holding Miaow, into the saucer. At the same time the gun falls into the hands of the people on the ground. In the saucer Paul meets a being calling itself Tigerishka. A large, female telepathic feline creature, she initially mistakes Miaow as the intelligent being whose thoughts she can hear, and Paul as a "monkey". Realizing her mistake, she regards Paul with contempt. Monkey-beings are not well regarded by her people. However she slowly warms to him, and explains why her planet has appeared to consume the moon. Like many of the human characters, her people are intellectuals, dreamers, charlatans and misfits. They belong to a culture that spans the Universe, has achieved immortality, and can construct planets and traverse hyperspace. They can create bodies for themselves that reflect the origins of their races, such as Tigerishka's cat-form. However they are fleeing their culture's police. Their culture rejects nonconformists, instead devoting itself to ensuring that intelligent life survives to the end of time. Tigerishka's people want to explore hyperspace, and tinker with space, time and the Mind. Their flight has brought them to Earth orbit simply to refuel. Huge amounts of matter must be converted to energy to power their hyperspace drive and their weapons. As alien as Tigerishka is, Paul becomes besotted with her. Tigerishka eventually yields to his advances. At the same time, Don Merriam has been rescued with his ship by the Wanderer's other spaceships. He is reunited with Paul aboard Tigerishka's ship. Now they must testify in the Wanderer's trial, for the police have arrived. A second planet, "The Stranger", colored a dull gray where the Wanderer is bright purple and yellow, appears and threatens battle. Don and Paul give their testimony as to the good treatment they have seen, along with thousands of other humans appearing by some kind of holographic projection. However the trial goes badly. Paul and Don are evacuated in Don's ship, placed into position close to Earth by Tigerishka. Tigerishka takes Miaow with her back to her planet. Then the final battle takes place, and both planets disappear. In the final scene, Margo and her companions walk to Vandenberg Spaceport as Don's ship comes in to land.

/m/090m2

2010: Odyssey Two

Arthur C. Clarke

1982-01

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction

The story is set nine years after the failure of the Discovery One mission to Jupiter. A joint Soviet-American crew, including Heywood Floyd from 2001, on the Soviet spaceship Alexei Leonov (named after the famous cosmonaut) arrives to discover what went wrong with the earlier mission, to investigate the monolith in orbit around the planet, and to resolve the disappearance of David Bowman. They hypothesize that much of this information is locked away on the now-abandoned Discovery One. The Soviets have an advanced new "Sakharov" drive which will propel them to Jupiter ahead of the American Discovery Two, so Floyd is assigned to the Leonov crew. However, a Chinese space station rockets out of Earth orbit, revealing itself to be the interplanetary spacecraft Tsien, also aimed at Jupiter. The Leonov crewmembers think the Chinese are on a one-way trip due to its speed, but Floyd surmises that due to the large water content of Europa they intend to land there and use the water content to refuel. The Tsien's daring mission ends in failure, when it is destroyed by an indigenous life-form on Europa. The only survivor radios the story to the Leonov; it is presumed that he dies when his spacesuit air supply runs out. The Leonov survives a dangerous aerobraking around Jupiter and arrives at Discovery. Mission crewmember and HAL 9000's creator, Dr. Chandra, reactivates the computer to ascertain the cause of his earlier aberrant behavior. After some time, Floyd is speaking to a Russian on board, who, for an instant, sees the Monolith open again, into a Stargate, as David Bowman escapes from the Monolith's universe back into ours. A sequence of scenes follows the explorations of David Bowman, who has been transformed into a non-corporeal, energy-based life-form, much like the aliens controlling the monoliths. During his journey, the Avatar of Bowman travels to Earth, making contact with significant individuals from his human past: He visits his mother and brushes her hair (shortly before she dies), and he appears to his ex-girlfriend on her television screen. In the novel, the aliens are using Bowman as a probe to learn about humankind. He then returns to the Jupiter system to explore beneath the ice of Europa, where he finds aquatic life-forms, and under the clouds of Jupiter, where he discovers gaseous life-forms. Both are primitive, but the aliens deem the Europan creatures to have evolutionary potential. An apparition of Bowman appears before Floyd, warning him that they must leave Jupiter within 15 days. Floyd has difficulty convincing the rest of the crew at first, but then the monolith vanishes from orbit and a mysterious dark spot appears on Jupiter and begins to grow. HAL's telescope observations reveal that the "Great Black Spot" is, in fact, a vast population of monoliths, increasing at an exponential rate, which appear to be eating the planet. The Leonov crew devises a plan to use the Discovery as a "booster rocket", enabling them to return to Earth ahead of schedule. Unfortunately, HAL and the Discovery will be trapped in Jupiter's orbit, with insufficient fuel to escape. The crew are worried that HAL will have the same neuroses on discovering that he will be abandoned yet again, so Chandra must convince HAL that the human crew is in danger. The Leonov crew flees Jupiter as the swarm of monoliths spread to engulf the planet. By acting as self-replicating 'von Neumann' machines, these monoliths increase Jupiter's density until the planet achieves nuclear fusion, becoming a small star. In the novel, this obliterates the primitive life forms inhabiting the Jovian atmosphere, which the Monoliths' controllers had deemed less worthy than the aquatic life of Europa. As Jupiter is about to transform, Bowman returns to Discovery to give HAL a last order to carry out. HAL begins repeatedly broadcasting the message The creation of the new star, which Earth eventually names Lucifer, destroys Discovery. However, in appreciation for HAL's help, Bowman has the aliens which control the monoliths remove HAL's artificial intelligence from Discoverys computer core and transform him into the same kind of life form as David Bowman, and becomes his companion. The book ends with a brief epilogue, which takes place in AD 20,001. By this time, the Europans have evolved into a species that has developed a primitive civilization, most likely with assistance from a monolith. They are not described in detail, though they are said to have "tendril"-like limbs. They regard the star Lucifer (formerly the planet Jupiter) as their primary Sun, referring to ours as "The Cold Sun". Though their settlements are concentrated primarily in the hemisphere of Europa which is constantly bathed in Lucifer's rays, some Europans have begun in recent generations to explore the Farside, the hemisphere facing away from Lucifer, which is still covered in ice. There they may witness the spectacle of night, unknown on the other side of Europa, when the Cold Sun sets. The Europans who explore the Farside have been carefully observing the night sky and have begun to develop a mythology based on their observations. They correctly believe that Lucifer was not always there. They believe that the Cold Sun was its brother and was condemned to march around the sky for a crime. The Europans also see three other major bodies in the sky. One seems to be constantly engulfed in fire, and the other two have lights on them which are gradually spreading. These three bodies are the moons Io, Callisto, and Ganymede, the latter two of which are presently being colonized by humans. Humans have been attempting to explore Europa ever since Lucifer was created in 2010. However, none of these attempts has been successful. Every probe that has attempted to land on Europa has been destroyed in the atmosphere; as it is later shown in 2061 and 3001 manned spacecraft that attempt to land have been instead diverted by an external force. The debris from every probe falls to the surface of the planet, and the debris from some of the first ships to be destroyed is venerated by the Europans. Finally, there is a Monolith on the planet, which is worshipped by the Europans more than anything else. The Europans assume, correctly, that the Monolith is what keeps humans at bay. Dave Bowman and HAL lie dormant in this Monolith. The Monolith is the guardian of Europa, and will continue to prevent contact between humans and Europans for as long as it sees fit.

/m/0952p

Brave New World

Aldous Huxley

Science Fiction, Children's literature, Speculative fiction, Utopian and dystopian fiction, Fiction, Dystopia

The novel opens in London in 632 (AD 2540 in the Gregorian Calendar). The vast majority of the population is unified under the World State, an eternally peaceful, stable global society in which goods and resources are plentiful (because the population is permanently limited to no more than two billion people) and everyone is happy. Natural reproduction has been done away with and children are created, 'decanted' and raised in Hatcheries and Conditioning Centres, where they are divided into five castes (which are further split into 'Plus' and 'Minus' members) and designed to fulfill predetermined positions within the social and economic strata of the World State. Fetuses chosen to become members of the highest caste, 'Alpha', are allowed to develop naturally while maturing to term in "decanting bottles", while fetuses chosen to become members of the lower castes ('Beta', 'Gamma', 'Delta', 'Epsilon') are subjected to in situ chemical interference to cause arrested development in intelligence or physical growth. Each 'Alpha' or 'Beta' is the product of one unique fertilized egg developing into one unique fetus. Members of lower castes are not unique but are instead created using the Bokanovsky process which enables a single egg to spawn (at the point of the story being told) up to 96 children and one ovary to produce thousands of children. To further increase the birthrate of Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons, Podsnap's Technique causes all the eggs in the ovary to mature simultaneously, allowing the hatchery to get full use of the ovary in two years' time. People of these castes make up the majority of human society, and the production of such specialized children bolsters the efficiency and harmony of society, since these people are deliberately limited in their cognitive and physical abilities, as well as the scope of their ambitions and the complexity of their desires, thus rendering them easier to control. All children are educated via the hypnopaedic process, which provides each child with caste-appropriate subconscious messages to mold the child's lifelong self-image and social outlook to that chosen by the leaders and their predetermined plans for producing future adult generations. To maintain the World State's Command Economy for the indefinite future, all citizens are conditioned from birth to value consumption with such platitudes as "ending is better than mending," "more stiches less riches" i.e., buy a new item instead of fixing the old one, because constant consumption, and near-universal employment to meet society's material demands, is the bedrock of economic and social stability for the World State. Beyond providing social engagement and distraction in the material realm of work or play, the need for transcendence, solitude and spiritual communion is addressed with the ubiquitous availability and universally endorsed consumption of the drug soma. Soma is an allusion to a mythical drink of the same name consumed by ancient Indo-Aryans. In the book, soma is a hallucinogen that takes users on enjoyable, hangover-free "holidays". It was developed by the World State to provide these inner-directed personal experiences within a socially managed context of State-run 'religious' organizations; social clubs. The hypnopaedically inculcated affinity for the State-produced drug, as a self-medicating comfort mechanism in the face of stress or discomfort, thereby eliminates the need for religion or other personal allegiances outside or beyond the World State. Recreational sex is an integral part of society. According to the World State, sex is a social activity, rather than a means of reproduction (sex is encouraged from early childhood). The few women who can reproduce are conditioned to use birth control, even wearing a "Malthusian belt" (which resembles a cartridge belt and holds "the regulation supply of contraceptives") as a popular fashion accessory. The maxim "everyone belongs to everyone else" is repeated often, and the idea of a "family" is considered pornographic; sexual competition and emotional, romantic relationships are rendered obsolete because they are no longer needed. Marriage, natural birth, parenthood, and pregnancy are considered too obscene to be mentioned in casual conversation. Thus, society has developed a new idea of reproductive comprehension. Spending time alone is considered an outrageous waste of time and money, and wanting to be an individual is horrifying. Conditioning trains people to consume and never to enjoy being alone, so by spending an afternoon not playing "Obstacle Golf," or not in bed with a friend, one is forfeiting acceptance. In the World State, people typically die at age 60 having maintained good health and youthfulness their whole life. Death isn't feared; anyone reflecting upon it is reassured by the knowledge that everyone is happy, and that society goes on. Since no one has family, they have no ties to mourn. The conditioning system eliminates the need for professional competitiveness; people are literally bred to do their jobs and cannot desire another. There is no competition within castes; each caste member receives the same food, housing, and soma rationing as every other member of that caste. There is no desire to change one's caste, largely because a person's sleep-conditioning reinforces each individual's place in the caste system. To grow closer with members of the same class, citizens participate in mock religious services called Solidarity Services, in which twelve people consume large quantities of soma and sing hymns. The ritual progresses through group hypnosis and climaxes in an orgy. In geographic areas nonconducive to easy living and consumption, securely contained groups of "savages" are left to their own devices. These appear to be similar to the reservations of land established for the Native American population during the colonisation of North America. These 'savages' are beholden of strange customs, including self-mutilation and religion, a mere curio in the outside world. In its first chapters, the novel describes life in the World State as wonderful and introduces Lenina Crowne and Bernard Marx. Lenina, a hatchery worker, is socially accepted and comfortable with her place in society, while Bernard, a psychologist, is an outcast. Although an Alpha Plus, Bernard is shorter in stature than the average of his caste—a quality shared by the lower castes, which gives him an inferiority complex. His work with sleep-teaching has led him to realize that what others believe to be their own deeply held beliefs are merely phrases repeated to children while they are asleep. Still, he recognizes the necessity of such programming as the reason why his society meets the emotional needs of its citizens. Courting disaster, he is vocal about being different, once stating he dislikes soma because he'd "rather be himself." Bernard's differences fuel rumors that he was accidentally administered alcohol while incubated, a method used to keep Epsilons short. Bernard's only friend is Helmholtz Watson, an Alpha Plus lecturer at the College of Emotional Engineering (Department of Writing). The friendship is based on their similar experiences as misfits, but unlike Bernard, Watson's sense of loneliness stems from being too gifted, too intelligent, too handsome, and too physically strong. Helmholtz is drawn to Bernard as a confidant: he can talk to Bernard about his desire to write poetry. Bernard is on holiday at a Savage Reservation. The reservation, located in New Mexico, consists of a community named Malpais. From afar, Lenina thinks it will be exciting. In person, she finds the aged, toothless natives who mend their clothes rather than throw them away repugnant, and the situation is made worse when she discovers that she has left her soma tablets at the resort hotel. In typical tourist fashion, Bernard and Lenina watch what at first appears to be a quaint native ceremony. The village folk, whose culture resembles the contemporary Indian groups of the region, descendants of the Anasazi, including the Puebloan peoples of Acoma, Laguna, and Zuni, and the Ramah Navajo, begin by singing, but the ritual quickly becomes a passion play where a village boy is whipped to unconsciousness. Soon after, the couple encounters Linda, a woman who has been living in Malpais since she came on a trip and became separated from her group, among whom was a man to whom she refers as "Tomakin" but who is revealed to be Bernard's boss, the Director of Hatcheries and Conditioning, Thomas. She became pregnant despite adhering to her "Malthusian Drill" and there were no facilities for an abortion. Her shame at pregnancy was so great that she decided not to return to her old life, but to stay with the "savages". Linda gave birth to a son, John (later referred to as John the Savage) who is now 18. Conversations with Linda and John reveal that their life has been hard. For 18 years, they have been treated as outsiders: the native men treated Linda like a sex object while the native women regularly beat and ostracized her because of her promiscuity, and John was mistreated and excluded for his mother's actions and the color of his skin. John was angered by Linda's lovers, and even attacked one in a jealous rage while a child. John's one joy was that his mother had taught him to read, although he only had two books: a scientific manual from his mother's job, which he called a "beastly, beastly book," and a collection of Shakespeare's works (which have been banned in the World State for being subversive). Shakespeare gives John articulation to his feelings, though, and he especially is interested in Othello, Romeo and Juliet, and Hamlet. At the same time, John has been denied the religious rituals of the village, although he has watched them and even has had some religious experiences on his own in the desert. Old, weathered and tired, Linda wants to return to her familiar world in London, as she misses living in the city and taking soma. John wants to see the "brave new world" his mother has told him so much about. Bernard wants to take them back to block Thomas from his plan to reassign Bernard to Iceland as punishment for his asocial beliefs. Bernard arranges permission for Linda and John to leave the reservation. John also seems to have an attraction to Lenina, as while Bernard is away, getting the permission to move the savages, he finds her suitcase and ruffles through all of her clothes, taking in the smells. He then sees her "sleeping" and stares at her, thinking all he has to do to see her properly is undo one zip. He later tells himself off for being like this towards Lenina, and seems to be extremely shy around her. Upon his return to London, Bernard is confronted by Thomas, the Director of the Hatchery and Conditioning Centre who, in front of an audience of higher-caste Centre workers, denounces Bernard for his asocial behavior. Bernard, thinking that for the first time in his life he has the upper hand, defends himself by presenting the Director with his long-lost lover and unknown son, Linda and John. John falls to his knees and calls Thomas his father, which causes an uproar of laughter. The humiliated Director resigns in shame. Spared from reassignment, Bernard makes John the toast of London. Pursued by the highest members of society, able to bed any woman he fancies, Bernard revels in attention he once scorned. The victory, however, is short-lived. Linda, decrepit, toothless, and friendless, goes on a permanent soma holiday while John, appalled by what he perceives to be an empty society, refuses to attend Bernard's parties. Society drops Bernard as swiftly as it had taken him. Bernard turns to the person he'd believed to be his one true friend, only to see Helmholtz fall into a quick, easy camaraderie with John. Bernard is left an outcast yet again as he watches the only two men with whom he ever connected find more of interest in each other than they ever did in him. John and Helmholtz's island of peace is brief. Lenina tries to seduce John, but John pushes her away, calling her out on her sexually wanton ways. Whilst Lenina is in the bathroom, humiliated and putting her clothes on, John receives a telephone call from the hospital telling him that his mother is extremely unwell. He rushes over to see her and sits at her bedside, trying to get her out of her soma holiday so that he can talk to her. He is heartbroken when his mother succumbs to soma and dies. He is extremely annoyed by the young boys that enter the ward to be conditioned about death and annoy John to the point where he starts to use violence to send them away. John's grief bewilders and revolts the hospital workers, and their lack of reaction to Linda's death prompts John to try to force humanity from the workers by throwing their soma rations out a window. The ensuing riot brings the police, who quell the riot by filling the room with soma. Bernard and Helmholtz arrive to help John, but only Helmholtz helps him, while Bernard stands to the side, torn between risking involvement by helping or escaping the scene. Following the riot, Bernard, Helmholtz and John are brought before Mustapha Mond, the Resident World Controller for Western Europe. Bernard (who breaks down during the middle of the conversation) and Helmholtz are told they will be exiled to islands of their choice. Mond explains that this exile is not so much a threat to force freethinkers to reform and rejoin society as it is a chance for them to act as they please because they will not be able to influence the population. He also divulges that he too once risked banishment to an island because of some scientific experiments that were deemed controversial by the state, giving insight into his sympathetic tone. Helmholtz chooses the Falkland Islands, believing that their terrible weather will inspire his writing, but Bernard simply does not want to leave London; he struggles with Mond and is thrown out of the office. After Bernard and Helmholtz have left, Mustapha and John engage in a philosophical argument on the morals behind the existing society and then John is told the "experiment" will continue and he will not be sent to an island. John meets with Bernard and Helmholtz once again before their departures from London and Bernard apologizes to John for his opportunistic behavior, having come to terms with his imminent exile and having restored his friendship with Helmholtz. In the final chapter, John isolates himself from society in a lighthouse outside London where he finds his hermit life interrupted from mourning his mother by the more bitter memories of civilization. To atone, John brutally whips himself in the open, a ritual the Indians in his own village had denied him. His self-flagellation, caught on film and shown publicly, destroys his hermit life. Hundreds of gawking sightseers, intrigued by John's violent behavior, fly out to watch the savage in person. Even Lenina comes to watch, crying a tear John does not see. The sight of the woman whom he both adores and blames is too much for him; John attacks and whips her. This sight of genuine, unbridled emotion drives the crowd wild with excitement, and — handling it as they are conditioned to — they turn on each other, in a frenzy of beating and chanting that devolves into a mass orgy of soma and sex. In the morning, John, hopeless, alone, horrified by his drug use and the orgy in which he participated that countered his beliefs, makes one last attempt to escape civilization and atone. When thousands of gawking sightseers arrive that morning, frenzied at the prospect of seeing the savage perform again, they find John dead from a suicidal hanging.

/m/099gy

Aeneid

Virgil

1943

Fantasy, Fiction, Poetry

The Aeneid can be divided into two halves based on the disparate subject matter of Books 1–6 (Aeneas' journey to Latium in Italy) and Books 7–12 (the war in Latium). These two halves are commonly regarded as reflecting Virgil's ambition to rival Homer by treating both the Odyssey's wandering theme and the Iliads warfare themes. This is, however, a rough correspondence, the limitations of which should be borne in mind. Virgil begins his poem with a statement of his theme (Arma virumque cano ..., "I sing of arms and of a man ...") and an invocation to the Muse, falling some seven lines after the poem's inception: (Musa, mihi causas memora ..., "O Muse, recount to me the causes ..."). He then explains the reason for the principal conflict in the story: the resentment held by the goddess Juno against the Trojan people. This is consistent with her role throughout the Homeric epics. Also in the manner of Homer, the story proper begins in medias res, with the Trojan fleet in the eastern Mediterranean, heading in the direction of Italy. The fleet, led by Aeneas, is on a voyage to find a second home. It has been foretold that in Italy, he will give rise to a race both noble and courageous, a race which will become known to all nations. Juno is wrathful, because she had not been chosen in the judgment of Paris, and because her favorite city, Carthage, will be destroyed by Aeneas' descendants. Also, Ganymede, a Trojan prince, was chosen to be her husband Jupiter's cup bearer—replacing Juno's daughter Hebe. Juno proceeds to Aeolus, King of the Winds, and asks that he release the winds to stir up a storm in exchange for a bribe (Deiopea, the loveliest of all her sea nymphs, as a wife). Despite refusing her bribe, he agrees, and the storm devastates the fleet. Neptune takes notice: although he himself is no friend of the Trojans, he is infuriated by Juno's intrusion into his domain, and stills the winds and calms the waters, after making sure that Aeolus would not try again. The fleet takes shelter on the coast of Africa. There, Aeneas's mother, Venus, in the form of a hunting woman very similar to the goddess Diana, encourages him and tells him the history of the city. Eventually, Aeneas ventures in, and in the temple of Juno, seeks and gains the favor of Dido, Queen of Carthage, the city which has only recently been founded by refugees from Tyre and which will later become one of Rome's greatest imperial rivals and enemies. At a banquet given in the honour of the Trojans, Aeneas recounts sadly the events which occasioned the Trojans' fortuitous arrival. He begins the tale shortly after the events described in the Iliad. Crafty Ulysses devised a way for Greek warriors to gain entry into Troy by hiding in a large wooden horse. The Greeks pretended to sail away, leaving a man, Sinon, to tell the Trojans that the horse was an offering and that if it were taken into the city, the Trojans would be able to conquer Greece. The Trojan priest Laocoön, who had seen through the Greek plot and urged the horse's destruction, hurled his spear at the wooden horse. Just after, in what would be seen by the Trojans as punishment from the gods, Laocoön was suddenly grabbed and eaten, along with his two sons, by two giant sea snakes. So the Trojans brought the horse inside the fortified walls, and after nightfall the armed Greeks emerged and began to slaughter the city's inhabitants. Aeneas woke up and saw with horror what was happening to his beloved city. At first he tried to fight against the enemy, but soon he lost his comrades and was left alone to fend off tens of Greeks. Hector, the fallen Trojan prince, had told him in a dream to flee with his family. Aeneas tells of his escape with his son Ascanius and father Anchises after various omens (his son Ascanius' head catches fire without his being harmed, and then a shooting star), his wife Creusa having been separated from the others and subsequently killed in the general catastrophe. After getting outside Troy, he goes back for his wife. Her ghost appears before him and tells him that his destiny is to found Rome. He tells of how, rallying the other survivors, he built a fleet of ships and made landfall at various locations in the Mediterranean: Thrace, where they find the last remains of a fellow Trojan, Polydorus; The Strophades, where they encounter the Harpy Celaeno; Crete, which they believe to be the land where they are to build their city (but they are set straight by Apollo); and Buthrotum. This last city had been built in an attempt to replicate Troy. In Buthrotum, Aeneas met Andromache, the widow of Hector. She still laments for the loss of her valiant husband and beloved child. There, too, Aeneas saw and met Helenus, one of Priam's sons, who had the gift of prophecy. Through him, Aeneas learned the destiny laid out for him: he was divinely advised to seek out the land of Italy (also known as Ausonia or Hesperia), where his descendants would not only prosper, but in time rule the entire known world. In addition, Helenus also bade him go to the Sibyl in Cumae. Heading out into the open sea, Aeneas left Buthrotum, rounding Italy's cape and making his way towards Sicily (Trinacria). There, they are caught in the whirlpool of Charybdis and driven out to sea. Soon they come ashore at the land of the Cyclops. There they meet a Greek, Achaemenides, one of Ulysses' men, who had been left behind when his comrades escaped the cave of Polyphemus. They take Achaemenides onboard and narrowly escape Polyphemus. Shortly after these events, Anchises dies peacefully of old age. Meanwhile, Venus has her own plans. She goes to her son, Aeneas' half-brother Cupid, and tells him to imitate Ascanius. Disguised as such, he goes to Dido, and offers the gifts expected from a guest. With her motherly love revived in the presence of the boy, her heart is pierced and she falls in love with the boy and his father. During the banquet, Dido realizes that she has fallen madly in love with Aeneas, although she had previously sworn fidelity to the soul of her late husband, Sychaeus, who had been murdered by her brother Pygmalion. Juno seizes upon this opportunity to make a deal with Venus, Aeneas' mother, with the intention of distracting him from his destiny of founding a city in Italy. Aeneas is inclined to return Dido's love, and during a hunting expedition, a storm drives them into a cave in which Aeneas and Dido presumably have sex, an event that Dido takes to indicate a marriage between them. But when Jupiter sends Mercury to remind Aeneas of his duty, he has no choice but to part. Her heart broken, Dido commits suicide by stabbing herself upon a pyre with Aeneas' sword. Before dying, she predicts eternal strife between Aeneas's people and hers; "rise up from my bones, avenging spirit" (4.625, trans. Fitzgerald) is an obvious invocation to Hannibal. Looking back from the deck of his ship, Aeneas sees Dido's funeral pyre's smoke and knows its meaning only too clearly. However, destiny calls and the Trojan fleet sails on to Italy. Book 5 takes place on Sicily and centers on the funeral games that Aeneas organizes for the anniversary of his father's death. Aeneas and his men have left Carthage for Sicily where, one year after the death of his father, Aeneas organizes a nine-day anniversary which includes celebratory games–a boat race, a foot race, a boxing match, and a shooting contest. In all those contests, Aeneas is careful to reward winners and losers, showing his leadership qualities by not allowing for antagonism even after foul play. Afterward, Ascanius leads a military parade and demonstration, prefiguring Rome's future predilection for war. During those events (in which only men participate), Juno incites the womenfolk to burn the fleet and prevent them from ever reaching Italy, but her plan is thwarted when Ascanius and then Aeneas intervene. Aeneas prays to Jupiter to quench the fires, which the god does with a torrential rainstorm. An anxious Aeneas is comforted by a vision of his father, who tells him to go down to the underworld to receive a vision of his and Rome's future, which he will do in Book 6. In return for safe passage to Italy, the gods, by order of Jupiter, will receive one of Aeneas's men as sacrifice: Palinurus, who steers Aeneas's ship by night, falls overboard and is drowned. In Book 6, Aeneas, with the guidance of the Cumaean Sibyl, descends into the underworld through an opening at Cumae; there he speaks with the spirit of his father and is offered a prophetic vision of the destiny of Rome. Upon returning to the land of the living, Aeneas leads the Trojans to settle in the land of Latium, where he courts Lavinia, the daughter of king Latinus. Although Aeneas would have wished to avoid it, war eventually breaks out. Juno is heavily involved in causing this war—she convinces the Queen of Latium to demand that Lavinia be married to Turnus, the king of a local people, the Rutuli. Juno continues to stir up trouble, even summoning the Fury Alecto to ensure that a war takes place. Seeing the masses of Italians that Turnus has brought against him, Aeneas seeks help from the Tuscans, enemies of Turnus. He meets King Evander from Arcadia, whose son Pallas agrees to lead troops against the other Italians. Meanwhile, the Trojan camp is being attacked, and a midnight raid leads to the deaths of Nisus and his companion Euryalus, in one of the most emotional passages in the book. The gates, however, are defended until Aeneas returns with his Tuscan and Arcadian reinforcements. In the battling that follows, many heroes are killed—notably Pallas, who is killed by Turnus, and Mezentius, Turnus' close associate. The latter, who has inadvertently allowed his son to be killed while he himself fled, reproaches himself and faces Aeneas in single combat—an honourable but essentially futile pursuit. Another notable hero, Camilla, a sort of Amazon character, fights bravely but is eventually killed. She has been a virgin devoted to Diana and to her nation; the man who kills her is struck dead by Diana's sentinel Opis after doing so, even though he tries to escape. After this, single combat is proposed between Aeneas and Turnus, but Aeneas is so obviously superior that the Italians, urged on by Turnus's divine sister, Juturna, break the truce. Aeneas is injured, but returns to the battle shortly afterwards. Turnus and Aeneas dominate the battle on opposite wings, but when Aeneas makes a daring attack at the city of Latium (causing the queen of Latium to hang herself in despair), he forces Turnus into single combat once more. In a dramatic scene, Turnus's strength deserts him as he tries to hurl a rock, and he is struck by Aeneas's spear in the leg. As Turnus is begging on his knees for his life, the poem ends with Aeneas killing him in rage when he sees that Turnus is wearing the belt of his friend Pallas as a trophy.

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Paradise Lost

John Milton

1667

Poetry

The poem is separated into twelve "books" or sections, and the lengths of each book varies greatly (the longest being Book IX, with 1,189 lines, and the shortest Book VII, having 640). The Arguments at the head of each book were added in subsequent imprints of the first edition. Originally published in ten books, in 1674 a fully "Revised and Augmented" edition with a new division into twelve books was issued. This is the edition that is generally used today. The poem follows the epic tradition of starting in medias res (Latin for in the midst of things), the background story being recounted later. Milton's story has two narrative arcs: one being that of Satan (Lucifer) and the other being that of Adam and Eve. It begins after Satan and the other rebel angels have been defeated and banished to Hell, or (as it is also called in the poem), Tartarus. In Pandæmonium, Satan employs his rhetorical skill to organise his followers; he is aided by Mammon and Beelzebub. Belial and Moloch are also present. At the end of the debate, Satan volunteers to poison the newly-created Earth and God's new and most favoured creation, Mankind. He braves the dangers of the Abyss alone in a manner reminiscent of Odysseus or Aeneas. After an arduous traverse of the Chaos outside Hell, he enters God's new material World, and later the Garden of Eden. At one point in the story, the Angelic War over Heaven is recounted. Satan's rebellion follows the epic convention of large-scale warfare. The battles between the faithful angels and Satan's forces take place over three days. The final battle involves the Son of God single-handedly defeating the entire legion of angelic rebels and banishing them from Heaven. Following the purging of Heaven, God creates the World, culminating in his creation of Adam and Eve. While God gave Adam and Eve total freedom and power to rule over all creation, He gave them one explicit command: not to eat from the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil on penalty of death. The story of Adam and Eve's temptation and fall is a fundamentally different, new kind of epic: a domestic one. Adam and Eve are presented for the first time in Christian literature as having a full relationship while still being without sin. They have passions and distinct personalities. Satan, disguised in the form of a serpent, successfully tempts Eve to eat from the Tree by preying on her vanity and tricking her with rhetoric. Adam, learning that Eve has sinned, knowingly commits the same sin. He declares to Eve that since she was made from his flesh, they are bound to one another so that if she dies, he must also die. In this manner, Milton portrays Adam as a heroic figure, but also as a greater sinner than Eve, as he is aware that what he is doing is wrong. After eating the fruit, Adam and Eve have lustful sex, and at first, Adam is convinced that Eve was right in thinking that eating the fruit would be beneficial. However, they soon fall asleep and have terrible nightmares, and after they awake, they experience guilt and shame for the first time. Realizing that they have committed a terrible act against God, they engage in mutual recrimination. Eve's pleas to Adam reconcile them somewhat. Her encouragement enables Adam and Eve both to approach God, to "bow and sue for grace with suppliant knee", and to receive grace from God. Adam is shown a vision by the angel Michael, in which Adam witnesses everything that will happen to mankind until the Great Flood. Adam is very upset by this vision of humankind's future, and so Michael also tells him about humankind's potential redemption from original sin through Jesus Christ (whom Michael calls "King Messiah"). Adam and Eve are cast out of Eden, and Michael says that Adam may find "a paradise within thee, happier far". Adam and Eve also now have a more distant relationship with God, who is omnipresent but invisible (unlike the tangible Father in the Garden of Eden).

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The Merchant of Venice

William Shakespeare

Bassanio, a young Venetian of noble rank, wishes to woo the beautiful and wealthy heiress Portia of Belmont. Having squandered his estate, Bassanio approaches his friend Antonio, a wealthy merchant of Venice and a kind and generous person, who has previously and repeatedly bailed him out, for three thousand ducats needed to subsidise his expenditures as a suitor. Antonio agrees, but since he is cash-poor - his ships and merchandise are busy at sea - he promises to cover a bond if Bassanio can find a lender, so Bassanio turns to the Jewish moneylender Shylock and names Antonio as the loan's guarantor. Shylock, who hates Antonio because of his Anti-Judaism and Antonio's customary refusal to borrow or lend money with interest, is at first reluctant, citing abuse he has suffered at Antonio's hand, but finally agrees to lend Antonio the sum without interest upon the condition that if Antonio is unable to repay it at the specified date, he may take a pound of Antonio's flesh. Bassanio does not want Antonio to accept such a risky condition; Antonio is surprised by what he sees as the moneylender's generosity (no "usance" – interest – is asked for), and he signs the contract. With money at hand, Bassanio leaves for Belmont with his friend Gratiano, who has asked to accompany him. Gratiano is a likeable young man, but is often flippant, overly talkative, and tactless. Bassanio warns his companion to exercise self-control, and the two leave for Belmont and Portia. Meanwhile in Belmont, Portia is awash with suitors. Her father left a will stipulating each of her suitors must choose correctly from one of three caskets – one each of gold, silver and lead. If he picks the right casket, he gets Portia. The first suitor, the luxurious Prince of Morocco, chooses the gold casket, interpreting its slogan "Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire" as referring to Portia. The second suitor, the conceited Prince of Arragon, chooses the silver casket, which proclaims "Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves", imagining himself to be full of merit. Both suitors leave empty-handed, having rejected the lead casket because of the baseness of its material and the uninviting nature of its slogan: "Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath." The last suitor is Bassanio, whom Portia wishes to succeed, having met him before. As Bassanio ponders his choice, members of Portia's household sing a song which says that "fancy" (not true love) is "engend'red in the eyes, With gazing fed.", prompting Bassanio to disregard "outward shows" and "ornament" and choses the lead casket, winning Portia's hand. At Venice, Antonio's ships are reported lost at sea. This leaves him unable to satisfy the bond. Shylock is even more determined to exact revenge from Christians after his daughter Jessica had fled home and eloped with the Christian Lorenzo, taking a substantial amount of Shylock's wealth with her, as well as a turquoise ring which was a gift to Shylock from his late wife, Leah. Shylock has Antonio brought before court. At Belmont, Bassanio receives a letter telling him that Antonio has been unable to return the loan taken from Shylock. Portia and Bassanio marry, as do Gratiano and Portia's handmaid Nerissa. Bassanio and Gratiano then leave for Venice, with money from Portia, to save Antonio's life by offering the money to Shylock. Unknown to Bassanio and Gratiano, Portia has sent her servant, Balthazar, to seek the counsel of Portia's cousin, Bellario, a lawyer, at Padua. The climax of the play comes in the court of the Duke of Venice. Shylock refuses Bassanio's offer of 6,000 ducats, twice the amount of the loan. He demands his pound of flesh from Antonio. The Duke, wishing to save Antonio but unable to nullify a contract, refers the case to a visitor who introduces himself as Balthazar, a young male "doctor of the law", bearing a letter of recommendation to the Duke from the learned lawyer Bellario. The doctor is actually Portia in disguise, and the law clerk who accompanies her is actually Nerissa, also in disguise. As Balthazar, Portia repeatedly asks Shylock to show mercy in a famous speech, advising him that mercy "is twice blest: It blesseth him that gives and him that takes." (IV,i,185) However, Shylock adamantly refuses any compensations and insists on the pound of flesh. As the court grants Shylock his bond and Antonio prepares for Shylock's knife, Portia points out that the contract only allows Shylock to remove the flesh, not the "blood", of Antonio (see quibble). Thus, if Shylock were to shed any drop of Antonio's blood, his "lands and goods" would be forfeited under Venetian laws. Further damning Shylock's case, she tells him that he must cut precisely one pound of flesh, no more, no less; she advises him that "if the scale do turn, But in the estimation of a hair, Thou diest and all thy goods are confiscate." Defeated, Shylock concedes to accepting Bassanio's offer of money for the defaulted bond, first his offer to pay "the bond thrice", which Portia rebuffs, telling him to take his bond, and then merely the principal, which Portia also prevents him from doing on the ground that he has already refused it "in the open court." She then cites a law under which Shylock, as a Jew and therefore an "alien", having attempted to take the life of a citizen, has forfeited his property, half to the government and half to Antonio, leaving his life at the mercy of the Duke. The Duke immediately pardons Shylock's life. Antonio asks for his share "in use" (that is, reserving the principal amount while taking only the income) until Shylock's death, when the principal will be given to Lorenzo and Jessica. At Antonio's request, the Duke grants remission of the state's half of forfeiture, but on the condition of Shylock converting to Christianity and bequeathing his entire estate to Lorenzo and Jessica (IV,i). Bassanio does not recognise his disguised wife, but offers to give a present to the supposed lawyer. First she declines, but after he insists, Portia requests his ring and Antonio's gloves. Antonio parts with his gloves without a second thought, but Bassanio gives the ring only after much persuasion from Antonio, as earlier in the play he promised his wife never to lose, sell or give it. Nerissa, as the lawyer's clerk, also succeeds in likewise retrieving her ring from Gratiano, who does not see through her disguise. At Belmont, Portia and Nerissa taunt and pretend to accuse their husbands before revealing they were really the lawyer and his clerk in disguise (V). After all the other characters make amends, Antonio learns from Portia that three of his ships were not stranded and have returned safely after all.

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The Invisible Man

H. G. Wells

1897

Albino bias, Science Fiction, Children's literature, Horror, Novel, Speculative fiction, Science, Fiction, Scientific romance

A mysterious stranger, Griffin, arrives at the local inn of the English village of Iping, West Sussex, during a snowstorm. The stranger wears a long-sleeved, thick coat and gloves, his face hidden entirely by bandages except for a fake pink nose, large goggles and a wide-brimmed hat. He is excessively reclusive, irascible, and unfriendly. He demands to be left alone and spends most of his time in his rooms working with a set of chemicals and laboratory apparatus, only venturing out at night. While staying at the inn, hundreds of strange glass bottles arrive that Griffin calls his luggage. Many local townspeople believe this to be very strange. He becomes the talk of the village (one of the novel's most charming aspects is its portrayal of small-town life in southern England, which the author knew from first-hand experience). Meanwhile, a mysterious burglary occurs in the village. Griffin has run out of money and is trying to find a way to pay for his board and lodging. When his landlady demands he pay his bill and quit the premises, he reveals part of his invisibility to her in a fit of pique. An attempt to apprehend the stranger is frustrated when he undresses to take advantage of his invisibility, fights off his would-be captors, and flees to the downs. There Griffin coerces a tramp, Thomas Marvel, into becoming his assistant. With Marvel, he returns to the village to recover three notebooks that contain his records of his experiments. When Marvel soon attempts to betray the Invisible Man to the police, Griffin chases him to the seaside town of Port Burdock, threatening to kill him. Marvel escapes to a local inn, and is saved by the people at the inn, but Griffin escapes. Marvel later goes to the police and tells them of this "invisible man," then requests to be locked up in a high security jail cell. His furious attempt to avenge his betrayal leads to his being shot. Griffin takes shelter in a nearby house that turns out to belong to Dr. Kemp, a former acquaintance from medical school. To Kemp, he reveals his true identity: the Invisible Man is Griffin, a former medical student who left medicine to devote himself to optics. Griffin recounts how he invented medicine capable of rendering bodies invisible and, on an impulse, performed the procedure on himself. Griffin tells Kemp of his story of how he turned invisible. He tells of how he tries the invisibility on a cat, then himself. Griffin burns down the boarding house he is staying in along with all his equipment he used to turn invisible to cover his tracks, but soon realizes he is ill-equipped to survive in the open. He attempts to steal food and clothes from a large store, but eventually he steals some clothing from a theatrical supply shop and heads to Iping to attempt to reverse the effect. But now that he imagines he can make Kemp his secret confederate, describing his plan to begin a "Reign of Terror" by using his invisibility to terrorize the nation. Kemp has already denounced Griffin to the local authorities and is on the watch for help to arrive as he listens to this wild proposal. When the authorities arrive at Kemp's house, Griffin fights his way out and the next day leaves a note announcing that Kemp himself will be the first man to be killed in the "Reign of Terror". Kemp, a cool-headed character, tries to organize a plan to use himself as bait to trap the Invisible Man, but a note he sends is stolen from his servant by Griffin. Griffin shoots and kills a local policeman who comes to Kemp's aid, then breaks into Kemp's house. Kemp bolts for the town, where the local citizenry comes to his aid. Griffin is seized, assaulted, and killed by a mob. The Invisible Man's naked, battered body gradually becomes visible as he dies. A local policeman shouts to cover his face with a sheet, then the book concludes. In the final chapter, it is revealed that Marvel has secretly kept Griffin's notes. Griffin's name is not known by anyone (including the reader) until he meets Kemp whom he reveals his identity to. Until then, he is referred to as the stranger or the Invisible Man.

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Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

Emanuel J Mickel

1869

Science Fiction, Children's literature, Novel, Adventure novel, Fiction, Scientific romance

As the story begins in 1866, a mysterious sea monster, theorized by some to be a giant narwhal, is sighted by ships of several nations; an ocean liner is also damaged by the creature. The United States government finally assembles an expedition in New York City to track down and destroy the menace. Professor Pierre Aronnax, a noted French marine biologist and narrator of the story, who happens to be in New York at the time and is a recognized expert in his field, is issued a last-minute invitation to join the expedition, and he accepts. Canadian master harpoonist Ned Land and Aronnax's faithful assistant Conseil are also brought on board. The expedition sets sail from Brooklyn aboard a naval ship called the Abraham Lincoln, which travels down around the tip of South America and into the Pacific Ocean. After much fruitless searching, the monster is found, and the ship charges into battle. During the fight, the ship's steering is damaged, and the three protagonists are thrown overboard. They find themselves stranded on the "hide" of the creature, only to discover to their surprise that it is a large metal construct. They are quickly captured and brought inside the vessel, where they meet its enigmatic creator and commander, Captain Nemo. The rest of the story follows the adventures of the protagonists aboard the submarine, the Nautilus, which was built in secrecy and now roams the seas free of any land-based government. Captain Nemo's motivation is implied to be both a scientific thirst for knowledge and a desire for revenge on (and self-imposed exile from) civilization. Captain Nemo explains that the submarine is electrically powered, and equipped to carry out cutting-edge marine biology research; he also tells his new passengers that while he appreciates having an expert such as Aronnax with whom to converse, they can never leave because he is afraid they will betray his existence to the world. Aronnax is enthralled by the undersea vistas he is seeing, but Land constantly plots to escape. Their travels take them to numerous points in the world's oceans, some of which were known to Jules Verne from real travelers' descriptions and guesses, while others are completely fictional. Thus, the travelers witness the real corals of the Red Sea, the wrecks of the battle of Vigo Bay, the Antarctic ice shelves, and the fictional submerged Atlantis. The travelers also don diving suits to go on undersea expeditions away from the ship, where they hunt sharks and other marine life with specially designed guns and have a funeral for a crew member who died when an accident occurred inside the Nautilus. When the Nautilus returns to the Atlantic Ocean, a "poulpe" (usually translated as a giant squid, although the French "poulpe" means "octopus") attacks the vessel and devours a crew member. Throughout the story it is suggested that Captain Nemo exiled himself from the world after an encounter with his oppressive country somehow affected his family. Near the end of the book, the Nautilus is tracked and attacked by a mysterious ship from that nation. Nemo ignores Aronnax's pleas for amnesty for the boat and attacks. Nemo attacks the ship under the waterline, sending it to the bottom of the ocean with all crew aboard as Aronnax watches from the salon. Nemo bows before the pictures of his wife and children and is plunged into deep depression after this encounter, and "voluntarily or involuntarily" allows the submarine to wander into an encounter with the Moskenstraumen, more commonly known as the "Maelstrom", a whirlpool off the coast of Norway. This gives the three prisoners an opportunity to escape; they make it back to land alive, but the fate of Captain Nemo and his crew is not revealed.

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Keep the Aspidistra Flying

George Orwell

1936

Novel

Gordon Comstock has 'declared war' on what he sees as an 'overarching dependence' on money by leaving a promising job as a copywriter for an advertising company called 'New Albion'—at which he shows great dexterity—and taking a low-paying job instead, ostensibly so he can write poetry. Coming from a respectable family background in which the inherited wealth has now become dissipated, Gordon resents having to work for a living. The 'war' (and the poetry), however, aren't going particularly well and, under the stress of his 'self-imposed exile' from affluence, Gordon has become absurd, petty and deeply neurotic. Comstock lives in a bedsit in London and earns enough to live, without luxuries, in a small bookshop owned by a Scot, McKechnie. He works intermittently at a magnum opus describing a day in London he plans to call London Pleasures; meanwhile, his only published work, a slim volume of poetry entitled Mice, collects dust on the remainder shelf. He is simultaneously content with his meagre existence and also disdainful of it. He lives without financial ambition and the need for a 'good job,' but his living conditions are uncomfortable and his job is boring. Comstock is 'obsessed' by what he sees as a pervasion of money (the 'Money God', as he calls it) behind social relationships, feeling sure that women would find him more attractive if he were better off. At the beginning of the novel, he senses that his girlfriend Rosemary Waterlow (whom he met at The Albion, and who continues to work there), is dissatisfied with him because of his poverty. An example of his financial embarrassment is when he is desperate for a pint of beer at his local pub, but has run out of pocket money and is ashamed to cadge a drink off his fellow lodger, Flaxman. One of Comstock's last remaining friends, Philip Ravelston, a Marxist who publishes a magazine called Anti-Christ, agrees with Comstock in principle, but is comfortably well-off himself and this causes strains when the practical miseries of Comstock's life become apparent. He does, however, endeavour to publish some of Comstock's work and his efforts had resulted in Mice being published via one of his publisher contacts (unbeknownst to Comstock). Gordon and Rosemary have little time together—she works late and lives in a hostel, and his 'bitch of a landlady' forbids female visitors to her tenants. Then one evening, having headed southward and having been thinking about women, - this women business in general, and Rosemary in particular, - he happens to see Rosemary in a street market. Rosemary won't have sex with him but she wants to spend a Sunday with him, right out in the country, near Burnham Beeches. At their parting, as he takes the tram from Tottenham Court Road back to his bedsit, he is happy and feels that somehow it is agreed between them that Rosemary is going to be his mistress. However, what is intended to be a pleasant day out away from London's grime turns into a disaster when, though hungry, they opt to pass by a 'rather low-looking' pub, and can then not find another pub, and are forced to eat an unappetizing lunch at a fancy, overpriced hotel instead. Gordon has to pay the bill with all the money he had set aside for their jaunt and worries about having to borrow money from Rosemary. At the critical moment when he is about to take her virginity, she raises the issue of contraception and his interest flags. He rails at her; "Money again, you see! [-] You say you can't have a baby. You mean you daren't; because you'd lose your job and I've got no money and all of us would starve." Having sent a poem to an American publication, Gordon suddenly receives from them a cheque worth ten pounds — a considerable sum for him at the time. He intends to set aside half for his sister Julia, who has always been there to lend him money and support. He treats Rosemary and Ravelston to dinner, which begins well, but the evening deteriorates as it proceeds. Gordon, drunk, tries to force himself upon Rosemary but she angrily rebukes him and leaves. Gordon continues drinking, drags Ravelston with him to visit a pair of prostitutes, and ends up broke and in a police cell the next morning. He is guilt-ridden over the thought of being unable to pay his sister back the money he owes her, because his £5 note is gone, given to, or stolen by, one of the tarts. Ravelston pays Gordon's fine after a brief appearance before the magistrate, but a reporter hears about the case, and writes about it in the local paper. The ensuing publicity results in Gordon losing his job at the bookshop, and, consequently, his relatively 'comfortable' lifestyle. As Gordon searches for another job, his life deteriorates, and his poetry stagnates. After living with his friend Ravelston, and his girlfriend Hermione, during his time of unemployment, Gordon ends up working at another book shop and cheap two-penny lending library, this time in Lambeth, owned by the sinister Mr. Cheeseman, for an even smaller wage of 30 shillings a week. This is 10 shillings less than he was earning before, but Gordon is satisfied; "The job would do. There was no trouble about a job like this; no room for ambition, no effort, no hope." Determined to sink to the lowest level of society Gordon takes a furnished bed-sitting-room in a filthy alley parallel to Lambeth Cut. Julie and Rosemary, "in feminine league against him", both seek to get Gordon to go back to his 'good' job at the New Albion advertising agency. Rosemary, having avoided Gordon for some time, suddenly comes to visit him one day at his dismal lodgings. Despite his terrible poverty and shabbiness, they make love but it is without any emotion or passion. Later, Rosemary drops in one day unexpectedly at the library, having not been in touch with Gordon for some time, and tells him that she is pregnant. Gordon is presented with the choice between leaving Rosemary to a life of social shame at the hands of her family—since both of them reject the idea of an abortion—or marrying her and returning to a life of respectability by taking back the job he once so deplored at the New Albion with its £4 weekly salary. He chooses Rosemary and respectability and then experiences a feeling of relief at having abandoned his anti-money principles with such comparative ease. After two years of abject failure and poverty, he throws his poetic work London Pleasures down a drain, marries Rosemary, resumes his advertising career, and plunges into a campaign to promote a new product to prevent foot odour. In his lonely walks around mean streets, aspidistras seem to appear in every lower-middle class window. As the book closes, Gordon wins an argument with Rosemary to install an aspidistra in their new small but comfortable flat off the Edgware Road.

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Manon Lescaut

Antoine François Prévost

Set in France and Louisiana in the early 18th century, the story follows the hero, the Chevalier des Grieux, and his lover, Manon Lescaut. Des Grieux comes from a noble and landed family, but forfeits his hereditary wealth and incurs the disappointment of his father by running away with Manon. In Paris, the young lovers enjoy a blissful cohabitation, while Des Grieux struggles to satisfy Manon's taste for luxury. He scrounges together money by borrowing from his unwaveringly loyal friend Tiberge and from cheating gamblers. On several occasions, Des Grieux's wealth evaporates (by theft, in a house fire, etc.), prompting Manon to leave him for a richer man because she cannot stand the thought of living in penury. The two lovers finally settle down in New Orleans, where the virtual absence of class differences allows them for a while to live in idyllic peace. But when Des Grieux reveals their unmarried state to the Governor and asks to be wed with Manon, the Governor's nephew sets his sights on winning Manon's hand. In despair, Des Grieux challenges the Governor's nephew to a duel and knocks him unconscious. Thinking he had killed the man and fearing retribution, the couple flee New Orleans and venture into the wilderness of Louisiana, hoping to reach a neighbouring English settlement. Manon dies of exposure and exhaustion the following morning; after burying her, Des Grieux returns to France to become a cleric.

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Lions' Commentary on UNIX 6th Edition, with Source Code

John Lions

1996

Computer Science

Unix Operating System Source Code Level Six is the kernel source code, lightly edited by Lions to better separate the functionality — system initialization and process management, interrupts and system calls, basic I/O, file systems and pipes and character devices. All procedures and symbols are listed alphabetically with a cross reference. The code as presented will run on a PDP-11/40 with RK-05 disk drive, LP-11 line printer interface, PCL-11 paper tape writer and KL-11 terminal interface, or a suitable PDP-11 emulator, such as SIMH. A Commentary on the Unix Operating System starts with notes on Unix and other useful documentation (the Unix manual pages, DEC hardware manuals and so on), a section on the architecture of the PDP-11 and a chapter on how to read C programs. The source commentary follows, divided into the same sections as the code. The book ends with suggested exercises for the student. As Lions explains, this commentary supplements the comments in the source. It is possible to understand the code without the extra commentary, and the reader is advised to do so and only read the notes as needed. The commentary also remarks on how the code might be improved.

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The Myth of Sisyphus

Albert Camus

1942

Existentialism

The essay is dedicated to Pascal Pia and is organized in four chapters and one appendix. Camus undertakes to answer what he considers to be the only question of philosophy that matters: Does the realization of the meaninglessness and absurdity of life necessarily require suicide? He begins by describing the absurd condition: much of our life is built on the hope for tomorrow yet tomorrow brings us closer to death and is the ultimate enemy; people live as if they didn't know about the certainty of death; once stripped of its common romanticisms, the world is a foreign, strange and inhuman place; true knowledge is impossible and rationality and science cannot explain the world: their stories ultimately end in meaningless abstractions, in metaphors. "From the moment absurdity is recognized, it becomes a passion, the most harrowing of all." It is not the world that is absurd, nor human thought: the absurd arises when the human need to understand meets the unreasonableness of the world, when "my appetite for the absolute and for unity" meets the inability of "reducing this world to a rational and reasonable principle." He then characterizes a number of philosophies that describe and attempt to deal with this feeling of the absurd, by Heidegger, Jaspers, Shestov, Kierkegaard, and Husserl. All of these, he claims, commit "philosophical suicide" by reaching conclusions that contradict the original absurd position, either by abandoning reason and turning to God, as in the case of Kierkegaard and Shestov, or by elevating reason and ultimately arriving at ubiquitous Platonic forms and an abstract god, as in the case of Husserl. For Camus, who set out to take the absurd seriously and follow it to its final conclusions, these "leaps" cannot convince. Taking the absurd seriously means acknowledging the contradiction between the desire of human reason and the unreasonable world. Suicide, then, also must be rejected: without man, the absurd cannot exist. The contradiction must be lived; reason and its limits must be acknowledged, without false hope. However, the absurd can never be accepted: it requires constant confrontation, constant revolt. While the question of human freedom in the metaphysical sense loses interest to the absurd man, he gains freedom in a very concrete sense: no longer bound by hope for a better future or eternity, without a need to pursue life's purpose or to create meaning, "he enjoys a freedom with regard to common rules". To embrace the absurd implies embracing all that the unreasonable world has to offer. Without a meaning in life, there is no scale of values. "What counts is not the best living but the most living." Thus, Camus arrives at three consequences from the full acknowledging of the absurd: revolt, freedom and passion. How should the absurd man live? Clearly, no ethical rules apply, as they are all based on higher powers or on justification. "Integrity has no need of rules." 'Everything is permitted' "is not an outburst of relief or of joy, but rather a bitter acknowledgment of a fact." Camus then goes on to present examples of the absurd life. He begins with Don Juan, the serial seducer who lives the passionate life to the fullest. "There is no noble love but that which recognizes itself to be both short-lived and exceptional." The next example is the actor, who depicts ephemeral lives for ephemeral fame. "He demonstrates to what degree appearing creates being." "In those three hours he travels the whole course of the dead-end path that the man in the audience takes a lifetime to cover." Camus' third example of the absurd man is the conqueror, the warrior who forgoes all promises of eternity to affect and engage fully in human history. He chooses action over contemplation, aware of the fact that nothing can last and no victory is final. Here Camus explores the absurd creator or artist. Since explanation is impossible, absurd art is restricted to a description of the myriad experiences in the world. "If the world were clear, art would not exist." Absurd creation, of course, also must refrain from judging and from alluding to even the slightest shadow of hope. He then analyzes the work of Dostoyevsky in this light, especially The Diary of a Writer, The Possessed and The Brothers Karamazov. All these works start from the absurd position, and the first two explore the theme of philosophical suicide. But both The Diary and his last novel, The Brothers Karamazov, ultimately find a path to hope and faith and thus fail as truly absurd creations. In the last chapter, Camus outlines the legend of Sisyphus who defied the gods and put Death in chains so that no human needed to die. When Death was eventually liberated and it came time for Sisyphus himself to die, he concocted a deceit which let him escape from the underworld. Finally captured, the gods decided on his punishment: for all eternity, he would have to push a rock up a mountain; upon reaching the top, the rock would roll down again leaving Sisyphus to start over. Camus sees Sisyphus as the absurd hero who lives life to the fullest, hates death and is condemned to a meaningless task. Camus presents Sisyphus's ceaseless and pointless toil as a metaphor for modern lives spent working at futile jobs in factories and offices. "The workman of today works every day in his life at the same tasks, and this fate is no less absurd. But it is tragic only at the rare moments when it becomes conscious." Camus is interested in Sisyphus' thoughts when marching down the mountain, to start anew. This is the truly tragic moment, when the hero becomes conscious of his wretched condition. He does not have hope, but "[t]here is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn." Acknowledging the truth will conquer it; Sisyphus, just like the absurd man, keeps pushing. Camus claims that when Sisyphus acknowledges the futility of his task and the certainty of his fate, he is freed to realize the absurdity of his situation and to reach a state of contented acceptance. With a nod to the similarly cursed Greek hero Oedipus, Camus concludes that "all is well," indeed, that "[o]ne must imagine Sisyphus happy." The essay contains an appendix titled "Hope and the Absurd in the work of Franz Kafka". While Camus acknowledges that Kafka's work represents an exquisite description of the absurd condition, he maintains that Kafka fails as an absurd writer because his work retains a glimmer of hope.

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Cymbeline

William Shakespeare

Imogen (or Innogen), daughter of the British king Cymbeline, is in love with Posthumus Leonatus, a man raised in her father's court who is described as possessing exceeding personal merit and martial skill. The two have secretly married, exchanging jewellery as tokens: a ring from Imogen, a bracelet from Posthumus. Cymbeline has discovered the affair and banishes Posthumus for his presumption, for Imogen is currently Cymbeline's only child and so her husband is heir to the British throne. Cymbeline did have two sons before Imogen, Guiderius and Arviragus, but they were stolen twenty years ago as infants by Belarius, a courtier banished as a traitor for supposedly conspiring with the Romans. Cymbeline is a vassal king of Caesar Augustus, and Caius Lucius, a Roman ambassador, is on his way to demand the tribute that Cymbeline, under the influence of his wife the Queen, has stopped paying. The Queen is conspiring to have Cloten, her cloddish and arrogant son by an earlier marriage, married to Imogen. The Queen also is plotting to murder both Imogen and Cymbeline to secure Cloten's kingship, and to that end has procured what she believes to be deadly poison from the court doctor Cornelius; Cornelius, however, suspects the Queen's malice and switches the "poison" with a drug that will cause the imbiber's body to mimic death for a while before reviving. Imogen meanwhile secludes herself in her chambers, resisting entreaties that she come forth and marry Cloten. Posthumus flees to Italy to the house of his friend Philario/Filario, where he meets Iachimo/Giacomo. Posthumus waxes at length on Imogen's beauty and chastity, and Iachimo challenges him to a bet that he, Iachimo, can seduce Imogen and bring Posthumus proof of her adultery. If he wins, Iachimo will get Imogen's ring from Posthumus's finger. If Posthumus wins, not only must Iachimo pay him but also consent to a sword duel so that Posthumus may avenge his and Imogen's affronted honour. Iachimo heads to Britain where he aggressively attempts to seduce the faithful Imogen, who sends him packing. Iachimo then hides in a chest in Imogen's bedchamber and, when the princess falls asleep, emerges to steal from her Posthumus's bracelet. He also examines the room and Imogen's naked body for further proof. Returning to Italy, Iachimo convinces Posthumus that he has successfully seduced Imogen. In his wrath, Posthumus sends two letters to Britain: one to Imogen, telling her to meet him at Milford Haven, on the west coast of Wales; the other to Pisanio, Posthumus's servant left behind at court, ordering him to murder Imogen at the Haven. On the way the anguished Pisanio instead shows his letter to Imogen, revealing Posthumus's plot. He has Imogen disguise herself as a boy and continue to Milford Haven to seek employment. He also gives her the Queen's "poison," believing it will alleviate nausea from distemper and motion sickness. Imogen adopts the name "Fidele," meaning "faithful." Back at court, Lucius receives Cymbeline's refusal of tribute, and warns him of Augustus's wrath. Meanwhile Cloten, incensed at Imogen's assertion that she values Posthumus's worst clothing over Cloten himself, learns of the "meeting" between the princess and her paramour at Milford Haven. Dressing himself in Posthumus's clothes, he determines to go to Wales and kill Posthumus while Imogen looks on, after which he will rape her on Posthumus's corpse before dragging her back to court for marriage. Imogen's long journey to Milford Haven takes her into the Welsh mountains, where she becomes weak from hunger, but she luckily stumbles upon a cave and inside finds food. The cave is home to Belarius and his "sons" Polydore and Cadwal, whom he raised into great woodsmen. These young men are in fact Guiderius and Arviragus, who themselves do not know their origin, but are nevertheless possessed of royal passion and heartiness. The three men enter their cave and find "Fidele," and the young men are captivated by "his" beauty. Leaving "Fidele" to eat, the men are met outside the cave by Cloten, who insults them. After a brief fight, Guiderius kills Cloten and cuts off his head. Recognizing the face, Belarius worries that Cloten's death will bring Cymbeline's wrath upon them. Meanwhile Imogen, feeling ill, takes the "poison," and when the men enter they find her "dead." They bewail "Fidele's" fate and, after placing Cloten's body beside her, solemnly depart. They also determine to fight for Britain in the inevitable battle with Roman forces. Imogen awakes to find Cloten's headless body, and takes it for Posthumus due to the clothes. She flees to Milford Haven, where "Fidele's" beauty earns "him" the affection of Lucius, who takes "him" on as a page. Meanwhile a guilt-ridden Posthumus arrives with the Roman army and dresses himself as a poor British soldier, hoping to die on the battlefield. The battle goes badly at first for the Britons, but four unknown men—Belarius, Guiderius, Arviragus, and Posthumus in their disguises—turn the tide, rallying Cymbeline's troops into a rout of the Romans. Posthumus, still alive, gives himself up to Cymbeline as a Roman soldier, hoping to win his sought-for death by execution. He is put in chains and jailed, after which he falls asleep. The ghosts of his father (Sicilius Leonatus) and mother, who both died at Posthumus's birth, and his brothers, who died in battle, appear around Posthumus's sleeping body and complain to Jupiter of his grim fate. Jupiter himself then appears in thunder and glory on an eagle to chide the ghosts for their lack of faith. Before the god and spirits depart they leave a tablet on Posthumus's chest explaining in obscure prophecy how destiny will grant happiness to Posthumus and Britain. Posthumus awakens, believing he has dreamed the ghosts and god, but wonders what the tablet could mean. A jailer then summons him to appear before Cymbeline. Posthumus stands in the ranks of prisoners with "Fidele," Lucius, and Iachimo, all condemned to be executed. Cornelius arrives from the court with a message that the Queen has died, and that on her deathbed she unrepentantly confessed to her murderous conspiracies. Both troubled and relieved at this news, Cymbeline prepares to carry out his sentence on the prisoners, but pauses when he sees "Fidele." Finding the "boy" both beautiful and somehow familiar, the king resolves not only to spare "Fidele's" life but also to grant "him" a favour. Imogen has noticed her ring on Iachimo's finger and demands to know from where the Italian got the jewel. A penitent Iachimo tells of his bet, how he could not seduce Imogen and yet tricked Posthumus into thinking he had. Posthumus then comes forward to corroborate Iachimo's story, revealing his identity and acknowledging his guilt and wrong in desiring Imogen dead. Ecstatic, Imogen throws herself at Posthumus, who still takes her for a boy and knocks her down. Pisanio then rushes forward to explain that the boy is Imogen in disguise; as the servant tries to help her up she pushes him away, under the impression that he worked with the Queen to poison her. Pisanio insists on his innocence, and Cornelius reveals how the poison was all along non-fatal. Belarius then speaks, noting how all this makes sense of the disappearance of "Fidele's" "corpse." Insisting that those who swore against him did so falsely, Belarius reveals Guiderius's and Arviragus's identities. With her brothers restored to their place in the line of inheritance, Imogen is now free to marry Posthumus. An elated Cymbeline pardons Belarius and all the prisoners. Posthumus produces Jupiter's tablet, still confused about its meaning, and Lucius calls forth his soothsayer Philharmonus, who deciphers the prophecy as a description of recent events, the unfolding of which has ensured happiness for all. Cymbeline decides to pay the tribute to Augustus as a gesture of peace between Britain and Rome, and invites everyone to a great feast.

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Vanity Fair

William Makepeace Thackeray

The story opens with Miss Pinkerton's Academy for Young Ladies, where Becky Sharp and Amelia Sedley have just completed their studies and are preparing to depart for Amelia's house in Russell Square. Becky is portrayed as a strong-willed and cunning young woman determined to make her way in society, and Amelia Sedley as a good-natured, lovable though simple-minded young girl. At Russell Square, Miss Sharp is introduced to the dashing and self-obsessed Captain George Osborne (to whom Amelia has been betrothed from a very young age) and to Amelia's brother Joseph Sedley, a clumsy and vainglorious/boastful but rich civil servant fresh from the East India Company. Hoping to marry Sedley Becky entices him, but she fails because of warnings from Captain Osborne, Sedley's own native shyness, and his embarrassment over some foolish drunken behaviour of his that Becky had seen. Now, Becky Sharp says farewell to Sedley's family and enters the service of the crude and profligate baronet Sir Pitt Crawley, who has engaged her as a governess to his daughters. Her behaviour at Sir Pitt's house gains his favour, and after the premature death of his second wife, he proposes marriage to her. Then he finds she is already secretly married to his second son, Rawdon Crawley. Sir Pitt's elder half sister, the spinster Miss Crawley, is very rich, having inherited her mother's fortune of £70,000. How she will bequeath her great wealth is a source of constant conflict between the branches of the Crawley family who vie shamelessly for her affections; initially her favourite is Sir Pitt's younger son, Captain Rawdon Crawley. For some time, Becky acts as Miss Crawley's companion, supplanting the loyal Miss Briggs in an attempt to establish herself in favour before breaking the news of her elopement with Miss Crawley's nephew. However, the misalliance so enrages Miss Crawley that she disinherits her nephew in favour of his pompous and pedantic elder brother, who also bears the name Pitt Crawley. The married couple constantly attempts to reconcile with Miss Crawley, and she relents a little, but she will only see her nephew and refuses to change her will. While Becky Sharp is rising in the world, Amelia's father, John Sedley, is bankrupted. The Sedleys and Osbornes were once close allies, but the relationship between the two families disintegrates after the Sedleys are financially ruined, and the marriage of Amelia and George is forbidden. George ultimately decides to marry Amelia against his father's will, pressured by his friend Dobbin, and George is consequently disinherited. While these personal events take place, the Napoleonic Wars have been ramping up. George Osborne and William Dobbin are suddenly deployed to Brussels, but not before an encounter with Becky and Captain Crawley at Brighton. The holiday is interrupted by orders to march to Brussels. Already, the newly wedded Osborne is growing tired of Amelia, and he becomes increasingly attracted to Becky who encourages his advances. At a ball in Brussels (based on the Duchess of Richmond's famous ball on the eve of the Battle of Waterloo) George gives Becky a note inviting her to run away with him. He regrets this shortly afterwards and reconciles with Amelia, who has been deeply hurt by his attentions towards her former friend. The morning after, he is sent to Waterloo with Captain Crawley and Dobbin, leaving Amelia distraught. Becky, on the other hand, is virtually indifferent to her husband's departure. She tries to console Amelia, but Amelia responds angrily, disgusted by Becky's flirtatious behaviour with George and her lack of concern about Captain Crawley. Becky resents this snub and a rift develops between the two women that lasts for years. Becky is not very concerned for the outcome of the war, either; should Napoleon win, she plans to become the mistress of one of his marshals. Meanwhile she makes a profit selling her carriage and horses at inflated prices to Amelia's panicking brother Joseph seeking to flee the city, where the Belgian population is openly pro-Napoleonic. Captain Crawley survives, but George dies in the battle. Amelia bears him a posthumous son, who is also named George. She returns to live in genteel poverty with her parents. Meanwhile, since the death of George, Dobbin, who is young George's godfather, gradually begins to express his love for the widowed Amelia by small kindnesses toward her and her son. Most notable is the recovery of her old piano, which Dobbin picks up at an auction following the Sedleys' ruin. Amelia mistakenly assumes this was done by her late husband. She is too much in love with George's memory to return Dobbin's affections. Saddened, he goes to India for many years. Dobbin's infatuation with Amelia is a theme which unifies the novel and one which many have compared to Thackeray's unrequited love for a friend's wife (Jane Brookfield). Meanwhile, Becky also has a son, also named after his father, but unlike Amelia, who dotes on and even spoils her child, Becky is a cold, distant mother. She continues her ascent first in post-war Paris and then in London where she is patronised by the great Marquis of Steyne, who covertly subsidises her and introduces her to London society. Her success is unstoppable despite her humble origins, and she is eventually presented at court to the Prince Regent himself. Becky and Rawdon appear to be financially successful, but their wealth and high standard of living are mostly smoke and mirrors. Rawdon gambles heavily and earns money as a billiards shark. The book also suggests he cheats at cards. Becky accepts trinkets and money from her many admirers and sells some for cash. She also borrows heavily from the people around her and seldom pays bills. The couple lives mostly on credit, and while Rawdon seems to be too dim-witted to be aware of the effect of his borrowing on the people around him, Becky is fully aware that her heavy borrowing and her failure to pay bills bankrupts at least two innocent people: her servant, Briggs, whose life savings Becky borrows and fritters away, and her landlord Raggles, who was formerly a butler to the Crawley family and who invested his life savings in the townhouse that Becky and Rawdon rent (and fail to pay for). She also cheats innkeepers, milliners, dressmakers, grocers, and others who do business on credit. She and Rawdon obtain credit by tricking everyone around them into believing they are receiving money from others. Sometimes, Becky and Rawdon buy time from their creditors by suggesting Rawdon received money in Miss Crawley's will or are being paid a stipend by Sir Pitt. Ultimately Becky is suspected of carrying on an extramarital affair with the Marquis of Steyne, apparently encouraged by Rawdon to prostitute herself in exchange for money and promotion. At the summit of her success, Becky's pecuniary relationship with the rich and powerful Marquis of Steyne is discovered after Rawdon is arrested for debt. Rawdon's brother's wife, Lady Jane, bails him out and Rawdon surprises Becky and Steyne in a compromising moment. Rawdon leaves his wife and through the offices of the Marquis of Steyne is made Governor of Coventry Island to get him out of the way, but Rawdon challenges the elderly marquis to a duel. Becky, having lost both husband and credibility, is warned by Steyne to leave the United Kingdom and she wanders the continent. Rawdon and Becky's son is left in the care of Pitt Crawley and Lady Jane. However, wherever Becky goes, she is followed by the shadow of the Marquis of Steyne. No sooner does she establish herself in polite society than someone turns up who knows her disreputable history and spreads rumours; Steyne himself hounds her out of Rome. As Amelia's adored son George grows up, his grandfather relents and takes him from poor Amelia, who knows the rich and bitter old man will give him a much better start in life than she or her family could ever manage. After twelve years abroad, both Joseph Sedley and Dobbin return to the UK. Dobbin professes his unchanged love to Amelia, but although Amelia is affectionate she tells him she cannot forget the memory of her dead husband. Dobbin also becomes close to young George, and his kind, firm manner is a good influence on the spoiled child. While in England, Dobbin mediates a reconciliation between Amelia and her father-in-law. The death of Amelia's father prevents their meeting, but following Osborne's death soon after, it is revealed that he had amended his will and bequeathed young George half his large fortune and Amelia a generous annuity. The rest is divided between his daughters, Miss Osborne, and Mrs. Bullock, who begrudges Amelia and her son the decrease in her annuity. After the death of old Mr. Osborne, Amelia, Joseph, George and Dobbin go on a trip to Germany, where they encounter the destitute Becky. She meets the young George at a card table and then enchants Jos Sedley all over again. Becky has unfortunately deteriorated as a character. She is drinking heavily, has lost her singing voice and much of her looks and spends time with card sharps and con artists. The book suggests that Becky has been involved in activities even more shady than her usual con games, but does not go into details. Following Jos' entreaties, Amelia agrees to a reconciliation (when she hears that Becky's ties with her son have been severed), much to Dobbin's disapproval. Dobbin quarrels with Amelia and finally realizes that he is wasting his love on a woman too shallow to return it. However, Becky, in a moment of conscience, shows Amelia the note that George (Amelia's dead husband) had given her, asking her to run away with him. This destroys Amelia's idealized image of George, but not before Amelia has sent a note to Dobbin professing her love. Becky resumes her seduction of Jos and gains control over him. He eventually dies of a suspicious ailment after signing a portion of his money to Becky as life insurance. In the original illustrations, which were done by Thackeray, Becky is shown behind a curtain with a vial in her hand; the picture is labelled "Becky's second appearance in the character of Clytemnestra" (she had played Clytemnestra during charades at a party earlier in the book). Jos' death appears to have made her fortune. By a twist of fate Rawdon dies weeks before his older brother, whose son has already died; the baronetcy descends to Rawdon's son. Had he outlived his brother by even a day he would have become Sir Rawdon Crawley and Becky would have become Lady Crawley, a title she uses anyway in later life. The reader is informed at the end of the novel that although Dobbin married Amelia, and although he always treated her with great kindness, he never fully regained the love that he once had for her. There is also a final appearance for Becky, as cocky as ever, selling trinkets at a fair in aid of various charitable causes. She is now living well again as her son, the new baronet, has agreed to financially support her (in spite of her past neglect and indifference towards him).

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Northanger Abbey

Jane Austen

1817-12

Gothic fiction, Satire, Reference, Fiction, Romance novel

Seventeen-year-old, Catherine Morland is one of ten children of a country clergyman. Although a tomboy in her childhood, by the age of 17 she is "in training for a heroine," and is excessively fond of reading Gothic novels of which Ann Radcliffe's Mysteries of Udolpho is a favourite. Catherine is invited by her wealthier neighbours in Fullerton, the Allens, to accompany them to visit the town of Bath and partake in the winter season of balls, theatre and other social delights. Although initially the excitement of Bath is dampened by her lack of acquaintances, she is soon introduced to a clever young gentleman, Henry Tilney, with whom she dances and converses. Much to her disappointment, Catherine does not see Henry again for quite some time. Through Mrs. Allen's old school friend Mrs. Thorpe, she meets her daughter Isabella, a vivacious and flirtatious young woman, and quickly becomes friends. Mrs. Thorpe's son John is also acquainted with Catherine's older brother, James. James and John soon arrive in Bath. While Isabella and James spend time together, Catherine becomes acquainted with John, a vain and crude young gentleman who incessantly tells fantastical stories about himself. Henry Tilney then returns to Bath, accompanied by his younger sister Eleanor, who is a sweet, elegant, and respectable young lady. Catherine also meets their father, the imposing General Tilney. The Thorpes are not very happy about Catherine's friendship with the Tilneys, as they (correctly as it happens) perceive Henry as a rival for Catherine's affections. Catherine tries to maintain her friendships with both the Thorpes and the Tilneys, though John Thorpe continuously tries to sabotage her relationship with the Tilneys. This leads to several misunderstandings, which upset Catherine and put her in the awkward position of having to explain herself to the Tilneys. Isabella and James become engaged. James's father approves of the match and offers his son a country parson's living of a modest sum, 400 pounds annually, which he may have in two and a half years. The couple must therefore wait until that time to marry. Isabella is dissatisfied, having believed the Morlands were quite wealthy, but she pretends to Catherine that she is merely dissatisfied that they must wait so long. James departs to purchase a ring, and John accompanies him after coyly suggesting marriage to the oblivious Catherine. Isabella immediately begins to flirt with Captain Tilney, Henry's older brother. Innocent Catherine cannot understand her friend's behavior, but Henry understands all too well, as he knows his brother's character and habits. The flirtation continues even when James returns, much to the latter's embarrassment and distress. The Tilneys invite Catherine to stay with them for a few weeks at their home, Northanger Abbey. Catherine, in accordance with her novel reading, expects the abbey to be exotic and frightening. Henry teases her about this, as it turns out that Northanger Abbey is pleasant and decidedly not Gothic. However, the house includes a mysterious suite of rooms that no one ever enters; Catherine learns that they were Mrs. Tilney's, who died nine years earlier. Catherine decides that, since General Tilney does not now seem to be affected by the loss of his wife, he may have murdered her or even imprisoned her in her chamber. Catherine persuades Eleanor to show her Mrs. Tilney's rooms, but General Tilney suddenly appears. Catherine flees, sure that she will be punished. Later, Catherine sneaks back to Mrs. Tilney's rooms, to discover that her overactive imagination has once again led her astray, as nothing is strange or distressing in the rooms at all. Unfortunately, Henry joins her in the corridor and questions why she is there. He guesses her surmises and inferences, and informs her that his father loved his wife in his own way and was truly upset by her death. "What have you been judging from? Remember the country and the age in which we live. Remember that we are English, that we are Christians. Consult your own understanding, your own sense of the probable, your own observation of what is passing around you. Does our education prepare us for such atrocities? Do our laws connive at them? ... Dearest Miss Morland, what ideas have you been admitting?" She leaves, crying, fearing that she has lost Henry's entire regard. Realizing how foolish she had been, Catherine comes to believe that, though novels may be delightful, their content does not relate to everyday life. Henry lets her get over her shameful thoughts and actions in her own time and does not mention them to her again. Soon after this adventure, James writes to inform her that he has broken off his engagement with Isabella because of her flirtations with Captain Tilney. The Tilneys are shocked; and Catherine is terribly disappointed, realizing what a dishonest person Isabella is. The General goes off to London, and Eleanor becomes less inhibited and shy away from his imposing presence. Catherine passes several enjoyable days with Henry and Eleanor until he returns abruptly, in a temper. Eleanor tells Catherine that the family has an engagement that prevents Catherine from staying any longer and that she must go home early the next morning, in a shocking, inhospitable move that forces Catherine to undertake the journey alone. At home, Catherine is listless and unhappy. Her parents, unaware of her trials of the heart, try to bring her up to her usual spirits, with little effect. Two days after she returns home, however, Henry pays a sudden unexpected visit and explains what happened. General Tilney had believed (on the misinformation of John Thorpe) her to be exceedingly rich and therefore a proper match for Henry. In London, General Tilney ran into Thorpe again, who, angry at Catherine's refusal of his half-made proposal of marriage, said instead that she was nearly destitute. Enraged, General Tilney returned home to evict Catherine. When Henry returned to Northanger from Woodston, his father informed him of what had occurred and forbade him to think of Catherine again. When Henry learned how she had been treated, he breaks with his father and tells Catherine he still wants to marry her despite his father's disapproval. Catherine is delighted. Eventually, General Tilney acquiesces, because Eleanor has become engaged to a wealthy and titled man; and he discovers that the Morlands, while not extremely rich, are far from destitute.

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Amadeus

Peter Shaffer

Since the original run, Shaffer has extensively revised his play, including changes to plot details; the following is common to all revisions. At the opening of the tale, Salieri is an old man, having long outlived his fame, and is convinced he used poison to assassinate Mozart. Speaking directly to the audience, he promises to explain himself. The action then flashes back to the eighteenth century, at a time when Salieri has not met Mozart in person, but has heard of him and his music. He adores Mozart's compositions, and is thrilled at the chance to meet Mozart in person, during a salon at which some of Mozart's compositions will be played. When he finally does catch sight of Mozart, however, he is deeply disappointed to find that Mozart's personality does not match the grace or charm of his compositions. When Salieri first meets him, Mozart is crawling around on his hands and knees, engaging in profane talk with his future bride Constanze Weber. Salieri cannot reconcile Mozart's boorish behaviour with the genius that God has inexplicably bestowed upon him. Indeed, Salieri, who has been a devout Catholic all his life, cannot believe that God would choose Mozart over him for such a gift. Salieri renounces God and vows to do everything in his power to destroy Mozart as a way of getting back at his Creator. Throughout much of the rest of the play, Salieri masquerades as Mozart's ally to his face while doing his utmost to destroy his reputation and any success his compositions may have. On more than one occasion it is only the direct intervention of the Emperor himself that allows Mozart to continue (interventions which Salieri opposes, and then is all too happy to take credit for when Mozart assumes it was he who intervened). Salieri also humiliates Mozart's wife when she comes to Salieri for aid, and smears Mozart's character with the Emperor and the court. A major theme in Amadeus is Mozart's repeated attempts to win over the aristocratic "public" with increasingly brilliant compositions, which are always frustrated either by Salieri or by the aristocracy's own inability to appreciate Mozart's genius. The play ends with Salieri attempting suicide in a last attempt to be remembered, leaving a false confession of having murdered Mozart with arsenic. He survives, however, and his confession is disbelieved by all, leaving him to wallow once again in mediocrity.

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Poetry

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner relates the experiences of a sailor who has returned from a long sea voyage. The Mariner stops a man who is on the way to a wedding ceremony and begins to narrate a story. The Wedding-Guest's reaction turns from bemusement to impatience and fear to fascination as the Mariner's story progresses, as can be seen in the language style: for example, Coleridge uses narrative techniques such as personification and repetition to create either a sense of danger, of the supernatural or of serenity, depending on the mood of each of the different parts of the poem. The Mariner's tale begins with his ship departing on its journey. Despite initial good fortune, the ship is driven south off course by a storm and eventually reaches Antarctica. An albatross appears and leads them out of the Antarctic but, even as the albatross is praised by the ship's crew, the Mariner shoots the bird ("with my cross-bow / I shot the albatross"). The crew is angry with the Mariner, believing the albatross brought the south wind that led them out of the Antarctic. However, the sailors change their minds when the weather becomes warmer and the mist disappears ("'Twas right, said they, such birds to slay / that bring the fog and mist"). However, they made a grave mistake in supporting this crime as it arouses the wrath of spirits who then pursue the ship "from the land of mist and snow"; the south wind that had initially led them from the land of ice now sends the ship into uncharted waters, where it is becalmed. : Day after day, day after day, : We stuck, nor breath nor motion; : As idle as a painted ship : Upon a painted ocean. : Water, water, every where, : And all the boards did shrink; : Water, water, every where, : Nor any drop to drink. Here, however, the sailors change their minds again and blame the Mariner for the torment of their thirst. In anger, the crew forces the Mariner to wear the dead albatross about his neck, perhaps to illustrate the burden he must suffer from killing it, or perhaps as a sign of regret ("Ah! Well a-day! What evil looks / Had I from old and young! / Instead of the cross, the albatross / About my neck was hung"). Eventually, the ship encounters a ghostly vessel. On board are Death (a skeleton) and the "Night-mare Life-in-Death" (a deathly-pale woman), who are playing dice for the souls of the crew. With a roll of the dice, Death wins the lives of the crew members and Life-in-Death the life of the Mariner, a prize she considers more valuable. Her name is a clue as to the Mariner's fate; he will endure a fate worse than death as punishment for his killing of the albatross. One by one, all of the crew members die, but the Mariner lives on, seeing for seven days and nights the curse in the eyes of the crew's corpses, whose last expressions remain upon their faces. Eventually, the Mariner's curse is temporarily lifted when he sees sea creatures swimming in the water. Despite his cursing them as "slimy things" earlier in the poem ("Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs / upon the slimy sea"), he suddenly sees their true beauty and blesses them ("a spring of love gush'd from my heart and I bless'd them unaware"); suddenly, as he manages to pray, the albatross falls from his neck and his guilt is partially expiated. The bodies of the crew, possessed by good spirits, rise again and steer the ship back home, where it sinks in a whirlpool, leaving only the Mariner behind. A hermit on the mainland had seen the approaching ship and had come to meet it with a pilot and the pilot's boy in a boat. When they pull him from the water, they think he is dead, but when he opens his mouth, the pilot has a fit. The hermit prays, and the Mariner picks up the oars to row. The pilot's boy goes crazy and laughs, thinking the Mariner is the devil, and says, "The Devil knows how to row." As penance for shooting the albatross, the Mariner, driven by guilt, is forced to wander the earth, tell his story, and teach a lesson to those he meets: : He prayeth best, who loveth best : All things both great and small; : For the dear God who loveth us, : He made and loveth all. After relating the story, the Mariner leaves, and the Wedding Guest returns home, and wakes the next morning "a sadder and a wiser man".

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The Eye of the World

Robert Jordan

1990-01-15

Speculative fiction, Fantasy, High fantasy

The Eye of the World revolves around the lives of a group of young people from Emond's Field in The Two Rivers district: Rand al'Thor, Matrim (Mat) Cauthon, Perrin Aybara, Egwene al'Vere, and Nynaeve al'Meara. Emond's Field is unexpectedly attacked by Dark forces—bestial Trollocs and a Myrddraal who seem to specifically target Rand, Mat and Perrin. Hoping to save their village from further attacks, the young men and Egwene flee the village accompanied by an Aes Sedai named Moiraine Damodred, her WarderAl'Lan Mandragoran and a Gleeman Thom Merrilin. They are later joined by Nynaeve al'Meara, the Wisdom of Emond's Field. Pursued by ever-increasing numbers of Trollocs and Myrddraal, the travellers are forced to take refuge in the abandoned city of Shadar Logoth, a place even the dark forces are reluctant to enter because of the evil Mashadar that resides there. While escaping the city the travelers are separated. Rand, Mat and Thom make their way by boat to Whitebridge where Thom is apparently killed while allowing Rand and Mat to escape a Myrddraal. In Caemlyn Rand befriends an Ogier named Loial. While exploring the city and trying to catch a glimpse of the recently captured False Dragon, Rand falls into the palace gardens. Once there he meets Elayne Trakand, heir apparent to the throne of Andor and her brothers Gawyn and Galad Damodred. Rand is taken before Queen Morgase and her Aes Sedai advisor, Elaida who foretells that Rand is dangerous. Queen Morgase, however, decides to let Rand go free. Meanwhile Egwene and Perrin travel separately to Caemlyn in the company of Elyas Machera, a man who can communicate with wolves and who claims that Perrin can do the same. The three run afoul of a legion of the Children of the Light. Perrin kills two Whitecloaks after witnessing the death of a wolf at their hands and is sentenced to death. Moiraine, Lan and Nynaeve rescue Egwene and Perrin from the Whitecloaks in time to escape their fate. Together they travel to Caemlyn where they are reunited with Rand and Mat. Rand tells Moiraine that Mat has been suspicious and withdrawn, and Moiraine diagnoses Mat's "sickness" as the corrupting influence of a ruby dagger Mat took from Shadar Logoth. Moiraine says that Mat must travel to Tar Valon in order to be healed. Loial warns Moiraine of a threat to the Eye of the World, which is confirmed by vivid and disturbing dreams Mat, Rand and Perrin have had. The Eye of the World was created by Aes Sedai who sacrificed themselves to create a pool of Saidin untouched by the Dark One's taint, and is hidden in the Blight. The Eye of the World is protected by Someshta (the Green Man) and contains one of the seven seals on the Dark One's prison, the Dragon banner of Lews Therin Telamon and the Horn of Valere. Loial guides the group through the Ways (passageways built by the male Aes Sedai during the Breaking of the World, which are now tainted by the same evil that tainted Saidin) in order to reach the Eye of the World. The group enters the Blight, in search of the Eye of the World guided by The Green Man. The Eye is revealed to be a pool of Saidin, pure and untainted. The companions are confronted by the Forsaken Aginor and Balthamel. Balthamel dies at the hand of the Green Man and Aginor and Rand battle for control of the Eye of the World. Rand defeats Aginor and guided by blind luck uses the pure Saidin to decimate the Trolloc army and defeat Ba'alzamon. Afterwards Rand realizes to his own horror that he has channeled the One Power and is therefore condemned to a fate of insanity and horrific death. It is revealed that Moiraine believes Rand is the Dragon Reborn.

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The Great Hunt

Robert Jordan

1990-11-15

Speculative fiction, Fantasy

Ba'alzamon presides over a clandestine meeting as Shadow forces plot their actions and Shaitan’s return. In addition to Forsaken and Darkfriends, the meeting includes two Aes Sedai, one of whom we come to know as Liandrin. The prologue shows how deep Ba'alzamon's influence has gone, even in places the protagonists believe to be safe. Following the events in The Eye of the World, the protagonists rest at Fort Fal Dara in Shienar, where the White Tower’s Amyrlin Seat, Siuan Sanche, visits. Siuan reminisces and plots with fellow Aes Sedai Moiraine Damodred and Verin. Rand al'Thor meets Siuan. Siuan tells Rand that he is the Dragon Reborn, which Rand denies. Mat's condition worsens as he is symbiotically attached to a tainted parasitic dagger. Lan Mandragoran further instructs Rand in swordfighting. Powerful Darkfriend Padan Fain is imprisoned in the Fal Dara dungeon. Darkforces attack the city, freeing their leader Padan Fain and stealing the Horn of Valere and the tainted dagger that Mat needs to survive. Rand, Perrin Aybara, and Mat accompany a Shienaran party southbound in pursuit of the horn and dagger. Shienaran Lord Ingtar heads the group, which includes skilled tracker Hurin. Fain’s fleeing darkforce includes trollocs, myrddraal, and darkfriends. Nynaeve al'Meara and Egwene al'Vere accompany Moraine to Tar Valon for Aes Sedai training. Andoran Princess Elayne and clairvoyant Min arrive at Tar Valon as well. At Tar Valon's White Tower, Nynaeve passes the test to become Accepted, a rank in the White Tower below Aes Sedai and above a Novice. Rand, Loial and Hurin are separated from the Shienaran party and transported to an alternate world via a portal stone, a world similar to their own but where the land appears deserted and distorted. Rand suspects that he activated the portal stone by unconsciously channeling saidin in his sleep, although Egwene dreams that a mysterious woman is responsible. Rand's struggle to accept his channeling ability is a recurring element in the novel. In the Portal Stone world, Rand meets Ba'alzamon and has a heron branded into his palm in a fight. Later, they find another portal stone with the help of a mysterious woman called Selene. Rand is able to use the Stone to return to their own world, albeit much farther ahead than either Fain's or Ingtar's group. By hiding and waiting for the Darkfriends to catch up, they manage to sneak into Fain's camp and recover both Horn and dagger. At a loss to explain Rand's disappearance, Lord Ingtar's group continues tracking Padan Fain with the aid of Perrin. Perrin pretends to be another sniffer like Hurin, but secretly uses his wolf senses to smell and track and also ask nearby wolves which way Padan Fain's group went. Rand's party journeys to Cairhien, and Selene leaves their party without warning. Arriving in the city, Rand finds gleeman Thom Merrilin, whom he thought dead after an encounter with a myrddraal in The Eye of the World. Rand and Loial are attacked by trollocs and, during their escape, destroy the Chapter House of the Illuminator's Guild, a society of people who are extremely protective of their knowledge of fireworks. The Horn and dagger are once again lost. Later on Thom's apprentice and lover, Dena, is murdered for Thom's involvement with Rand. With the aid of Perrin, Ingtar's group is successfully reunited with Rand, and they learn that the Horn has been taken to Toman Head, at the port city of Falme. Hoping to get there faster, Rand tries to lead them through a portal stone. While successful, during his attempt the stone malfunctions and the group ends up losing time. As these events unfold, action also takes place on the other side of the continent, where the invading Seanchan and their exotic beasts have occupied Falme. Whitecloak Geofram Bornhald, of the zealous religious group Children of the Light, is preparing forces to attack the Seanchan. At the White Tower, Liandrin tells Egwene and Nynaeve that Rand and his friends are in danger. They, along with Elayne and Min, travel with her to Toman Head via Waygate. When they arrive Min is captured by the Seanchan and Egwene is collared with an a'dam, a device used by the Seanchan to control women who can channel. Nynaeve and Elayne escape. At Falme, Rand, Ingtar and the others form a small party to reclaim the dagger and Horn of Valere, consisting of Ingtar, Hurin, Rand, Perrin, and an increasingly sickly Mat. Rand sneaks into the building where the Horn is being kept, and slays blademaster High Lord Turak of the Seanchan before escaping with the Horn and dagger. Ingtar reveals himself as a Darkfriend and furthermore, that he was responsible for letting in the attackers during the surprise attack at Fal Dara, but he redeems himself when he dies fighting for Rand's group. At the same time, Elayne and Nynaeve rescue Egwene from the Seanchan and attempt to flee the city. At this moment the Whitecloaks also choose to attack, leaving the heroes trapped between the Seanchan and the Whitecloaks. Desperately, Mat blows the Horn of Valere, summoning forth dead heroes who aid Mat's cause. The resurrected heroes include Artur Hawkwing. The Seanchan easily defeat the Whitecloaks. The resurrected Heroes then overwhelm the Seanchan, who retreat back to their ships and sail off as the resurrected heroes fade away. Finally, Rand duels with Ba'alzamon, while their images appear in the sky, drawing the attention of all. Rand is initially unable to penetrate Ba'alzamon's defenses. Rand then leaves himself open while employing a final fighting maneuver Lan had taught him. Ba'alzamon strikes Rand as Rand lands a killing counter-blow slaying Ba'alzamon. Rand is severely wounded. Selene is revealed to be Lanfear, one of the most powerful Forsaken.

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A Crown of Swords

Robert Jordan

1996-05-15

Speculative fiction, Fantasy

A Crown of Swords has three primary plotlines: * Rand al'Thor, the Dragon Reborn, prepares to attack the Forsaken Sammael in Illian while enjoying life with his friend, Min Farshaw, and attempting to quell the rebellion by nobles in Cairhien, during which Padan Fain severely injures him with the Shadar Logoth dagger. After recovering, Rand, accompanied by Asha'man, attacks Illian and defeats Sammael in a duel of the One Power in Shadar Logoth, where Sammael is destroyed by Mashadar. Rand then takes the crown of Illian, formerly the Laurel Crown, but now called the Crown of Swords. * Egwene al'Vere and Siuan Sanche attempt to manipulate the Aes Sedai rebels in Salidar to move against Elaida's Aes Sedai in the White Tower in Tar Valon. After Egwene and Siuan investigate Siuan's suspicions about Myrelle, Egwene exploits the transfer of Lan's Warder bond from Moiraine to Myrelle in order to force Myrelle and Nisao to swear fealty to her. * In the city of Ebou Dar in Altara, Elayne Trakand, Nynaeve al'Meara, Aviendha, and Mat Cauthon search for a ter'angreal, the Bowl of the Winds, to break the unnatural heat brought on by the Dark One's manipulation of climate. They find it and enlist the help of the Kin and the Atha'an Miere, or Sea Folk. They also confront a Gholam. Mat is left behind after searching for Olver, and is caught in the fighting as the Seanchan invade Ebou Dar.

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Winter's Heart

Robert Jordan

2000-11-07

Speculative fiction, Fantasy

Many of the events of Winter's Heart take place simultaneously with the events of the next book, Crossroads of Twilight. Perrin Aybara and his followers pursue the Shaido Aiel who kidnapped his wife, Faile Bashere. Elayne Trakand attempts to solidify her grip on the Lion Throne and put down rebellious nobles. Mat Cauthon, making his return to the series after his absence in the previous book, is trapped in the city of Ebou Dar in Altara, which is under Seanchan occupation. He plans his escape, but in the end, his plans are disrupted by the interference of a Seanchan noblewoman named Tuon, who is revealed as the Daughter of the Nine Moons, heir to the Seanchan Crystal Throne. Mat, having heard a prophecy about him marrying the Daughter of the Nine Moons, kidnaps Tuon instead of tying her up and leaving her behind. Rand al'Thor, the Dragon Reborn, is bonded as a Warder by Elayne Trakand, Aviendha, and Min Farshaw. He hunts down Asha'man traitors in Far Madding and kills most of them. Lan also kills Toram Riatin in a duel. Caught by guards, he is imprisoned for a short time but is set free by Cadsuane and the other Aes Sedai who followed him. Rand and Nynaeve al'Meara Travel to Shadar Logoth. There, defended by Cadsuane Melaidhrin's Aes Sedai and loyal Asha'man against the Forsaken, Rand and Nynaeve link and use the Choedan Kal to cleanse saidin of the Dark One's taint so that men who channel will no longer go mad. Whilst using so much of the One Power, the access key (of the female Choedan Kal) is destroyed. During the course of the events of the book, Rand al'Thor made an extraordinary claim: he believed he had discovered how to cleanse the Dark One's 3000-year-old taint on saidin. He discovered how to do this upon careful questioning of the Aelfinn, as well as of Herid Fel. His preparations bore great fruit when he and Nynaeve al'Meara used the two most powerful sa'angreal ever made (the Choedan Kal) to funnel the taint into Shadar Logoth. Rand al'Thor did this by creating a funnel of pure saidar and forcing saidin through the funnel. The evil in Shadar Logoth, which was born out of pure hate for the Shadow and the Dark One, attracted and reacted with the taint of saidin, and the two forces annihilated each other, removing the taint from saidin. In Knife of Dreams, it has been confirmed that saidin is clean, by both Aes Sedai and Asha'man. However, according to Jordan himself, though sane channelers no longer need to fear its destructive effects, it does not restore any already affected by it to their former selves (as far as madness is concerned, presumably the rotting sickness can now be cured). During the cleansing, a battle took place between the forces of light and the shadow. The forces of light under Cadsuane split into several groups of Aes Sedai and Asha'man linked to be ready for the upcoming attack. The Aes Sedai Sarene and Corele linked with the Asha'man Damer Flinn, while Elza (who is secretly Black Ajah) and Merise linked with Jahar (one of Merise's warders, wielding Callandor). Nesune, Beldeine, Daigian linked with Eben Hopwil. Verin and Kumira linked with a Sea Folk Windfinder Shalon. The former Damane Alivia fought without being linked, helped by a set of Angreal and Ter'angreal presumably made for battle, and by virtue of fact that she was (and is currently) the strongest and most experienced female channeler for the Light in the series thus far. The forces of the Shadow consisted of Cyndane (formerly Lanfear), Demandred, Osan'gar (formerly Aginor, who we find out has been masquerading as Corlan Dashiva, an Asha'man), Moghedien, Graendal and Aran'gar who was formerly Balthamel and now is in a female body but still channels saidin. During the fight, Osan'gar was killed by Elza (ironically a Black Ajah), Eben Hopwil by Aran'gar and Kumira by Graendal. It has also resulted in the utter destruction of the female Choedan Kal and its access key, which triggered the mass suicide of Amayar along the Islands of the Sea Folk, who believed the giant statue's destruction to signal the end of their Age of Illusion.

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Around the World in Eighty Days

Jules Verne

Children's literature, Fiction, Adventure novel

The story starts in London on October 1, 1872. Phileas Fogg is a rich English gentleman and bachelor living in solitude at Number 7 Savile Row, Burlington Gardens. Despite his wealth, which is £40,000 (equal to £ today), Mr Fogg, whose countenance is described as "repose in action", lives a modest life with habits carried out with mathematical precision. Very little can be said about Mr. Fogg's social life other than that he is a member of the Reform Club. Having dismissed his former valet, James Foster, for bringing him shaving water at instead of , Mr Fogg hires a Frenchman by the name of Jean Passepartout, who is about 30 years old, as a replacement. Later, on that day, in the Reform Club, Fogg gets involved in an argument over an article in The Daily Telegraph, stating that with the opening of a new railway section in India, it is now possible to travel around the world in 80 days. He accepts a wager for £20,000 from his fellow club members, which he will receive if he makes it around the world in 80 days. Accompanied by Monsieur Passepartout, he leaves London by train at 8:45 P.M. on October 2, 1872, and this is due back at the Reform Club at the same time 80 days later, on December 21. {| class="wikitable" style="margin:auto;" |- |+The proposed schedule | London, United Kingdom to Suez, Egypt || rail and steamer across Mediterranean | 7 days |----- | Suez to Bombay, India || steamer through Red Sea and Indian Ocean || 13 days |----- | Bombay to Calcutta, India || rail || 3 days |----- | Calcutta to Hong Kong, China || steamer across South China Sea || 13 days |----- | Hong Kong to Yokohama, Japan || steamer across South China Sea, East China Sea and through Pacific Ocean || 6 days |----- | Yokohama to San Francisco, United States || steamer across Pacific Ocean | 22 days |----- | San Francisco to New York City, United States || rail | 7 days |----- | New York to London || steamer across Atlantic Ocean and rail || 9 days |----- | colspan="2"|Total || 80 days |} Fogg and Passepartout reach Suez in time. While disembarking in Egypt, they are watched by a Scotland Yard detective named Fix, who has been dispatched from London in search of a bank robber. Because Fogg happens to answer the description of the bank robber, Fix mistakes Fogg for the criminal. Since he cannot secure a warrant in time, Fix goes on board the steamer conveying the travellers to Bombay. During the voyage, Fix becomes acquainted with Passepartout, without revealing his purpose. On the voyage, Fogg promises the engineer a large reward if he gets them to Bombay early. They dock two days ahead of schedule. After reaching India they take a train from Bombay (known today as Mumbai) to Calcutta (Kolkata). About halfway there, Fogg learns that the Daily Telegraph newspaper article was wrong—the railroad ends at Kholby and starts again 50 miles further on at Allahabad. Fogg promptly buys an elephant, hires a guide, and starts toward Allahabad. During the ride, they come across a procession, in which a young Indian woman, Aouda, is led to a sanctuary to be sacrificed by the process of suttee the next day by Brahmins. Since the young woman is drugged with the smoke of opium and hemp and is obviously not going voluntarily, the travellers decide to rescue her. They follow the procession to the site, where Passepartout secretly takes the place of Aouda's deceased husband on the funeral pyre, on which she is to be burned the next morning. During the ceremony, he then rises from the pyre, scaring off the priests, and carries the young woman away. Due to this incident, the two days gained earlier are lost, but Fogg shows no sign of regret. The travellers then hasten on to catch the train at the next railway station, taking Aouda with them. At Calcutta, they can finally board a steamer going to Hong Kong. Fix, who has secretly been following them, has Fogg and Passepartout arrested in Calcutta. However, they jump bail and Fix is forced to follow them to Hong Kong. On board, he shows himself to Passepartout, who is delighted to meet again his travelling companion from the earlier voyage. In Hong Kong, it turns out that Aouda's distant relative, in whose care they had been planning to leave her, has moved, probably to Holland, so they decide to take her with them to Europe. Meanwhile, still without a warrant, Fix sees Hong Kong as his last chance to arrest Fogg on British soil. Around this time, Passepartout becomes convinced that Fix is a spy from the Reform Club trying to see if Fogg is really going around the world. However, Fix confides in Passepartout, who does not believe a word and remains convinced that his master is not a bank robber. To prevent Passepartout from informing his master about the premature departure of their next vessel, Fix gets Passepartout drunk and drugs him in an opium den. In his dizziness, Passepartout still manages to catch the steamer to Yokohama, but neglects to inform Fogg. Fogg, on the next day, discovers that he has missed his connection. He goes in search of a vessel that will take him to Yokohama. He finds a pilot boat that takes him and Aouda to Shanghai, where they catch a steamer to Yokohama. In Yokohama, they go on a search for Passepartout, believing that he may have arrived there on the original boat. They find him in a circus, trying to earn the fare for his homeward journey. Reunited, the four board a steamer taking them across the Pacific to San Francisco. Fix promises Passepartout that now, having left British soil, he will no longer try to delay Fogg's journey, but rather support him in getting back to Britain as fast as possible to minimize the amount of his share of the stolen money that Fogg can spend. In San Francisco they get on a trans-American train to New York, encountering a number of obstacles (as well as a Mormon missionary) along the way: a massive herd of bison crossing the tracks, a failing suspension bridge, and most disastrously, the train is attacked and overcome by Sioux warriors. After heroically uncoupling the locomotive from the carriages, Passepartout is kidnapped by the Indians, but Fogg rescues him after some American soldiers volunteer to help. They continue by a wind powered sledge over the snowy prairie to Omaha, where they get a train to New York. Once in New York, and having missed departure of their ship (the China) by 45 minutes, Fogg starts looking for an alternative for the crossing of the Atlantic Ocean. He finds a small steamboat, destined for Bordeaux. However, the captain of the boat refuses to take the company to Liverpool, whereupon Fogg consents to be taken to Bordeaux for the price of $2000 (equal to $ today) per passenger. On the voyage, he bribes the crew to mutiny and take course for Liverpool. Against hurricane winds and going on full steam all the time, the boat runs out of fuel after a few days. Fogg buys the boat at a very high price from the captain, soothing him thereby, and has the crew burn all the wooden parts to keep up the steam. The companions arrive at Queenstown (Cobh), Ireland, in time to reach London via Dublin and Liverpool before the deadline. However, once on British soil again, Fix produces a warrant and arrests Fogg. A short time later, the misunderstanding is cleared up—the actual bank robber had been caught three days earlier in Edinburgh. In response to this, Fogg, in a rare moment of impulse, punches Fix, who immediately falls to the ground. However, Fogg has missed the train and returns to London five minutes late, assured that he has lost the wager. In his London house the next day, he apologises to Aouda for bringing her with him, since he now has to live in poverty and cannot financially support her. Aouda suddenly confesses that she loves him and asks him to marry her, which he gladly accepts. He calls for Passepartout to notify the reverend. At the reverend's, Passepartout learns that he is mistaken in the date, which he takes to be Sunday but which actually is Saturday because the party travelled east, thereby gaining a full day on their journey around the globe, by crossing the International Date Line. He did not notice this after landing in North America because the only phase of the trip that depended on vehicles departing less often than daily was the Atlantic crossing, and he had hired his own ship for that. Passepartout hurries back to Fogg, who immediately sets off for the Reform Club, where he arrives just in time to win the wager. Fogg marries Aouda and the journey around the world is complete. Passepartout and Fogg carried only a carpet bag with only two shirts and three pairs of stockings each, a mackintosh, a travelling cloak, and a spare pair of shoes. The only book they carried is Bradshaw's Continental Railway Steam Transit and General Guide. This contains timetables of trains and steamers. He also carried a huge roll of English banknotes-about £20,000. He also left with twenty guineas (equal to £ today) won at whist, of which he soon disposed.

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The Grapes of Wrath

John Steinbeck

1939

Novel

The narrative begins just after Tom Joad is paroled from McAlester prison for homicide. On his journey to his home near Sallisaw, Oklahoma, he meets former preacher Jim Casy whom he remembers from his childhood, and the two travel together. When they arrive at his childhood farm home, they find it deserted. Disconcerted and confused, he and Casy meet their old neighbor, Muley Graves, who tells them that the family has gone to stay at Uncle John Joad's home nearby. He goes on to tell them that the banks have evicted all the farmers off their land, but he refuses to leave the area. Tom and Casy get up the next morning to go to Uncle John's. There, Tom finds his family loading a converted Hudson truck with what remains of their possessions; the crops were destroyed in the Dust Bowl and, as a result, the family had to default on their loans. With their farm repossessed, the Joads cling to hope, mostly in the form of handbills distributed everywhere in Sallisaw, Oklahoma, describing the fruitful state of California and the high pay to be had in that state. The Joads are seduced by this advertising and invest everything they have into the journey. Although leaving Oklahoma would be breaking parole, Tom decides that it is a risk worth taking. Casy is invited to join the family as well. Going west on Route 66, the Joad family discovers that the road is saturated with other families making the same trek, ensnared by the same promise. In makeshift camps, they hear many stories from others, some coming back from California, and are forced to confront the possibility that their prospects may not be what they hoped. Along the road, Grampa dies and is buried in the camp; Granma dies close to the California state line, both Noah (the eldest Joad son) and Connie (the husband of the pregnant Joad daughter, Rose of Sharon) split from the family; the remaining members, led by Ma, realize they have no choice but to go on, as there is nothing remaining for them in Oklahoma. Upon arrival, they find little hope of making a decent wage, as there is an oversupply of labor and a lack of rights, and the big corporate farmers are in collusion, while smaller farmers are suffering from collapsing prices. A gleam of hope is presented at Weedpatch Camp, one of the clean, utility-supplied camps operated by the Resettlement Administration, a New Deal agency that has been established to help the migrants, but there is not enough money and space to care for all of the needy. As a Federal facility, the camp is also off-limits to California deputies who constantly harass and provoke the newcomers. In response to the exploitation of laborers, there are people who attempt for the workers to join unions, including Casy, who had gone to jail after taking the blame for attacking a rogue deputy. The remaining Joads work as strikebreakers on a peach orchard where Casy is involved in a strike that eventually turns violent. Tom Joad witnesses the killing of Casy and kills the attacker, becoming a fugitive. They later leave the orchard for a cotton farm where Tom is at risk of being identified for the murder he committed. He bids farewell to his mother, promising that no matter where he runs, he will be a tireless advocate for the oppressed. Rose of Sharon's baby is stillborn; however, Ma Joad remains steadfast and forces the family through the bereavement. When the rains arrive, the Joads' dwelling is flooded, and they move to higher ground.

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How Green Was My Valley

Richard Llewellyn

1939

Historical fiction, Drama, Fiction, Novel

The novel is set in South Wales in the reign of Queen Victoria. It tells the story of the Morgans, a respectable mining family of the South Wales Valleys, through the eyes of the youngest son, Huw Morgan. Huw's academic ability sets him apart from his elder brothers and enables him to consider a future away from this troubled industrial environment. His five brothers and his father are miners; after the eldest brother, Ivor, is killed in an mining accident, Huw moves in with his sister-in-law, Bronwen, with whom he has always been in love. One of Huw's three sisters, Angharad, marries the wealthy mine owner's son, whom she does not love, and the marriage is an unhappy one. She never overcomes her clandestine relationship with the local minister. Huw's father is later killed in a mine explosion. After everyone Huw has known either dies or moves away, he decides to leave as well, and tells us the story of his life just before he does.

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Lady Audley's Secret

Mary Elizabeth Braddon

The novel opens with the marriage of Lucy Graham, a beautiful, doll-like blonde who enchants almost all who meet her, to Sir Michael Audley, an old, rich, and kind widower, in June 1857. Lucy was a governess for the local doctor, Mr. Dawson. Until her marriage, Lucy was in service with Mrs. Vincent, and besides that very little is known about her past. Around the time of the marriage, Sir Michael’s nephew, barrister Robert Audley, welcomes back to England his old friend, George Talboys, who has returned after three years of gold prospecting in Australia. George is anxious to get news of his wife, Helen, whom he left three years ago when their financial situation became desperate, in the hope of returning to her with Australian gold. He reads in the newspaper that she has died, and, after visiting her home to confirm this, he has a complete breakdown. Robert Audley cares for his friend, and, hoping to distract him, offers to take him to his wealthy uncle’s country manor. George had a child, Georgey, who was left under the care of Lieutenant Maldon, George's father-in-law. Robert and George set off to visit Georgey, and George decides to make Robert little Georgey's guardian and caretaker of 20,000 pounds put into the boy's name. After settling the matter of the boy's guardianship, the two set off to visit Sir Michael. While at Audley Court, the country manor, Lady Audley avoids meeting with George. When the two seek an audience with the new Lady Audley, she makes many excuses to avoid their visit, but he and Robert are shown a portrait of her by Alicia Audley, Robert’s cousin. George appears greatly struck by the portrait, unbeknownst to Robert (who credits the unfavorable reaction to that evening's storm). Shortly thereafter, George disappears upon a visit to Audley Court, much to Robert’s consternation. Unwilling to believe that George has simply left suddenly and without notice, Robert begins to look into the circumstances around the strange disappearance. While searching for his friend, Robert begins to take notes of the events as they unfold. His notes indicate the involvement of Lady Audley, much to his chagrin, and he slowly begins to collect evidence against her. One night, he reveals the evidence and notes that George was in possession of many letters that his former wife wrote. Lady Audley immediately sets off to London, where the letters were kept, and Robert follows after her. However, by the time he arrives, he discovers that George's possessions have been broken into with the help of a local locksmith and that the letters have vanished. However, one possession, a book with a note written by George's wife that matches Lady Audley's handwriting, remains. This confirms Robert's suspicion that Lady Audley is implicated in George's disappearance; it also leads Robert to conclude that Lady Audley is actually George's supposedly dead wife. Suspecting the worst of Lady Audley and being afraid for little Georgey's life, Robert travels to Lieutenant Maldon's house and demands possession of the boy. Once Robert has Georgey under his control, he places the boy in a school run by Mr. Marchmont. Afterwards, Robert visits George's father, Mr. Harcourt Talboys, and confronts the Squire with his son's death. Mr. Harcourt listens dispassionately to the story. In the course of his visit to the Talboy's manor, Robert is entranced by George’s sister Clara, who looks startlingly like George. Clara’s passion for finding her brother spurs Robert on. During February 1859, Robert continues searching for evidence. He receives a notice that his uncle is ill, and he quickly returns to Audley Court. While there, Robert speaks with Mr. Dawson and receives a brief description of all that is known about Lucy's background. He hears that Lucy was employed by Mrs. Vincent at her school since 1852, and, to verify this claim, Robert tracks down Mrs. Vincent, who is in hiding because of debts. According to Miss Tonks, a teacher at Mrs. Vincent's school, Lucy actually arrived at the school in August 1854 and was secretive about her past. Miss Tonks gives Robert a travel box that used to belong to Lucy, and upon examining stickers on the box, Robert discovers both the name Lucy Graham and the name Helen Talboys. Robert realizes that Helen Talboys faked her death before creating her new identity. When Robert confronts Lucy, she tells him that he has no proof, and he leaves to find more evidence, heading to Castle Inn, which is run by Phoebe Marks's husband, Luke. During the night, Lucy forces Phoebe Marks to let her into the inn and Lucy sets the place on fire, with the intention of killing Robert. However, Robert survives and returns to Audley Court and again confronts Lucy. This time, she says she is crazy and confesses her life's story to Robert and Sir Michael, claiming that George abandoned her originally and she had no choice but to abandon her old life and child in order to find another, wealthier husband. Sir Michael is unhappy and leaves with Alicia to travel through Europe. Robert invites a Doctor Mosgrave to make a more astute judgment regarding Lucy's sanity, and he proclaims that she is indeed victim to latent insanity, which overpowers her in times of stress and makes her very dangerous to any and all. Lucy, under the name of Madame Taylor, enters a mental institution located somewhere in Belgium along the route between Brussels and Paris. While being committed, Lucy confesses to Robert that she killed George by pushing him down a deserted well in the garden of Audley Court. Robert grieves for his friend George until Luke Marks, who was fatally injured in the fire, manages, before dying, to tell Robert that George survived Lady Audley’s attempted murder and that George, with Luke’s help, left with intent of returning to Australia. Robert is overjoyed, and he asks Clara to marry him and go with him to Australia to find George. Clara accepts, but before they set out, George returns and reveals that he actually visited New York instead. The narrative ends with the death of Lucy abroad, Clara and Robert happily married and living in a country cottage with George and his son. Robert's formerly infatuated cousin Alicia marries her once-spurned suitor, Sir Harry Towers, and Audley Court is left abandoned along with all of its unhappy memories.

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A Streetcar Named Desire

Tennessee Williams

Blanche DuBois is a fading, but still-attractive, Southern belle whose pretensions to virtue and culture only thinly mask alcoholism and delusions of grandeur. Her poise is an illusion she presents to shield others (but most of all, herself) from her reality, and an attempt to make herself still attractive to new male suitors. Blanche arrives at the apartment of her sister Stella Kowalski in the Faubourg Marigny neighborhood of New Orleans, on Elysian Fields Avenue; the local transportation that she takes to arrive there includes a streetcar route named "Desire." The steamy, urban ambiance is a shock to Blanche's nerves. Stella, who fears the reaction of her husband Stanley, welcomes Blanche with some trepidation. As Blanche explains that their ancestral Southern plantation, Belle Reve in Laurel, Mississippi, has been "lost" due to the "epic fornications" of their ancestors, her veneer of self-possession begins to slip drastically. Blanche tells Stella that her supervisor allowed her to take time off from her job as an English teacher because of her upset nerves, when in fact, she has been fired for having an affair with a 17-year-old student. This turns out not to be the only seduction in which she has engaged, and, along with other problems, has led her to escape Laurel. A brief marriage marred by the discovery that her husband, Allan Grey, was having a homosexual affair and his subsequent suicide has led Blanche to withdraw into a world in which fantasies and illusions blend seamlessly with reality. In contrast to both the self-effacing and deferential Stella and the pretentious refinement of Blanche, Stella's husband, Stanley Kowalski, is a force of nature: primal, rough-hewn, brutish, and sensual. He dominates Stella in every way and is physically and emotionally abusive. Stella tolerates his primal behavior as this is part of what attracted her in the first place; their love and relationship are heavily based on powerful—even animal-like—sexual chemistry, something that Blanche finds impossible to understand. The arrival of Blanche upsets her sister and brother-in-law's system of mutual dependence. Stella's concern for her sister's well-being emboldens Blanche to hold court in the Kowalski apartment, infuriating Stanley and leading to conflict in his relationship with his wife. Blanche and Stanley are on a collision course, and Stanley's friend and Blanche's would-be suitor, Harold "Mitch" Mitchell, gets trampled in their path. Stanley discovers Blanche's past through a co-worker who travels to Laurel frequently, and he confronts her with the things that she has been trying to put behind her, partly out of concern that her character flaws may be damaging to the lives of those in her new home, just as they were in Laurel, and partly out of a distaste for her pretense in general. However, his attempts to "unmask" her are predictably cruel and violent. In their final confrontation, it is implied that Stanley rapes Blanche, resulting in her nervous breakdown. Stanley has her committed to a mental institution, and in the closing moments, Blanche utters her signature line to the kindly doctor who leads her away: "Whoever you are, I have always depended on the kindness of strangers." The reference to the streetcar named Desire—providing the aura of New Orleans geography—is symbolic. Blanche not only has to travel on a streetcar route named "Desire" to reach Stella's home on "Elysian Fields" but her desire acts as an irrepressible force throughout the play—she can only hang on as her desires lead her. The character of Blanche is thought to be based on Williams' sister Rose Williams who struggled with her mental health and became incapacitated after a lobotomy.

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The Queen of the Damned

Anne Rice

1988-10

Horror, Supernatural, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Gothic fiction

Part One follows several different people over the same period of several days. Several of the characters appear in the two previous books, including Armand, Daniel (the "boy reporter" of Interview with the Vampire), Marius, Louis, Gabrielle and Santino. Each of the six chapters in Part One tells a different story about a different person or group of people. Two things unify these chapters: a series of dreams about red-haired twin sisters, and the fact that a powerful being is killing vampires around the world by means of spontaneous combustion. Pandora and Santino rescue Marius, having answered his telepathic call for help. Marius informs his rescuers that Akasha has been awakened by Lestat, or rather his rock music, for he has joined a rock band of mortals whose names are Alex, Larry and Tough Cookie. Having been awakened by Lestat's rebellious music, Akasha destroys her husband Enkil and plots to rule the world. Akasha is also revealed as the source of the attacks on other vampires. Part Two takes place at Lestat's concert. Jesse, a member of the secret Talamasca and relative of Maharet, is mortally injured while attending the concert, and is taken to Maharet's Sonoma compound where she is made into a vampire. The vampires from Part One later congregate in the Sonoma compound. The only vampires not present are Akasha and Lestat. Akasha has abducted Lestat and takes him as an unwilling consort to various locations in the world, inciting women to rise up and kill the men who have oppressed them. Part Three takes place at Maharet's home in a Sonoma forest. There Maharet tells the story of Akasha and the red-haired twins (who are, in fact, Maharet and her sister, Mekare) to Pandora, Jesse, Marius, Santino, Eric, Armand, Daniel, Louis and Gabrielle. Also present are Mael and Khayman, who already know the story. In Part Four, Akasha confronts the gathered vampires at Maharet's compound. There she explains her plans and offers the vampires a chance to be her "angels" in her New World Order. Akasha plans to kill 90 percent of the world's human men, and to establish a new Eden in which women will worship Akasha as a goddess. If the assembled vampires refuse to follow her, she will destroy them. The vampires refuse, but before Akasha can destroy them, Mekare enters. Mekare kills Akasha by severing her head. Mekare then consumes Akasha's brain and heart, thereby saving the lives of the remaining vampires and becoming the new Queen of the Damned. In Part Five, the vampires leave Maharet's compound and assemble at Armand's resort, the Night Island, (according to Anne Rice, inspired by Fire Island) in Florida to recover. They eventually go their separate ways (as told in The Tale of the Body Thief). Lestat takes Louis to see David Talbot in London. After their brief visit with Talbot they depart into the night, an incensed Louis and his angry words filling Lestat with glee. The Queen of the Damned, deals with the origins of vampires themselves. The mother of all vampires, Akasha, begins as a pre-Egyptian queen, in a land called Kemet (which will become Egypt), many thousands of years ago. During this time two powerful witches (Maharet and Mekare) live in the mountains of an unnamed region. The witches are able to communicate with invisible spirits and gain simple favors from them. During this period there is a bloodthirsty, invisible spirit known as Amel who continually asks the two witches if they need his assistance, although they prudently decline the offer. The witches' village is destroyed and they are incarcerated by the king and queen, who desire their knowledge. When the witches offend Akasha, the Queen condemns the twins. Enkil then orders his chief steward (who is Khayman as a mortal man) to rape the twins in his stead, which would prove their lack of power, before the eyes of the court. Afterward the witches are cast out into the desert. While making her way back home with a pregnant Maharet, Mekare curses the king and queen secretly with the bloodthirsty spirit. Eventually this spirit inflicts such torment on Akasha and Enkil that they again demand advice and help from the two witches. Conspirators, unhappy with the young king's policies, assassinate the royal couple in Khayman's house whilst they were attempting to exorcise Amel, who had been tormenting Khayman. While the king and queen lie dying, the evil spirit sees its chance to ensnare the soul of the dying queen and pulls it back into her body. The spirit combines itself with the flesh and blood of the queen, transforming her into a vampire. Akasha allows the king to drink her blood, which saves his life. They then order Khayman to find the witches and bring them back to Egypt so that they could use their knowledge of spirits to help them, as they feel guilty because of their thirst for blood. However, when the witches admit that they cannot help the monarchs, Akasha orders the mutilation of the witches: Maharet loses her eyes and Mekare her tongue. Afterward, Khayman, who had been turned into a vampire by Akasha, comes to the witches' cell and turns them too. The three flee together, but are caught by Akasha's soldiers. Khayman escapes, but Maharet and Mekare are further punished. The witches are put into two separate coffins which are then set afloat on two separate bodies of water. They are only reunited near the end of the novel Queen of the Damned. In Mekare's absence, Maharet returns to watch over her daughter and her descendants. Maharet's descendants become what she calls the Great Family. A maternal line, the Great Family includes every culture, religion, ethnicity, and race. The Great Family represents all humanity and shows the vampires what Akasha would destroy with the creation of her New World Order. As the source of all vampires, Akasha is connected to all vampires by the blood and spirit they collectively share. In an experiment by the first Keeper, Akasha and Enkil are exposed to sunlight when they are several thousand years old. This merely darkens their skin. However, the result on all other vampires is extreme, and many of the weakest vampires die, thus confirming the legend that anything that harms Akasha will also directly affect all of her progeny.

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Gulliver's Travels

Jonathan Swift

1726

Science Fiction, Satire, Fantasy, Speculative fiction

;4 May 1699 — 13 April 1702 The book begins with a short preamble in which Lemuel Gulliver, in the style of books of the time, gives a brief outline of his life and history before his voyages. He enjoys travelling, although it is that love of travel that is his downfall. During his first voyage, Gulliver is washed ashore after a shipwreck and finds himself a prisoner of a race of tiny people, less than 6 inches tall, who are inhabitants of the island country of Lilliput. After giving assurances of his good behaviour, he is given a residence in Lilliput and becomes a favourite of the court. From there, the book follows Gulliver's observations on the Court of Lilliput. He is also given the permission to roam around the city on a condition that he would not harm their subjects. Gulliver assists the Lilliputians to subdue their neighbours, the Blefuscudians, by stealing their fleet. However, he refuses to reduce the island nation of Blefuscu to a province of Lilliput, displeasing the King and the court. Gulliver is convicted of treason for "making water" in the capital (even though he was putting out a fire and saving countless lives)--among other "crimes." Gulliver is charged with treason and sentenced to be blinded. With the assistance of a kind friend, Gulliver escapes to Blefuscu, where he spots and retrieves an abandoned boat and sails out to be rescued by a passing ship which safely takes him back home. This book of the Travels is a topical political satire. ;20 June 1702 — 3 June 1706 When the sailing ship Adventure is blown off course by storms and forced to put in to land for want of fresh water, Gulliver is abandoned by his companions and found by a farmer who is tall (the scale of Brobdingnag is about 12:1, compared to Lilliput's 1:12, judging from Gulliver estimating a man's step being ). He brings Gulliver home and his daughter cares for Gulliver. The farmer treats him as a curiosity and exhibits him for money. The word gets out and the Queen of Brobdingnag wants to see the show. She loves Gulliver and she buys him and keeps him as a favourite at court. Since Gulliver is too small to use their huge chairs, beds, knives and forks, the queen commissions a small house to be built for Gulliver so that he can be carried around in it. This is referred to as his 'travelling box'. Between small adventures such as fighting giant wasps and being carried to the roof by a monkey, he discusses the state of Europe with the King. The King is not happy with Gulliver's accounts of Europe, especially upon learning of the use of guns and cannons. On a trip to the seaside, his travelling box is seized by a giant eagle which drops Gulliver and his box into the sea, where he is picked up by some sailors, who return him to England. This book compares the truly moral man to the representative man; the latter is clearly shown to be the lesser of the two. Swift, being in Anglican holy orders, was likely to make such comparisons. ;5 August 1706 — 16 April 1710 After Gulliver's ship is attacked by pirates, he is marooned close to a desolate rocky island, near India. Fortunately he is rescued by the flying island of Laputa, a kingdom devoted to the arts of music and mathematics but unable to use them for practical ends. ("La puta" is Spanish for "the whore". Swift was attacking reason and the deism movement in this book, the last one he wrote for the Travels.) Laputa's custom of throwing rocks down at rebellious cities on the ground seems the first time that aerial bombardment was conceived as a method of warfare. Gulliver tours Laputa as the guest of a low-ranking courtier and sees the ruin brought about by the blind pursuit of science without practical results, in a satire on bureaucracy and on the Royal Society and its experiments. At the Grand Academy of Lagado, great resources and manpower are employed on researching completely preposterous schemes such as extracting sunbeams from cucumbers, softening marble for use in pillows, learning how to mix paint by smell, and uncovering political conspiracies by examining the excrement of suspicious persons (see muckraking). Gulliver is then taken to Balnibarbi to await a trader who can take him on to Japan. While waiting for passage, Gulliver takes a short side-trip to the island of Glubbdubdrib, where he visits a magician's dwelling and discusses history with the ghosts of historical figures, the most obvious restatement of the "ancients versus moderns" theme in the book. In Luggnagg he encounters the struldbrugs, unfortunates who are immortal. They do not have the gift of eternal youth, but suffer the infirmities of old age and are considered legally dead at the age of eighty. After reaching Japan, Gulliver asks the Emperor "to excuse my performing the ceremony imposed upon my countrymen of trampling upon the crucifix", which the Emperor grants. Gulliver returns home, determined to stay there for the rest of his days. ;7 September 1710 – 2 July 1715 Despite his earlier intention of remaining at home, Gulliver returns to the sea as the captain of a merchantman as he is bored with his employment as a surgeon. On this voyage he is forced to find new additions to his crew whom he believes to have turned the rest of the crew against him. His crew then mutiny, and after keeping him contained for some time resolve to leave him on the first piece of land they come across and continue as pirates. He is abandoned in a landing boat and comes upon a race of hideous, deformed and savage humanoid creatures to which he conceives a violent antipathy. Shortly afterwards he meets a race of horses who call themselves Houyhnhnms (which in their language means "the perfection of nature"); they are the rulers, while the deformed creatures called Yahoos are human beings in their base form. Gulliver becomes a member of a horse's household, and comes to both admire and emulate the Houyhnhnms and their lifestyle, rejecting his fellow humans as merely Yahoos endowed with some semblance of reason which they only use to exacerbate and add to the vices Nature gave them. However, an Assembly of the Houyhnhnms rules that Gulliver, a Yahoo with some semblance of reason, is a danger to their civilization, and expels him. He is then rescued, against his will, by a Portuguese ship, and is surprised to see that Captain Pedro de Mendez, a Yahoo, is a wise, courteous and generous person. He returns to his home in England, but he is unable to reconcile himself to living among Yahoos and becomes a recluse, remaining in his house, largely avoiding his family and his wife, and spending several hours a day speaking with the horses in his stables. This book uses coarse metaphors to describe human depravity, and the Houyhnhms are symbolized as not only perfected nature but also the emotional barrenness which Swift maintained that devotion to reason brought.

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The Color Purple

Alice Walker

1982

Epistolary novel, Fiction

Celie, the protagonist and narrator, is a poor, uneducated, fourteen-year-old black girl living in the South. She starts writing letters to God because her father, Alphonso, beats and rapes her. Alphonso has already impregnated Celie once. Celie gave birth to a girl, whom her father presumably killed in the woods. Celie has a second child, a boy, whom her father also abducts. Celie’s mother becomes ill and dies. Alphonso brings home a new wife, and continues to abuse Celie. Celie and her bright, pretty younger sister, Nettie, learn that a man known only as Mr. Johnson wants to marry Nettie. Mr. Johnson has a mistress named Shug Avery, a sultry lounge singer whose photograph fascinates Celie. Alphonso refuses to let Nettie marry, and instead offers Mr. Johnson Celie, "an ugly woman," as his bride. Mr. Johnson eventually accepts the offer, forcing Celie into a difficult and joyless married life. Nettie runs away from Alphonso and takes refuge at Celie’s house. Mr. Johnson still desires Nettie, and when he advances on her, she flees. Never hearing from Nettie again, Celie assumes her dead. Mr. Johnson's sister Kate feels sorry for Celie, and tells her to fight back against Mr. Johnson rather than submit to his abuses. Harpo, Mr. Johnson's son, falls in love with a large, spunky girl named Sofia. Shug Avery comes to town to sing at a local bar, but Celie is not allowed to go see her. Sofia gets pregnant and marries Harpo. Celie is amazed by Sofia’s defiance in the face of Harpo’s and Mr. Johnson’s attempts to treat Sofia as an inferior. Harpo, kinder and gentler than his father, still assumes this means he is doing something wrong and under the advice of Mr. Johnson and a momentarily jealous Celie, attempts to beat Sofia into submission. However, he consistently fails, as Sofia is at least as strong and a more experienced brawler. Shug falls ill and Mr. Johnson takes her into his house. Shug is initially rude to Celie, but the two women become friends as Celie takes charge of nursing Shug. Celie finds herself infatuated with Shug and attracted to her sexually. Frustrated by Harpo’s consistent attempts to subordinate her, Sofia moves out, taking her children with her. Several months later, Harpo opens a juke joint where Shug sings nightly. Celie grows confused over her feelings toward Shug. Shug decides to stay when she learns that Mr. Johnson beats Celie when Shug is away. Shug and Celie’s relationship grows intimate, and Shug begins to ask Celie questions about sex. Sofia returns for a visit and promptly gets in a fight with Harpo’s new girlfriend, Squeak. In town one day, the mayor’s wife, Miss Millie, asks Sofia to work as her maid. Sofia replies with a sassy "Hell no!" When the mayor slaps Sofia for her "insubordination", Sofia returns the blow, knocking the mayor down, for which she is sent to jail. Squeak’s attempts to get Sofia released are futile. Sofia is sentenced to work for 12 years as the mayor’s maid, though she is eventually released from jail six months early. Despite her new marriage, Shug instigates a sexual relationship with Celie, and the two frequently share the same bed. One night Shug asks Celie about her sister and Celie tells her she assumes Nettie is dead because she'd promised to write Celie but never did. Shug helps Celie recover letters from Nettie that Mr. Johnson has been hiding from her for decades. Overcome with emotion, Celie reads the letters in order, wondering how to keep herself from killing Mr. Johnson. The letters indicate that Nettie befriended a missionary couple, Samuel and Corrine, and accompanied them to Africa to do ministry work. Samuel and Corrine have two adopted children, Olivia and Adam. Nettie and Corrine have become close friends, but Corrine, noticing that her adopted children resemble Nettie, wonders if Nettie and Samuel have a secret past. Increasingly suspicious, Corrine tries to limit Nettie’s role within her family. Nettie becomes disillusioned with her missionary experience, as she finds the Africans self-centered and obstinate. Corrine becomes ill with a fever. Nettie asks Samuel to tell her how he adopted Olivia and Adam. Based on Samuel’s story, Nettie realizes that the two children are actually Celie’s biological children (whom Alphonso, her stepfather, abducted), alive after all. Nettie also learns that Alphonso is actually only Nettie and Celie’s stepfather, not their biological father, who was a store owner whom white men lynched because they resented his success. Alphonso told Celie and Nettie he was their real father because he wanted to inherit the house and property that was once their mother’s. Nettie confesses to Samuel and Corrine that she is in fact their children’s biological aunt. The gravely ill Corrine refuses to believe Nettie. Later, Corrine dies, finally having accepted Nettie’s story and reconciled thereto just before her death. Meanwhile, Celie visits Alphonso, who confirms Nettie’s story, admitting that he is only the sisters' stepfather. Celie begins to lose some of her faith in God, but Shug tries to get her to reimagine God in her own way, rather than in the traditional image of the old, bearded white man. Celie moves to Tennessee and designs and sews tailored pants, turning her hobby into a business. She returns to her home to learn that Mr. Johnson has changed dramatically, becoming much more considerate and even helping her sew some of the clothing for her business. He proposes that they marry "in the spirit as well as in the flesh," but she declines. She also finds out that Alphonso, her stepfather, has died. Celie inherits the land and moves back into the house. Around this time, Shug has fallen in love with Germaine, a 19-year-old flautist that is part of her blues band, and the news of this crushes Celie. Shug travels across the country and to Panama with Germaine, all the while writing postcards to Celie. Nevertheless, Celie pledges to love Shug even if Shug does not love her back. Meanwhile, Nettie and Samuel marry and prepare to return to America. Before they leave, Adam marries Tashi, an African girl. Following African tradition, Tashi undergoes the painful rituals of female circumcision and facial scarring. In solidarity, Adam undergoes the same facial scarring ritual. The end of the novel has Nettie, Samuel, Olivia, Adam, and Tashi arriving at Celie's house. Nettie and Celie embrace, having not seen each other for over 30 years. They introduce one another to their respective families as the novel ends.

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A Midsummer Night's Dream

William Shakespeare

1600

Fantasy, Comedy

The play features three interlocking plots, connected by a celebration of the wedding of Duke Theseus of Athens and the Amazon queen, Hippolyta, which is set simultaneously in the woodland and in the realm of Fairyland, under the light of the moon. In the opening scene, Hermia refuses to follow her father's, Egeus, instructions to marry Demetrius, whom he has chosen for her. In response, Egeus quotes before Theseus an ancient Athenian law whereby a daughter must marry the suitor chosen by her father, or else face death. Theseus offers her another choice: lifelong chastity while worshiping the goddess Diana as a nun. At that same time, Peter Quince and his fellow players gather to produce a stage play, "the most lamentable comedy and most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisbe", for the Duke and the Duchess. Quince reads the names of characters and bestows them to the players. Nick Bottom, who is playing the main role of Pyramus, is over-enthusiastic and wants to dominate others by suggesting himself for the characters of Thisbe, the Lion, and Pyramus at the same time. He would also rather be a tyrant and recites some lines of Ercles. Quince ends the meeting with "at the Duke's oak we meet". Meanwhile, Oberon, king of the fairies, and his queen, Titania, have come to the forest outside Athens. Titania tells Oberon that she plans to stay there until she has attended Theseus and Hippolyta's wedding. Oberon and Titania are estranged because Titania refuses to give her Indian changeling to Oberon for use as his "knight" or "henchman," since the child's mother was one of Titania's worshippers. Oberon seeks to punish Titania's disobedience, so he calls for his mischievous court jester Puck or "Robin Goodfellow" to help him apply a magical juice from a flower called "love-in-idleness", originally it was a white flower but when struck by Cupid's bow it tints the flower purple. When someone applies the potion to a sleeping person's eyelids, it makes the victim fall in love with the first living thing seen upon awakening. He instructs Puck to retrieve the flower so that he can make Titania fall in love with the first thing she sees when waking up, which he is sure will be an animal of the forest. Oberon's intent is to shame Titania into giving up the little Indian boy. He says, "And ere I take this charm from off her sight, / As I can take it with another herb, / I'll make her render up her page to me." Having seen Demetrius act cruelly toward Helena, Oberon orders Puck to spread some of the magical juice from the flower on the eyelids of the young Athenian man. Instead, Puck mistakes Lysander for Demetrius, not having actually seen either before, and administers the juice to the sleeping Lysander. Helena, coming across him, wakes him while attempting to determine whether he is dead or asleep. Upon this happening, Lysander immediately falls in love with Helena. Oberon sees Demetrius still following Hermia and is enraged. When Demetrius decides to go to sleep, Oberon sends Puck to get Helena while he charms Demetrius' eyes. Upon waking up, he sees Helena. Now, both men are in pursuit of Helena. However, she is convinced that her two suitors are mocking her, as neither loved her originally. Hermia is at a loss to see why her lover has abandoned her, and accuses Helena of stealing Lysander away from her. The four quarrel with each other until Lysander and Demetrius become so enraged that they seek a place to duel each other to prove whose love for Helena is the greatest. Oberon orders Puck to keep Lysander and Demetrius from catching up with one another and to remove the charm from the two men, so that they are back to normal. Lysander continues to love Hermia, and Demitrius realizes that he does love Helena. Meanwhile, Quince and his band of six labourers ("rude mechanicals", as they are described by Puck) have arranged to perform their play about Pyramus and Thisbe for Theseus' wedding and venture into the forest, near Titania's bower, for their rehearsal. Bottom is spotted by Puck, who (taking his name to be another word for a jackass) transforms his head into that of a donkey. When Bottom returns for his next lines, the other workmen run screaming in terror, much to Bottom's confusion, since he hasn't felt a thing during the transformation. Determined to wait for his friends, he begins to sing to himself. Titania is awakened by Bottom's singing and immediately falls in love with him. She lavishes him with attention and presumably makes love to him. While she is in this state of devotion, Oberon takes the changeling. Having achieved his goals, Oberon releases Titania, orders Puck to remove the donkey's head from Bottom, and arrange everything so that Hermia, Lysander, Demetrius, and Helena will believe that they have been dreaming when they awaken. The fairies then disappear, and Theseus and Hippolyta arrive on the scene, during an early morning hunt. They wake the lovers and, since Demetrius does not love Hermia any more, Theseus overrules Egeus's demands and arranges a group wedding. The lovers decide that the night's events must have been a dream. After they all exit, Bottom awakes, and he too decides that he must have experienced a dream "past the wit of man". In Athens, Theseus, Hippolyta and the lovers watch the six workmen perform Pyramus and Thisbe. Given a lack of preparation, the performers are so terrible playing their roles to the point where the guests laugh as if it were meant to be a comedy, and afterward everyone retires to bed. Afterward, Oberon, Titania, Puck, and other fairies enter, and bless the house and its occupants with good fortune. After all other characters leave, Puck "restores amends" and suggests to the audience that what they just experienced might be nothing but a dream (hence the name of the play).

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The English Patient

Michael Ondaatje

1992-09

Fiction, Novel

The historical backdrop for this novel is the Second World War in Northern Africa and Italy. Hana, a young Canadian Army nurse, lives in the abandoned Villa San Girolamo in Italy, which is filled with hidden, undetonated bombs. All she knows about her English patient is that he was burned beyond recognition in a plane crash before being taken to the hospital by a Bedouin tribe. He also claimed to be English. The only possession that the patient has is a copy of Herodotus' histories that survived the fire. He has annotated these histories and is constantly remembering his explorations in the desert in great detail, but cannot state his own name. The patient is, in fact, László de Almásy, a Hungarian desert explorer who was part of a British cartography group. He chose, however, to erase his identity and nationality. Caravaggio, a Canadian who served in Britain's foreign intelligence service since the late 1930s, was a friend of Hana's father, who died in the war. Caravaggio, who entered the world of spying because of his skill as a thief, comes to the villa in search of Hana. He overheard in another hospital that she was there taking care of a burned patient. Caravaggio bears physical and psychological scars; he was deliberately left behind to spy on the German forces and was eventually caught, interrogated and tortured, his thumbs having been cut off. Seeking vengeance three years later, Caravaggio (like Almásy) is addicted to morphine, which Hana supplies. One day, while Hana is playing the piano, two British soldiers enter the villa. One of the soldiers is Kip, an Indian Sikh who has been trained as a sapper or combat engineer, specializing in bomb and ordnance disposal. Kip explains that the Germans often booby-trapped musical instruments with bombs, and that he will stay in the villa to rid it of its dangers. Kip and the English Patient immediately become friends. Prompted to tell his story, the Patient begins to reveal all: An English gentleman, Geoffrey Clifton and his wife, Katharine, accompanied the patient's desert exploration team. The Patient's job was to draw maps of the desert, and the Cliftons' plane made this job easier. Almásy fell in love with Katharine Clifton one night as she read from Herodotus' histories aloud around a campfire. They soon began a very intense affair, but in 1938, Katharine cut it off, claiming that Geoffrey would go mad if he discovered them. When World War II broke out in 1939, the members of the exploration team decided to pack up base camp, and Geoffrey Clifton offered to pick up Almásy in his plane, and takes Katharine with him. However, Geoffrey turns around and crashes his plane in an effort to kill all three of them, revealing he had known about the affair. Geoffrey died immediately; Katharine survived, but was horribly injured. Almásy took her to "the cave of swimmers", a place the exploration team had previously discovered, and covered her with a parachute so he could leave to find help. After three days, he reached a town, but the British were suspicious of him because he was incoherent and had a foreign surname. They locked him up as a spy. When Almásy finally escaped, he knew it was too late to save Katharine, so he allowed himself to be captured by the Germans, helping their spy cross the desert into Cairo. He then returns to collect Katherine's body; however while flying over the desert, the aircraft is observed by Germans and shot down into flames. Almásy parachuted down covered in flames which was where the Bedouins found him. Caravaggio, who had had suspicions that the Patient was not English, fills in details. Geoffrey Clifton was, in fact, an English spy and had intelligence about Almásy's affair with Katharine. He also had intelligence that Almásy was already working with the Germans. Over time while Almásy divulges the details of his past, Kip becomes close to Hana. Kip's brother had always distrusted the West, but Kip entered the British Army willingly. He was trained as a sapper byLord Suffolk, an English gentleman, who welcomed Kip into his family. Under Lord Suffolk's training, Kip became very skilled at his job. When Lord Suffolk and his team were killed by a bomb, Kip became separated from the world and emotionally removed from everyone. He decided to leave England and began defusing bombs in Italy. Kip's best friend, a British Army sergeant, is killed in a bomb explosion. Kip forms a romantic relationship with Hana and uses it to reconnect to humanity. He becomes a part of a community again and begins to feel comfortable as a lover. Then he hears on the wireless that the United States have dropped the atomic bomb on Japan. Kip is convinced that they would not have dropped the bomb if the nation were white. He feels betrayed by the side he was fighting for. He becomes depressed and separates himself from everyone, including Hana. He eventually leaves.

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Captains Courageous

Rudyard Kipling

1897

Harvey Cheyne is the son of a wealthy railroad magnate and his wife, who are over-indulgent parents in San Diego, California. Washed overboard from a transatlantic steamship and rescued by fishermen off the Grand Banks of Newfoundland, the young Harvey Cheyne cannot persuade them to take him quickly to port, nor convince them of his wealth. Disko Troop, captain of the We're Here, offers him a job as part of the crew until they return to port. With no other choice, Harvey accepts. Through a series of trials and adventures, the youth learns to adjust to his rough new life and, with the help of his friend, the captain's son Dan Troop, he makes progress. Eventually, the schooner returns to port and Harvey wires his parents. They rush cross-country by their private rail car, given priority over commercial traffic, to Boston, Massachusetts. From there they go to the fishing town of Gloucester to find that their son has matured to become an industrious, serious and considerate young man. Harvey's mother rewards the seaman who initially rescued her son. Harvey's father rewards Captain Troop by hiring his son Dan to work on his prestigious tea clipper fleet. He is delighted at his son's new maturity and their relationship improves, even as Harvey decides to begin his career with his father's shipping lines.

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Ramayana

Valmiki

Dasharatha was the king of Ayodhya. He had three queens and they are Kausalya, Kaikeyi and Sumitra. He was childless for a long time and, anxious to produce an heir, he performs a fire sacrifice known as Putra-Kameshti Yagya. As a consequence, Rama is first born to Kausalya, Bharata is born to Kaikeyi, and Lakshmana and Shatrughna are born to Sumitra. These sons are endowed, to various degrees, with the essence of the God Vishnu; Vishnu had opted to be born into mortality in order to combat the demon Ravana, who was oppressing the Gods, and who could only be destroyed by a mortal. The boys are reared as the princes of the realm, receiving instructions from the scriptures and in warfare. When Rama is 16 years old, the sage Vishwamitra comes to the court of Dasharatha in search of help against demons, who were disturbing sacrificial rites. He chooses Rama, who is followed by Lakshmana, his constant companion throughout the story. Rama and Lakshmana receive instructions and supernatural weapons from Vishwamitra, and proceed to destroy the demons. Janaka was the king of Mithila. One day, a female child was found in the field by the king in the deep furrow dug by his plough. Overwhelmed with joy, the king regarded the child as a "miraculous gift of God". The child was named Sita, the Sanskrit word for furrow. Sita grew up to be a girl of unparalleled beauty and charm. When Sita was of marriageable age, the king decided to have a swayamvara which included a contest. The king was in possession of an immensely heavy bow, presented to him by the God Shiva: whoever could wield the bow could marry Sita. The sage Vishwamitra attends the swayamvara with Rama and Lakshmana. Only Rama wields the bow and breaks it. Marriages are arranged between the sons of Dasharatha and daughters of Janaka. Rama gets married to Sita, Lakshmana to Urmila, Bharata to Mandavi and Shatrughan to Shrutakirti. The weddings are celebrated with great festivity at Mithila and the marriage party returns to Ayodhya. After Rama and Sita have been married for twelve years, an elderly Dasharatha expresses his desire to crown Rama, to which the Kosala assembly and his subjects express their support. On the eve of the great event, Kaikeyi—her jealousy aroused by Manthara, a wicked maidservant—claims two boons that Dasharatha had long ago granted her. Kaikeyi demands Rama to be exiled into wilderness for fourteen years, while the succession passes to her son Bharata. The heartbroken king, constrained by his rigid devotion to his given word, accedes to Kaikeyi's demands. Rama accepts his father's reluctant decree with absolute submission and calm self-control which characterizes him throughout the story. He is joined by Sita and Lakshmana. When he asks Sita not to follow him, she says, "the forest where you dwell is Ayodhya for me and Ayodhya without you is a veritable hell for me." After Rama's departure, king Dasharatha, unable to bear the grief, passes away. Meanwhile, Bharata who was on a visit to his maternal uncle, learns about the events in Ayodhya. Bharata refuses to profit from his mother's wicked scheming and visits Rama in the forest. He requests Rama to return and rule. But Rama, determined to carry out his father's orders to the letter, refuses to return before the period of exile. However, Bharata carries Rama's sandals, and keeps them on the throne, while he rules as Rama's regent. Rama, Sita and Lakshmana journeyed southward along the banks of river Godavari, where they built cottages and lived off the land. At the Panchavati forest they are visited by a rakshasa woman, Surpanakha, the sister of Ravana. She attempts to seduce the brothers and, failing in this, attempts to kill Sita. Lakshmana stops her by cutting off her nose and ears. Hearing of this, her demon brother, Khara, organizes an attack against the princes. Rama annihilates Khara and his demons. When news of these events reaches Ravana, he resolves to destroy Rama by capturing Sita with the aid of the rakshasa Maricha. Maricha, assuming the form of a golden deer, captivates Sita's attention. Entranced by the beauty of the deer, Sita pleads with Rama to capture it. Lord Rama, aware that this is the play of the demons, is unable to dissuade Sita from her desire and chases the deer into the forest, leaving Sita under Lakshmana's guard. After some time Sita hears Rama calling out to her; afraid for his life she insists that Lakshmana rush to his aid. Lakshmana tries to assure her that Rama is invincible, and that it is best if he continues to follow Rama's orders to protect her. On the verge of hysterics Sita insists that it is not she but Rama who needs Lakshmana's help. He obeys her wish but stipulates that she is not to leave the cottage or entertain any strangers. He draws a chalk outline, the Lakshmana rekha around the cottage and casts a spell on it that prevents anyone from entering the boundary but allows people to exit. Finally with the coast clear, Ravana appears in the guise of an ascetic requesting Sita's hospitality. Unaware of the devious plan of her guest, Sita is tricked into leaving the rekha and then forcibly carried away by the evil Ravana. Jatayu, a vulture, tries to rescue Sita, but is mortally wounded. At Lanka Sita is kept under the heavy guard of rakshasis. Ravana demands Sita marry him, but Sita, eternally devoted to Rama, refuses. During their search, they meet the demon Kabandha and the ascetic Shabari, who direct them towards Sugriva and Hanuman. The Kishkindha Kanda is set in the monkey citadel Kishkindha. Rama and Lakshmana meet Hanuman, the greatest of monkey heroes and an adherent of Sugriva, the banished pretender to the throne of Kishkindha. However Sugriva soon forgets his promise and spends his time in debauchery. The clever monkey Queen Tara, second wife of Sugriva (initially wife of Vali), calmly intervenes to prevent an enraged Lakshmana from destroying the monkey citadel. She then eloquently convinces Sugriva to honor his pledge. Sugriva then sends search parties to the four corners of the earth, only to return without success from north, east and west. The southern search party under the leadership of Angad and Hanuman learns from a vulture named Sampati that Sita was taken to Lanka. The Sundara Kanda forms the heart of Valmiki's Ramayana and consists of a detailed, vivid account of Hanuman's adventures. After learning about Sita, Hanuman assumes a gargantuan form and makes a colossal leap across the ocean to Lanka. Here, Hanuman explores the demon's city and spies on Ravana. He locates Sita in Ashoka grove, who is wooed and threatened by Ravana and his rakshasis to marry Ravana. He reassures her, giving Rama's signet ring as a sign of good faith. He offers to carry Sita back to Rama, however she refuses, reluctant to allow herself to be touched by a male other than her husband. She says that Rama himself must come and avenge the insult of her abduction. Hanuman then wreaks havoc in Lanka by destroying trees and buildings, and killing Ravana's warriors. He allows himself to be captured and produced before Ravana. He gives a bold lecture to Ravana to release Sita. He is condemned and his tail is set on fire, but he escapes his bonds and, leaping from roof to roof, sets fire to Ravana's citadel and makes the giant leap back from the island. The joyous search party returns to Kishkindha with the news. This book describes the battle between the army of Rama, constructed with the help of Sugriv, and Ravana. Having received Hanuman's report on Sita, Rama and Lakshmana proceed with their allies towards the shore of the southern sea. There they are joined by Ravana's renegade brother Vibhishana. The monkeys named "Nal" and "Neel" construct a floating bridge (known as Rama Setu) across the ocean, and the princes and their army cross over to Lanka. A lengthy battle ensues and Rama kills Ravana. Rama then installs Vibhishana on the throne of Lanka. On meeting Sita, Rama asks her to undergo an "agni pariksha" (test of fire) to prove her purity, as he wanted to get rid of the rumours surrounding Sita's purity. When Sita plunges into the sacrificial fire, Agni the lord of fire raises Sita, unharmed, to the throne, attesting to her purity. The episode of agni pariksha varies in the versions of Ramayana by Valmiki and Tulsidas. The above version is from Valmiki Ramayana. In Tulsidas's Ramacharitamanas Sita was under the protection of Agni so it was necessary to bring her out before reuniting with Rama. At the expiration of his term of exile, Rama returns to Ayodhya with Sita and Lakshmana, where the coronation is performed. This is the beginning of Ram Rajya, which implies an ideal state with good morals. The Uttara Kanda is regarded to be a later addition to the original story by Valmiki. Rama yields to public opinion and orders a court of inquiry, which finds Sita guilty. Rama reluctantly banishes Sita to the forest, where sage Valmiki provides shelter in his ashrama (hermitage). Here she gives birth to twin boys, Lava and Kusha, who became pupils of Valmiki and are brought up in ignorance of their identity. Valmiki composes the Ramayana and teaches Lava and Kusha to sing it. Later, Rama holds a ceremony during Ashwamedha yagna, which the sage Valmiki, with Lava and Kusha, attends. Lava and Kusha sing the Ramayana in the presence of Rama and his vast audience. When Lava and Kusha recite about Sita's exile, Rama becomes grievous, and Valmiki produces Sita. Sita calls upon the Earth, her mother, to receive her and as the ground opens, she vanishes into it. Rama then learns that Lava and Kusha are his children. Later a messenger from the Gods appears and informs Rama that the mission of his incarnation was over. Rama returns to his celestial abode.

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The Forge of God

Greg Bear

1987

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction, Novel

The novel features scenes and events including the discovery of a near-dead alien in the desert, who clearly says in English, "I'm sorry, but there is bad news," and this alien's subsequent interrogation and autopsy; the discovery of an artificial geological formation and its subsequent nuclear destruction by a desperate military; and the Earth's eventual destruction by the mutual annihilation of a piece of neutronium and a piece of antineutronium dropped into Earth's core. There is another alien faction at work, however, represented on Earth by small spider-like robots that recruit human agents through some form of mind control. They frantically collect all the human data, biological records, tissue samples, seeds, and DNA from the biosphere that they can, and evacuate a handful of people from Earth. In space, this faction's machines combat and eventually destroy the attackers, though not before Earth's fate is sealed. The evacuees eventually settle a newly terraformed Mars while some form the crew of a Ship of the Law to hunt down the home world of the killers, a quest described in the sequel, Anvil of Stars. One of the point of view characters is Arthur Gordon, a scientist who, with his wife Francine and son Martin is among those rescued from the destruction of Earth. Some other characters are close to an American president who fails to take action against the threat. The two books show at least one solution to the Fermi paradox, with electromagnetically noisy civilisations being snuffed out by the arrival of self-replicating machines designed to destroy any potential threat to their (possibly long-dead) creators. (A similar theme is explored in Fred Saberhagen's Berserker novels.)

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Blood Music

Greg Bear

1985

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Fiction

In the novel, renegade biotechnologist Vergil Ulam creates simple biological computers based on his own lymphocytes. Faced with orders from his nervous employer to destroy his work, he injects them into his own body, intending to smuggle the 'noocytes' (as he calls them) out of the company and work on them elsewhere. Inside Ulam's body, the noocytes multiply and evolve rapidly, altering their own genetic material and quickly becoming self-aware. The nanoscale civilization they construct soon begins to transform Ulam, then others. The people who are infected start to find that genetic faults such as myopia and high blood pressure are fixed. The bumps along the spine as well as the nipples fade. Finally, white stripes and ridges start growing over their bodies. Ulam reports that the cells seem to sing. Through infection, conversion and assimilation of humans and other organisms the cells eventually aggregate most of the biosphere of North America into a region seven thousand kilometres wide. This civilization, which incorporates both the evolved noocytes and recently-assimilated conventional humans, is eventually forced to abandon the normal plane of existence in favor of one in which thought does not require a physical substrate. The reason for the noocytes' inability to remain in this reality is somewhat related to the strong anthropic principle. The book's structure is titled "inter-phase", "prophase", "metaphase", "anaphase", "telophase" and "interphase." This mirrors the major phases of cell cycle: interphase and mitosis.

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The World According to Garp

John Irving

1978

Literary fiction

The story deals with the life of T. S. Garp. His mother, Jenny Fields, is a strong-willed nurse who wants a child but not a husband. She encounters a dying ball turret gunner known only as Technical Sergeant Garp who was severely brain damaged in combat. Jenny nurses Garp, observing his infantile state and almost perpetual autonomic sexual arousal. As a matter of practicality and kindness in making his passing as comfortable as possible and reducing his agitation, she manually gratifies him several times. Unconstrained by convention and driven by practicality and her desire for a child, Jenny uses Garp's sexual response to impregnate herself, and names the resultant son after him "T. S." (standing only for "Technical Sergeant"). Jenny raises young Garp alone, taking a position at the all-boys school Steering School in New England. Garp grows up, becoming interested in sex, wrestling, and writing fiction—three topics in which his mother has little interest. After his graduation in 1961, his mother takes him to Vienna where he writes his first novella. His mother, too, starts writing, - her autobiography. After they return to Steering Garp marries Helen, the wrestling coach's daughter and founds his family, he a struggling writer, she a teacher of English. The publication of A Sexual Suspect makes his mother famous as she becomes a feminist icon as feminists view her book as a manifesto of a woman who does not care to bind herself to a man, and who chooses to raise a child on her own. She nurtures and supports women traumatized by men among them the Ellen Jamesians, a group of women who cut off their tongues in support of and named after an eleven-year-old girl whose tongue was cut off by her rapists to silence her. Garp becomes a devoted parent, wrestling with anxiety for the safety of his children and a desire to keep them safe from the dangers of the world. He and his family inevitably experience dark and violent events through which the characters change and grow. Garp learns (often painfully) from the women in his life (including transsexual ex-football player Roberta Muldoon) struggling to become more tolerant in the face of intolerance. The story is decidedly rich with (in the words of the fictional Garp's teacher) "lunacy and sorrow," and the sometimes ridiculous chains of events the characters experience still resonate with painful truth. The novel contains several framed narratives: Garp's first novella, The Pension Grillparzer; Vigilance, a short story; and the first chapter of his novel, The World According to Bensenhaver. As well, the book contains some motifs that appear in almost all John Irving novels: bears, wrestling, Vienna, New England, people who are uninterested in having sex, and a complex Dickensian plot that spans the protagonist's whole life. Adultery (another common Irving motif) also plays a large part, culminating in one of the novel's most harrowing and memorable scenes. There is also a tincture of another familiar Irving trope, castration anxiety, most obvious in the lamentable fate of Michael Milton.

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Mutiny on the Bounty

James Norman Hall

1932

History, Novel

The novel tells the story through a fictional first-person narrator by the name of Roger Byam, based on actual crew member Peter Heywood. Byam, although not one of the mutineers, remains with the Bounty after the mutiny. He subsequently returns to Tahiti, and is eventually arrested and taken back to England to face a court-martial. He and several other members of the crew are eventually acquitted.

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The Mothman Prophecies

John A. Keel

1975

The book combines Keel's account of his investigation into alleged sightings of a large, winged creature called Mothman in the vicinity of Point Pleasant, West Virginia, during 1966 and 1967 with his own theories about UFOs and various supernatural phenomena, ultimately connecting them to the December 15, 1967, collapse of the Silver Bridge across the Ohio River.

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The Memory of Earth

Orson Scott Card

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction

Humanity has lived for 40 million years on a planet called Harmony, after leaving an Earth that has been destroyed by human conflict. In order not to repeat the mistakes that led to the destruction of civilization on Earth, a computer, known as the Oversoul, was left as guardian of this planet. Its main mission was to prevent humans from developing technologies that could make wars a global affair. For that, humans were genetically modified so they could communicate with the Oversoul. The Oversoul uses this connection to make humans quite easily distracted when thinking about forbidden technologies, leading them to forget that train of thought. However, after this long time the Oversoul is beginning to fail, and it chooses a group of humans to return to Earth in search of the Keeper of Earth, in the hopes it will be able to find a way to maintain power over the people on Harmony. To this end the Oversoul recruits Volemak, father of the protagonist of the story, Nafai. Nafai and Issib, his brother, begin to try and defy the Oversoul's capability to override thought. Through this they learn of the danger that it is in. Nafai begins hearing the Oversoul's voice in his mind. The first book focuses on the family's eventual betrayal, the taking of the Index, and the downfall of the man Gaballufix, who had been planning to ally the city of Basilica, the home of the main characters and the setting of the first half of the book, with a malignant nation. Nafai, Elemak and Mebbekew, his older half brothers, Issib and his father Volemak are eventually forced to leave the city. They come back to retrieve the Index of the Oversoul, which allows them to communicate with it directly. Because of Nafai's careless blunders and miraculous successes, Elemak, Nafai's oldest brother, begins to hate him, a theme that will play out throughout the rest of the saga.

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Sixth Column

Robert A. Heinlein

1949

Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction

A top secret research facility hidden in the Colorado mountains is the last remaining outpost of the United States Army after its defeat by the PanAsians. The conquerors had absorbed the Soviets after being attacked by them and had then gone on to absorb India as well. The invaders are depicted as ruthless and cruel—for example, they crush an abortive rebellion by killing 150,000 American civilians as punishment. The laboratory is in turmoil as the novel begins. All but six of the personnel have died suddenly, due to unknown forces released by an experiment operating within the newly-discovered magneto-gravitic or electro-gravitic spectra. The surviving scientists soon learn that they can selectively kill people by releasing the internal pressure of their cell membranes, among other things. Using this discovery they construct a race-selective weapon which will kill only Asians. They devise other uses for the awesome forces they have discovered, but how can a handful of men overthrow an occupation force that controls all communications and when it is a crime to print a word in English? Noting that the invaders have allowed the free practice of religion (the better to pacify their slaves), the Americans set up a church of their own and begin acting as "Priests of Mota" (Mota is atom spelled backwards) in order to build a resistance movement—which Major Ardmore, the protagonist of the book, refers to as the Sixth Column (as opposed to a traitorous fifth column).

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The Puppet Masters

Robert A. Heinlein

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction

"Sam" is an agent in "Section", a United States government intelligence organization. It is so secret it reports only to the President, and is entirely unknown to anyone else. Sam is superbly trained, equipped with a built-in communicator he calls a "skull phone" as well as a number of ways to commit suicide if the need arises. Called in by "the Old Man", his boss and the head of the organization, they go to investigate the report of a flying saucer landing in Grinnell, Iowa after other agents sent earlier fail to report back. With them is another agent named "Mary", a stunningly beautiful redhead. Sam is informed that her life is only slightly less precious than the Old Man's, and that he (Sam) is the most expendable. In Iowa, they discover that the people are being brought under the mental control of repulsive, slug-like creatures that attach to their backs, just below the neck. Detaching one slug from its host, they seal it in a film canister and bring it back to headquarters in Washington, D.C. By the time they get there though, the remains of the slug are a stinking mess, and they are unable to convince the President that there is an invasion. Sam eventually leads a small team back to Iowa. They inadvertently succeed in capturing a live slug, as one agent becomes "hagridden" without them realizing it. However, Mary spots it when he does not react to her allure like a normal male. The agent is unmasked, subdued and confined. The slug escapes by transferring to another person, and eventually to Sam himself. He immediately becomes enslaved and escapes the agency. Meanwhile, the invasion continues to expand. Slugs are shipped through the mail to recruit more humans. Gradually they infect more and more important people, especially the members of exclusive clubs frequented by politicians. Before the Old Man tracks Sam down and captures him, they have infected the Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, whose department controls the United States Secret Service (responsible for the President's personal security); the slugs are a step away from infecting the President himself. By the time Sam recovers in hospital, anyone fully dressed is suspect. The Old Man wants someone to "wear" the slug so it can be interrogated. Sam cannot bear the idea, but when Mary volunteers, he gives in and does it himself. He is completely aware of himself when possessed, but totally committed to the slugs' cause. The slug dies under torture from electric shocks, but in the process Sam learns that they come from Titan, the largest moon of Saturn. Thoroughly disgusted by the treatment he has received, Sam is ready to quit. He is at first furious with Mary for entrapping him, and then with the Old Man, when he learns that his boss tricked Mary into it. At this point, it is revealed that the Old Man is Sam's father. Eventually the politicians realize the danger. From Minnesota to Louisiana, the center of the country has been taken over. On a solo mission to Kansas City, Sam is shocked to discover that the number of slugs is much greater than thought. Instead of taking over key people, they have absorbed the entire human population of the occupied territory. However, he and the Old Man are unable to convince the President to stop a meticulously planned military counter-invasion of the heartland; the entire force is taken over by the enemy. They find that slugs are capable of fissioning in two fairly quickly. The number of infected humans must now be so large that any military action would kill tens of millions. The problem having reached a scale beyond their ability to influence it, Sam and Mary are given leave. By this time, they have fallen in love and get married before going to Sam's bolt-hole in the Adirondack Mountains. Their idyll is interrupted when a slug takes over first his beloved pet cat, then Mary. Sam manages to push Mary onto a hot fire to kill the slug, leaving them both badly burned, but alive and free. Returning to HQ for treatment, they find that a new law requires everyone to be functionally naked to show that a slug is not in control. The law is rigorously enforced not as much by police as by vigilantes, who often shoot first and confirm afterward. Sam begins to believe that the slugs have him marked for repossession. They can communicate by "direct conference", where their hosts sit back to back and the slugs partially merge. A network of such interactions could spread his description rapidly among the invaders, who knew how valuable he is. Some scientists even speculate that the slugs are really just one organism in many bodies. For their part, the slugs drop all pretenses and openly wage war on the states to their east and west. Where human hosts cannot go, they use animals such as dogs, horses and even elephants. Sam and Mary go with the Old Man to investigate a saucer which crash-landed in Mississippi. Inside they encounter the slugs' hosts from Titan, small elf-like creatures, who died when Earth's air entered the ship. There are also tanks containing humans in suspended animation. Mary has a mental breakdown when she enters the ship. It triggers long-suppressed memories from when she was a child in a failed Venus colony which was taken over by slugs. She herself spent years in one of the tanks. Mary caught a disease which killed her slug. They discover that the disease is "Nine-day Fever", which is almost 100% fatal if untreated. However, they find that it kills slugs faster than humans. It might just be possible to spread the fever among the slugs using "direct conference", and then treat as many humans as possible before they die. The Old Man springs a surprise on Sam. He had expected Sam to replace him one day, and Sam would show when he was ready by opposing the Old Man's authority. From now on, Sam is in charge, official titles notwithstanding. Time is short – diseases erupt in the infected areas, as the slugs neglect hygiene and often drive their hosts until they starve. Outbreaks of plague in the Communist countries suggest that they were taken over even before the center of the United States. The counter-attack begins. Releasing animals with infected slugs into enemy territory, they wait for the epidemic to break out. Days pass, and then calls start coming in from desperate people whose slugs have died. Hundreds of thousands of agents, Sam and the Old Man among them, parachute in to treat victims with drug-dispensing guns. Just when the battle seems won, the Old Man is possessed by one of the few healthy slugs and kidnaps Sam, intending to take them both into hiding to regroup for a new invasion. Sam watches in horror as the Old Man's slug begins dividing so he too can be possessed. Despite being tied up, Sam is able to crash their flyer into the sea, killing the slug. In the final section, Sam writes in a journal before embarking with Mary on a spaceship which will take the battle to Titan. The slugs will remain a problem for years to come, having infected too many parts of the Earth to root out easily, but they will never be able to take over.

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Henry V

William Shakespeare

Elizabethan stages did not use scenery. Acknowledging the difficulty of conveying great battles and shifts of location on a bare stage, the Chorus (a single actor) calls for a "Muse of fire" so that the actor playing King Henry can "[ā]ssume the port [bearing] of Mars". He asks, "Can this cockpit [i.e. the theatre] hold / The vasty fields of France?" and encourages the audience to use their "imaginary forces" (imaginations) to overcome the stage's limitations: "Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts." The early scenes deal with the embarkation of Henry's fleet for France, and include a real-life incident in which the Earl of Cambridge and two others plotted to assassinate Henry at Southampton. (Henry's clever uncovering of the plot and his ruthless treatment of the plotters show that he has changed from the earlier plays in which he appeared.) When the Chorus reappears, he describes the country's dedication to the war effort – "They sell the pasture now to buy the horse." The chorus tells the audience "We'll not offend one stomach with our play", a humorous reference to the fact that the scene of the play crosses the English Channel. The Chorus appears again, seeking support for the English navy: "Grapple your minds to sternage of this navy" he says, and notes that "the ambassador from the French comes back / Tells Harry that the king doth offer him / Katherine his daughter." At the siege of Harfleur, Henry utters one of Shakespeare's best-known speeches, beginning "Once more unto the breach, dear friends..." Before the Battle of Agincourt, victory looks uncertain, and the young king's heroic character emerges in his decision to wander around the English camp at night, in disguise, so as to comfort his soldiers and determine what they really think of him. He agonizes about the moral burden of being king, noting that a king is only a man. Before the battle, Henry rallies his troops with the famous St. Crispin's Day Speech, referring to "we few, we happy few, we band of brothers". Following the victory at Agincourt, Henry attempts to woo the French princess, Catherine of Valois. This is difficult because neither speaks the other's language well, but the humour of their mistakes actually helps achieve his aim. The action ends with the French king adopting Henry as his heir to the French throne and the prayer of the French queen "that English may as French, French Englishmen, receive each other, God speak this Amen." But before the curtain descends, the Chorus re-appears one more time and ruefully notes, of Henry's own heir's "state, so many had the managing, that they lost France, and made his England bleed" – a reminder of the tumultuous reign of Henry VI of England, which Shakespeare had previously brought to the stage in a trilogy of plays: Henry VI, Part 1, Henry VI, Part 2 and Henry VI, Part 3. As with all of Shakespeare's serious plays, there are also a number of minor comic characters whose activities contrast with and sometimes comment on the main plot. In this case, they are mostly common soldiers in Henry's army, and they include Pistol, Nym, and Bardolph from the Henry IV plays. The army also includes a Scot, an Irishman, an Englishman and Fluellen, a comically stereotyped Welsh soldier, whose name is an attempt at a phonetic rendition of "Llywelyn". The play also deals briefly with the death of Falstaff, Henry's estranged friend from the Henry IV plays, whom Henry remembers fondly.

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The Wind in the Willows

Kenneth Grahame

1908

Children's literature, Fiction, Novel

At the start of the book, it is spring time: the weather is fine, and good-natured Mole loses patience with spring cleaning. He flees his underground home, heading up to take in the air. He ends up at the river, which he has never seen before. Here he meets Ratty (a water rat), who at this time of year spends all his days in, on and close by the river. Rat takes Mole for a ride in his rowing boat. They get along well and spend many more days boating, with Rat teaching Mole the ways of the river. One summer day shortly thereafter, Rat and Mole find themselves near the grand Toad Hall and pay a visit to Toad. Toad is rich (having inherited wealth from his father): jovial, friendly and kind-hearted but aimless and conceited, he regularly becomes obsessed with current fads, only to abandon them as quickly as he took them up. Having only recently given up boating, Toad's current craze is his horse-drawn caravan. In fact, he is about to go on a trip, and persuades the reluctant Rat and willing Mole to join him. The following day (after Toad has already tired of the realities of camp life and sleeps-in to avoid chores), a passing motor car scares the horse, causing the caravan to overturn into a ditch. Rat does a war dance and threatens to have the law on the motor car drivers, but this marks the immediate end of Toad's craze for caravan travel, to be replaced with an obsession for motor cars. When the three animals get to the nearest town, they have Toad go to the police station to make a complaint against the vandals and their motor car and thence to a blacksmith to retrieve and mend the caravan. Toad - in thrall to the experience of his encounter - refuses. Rat and Mole find an inn from where they organise the necessary steps and, exhausted, return home by train. Meanwhile, Toad makes no effort to help, instead deciding to order himself a motor car. Mole wants to meet the respected but elusive Badger, who lives deep in the Wild Wood, but Rat - knowing that Badger does not appreciate visits - refuses to take him, telling Mole to be patient and wait and Badger will pay them a visit himself. Nevertheless, on a snowy winter's day, whilst the seasonally somnolent Ratty dozes unaware, Mole impulsively goes to the Wild Wood to explore, hoping to meet Badger. He gets lost in the woods, sees many "evil faces" among the wood's less-welcoming denizens, succumbs to fright and panic and hides, trying to stay warm, amongst the sheltering roots of a tree. Rat, upon awakening and finding Mole gone, guesses his mission from the direction of Mole's tracks and, equipping himself with a pistol and a stout stick, goes in search, finding him as snow begins to fall in earnest. Attempting to find their way home, Rat and Mole quite literally stumble across Badger's home — Mole barks his shin upon the boot scraper on Badger's doorstep. Rat finds it and a doormat, knowing they are an obvious sign of hope, but Mole thinks Rat has gone crazy, only to believe him when the digging reveals a door. Badger - en-route to bed in his dressing-gown and slippers - nonetheless warmly welcomes Rat and Mole to his large and cosy underground home and hastens to give them hot food and dry clothes. Badger learns from his visitors that Toad has crashed six cars, has been hospitalised three times, and has spent a fortune on fines. Though nothing can be done at the moment (it being winter), they resolve that once spring arrives they will make a plan to protect Toad from himself; they are, after all, his friends and are worried for his well-being. With the arrival of spring, Badger visits Mole and Rat to do something about Toad's self-destructive obsession. The three of them go to visit Toad, and Badger tries talking him out of his behaviour, to no avail. They decide to put Toad under house arrest, with themselves as the guards, until Toad changes his mind. Feigning illness, Toad bamboozles the Water Rat (who is on guard duty at the time) and escapes. He steals a car, drives it recklessly and is caught by the police. He is sent to prison on a twenty-year sentence. Badger and Mole are cross with Rat for his gullibility but draw comfort from the fact that they need no longer waste their summer guarding Toad. However, Badger and Mole continue to live in Toad Hall in the hope that Toad may return. Meanwhile in prison, Toad gains the sympathy of the Jailer's Daughter who helps him to escape disguised as a washerwoman. Though free again, Toad is without money or possessions other than the clothes upon his back, and is being pursued by the police. Still disguised as a washerwoman, and after hitchhiking a lift on a train, Toad comes across a horse-drawn barge. The Barge's Owner offers him a lift in exchange for Toad's services as a "washer woman". After botching the wash, Toad gets into a fight with the barge-woman, who deliberately tosses him in the canal. After making off with the barge horse, which he then sells to a gypsy, Toad flags down a passing car, which happens to be the very one which he stole earlier. The car owners, not recognizing Toad disguised as a washer woman, permit him to drive their car. Once behind the wheel, he is repossessed by his former passion and drives furiously, declaring his true identity to the outraged passengers who try to seize him. This leads to an accident, after which Toad flees once more. Pursued by police he runs accidentally into a river, which carries him by sheer chance to the house of the Water Rat. Toad now hears from Rat that Toad Hall has been taken over by weasels, stoats and ferrets from the Wild Wood, who have driven out its former custodians, Mole and Badger. Although upset at the loss of his house, Toad realises what good friends he has and how badly he has behaved. Badger then arrives and announces that he knows of a secret tunnel into Toad Hall through which the enemies may be attacked. Armed to the teeth, Rat, Mole and Toad enter via the tunnel and pounce upon the unsuspecting weasels who are holding a party in honour of their leader. Having driven away the intruders, Toad holds a banquet to mark his return, during which (for a change) he behaves both quietly and humbly. He makes up for his earlier wrongdoings by seeking out and compensating those he has wronged, and the four friends live out their lives happily ever after. In addition to the main narrative, the book contains several independent short-stories featuring Rat and Mole. These appear for the most part between the chapters chronicling Toad's adventures, and are often omitted from abridgements and dramatizations. The chapter Dulce Domum describes Mole's return to his home, accompanied by Rat, in which despite finding it in a terrible mess after his abortive spring clean he rediscovers, with Rat's help, a familiar comfort. The Piper at the Gates of Dawn tells how Mole and Rat go in search of Otter's missing son Portly, whom they find in the care of the god Pan. (Pan removes their memories of this meeting "lest the awful remembrance should remain and grow, and overshadow mirth and pleasure".) Finally in Wayfarers All Ratty shows a restless side to his character when he is sorely tempted to join a Sea Rat on his travelling adventures.

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The Hunting of the Snark

Lewis Carroll

1876

Speculative fiction

After crossing the sea guided by the Bellman's map of the Ocean—a blank sheet of paper—the hunting party arrive in a strange land. The Baker recalls that his uncle once warned him that, though catching Snarks is all well and good, you must be careful; for, if your Snark is a Boojum, then you will softly and suddenly vanish away, and never be met with again. With this in mind, they split up to hunt. Along the way, the Butcher and Beaver -previously mutually wary for the Butcher's specialty in preparing beavers- become fast friends, the Barrister falls asleep and dreams of a court trial defended by the Snark, and the Banker loses his sanity after being attacked by a frumious Bandersnatch. At the end, the Baker calls out that he has found a Snark; but when the others arrive he has mysteriously disappeared, 'For the Snark was a Boojum, you see'.

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Jonathan Livingston Seagull

Richard Bach

1970

Self-help, Spirituality, Speculative fiction, Fiction, Novella

The book tells the story of Jonathan Livingston Seagull, a seagull who is bored with the daily squabbles over food. Seized by a passion for flight, he pushes himself, learning everything he can about flying, until finally his unwillingness to conform results in his expulsion from his flock. An outcast, he continues to learn, becoming increasingly pleased with his abilities as he leads an idyllic life. One day, Jonathan is met by two gulls who take him to a "higher plane of existence" in that there is no heaven but a better world found through perfection of knowledge, where he meets other gulls who love to fly. He discovers that his sheer tenacity and desire to learn make him "pretty well a one-in-a-million bird." In this new place, Jonathan befriends the wisest gull, Chiang, who takes him beyond his previous learning, teaching him how to move instantaneously to anywhere else in the Universe. The secret, Chiang says, is to "begin by knowing that you have already arrived." Not satisfied with his new life, Jonathan returns to Earth to find others like him, to bring them his learning and to spread his love for flight. His mission is successful, gathering around him others who have been outlawed for not conforming. Ultimately, the very first of his students, Fletcher Lynd Seagull, becomes a teacher in his own right and Jonathan leaves to teach other flocks. Part One of the book finds young Jonathan Livingston frustrated with the meaningless materialism and conformity and limitation of the seagull life. He is seized with a passion for flight of all kinds, and his soul soars as he experiments with exhilarating challenges of daring and triumphant aerial feats. Eventually, his lack of conformity to the limited seagull life leads him into conflict with his flock, and they turn their backs on him, casting him out of their society and exiling him. Not deterred by this, Jonathan continues his efforts to reach higher and higher flight goals, finding he is often successful but eventually he can fly no higher. He is then met by two radiant, loving seagulls who explain to him that he has learned much, and that they are there now to teach him more. Jonathan transcends into a society where all the gulls enjoy flying. He is only capable of this after practising hard alone for a long time (described in the first part). In this other society, real respect emerges as a contrast of the coercive force that was keeping the former "Breakfast Flock" together. The learning process, linking the highly experienced teacher and the diligent student, is raised into almost sacred levels, suggesting that this may be the true relation between human and God. Because of this, each has been described as believing that human and God, regardless of the all immense difference, are sharing something of great importance that can bind them together: "You've got to understand that a seagull is an unlimited idea of freedom, an image of the Great Gull." He realizes that you have to be true to yourself: "You have the freedom to be yourself, your true self, here and now, and nothing can stand in your way." In the third part of the book are the last words of Jonathan's teacher: "Keep working on love." Through his teachings, Jonathan understands that the spirit cannot be really free without the ability to forgive, and that the way to progress leads—for him, at least—through becoming a teacher, not just through working hard as a student. Jonathan returns to the Breakfast Flock to share his newly discovered ideals and the recent tremendous experience, ready for the difficult fight against the current rules of that society. The ability to forgive seems to be a mandatory "passing condition." "Do you want to fly so much that you will forgive the Flock, and learn, and go back to them one day and work to help them know?" Jonathan asks his first student, Fletcher Lynd Seagull, before getting into any further talks. The idea that the stronger can reach more by leaving the weaker friends behind seems totally rejected. Hence, love, deserved respect, and forgiveness all seem to be equally important to the freedom from the pressure to obey the rules just because they are commonly accepted.

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I Am Legend

Richard Matheson

1954

Vampire fiction, Science Fiction, Horror, Speculative fiction, Zombies in popular culture, Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, Fiction, Catastrophic literature, Dystopia

The main character is Robert Neville, apparently the sole survivor of a pandemic whose symptoms resemble vampirism. It is implied that the pandemic was caused by a war, and that it was spread by dust storms in the cities and an explosion in the mosquito population. The narrative details Neville's daily life in Los Angeles as he attempts to comprehend, research, and possibly cure the disease, to which he is immune. Neville's past is revealed through flashbacks. The vampires only come out at night and become comatose by day, though they also sometimes come out earlier during cloudy weather. Neville survives by barricading himself by sunset inside his house, further protected by garlic, mirrors, and crosses. Swarms of vampires would regularly surround his house, trying to find ways to get inside. During the day, he scavenges for supplies and methodically searches out the inactive vampires, driving stakes into their hearts to kill them. After bouts of depression and alcoholism, Neville decides to find out the scientific cause of the pandemic. He obtains books and other research materials from a library, and through painstaking research discovers the root of the vampiric disease in a strain of bacteria capable of infecting both deceased and living hosts. He also discovers that much of the efficacy of the garlic, mirrors, and crosses were actually "hysterical blindess", the result of previous psychological conditioning of the infected (particularly the religious) who believed that they were effective against vampires. Driven to insanity by the disease, the vampires now reacted as they believed they should react when confronted with these items. Even then, it was constrained to the beliefs of the particular person, such that a vampire who was Christian would fear the cross, but a vampire who was Jewish would not. Neville also discovers more efficient means of killing the infected, other than just driving a stake into their hearts. This included exposing them to direct sunlight (which killed the bacteria) or inflicting deep wounds on their bodies so that the bacteria switch from being anaerobic symbionts to aerobic parasites, rapidly consuming their hosts when exposed to air. He is now killing such large numbers of vampires in his daily forays that his nightly visitors have diminished significantly. After three years, Neville sees an apparently uninfected woman, Ruth, abroad in the daylight, and captures her. After some convincing, Ruth tells him her story of how she and her husband survived the pandemic (though her husband was killed two weeks earlier). Neville is puzzled by the fact that she is upset when he speaks of killing vampires, on grounds that if her story of survival was true, she would have become hardened to the act. One night Neville is startled awake and finds Ruth about to leave. Suspicious, he questions her motives, but relates the trauma of his past, whereupon they comfort each other. Ruth reluctantly allows him a blood sample but knocks him senseless when he realizes she is infected. When he wakes, Neville discovers a note from Ruth confessing that she is actually infected and that Neville was responsible for her husband's death. Ruth admits that she was sent to spy on him. The infected have slowly overcome their disease until they can spend short periods of time in sunlight and are attempting to rebuild society; but they fear and hate Neville who has destroyed some of their people along with the true vampires (dead bodies animated by the germ) during his daytime excursions against the latter. Ruth warns Neville that her people will attempt to capture him, and that he should leave his house and escape; but Neville disregards Ruth's warning and is captured. Neville wakes in a prison where he is visited by Ruth, who informs him that she is a ranking member of the new society but, unlike the others, does not resent him. She acknowledges the need for Neville's execution, and gives him pills, claiming they will "make it easier". Badly injured, Neville accepts his fate and asks Ruth not to let this society become heartless. Ruth kisses him and leaves. Neville goes to his prison window and sees all the infected waiting for his execution. Judging by their reactions to the sight of him, he now recognizes their point of view. Having hitherto seen the destruction of the infected survivors as a moral imperative to be pursued for his own and mankind's survival, he failed to realize that the infected have come to view him in fear and awe. To them, he was an invisible killer who moved by day, killing their loved ones as they hibernated. He realizes that even as vampires were legend in pre-infection times, he, a remnant of old humanity, is now a legend to the new race born of the infection. He therefore remarks to himself as he dies: "[I am] a new superstition entering the unassailable fortress of forever. I am legend".

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The Stranger

Albert Camus

Crime Fiction, Existentialism, Fiction, Absurdist fiction, Suspense

Part One begins with Meursault finding out of his mother's death. At her funeral, he expresses none of the expected emotions of grief. When asked if he wishes to view the body, he says no, and, instead, smokes and drinks coffee with milk in front of the coffin. Rather than expressing his feelings, he only comments to the reader about the others at the funeral. He later encounters Marie, a former employee of his firm, and the two become re-acquainted and begin to have a sexual relationship, regardless of the fact that Meursault's mother died just a day before. In the next few days, he helps his friend and neighbour, Raymond Sintès, take revenge on a Moorish girlfriend suspected of infidelity. For Raymond, Meursault agrees to write a letter to his girlfriend, with the sole purpose of inviting her over so that Raymond can have sex with her but kick her out at the last minute as emotional revenge. Meursault sees no reason not to help him, and it pleases Raymond. He does not express concern that Raymond's girlfriend is going to be emotionally hurt, as he believes Raymond's story that she has been unfaithful, and he himself is both somewhat drunk and characteristically unfazed by any feelings of empathy. In general he considers other people either interesting or annoying. The letter works: the girlfriend returns, but the situation escalates when she slaps Raymond after he tries to kick her out, and Raymond beats her. Raymond is taken to court where Meursault testifies that she had been unfaithful, and Raymond is let off with a warning. After this, the girlfriend's brother and several Arab friends begin tailing Raymond. Raymond invites Meursault and Marie to a friend's beach house for the weekend, and when there, they encounter the spurned girlfriend's brother and an Arab friend; these two confront Raymond and wound him with a knife during a fist fight. Later, walking back along the beach alone and now armed with a pistol he took from Raymond so that Raymond would not do anything rash, Meursault encounters the Arab. Meursault is now disoriented on the edge of heatstroke, and when the Arab flashes his knife at him, Meursault shoots. Despite killing the Arab man with the first gunshot, he shoots the corpse four more times after a brief pause. He does not divulge to the reader any specific reason for his crime or emotions he experiences at the time, if any, aside from the fact that he was bothered by the heat and bright sunlight. Part Two begins with Meursault's incarceration, explaining his arrest, time in prison, and upcoming trial. His general detachment makes living in prison very tolerable, especially after he gets used to the idea of not being able to go places whenever he wants to and no longer being able to satisfy his sexual desires with Marie. He passes the time sleeping, or mentally listing the objects he owned back in his apartment building. At the trial, Meursault's quietness and passivity is seen as demonstrative of his seeming lack of remorse or guilt by the prosecuting attorney, and so the attorney concentrates more upon Meursault's inability or unwillingness to cry at his mother's funeral than on the actual murder. The attorney pushes Meursault to tell the truth but never comes through and later, on his own, Meursault explains to the reader that he simply was never really able to feel any remorse or personal emotions for any of his actions in life. The dramatic prosecutor theatrically denounces Meursault to the point that he claims Meursault must be a soulless monster, incapable of remorse and that he thus deserves to die for his crime. Although Meursault's attorney defends him and later tells Meursault that he expects the sentence to be light, Meursault is alarmed when the judge informs him of the final decision: that he will be decapitated publicly. In prison, while awaiting the execution of his death sentence by the guillotine, Meursault meets with a chaplain, but rejects his proffered opportunity of turning to God, explaining that God is a waste of his time. Although the chaplain persists in attempting to lead Meursault from his atheism, Meursault finally accosts him in a rage, with a climactic outburst on his frustrations and the absurdity of the human condition; his personal anguish at the meaninglessness of his existence without respite. At the beginning of his outrage he mentions other people in anger, that they have no right to judge him, for his actions or for who he is, no one has the right to judge someone else. Meursault ultimately grasps the universe's indifference towards humankind (coming to terms with his execution): "As if that blind rage had washed me clean, rid me of hope; for the first time, in that night alive with signs and stars, I opened myself to the benign indifference of the world. Finding it so much like myself—so like a brother, really—I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again. For everything to be consummated, for me to feel less alone, I had only to wish that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they greet me with howls of execration."

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The Man in the High Castle

Philip K. Dick

1962-01-01

Alternate history, Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Dystopia

Giuseppe Zangara's assassination of U.S. President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, in 1933, led to the weak governments of John Nance Garner (formerly FDR's VP-elect), and later of the Republican John W. Bricker in 1940. Both politicians failed to surmount the Great Depression and maintained the country's isolationist policy against participating in the Second World War; thus, the U.S. had insufficient military capabilities to assist the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany, or to defend itself against Japan in the Pacific. In 1941, the Nazis conquered the USSR and then exterminated most of its Slavic peoples; the few whom they allowed to live were confined to reservations. In the Pacific, the Japanese destroyed the entire U.S. Navy fleet in a decisive, definitive attack on Pearl Harbor; thereafter, the superior Japanese military conquered Hawaii, Australia, New Zealand and Oceania during the early forties. Afterward, the Axis Powers, each attacking from opposite fronts, conquered the coastal United States, and, by 1947, the United States and other remaining Allied forces surrendered to the Axis. Japan established the puppet Pacific States of America out of Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon, parts of Nevada and Washington as part of the Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere. The remaining Mountain, Great Plains and Southwestern states became the Rocky Mountain States, a buffer between the PSA and the remaining USA, now a Nazi puppet state in the style of Vichy France. Having defeated the Allies of World War II, the Third Reich and Imperial Japan became the resultant superpowers of their world and consequently embarked upon a Cold War. One of the core narrative elements (Operation Dandelion) is centred on a pre-emptive Nazi nuclear strike on the Japanese Home Islands. The Nazis "have the hydrogen bomb" and the ability to wipe out the Home Islands. Their nuclear energy capabilities also fuel extremely fast air travel and the colonization of the moon, Venus, and Mars. After Adolf Hitler's syphilitic incapacitation, Martin Bormann, as Nazi Party Chancellor, assumes power as Führer of Germany. Bormann proceeds to create a colonial empire to increase Germany's Lebensraum by using technology to drain the Mediterranean Sea and convert it into farmland (see Atlantropa), while sending spaceships to colonize Mars and other parts of the Solar System in the name of the Reich. As the novel begins, Führer Bormann dies, initiating an internal power struggle between Joseph Goebbels, Reinhard Heydrich, Hermann Göring, and other top Nazis to succeed him as Reichskanzler. The Man in the High Castle contains a loose collection of characters. Some of them know each other, while others are connected in more indirect ways as they all cope with living under totalitarianism. Three characters guide their lives based on the I Ching: *Nobusuke Tagomi is a trade missioner in Japanese San Francisco. To start with, the reader is let in to his world only slightly; this character doesn't intend to be a big part of the story but events unfold in a way that drags him into both central and peripheral conflicts with agendas beyond his control. *Frank Frink works for the Wyndham–Matson Corporation, which specializes in reproductions of pre-war Americana artifacts; he is fired for showing his temper. He is a secret Jew (né Fink) who hides to avoid extermination in a Nazi camp. He is a veteran of the Pacific War. *Juliana Frink, a judo instructor, is Frank's ex-wife. After an initially short introduction her character evolves throughout the rest of the book to her becoming a very central plot piece. She is also used throughout the book by a hired assassin. Others believe different things: *Robert Childan owns American Artistic Handcrafts, an Americana antiques business supplied by Wyndham–Matson Inc. He believes the items genuine; Tagomi is one of his best customers, who buys "gifts" for himself and for visiting businessmen. Given his mostly Japanese clientele, Childan has adopted their manners, Anglicised modes of speech, and ways of thinking, yet, despite his surface deference to the Japanese, he is contemptuous of them, privately retaining his pre-war white supremacy — believing in the essential inferiority of the non-white Asian and African races. Nonetheless, he is very conscious of his image, often deliberating, to himself, in the Asian mentality, how his actions might appear to others. *Wyndham-Matson (Frank Frink's boss) muses about the difference between a real antique and a reproduction antique; via his mistress, he introduces the novel The Grasshopper Lies Heavy to the plot and is the plot device used to show the initial difference of opinions in the novel, the differing opinions being those that believe The Grasshopper Lies Heavy is merely a work of good fiction, and those that believe it shows something more (a theme that reaches its climax at the end of the novel). *Mr. Baynes, a wealthy Swedish industrialist, is actually Rudolf Wegener, a Captain in Reich Naval Counter-Intelligence, who is en route to meet Tagomi, through whom he expects to meet an important Japanese representative. He is taken aback by Tagomi's gift of a "genuine Mickey Mouse watch" (bought at the American Artistic Handicrafts Inc. shop). The narrative storylines of the plot alternate among those of the characters, providing a broad picture of quotidian life in totalitarian America: *Baynes travels undercover to San Francisco, as a Swedish merchant. There, he talks with Tagomi, but, in pursuit of his true mission, must prolong their meeting until the arrival, from Japan, of Mr. Yatabe (General Tedeki, formerly of the Imperial General Staff). His mission is to warn the Japanese of Operation Löwenzahn (Operation Dandelion), a nuclear attack upon the Japanese Archipelago Home Islands planned by Joseph Goebbels's faction within the ruling Nazi Party and opposed by Heydrich's faction. *Frank Frink and his friend Ed McCarthy start a jewelry business; their beautiful, original art works strangely affect the Americans and Japanese who see them. He is arrested after his attempted sabotage of Wyndham-Matson — by telling Childan that the items of Americana he sells are fake. *Tagomi, unable to acknowledge the unpleasant rumors he has heard, finds solace in action, fighting the Nazi agents attempting to kill Baynes; he uses the "authentic" Colt U.S. Army revolver bought from Childan. Then, he retaliates against local Nazi authority, by directing the release of the Jew Frank Frink, who was bound for deportation to Nazi America. Tagomi and Frink never meet, nor does he know that Frank Frink created the beautiful artwork that so impressed him; however, as a devout Buddhist, the existential implications of deliberately taking a human life so bother him they provoke a heart attack. *Juliana, living in Colorado, begins a sexual relationship with Joe Cinnadella, a truck driver claiming to be an Italian war veteran. He wants to meet Hawthorne Abendsen (the eponymous Man in the High Castle, so called, because he allegedly lives in a guarded residence), who wrote the novel The Grasshopper Lies Heavy. Juliana travels with him, but discovers that he is actually a Swiss assassin meaning to kill the writer; she attempts to leave, but he bars her way. Distressed beyond reason, Juliana cuts Joe's throat with the straight razor which she had considered using to commit suicide. She completes the journey alone, meets author Abendsen, and induces him to reveal the truth about The Grasshopper Lies Heavy. *Robert Childan desperately attempts to retain his honor despite the forced obsequiousness towards the Japanese overlords. Although ambivalent about the lost war and foreign occupiers of his country, whom he loathes and respects, he discovers a sense of cultural pride in himself. He also investigates the widespread forgery in the antiques market amid increased Japanese interest in genuine Americana.

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Rocket Ship Galileo

Robert A. Heinlein

1947-05-01

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Children's literature, Fiction

After World War II, three teenage boy rocket experimenters are recruited by the uncle of one of them, Dr. Cargraves, a Nobel Prize-winning Physicist who had worked on the Manhattan Project, to refit a conventionally-powered surplus "mail rocket". It is to be converted to run on a thorium nuclear pile which boils zinc as a propellant. They use a cleared area in a military weapons test range in the desert for their work, despite prying and sabotage attempts by unknown agents. Upon completion of the modifications, they stock the rocket, which they name the Galileo, and take off for the Moon, taking approximately 11 days to arrive. After establishing a semi-permanent structure based on a Quonset hut, they claim the moon on behalf of the United Nations. As they set up a radio to communicate with the Earth they pick up a local transmission, the sender of which promises to meet them. Instead, their ship is bombed. Fortunately, they are able to hole up undetected in their hut and succeed in ambushing the other ship when it lands, capturing the pilot. They discover that there is a Nazi base on the Moon. They bomb it from their captured ship and land. One survivor is found, revived, and questioned. The boys also find evidence of an ancient lunar civilization, and postulate that the craters of the moon were formed not by impacts from space, but by nuclear bombs that destroyed the alien race. When the base's Nazi leader shoots the pilot in order to silence him, Cargraves convenes a trial and find him guilty of murder. Cargraves pretends to prepare to execute the prisoner by ejecting him into vacuum. The Nazi capitulates in the airlock and teaches them how to fly the Nazi spaceship back to Earth. The boys radio the location of the hidden Nazi base on Earth to the authorities, leading to its destruction; they return as heroes.

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Space Cadet

Robert A. Heinlein

1948

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Fiction

In 2075, teenager Matt Dodson applies to join the prestigious Space Patrol. After a number of physical, mental, and ethical tests, he is accepted as a cadet. He makes friends with fellow recruits William 'Tex' Jarman, Venus-born Oscar Jensen, and Pierre Armand from Ganymede. His first roommate is Girard Burke, the arrogant son of a wealthy spaceship builder. They are transported to the orbiting school ship PRS James Randolph for further training. Burke eventually either resigns or is asked to leave, and goes into the merchant service, but the remainder do well enough to be assigned to working Patrol ships. Dodson, Jarman and Jensen ship out on the Aes Triplex. Their first real mission is to help search for a missing research vessel, the Pathfinder, in the Asteroid Belt. They find it, but all aboard are dead, the unlucky victims of a fast-moving meteor that punctured the ship when the armored outer airlock door was open. Before the accident, a researcher on the Pathfinder had found evidence that the planet which blew up to form the asteroids was inhabited by an intelligent species, and that the explosion had been artificial. The captain of the Aes Triplex transfers half the crew to the repaired Pathfinder so that they can take the ship and the news of the startling discovery back to Earth quickly. With the remainder (including all three cadets), he continues his patrol. Then, he receives an urgent message to investigate an incident on Venus. He sends Lieutenant Thurlow and the cadets to the planet's surface. The lander touches down on a sinkhole, barely giving the crew enough time to get out before it disappears in the mud. With Thurlow comatose, injured when the lander fell over, Jensen assumes command. He contacts the sentient usually-friendly Venerians, but the entire party is taken captive. They soon find out why. These particular natives had never seen human beings before, until old classmate Burke showed up in a prospecting ship. He had taken the matriarch of the local clan hostage when she refused to give him permission to exploit a rich deposit of radioactive ores. The locals promptly attacked the ship and killed his crew; Burke managed to send a message for help before being taken prisoner. Jensen skillfully gains the matriarch's trust and convinces her that they are honorable and civilized, unlike Burke, and the Patrolmen are released. Neither the lander nor Burke's ship is flightworthy. To their amazement, she takes the stranded humans to the carefully preserved Astarte, the legendary first ship to set out for Venus over a century before and thought to have been lost en route. According to the log, the crew perished from disease. With the help of the natives, the cadets recommission the ship and fly it back to (human) civilization at Venus's South Pole colony. Dodson is initially disappointed when they are not treated as heroes—but then he realizes that what they accomplished was simply what was expected of Patrolmen.

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Between Planets

Robert A. Heinlein

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Children's literature, Fiction, Novel

A young man named Don Harvey leaves his dude ranch high school on Earth to go to his scientist parents on Mars. He visits an old family friend who asks him to deliver a ring to his father, but they are both later arrested by security forces. Harvey is released and given his ring back, after it has been examined; he is told that his friend has died of "heart failure." It is only later that he realizes that all deaths can be described that way. Harvey boards a shuttle to a space station orbiting the Earth. The station doubles as a transshipment terminus and a military base, armed with missiles to keep restive nations in check. On the trip up, he befriends one of his fellow passengers, a Venusian "dragon" named Sir Isaac Newton. Sir Isaac is a renowned physicist who can speak English using a portable device. Harvey gets caught up in the Venusian war of independence when the station is captured by the colonials in a surprise raid. Most of the other travelers are sent back to Earth, while a few decide to join the rebels. Harvey is in a quandary. The spaceship to Mars has been confiscated, but he remains determined to get there, by way of Venus if necessary. Because he was born in space, with one parent from Venus and the other from Earth, he claims Venusian citizenship; more importantly, Sir Isaac vouches for him. He is allowed to tag along, which turns out to be very fortunate for Harvey. The rebels blow up the station to stir up trouble for the Earth government. When the shuttle returns to Earth with its radios disabled, the military assumes it has been booby-trapped and destroys it, killing all aboard. On his arrival on Venus, Harvey finds that his Earth-backed money is now worthless. A banker lends him money, telling him to pay it forward. He gets a job washing dishes for his keep for Charlie, a Chinese immigrant who runs a small restaurant. He befriends a young woman, Isobel, when he tries to send a message to his parents. However, communication with Mars has been cut due to the hostilities. Harvey settles in to wait out the war, when the war comes to him. Earth sends a military force to put down the rebellion. The Venusian ships are destroyed in orbit and the ground forces are routed. Charlie is killed resisting the occupying soldiers. Harvey is rounded up and questioned by a senior security officer, who is very eager to get his hands on Harvey's ring. Luckily, Harvey had given it to Isobel for safekeeping and he does not know where she is or whether she is even alive. Before he can be interrogated with drugs, he escapes and joins the Venusian guerrilla forces. Harvey becomes an effective commando. In time, he is tracked down by the leaders of the resistance, who turn out to also be looking for the ring. Isobel and her father (who is an important member of the rebels) are safe at the very base where Harvey is taken. The seemingly valueless ring turns out to be carrying the secret of scientific breakthroughs resulting from archeological studies of an extict alien civilization on Mars. With Sir Isaac's assistance, it is used to secretly build an advanced spaceship that is much faster than any other vessel in existence, with revolutionary weapons and defenses also derived from the new technology. As the only combat veteran with knowledge of the ship, christened Little David, Harvey is recruited for its maiden voyage, manning a self-destruct mechanism, with strict orders to blow up the ship if it is in danger of being captured. Little David intercepts and defeats a group of warships on their way to Mars to crush the revolt there. Afterwards, Harvey is probably reunited with his parents, although the story ends before then.

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Starman Jones

Robert A. Heinlein

1953

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction, Novel

Max Jones works the family farm in the Ozark Mountains. With his father dead and his stepmother remarrying a man he detests, Max runs away from home, taking his uncle's astrogation manuals. Most occupations are tightly controlled by guilds, most with hereditary memberships. One such is the Astrogators Guild. Since his uncle had been a member and had no children, Max hopes that before he died, his uncle had named him his heir. He begins hitchhiking towards Earthport to find out. Along the way, he finds a friendly face in hobo Sam Anderson, who later alludes to being a deserter from the Imperial Marines. Sam feeds Max and offers advice, though he later departs with Max's valuable manuals. At the guild's headquarters, Max is disappointed to find that he had not been named as an heir, but he is returned his uncle's substantial security deposit for his manuals. Max learns that Sam had tried to claim the deposit for himself. By chance, he runs into an apologetic Sam. With Max's money, Sam is able to finagle them a one way job/trip aboard a starship using forged papers. Max signs on as a steward's mate third class, and then he absorbs the contents of the Stewards' Guild manual using his eidetic memory. Among his duties is caring for several animals, including passengers' pets—work with which he is comfortable. When passenger Eldreth "Ellie" Coburn visits her pet, an alien, semi-intelligent "spider puppy" that Max has befriended, she learns that he can play three-dimensional chess, and she challenges him to a game. A champion player, she diplomatically lets him win. Meanwhile, Sam manages to rise to the position of master-at-arms. When, through Ellie's machinations, the ship's officers discover that Max had learned astrogation from his uncle, Max is promoted to the command deck. Under the tutelage of Chief Astrogator Hendrix and Chief Computerman Kelly, he becomes a probationary apprentice chartsman, then a probationary astrogator. In a meeting with Hendrix, Max reluctantly admits to faking his record to get into space. Hendrix defers the matter until their return to Earth. The Asgard then departs for Halcyon, a human colony planet orbiting Nu Pegasi. When Hendrix dies, the astrogation department is left dangerously shorthanded. The aging captain tries to take his place, but is not up to the task. When Max detects an error in his real-time calculations leading up to a "transition", neither the captain nor Assistant Astrogator Simes believe him, and the ship winds up lost. They locate a habitable world, and the passengers become colonists. Meanwhile, the crew continues to try to figure out where they are, and if they can get back to the Earth. Unfortunately, it turns out the planet is already inhabited by intelligent centaurs. Max and Ellie are captured, but Ellie's pet is able to guide Sam and a rescue party to them. They escape, though Sam is killed covering their retreat. Upon his return, Max is informed that the captain has died. Simes tried to illegally take command and was killed by Sam, leaving Max as the only remaining astrogator. To make matters worse, Simes hid or destroyed the astrogation manuals. Vastly outnumbered by the hostile natives, the humans are forced to attempt a perilous return to known space by reversing the erroneous transition. Max must not only pilot the ship, he must supply the missing astrogation tables from his eidetic memory. To add to his burdens, the remaining officers inform Max that he must take charge, as only an astrogator can be the captain. The pressure is immense, but Max succeeds and the ship returns to known space. Max pays heavy fines for breaking guild regulations, but he becomes a member of the Astrogators Guild. However, he loses any chance for a relationship with Eldreth: she returns home to marry her boyfriend. Max accepts this with mixed feelings, but looks forward to his new career.

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Podkayne of Mars

Robert A. Heinlein

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction

The book is a first-person narrative in the form of Podkayne's diaries. Podkayne is 15 in Earth years (a bit over eight Martian years) while her genius younger brother Clark is 11 earth years (6 martian years). Due to the unscheduled "uncorking" (birth) of their three test-tube babies, Podkayne's parents cancel a much-anticipated trip to Earth. Disappointed, Podkayne confesses her misery to her uncle, Senator Tom Fries, an elder statesman of the Mars government. Tom arranges for Clark and Podkayne, escorted by himself, to get upgraded passage on a luxury liner to Earth. During boarding, Clark is asked by a customs official "Anything to declare?" and facetiously answers "Two kilos of happy dust!" As he anticipated, his seemingly flippant remark gets him taken away and searched, just in time to divert attention away from Podkayne's luggage, where he has hidden a package he was paid to smuggle aboard. Podkayne suspects the reason behind her brother's behavior, but cannot prove it. Clark was told it was a present for the captain, but is far too cynical to be taken in. He later carefully opens the package and finds a nuclear bomb, which he, in typical Clark-fashion, disarms and keeps. Much of the description of the voyage is based on Heinlein's own experiences as a naval officer and world traveler. Clark's ploy is taken from a real-life incident related in Heinlein's Tramp Royale in which his wife answers the same question with "heroin" substituted for the fictitious but equally illegal happy dust. Once aboard, they are befriended by "Girdie", an attractive, capable, experienced woman left impoverished by her late husband. Much to Podkayne's surprise, the normally very self-centered Clark contracts a severe case of puppy love. The liner makes a stop at Venus, which is depicted as a latter-day Las Vegas gone ultra-capitalistic. The planet is controlled by a single corporation; the dream of most of the frantically enterprising residents is to earn enough to buy a single share in it, which guarantees lifelong financial security. Just about anything goes, as long as one can pay for it. The penalty for murder is a fine paid to the corporation for the victim's estimated value plus his projected future earnings. On a less serious level, Heinlein anticipated, by over forty years, television ads in taxicabs (in the book, holographic), which have since been implemented in taxicabs in major cities worldwide. The Fries are given VIP treatment by the Venus Corporation and Podkayne is escorted by Dexter Cunha, the Chairman's dashing son. She begins to realize that Tom is much more than just her pinochle-playing uncle. When Clark vanishes and even the corporation is unable to find him, Tom reveals that he is on a secret diplomatic mission, and the children have been his protective coloration—instead of an accredited representative to a vital conference on Luna, Tom appears to be a doddering uncle escorting two young people on a tour of the solar system. Clark has been kidnapped by functionaries of a political faction opposed to Tom. Podkayne makes an ill-judged attempt to rescue Clark by herself and falls into the kidnappers' clutches as well--only to find her uncle caught too. The captors' scheme is to use the children to blackmail the uncle into doing their bidding at the Luna conference. Clark quickly realizes that once Uncle Tom is released, no matter what happens, their kidnappers will have little reason to keep their prisoners alive. He is prepared, however, and engineers an escape, leaving a bomb behind to blow up the kidnappers. In Heinlein's original ending, Podkayne is killed. This did not please his publisher, who demanded and got a rewrite over the author's bitter objections. In a letter to Lurton Blassingame, his literary agent, Heinlein complained that it would be like "revising Romeo and Juliet to let the young lovers live happily ever after." He also declared that changing the end "isn't real life, because in real life, not everything ends happily." In the original ending, after they escape from the kidnappers to a safe distance, Podkayne remembers that a semi-intelligent Venerian "fairy" baby has been left behind, and returns to rescue it. When the nuclear bomb that Clark leaves for the kidnappers blows up, Podkayne is killed, shielding the young fairy with her body. Clark takes over the narrative for the last chapter. The story ends with a hint of hope for him, as he admits his responsibility for what happened to Podkayne — that he "fubbed it, mighty dry" — then shows some human feeling by regretting his inability to cry and describes his plan to raise the fairy himself. In the revised version, Podkayne is injured by the bomb, but not fatally. Uncle Tom, in a phone conversation with Podkayne's father, blames the parents — especially the mother — for neglecting the upbringing of the children. Uncle Tom feels that Clark is dangerous and maladjusted, and attributes this to the mother giving priority to her career. Clark still takes over as the narrator, and, again, regrets that Podkayne was hurt and plans to take care of the fairy, this time because Podkayne will want to see it when she is better. The 1995 Baen edition includes both endings (which differ only on the last page), Jim Baen's own edited postlude to the story, and a collection of readers' essays giving their opinions about which ending is better. Most of these readers favored the sad ending, partly because they felt Heinlein should have been free to create his own story, and partly because they believed that the changed ending turned a tragedy into a mere adventure, and not a very well constructed one at that. Podkayne appears in Heinlein's later novel The Number of the Beast, attending the party at the end along with many other Heinlein characters from previous books.

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Story of O

Pauline Réage

1954

Erotica

Published in French by Jean-Jacques Pauvert, Story of O is a tale of female submission about a beautiful Parisian fashion photographer, O, who is blindfolded, chained, whipped, branded, pierced, made to wear a mask, and taught to be constantly available for oral, vaginal, and anal intercourse. Despite her harsh treatment, O grants permission beforehand for everything that occurs, and her permission is consistently sought. At the beginning of the story, O's lover, René, brings her to the château of Roissy, where she is trained to serve the men of an elite group. After this first period of training is finished, as a demonstration of their bond and his generosity, René hands O to Sir Stephen, a more dominant master. René wants O to learn to serve someone whom she does not love, and someone who does not love her. Over the course of this training, O falls in love with Sir Stephen and believes him to be in love with her as well. While her vain friend and lover, Jacqueline, is repulsed by O's chains and scars, O herself is proud of her condition as a willing slave. During the summer, Sir Stephen decides to move O to Samois, an old mansion solely inhabited by women for advanced training and body modifications related to submission. There she agrees to receive a branding and a labia piercing with rings marked with Sir Stephen's initials and insignia. At the climax, O appears as a slave, nude but for an owl-like mask, before a large party of guests who treat her solely as an object.

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The Star Beast

Robert A. Heinlein

1954

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction

An ancestor of John Thomas Stuart XI brought the alien, long-lived Lummox home from an interstellar voyage. The articulate, sentient pet he inherited has gradually grown from the size of a collie pup to a ridable behemoth—especially after consuming a used car. The childlike Lummox is perceived to be a neighborhood nuisance and, upon leaving the Stuart property one day, causes substantial property damage across the city of Westville. John's mother wants him to get rid of it, and a court orders it destroyed. Desperate to save his pet, John Thomas considers selling Lummox to a zoo. He rapidly changes his mind and runs away from home, riding into the nearby wilderness on Lummox's back. His girlfriend Betty Sorenson joins him and suggests bringing the beast back into town and hiding it in a neighbor's greenhouse. However, it isn't easy to conceal such a large creature. Eventually, the court tries to have Lummox destroyed, but is unable to do so, much to Lummox's amusement. Meanwhile, representatives of an advanced, powerful and previously unknown alien race appear and demand the return of their lost child...or else. A friendly alien diplomat of a third species intimates that the threat is not an empty one. Initially, no one associates Lummox with the newcomers, in part due to the size difference (Lummox was overfed). Lummox is identified as royalty, complicating the already-tense negotiations. It is discovered that, from her viewpoint, the young Lummox has been pursuing her only hobby and principal interest: the raising of John Thomases. She makes it clear that she intends to continue doing so. This gives the chief human negotiator the leverage he needs to avert the destruction of Earth. At the request of Lummox, the recently married John and Betty accompany her back to her people as members of the human diplomatic mission.

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Dr. No

Ian Fleming

1958-03-31

Spy fiction

After recovering from tetrodotoxin poisoning inflicted by SMERSH agent Rosa Klebb (see From Russia, with Love) MI6 agent James Bond is sent by his superior, M, on a "rest cure" to Jamaica. Whilst there his task is a simple assignment to investigate the disappearance of Commander John Strangways, the head of MI6 Station J in Kingston, Jamaica, and his secretary. Bond is briefed that Strangways had been investigating the activities of Dr. Julius No, a reclusive Chinese-German who lives on Crab Key and runs a guano mine; the island is said to be the home of a vicious dragon with a colony of Roseate Spoonbills at one end. The Spoonbills are protected by the National Audubon Society, two of whose representatives had died when their plane crashed on Dr. No's airstrip. On his arrival in Jamaica, Bond soon realises that he is being watched, as his hotel room is searched, a basket of poisoned fruit is delivered to his hotel room (supposedly a gift from the colonial governor) and a deadly centipede is placed in his bed while he is sleeping. With the help of old friend Quarrel, Bond visits Crab Key to establish if there is a connection between Dr. No and Strangways' disappearance. There he and Quarrel meet Honeychile Rider, who visits the island to collect valuable shells. Bond and Honey are captured by No's men after Quarrel is burned to death by the doctor's "dragon" – a flamethrowing armoured swamp buggy to keep away trespassers. Bond discovers that Dr. No is also working with the Russians and has built an elaborate underground facility from which he can sabotage American missile tests at nearby Cape Canaveral. No had previously been a member of a Chinese Tong, but after he stole a large amount of money from their treasury, he was captured by the organisation, whose leaders had his hands cut off as a sign of punishment for theft, and then ordered him shot. The Tong thought they shot him through the heart. However, because No's heart was on the right-hand side of his body (dextrocardia), the bullet missed his heart and he survived. Interested in the ability of the human body to withstand and survive pain, No forces Bond to navigate his way through an obstacle course constructed in the facility's ventilation system. He is kept under regular observation, suffering electric shocks, burns and an encounter with large poisonous spiders along the way. The ordeal ends in a fight against a captive giant squid, which Bond defeats by using improvised and stolen objects made into weapons. After his escape he encounters Honey from her ordeal where she had been pegged out to be eaten by crabs; the crabs ignored her and she had managed to make good her own escape. Bond kills Dr. No by taking over the guano-loading machine at the docks and diverting the guano flow from it to bury the villain alive. Bond and Honey then escape from No's complex in the dragon buggy.

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The Andromeda Strain

Michael Crichton

1969-05-12

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Techno-thriller, Mystery, Suspense, Fiction

When a military satellite returns to Earth, a recovery team is dispatched to retrieve it; during a live radio communication with their base, the team members suddenly die. Aerial surveillance reveals that everyone in Piedmont, Arizona, the town closest to where the satellite landed, is apparently dead. The base commander suspects the satellite returned with an extraterrestrial organism and recommends activating Wildfire, the government-sponsored team that counters extraterrestrial biological infestation. The Wildfire scientific team studying the unknown strain is composed of Dr. Jeremy Stone, bacteriologist specialist; Dr. Peter Leavitt, disease pathology; Dr. Charles Burton, infection vectors specialist; and Dr. Mark Hall, M.D., surgeon, biochemistry and pH specialist. Hall is the "odd man", since he is the only one without a spouse. The Robertson Odd Man Hypothesis states that unmarried men are capable of carrying out the best, most dispassionate decisions during crises and he is given the only key that can disarm the self-destruct mechanism. A fifth scientist, Dr. Christian Kirke, anthropologist and electrolytes specialist, was unavailable for duty because of appendicitis. The scientists believe the satellite, which was actually designed to capture upper-atmosphere microorganisms for bio-weapon exploitation, returned with a deadly microorganism that kills by nearly instantaneous disseminated intravascular coagulation (lethal blood clotting). Upon investigating the town, the Wildfire team discovers that the residents either died in mid-stride or went "quietly nuts" and committed bizarre suicides. Two Piedmont inhabitants, the sick, Sterno-addicted, geriatric Peter Jackson; and the constantly bawling infant, Jamie Ritter, are biologic opposites who somehow survived the organism. The man, infant, and satellite are taken to the secret underground Wildfire laboratory, a secure facility equipped with every known capacity for protection against a biological element escaping into the atmosphere, including a nuclear weapon to incinerate the facility if necessary. Wildfire is hidden in a remote area near the fictional town of Flatrock, Nevada, sixty miles from Las Vegas using a sort of purloined letter approach, by locating it in the sub-basements of a legitimate Department of Agriculture research station. Further investigation determines that the bizarre deaths were caused by a crystal-structured, extraterrestrial microbe on a meteor that crashed into the satellite, knocking it from orbit. The microbe contains chemical elements required for terrestrial life and appears to have a crystalline structure, but lacks DNA, RNA, proteins, and amino acids, yet it directly transforms matter to energy and vice versa. The microbe, code named "Andromeda", mutates with each growth cycle, changing its biologic properties. The scientists learn that Andromeda grows only within a narrow pH range; in a too-acid or too-basic growth medium, it will not multiply — Andromeda's pH range is 7.39–7.43, like that of human blood. That is why Jackson and Ritter survived: both had abnormal blood pH. However, by the time the scientists realize that, Andromeda's current mutation degrades the plastic shield and escapes its containment. Trapped in an Andromeda-contaminated laboratory, Dr. Burton demands that Stone inject him with Kalocin ("the universal antibiotic"); Stone refuses, arguing it would render Burton too vulnerable to infection by other harmful bacteria. Burton survives because Andromeda has already mutated to nonlethal form. The mutated Andromeda attacks the neoprene door and hatch seals within the Wildfire complex, racing to the upper levels and the surface. The self-destruct atomic bomb is automatically armed when it detects a containment breach, triggering its detonation countdown to incinerate all exo-biological diseases. As the bomb arms, the scientists realize that given Andromeda's ability to generate matter directly from energy, the organism would feed, reproduce, and ultimately benefit from an atomic explosion. To halt the atomic detonation, Dr. Hall must insert his special key to an emergency substation anywhere in Wildfire. Unfortunately, he is trapped in a section with no substation. He must navigate Wildfire's obstacle course of automatic defenses to reach a working substation on an upper level. He barely disarms the bomb in time before all the air is evacuated from the deepest level of the Wildfire complex. Andromeda eventually mutates to a benign form and is suspected to have migrated to the upper atmosphere, where the oxygen content is lower, better suiting Andromeda's growth. The novel's epilogue reveals that a manned spacecraft, Andros V, was incinerated during atmospheric re-entry, presumably because Andromeda Strain ate the plastic heat shield of Andros V and caused it to burn up.

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Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

J. K. Rowling

1997-06-30

Children's literature, Fantasy, Speculative fiction, Fiction

Before the start of the novel, Voldemort, considered the most evil and powerful dark wizard in history, kills Harry's parents but mysteriously vanishes after trying to kill the infant Harry. While the wizarding world celebrates Voldemort's downfall, Professor Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall and Rubeus Hagrid place the one year-old orphan in the care of his Muggle (non-wizard) uncle and aunt: Vernon and Petunia Dursley. For ten years, they and their son Dudley neglect, torment and abuse Harry. Shortly before Harry's eleventh birthday, a series of letters addressed to Harry arrive, but Vernon destroys them before Harry can read them. To get away from the letters, Vernon takes the family to a small island. As they are settling in, Hagrid bursts through the door to tell Harry what the Dursleys have kept him from finding out: Harry is a wizard and has been accepted at Hogwarts. Hagrid takes Harry to Diagon Alley, a magically-concealed shopping precinct in London, where Harry is bewildered to discover how famous he is among wizards as "the boy who lived". He also finds that he is quite wealthy, since a bequest from his parents has remained on deposit at Gringotts Wizarding Bank. Guided by Hagrid, he buys the books and equipment he needs for Hogwarts, as well as Hedwig the owl. At the wand shop, he finds that the wand that suits him best is the twin of Voldemort's; both wands contain feathers from the same phoenix. A month later Harry leaves the Dursleys' home to catch the Hogwarts Express from King's Cross railway station. There he meets the Weasley family, who show him how to pass through the magical wall to Platform 9¾, where the train is waiting. While on the train Harry makes friends with Ron Weasley, who tells him that someone tried to rob a vault at Gringotts. During the ride they meet Hermione Granger. Another new pupil, Draco Malfoy, accompanied by his sidekicks Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle, offers to advise Harry, but Harry dislikes Draco's arrogance and prejudice. Before the term's first dinner in the school's Great Hall, the new pupils are allocated to houses by the magical Sorting Hat. Before it is Harry's turn, he catches Professor Snape's eye and feels a pain in the scar Voldemort left on his forehead. When it is Harry's turn to be sorted, the Hat wonders whether he should be in Slytherin, but when Harry objects, the Hat sends him to join the Weasleys in Gryffindor. While Harry is eating, he questions Percy Weasley about Snape. After a terrible first Potions lesson with Snape, Harry and Ron visit Hagrid, who lives in a rustic house on the edge of the Forbidden Forest. There they learn that the attempted robbery at Gringotts happened the day Harry withdrew money. Harry remembers that Hagrid had removed a small package from the vault that was broken into and searched. During the new pupils' first broom-flying lesson, Neville Longbottom breaks his wrist, and Draco takes advantage to throw the forgetful Neville's fragile Remembrall high in the air. Harry gives chase on his broomstick, catching the Remembrall inches from the ground. Professor McGonagall dashes out and appoints him as the new Seeker for the Gryffindor Quidditch team. When Draco tricks Ron and Harry, accompanied by Neville and Hermione Granger, into a midnight excursion, they accidentally enter a forbidden corridor and find a huge three-headed dog. The group hastily retreats, and Hermione notices that the dog is standing over a trap-door. Harry concludes that the monster is guarding the package Hagrid retrieved from Gringotts. After Ron criticises Hermione's ostentatious proficiency in Charms, she hides in tears in the girls' toilet. At the Halloween Night dinner,Professor Quirrell hastily reports that a troll has entered the dungeons. While everyone else returns to their dormitories, Harry and Ron rush to warn Hermione. The troll corners Hermione in the toilet but when Harry sticks his wand up one of its nostrils, Ron uses the levitation spell to knock out the troll with its own club. Afterwards, several professors arrive and Hermione takes the blame for the battle and becomes a firm friend of the two boys. The evening before Harry's first Quidditch match, he sees Snape receiving medical attention from Filch for a bite on his leg by the three-headed dog. During the game, Harry's broomstick goes out of control, endangering his life, and Hermione notices that Snape is staring at Harry and muttering. She dashes over to the Professors' stand, knocking over Professor Quirrell in her haste, and sets fire to Snape's robe. Harry regains control of his broomstick and catches the Golden Snitch, winning the game for Gryffindor. Hagrid refuses to believe that Snape was responsible for Harry's danger, but lets slip that he bought the three-headed dog, and that the monster is guarding a secret that belongs to Professor Dumbledore and someone called Nicolas Flamel. Harry and the Weasleys stay at Hogwarts for Christmas, and one of Harry's presents, from an anonymous donor, is an Invisibility Cloak owned by his father. Harry uses the Cloak to search the library's Restricted Section for information about the mysterious Flamel, has to evade Snape and Filch after an enchanted book shrieks an alarm, and slips into a room containing the Mirror of Erised, which shows his parents and several of their ancestors. Harry becomes addicted to the Mirror's visions and is rescued by Professor Dumbledore, who explains that it shows what the viewer most desperately longs for. When the rest of the pupils return for the next term, Draco plays a prank on Neville, and Harry consoles Neville with a sweet. The collectible card wrapped with the sweet identifies Flamel as an alchemist. Hermione soon finds that he is a 665-year-old man who possesses the only known Philosopher's Stone, from which can be extracted an elixir of life. A few days later Harry notices Snape sneaking towards the outskirts of the Forbidden Forest. There he half-hears a furtive conversation about the Philosopher's Stone, in which Snape asks Professor Quirrell if he has found a way past the three-headed dog and menacingly tells Quirrell to decide whose side he is on. Harry concludes that Snape is trying to steal the Stone and Quirrell has helped prepare a series of defences for it, which was an almost fatal mistake. The three friends discover that Hagrid is raising a baby dragon, which is against wizard law, and arrange to smuggle it out of the country around midnight. Draco arrives, hoping to raise the alarm and get them into trouble, and goes to tell Professor McGonagall. Although Ron is bitten by the dragon and is sent to the infirmary, Harry and Hermione spirit the dragon safely away. However, they are caught, and Harry loses the Invisibility Cloak. As part of their punishment, Harry, Hermione, Draco, and Neville (who, trying to stop Harry and Hermione after hearing what Draco had been saying, had been caught by McGonagall as well) are compelled to help Hagrid to rescue a badly-injured unicorn in the Forbidden Forest. They split into two parties, and Harry and Draco find the unicorn dead, surrounded by its blood. A hooded figure crawls to the corpse and drinks the blood, while Draco screams and flees. The hooded figure moves towards Harry, who is knocked out by an agonising pain spreading from his scar. When Harry regains consciousness, the hooded figure has gone and a centaur, Firenze, offers to give him a ride back to the school. The centaur tells Harry that drinking a unicorn's blood will save the life of a mortally injured person, but at the price of having a cursed life from that moment on. Firenze suggests Voldemort drank the unicorn's blood to gain enough strength to make the elixir of life from the Philosopher's Stone, and regain full health by drinking that. On his return, Harry finds that someone has slipped the Invisibility Cloak under his sheets. A few weeks later, while relaxing after the end-of-session examinations, Harry suddenly wonders how something as illegal as a dragon's egg came into Hagrid's possession. The gamekeeper says he was given it by a hooded stranger who bought him several drinks and asked him how to get past the three-headed dog, which Hagrid admits is easy – music sends it to sleep. Realising that one of the Philosopher's Stone's defences is no longer secure, Harry goes to inform Professor Dumbledore, only to find that the headmaster has just left for an important meeting. Harry concludes that Snape faked the message that called Dumbledore away and will try to steal the Stone that night. Covered by the Invisibility Cloak, Harry and his two friends go to the three-headed dog's chamber, where Harry sends the beast to sleep by playing a flute given to him by Hagrid for Christmas. After lifting the trap-door, they encounter a series of obstacles, each of which requires special skills possessed by one of the three, and one of which requires Ron to sacrifice himself in a game of wizard's chess. In the final room Harry, now alone, finds Quirrell rather than Snape. Quirrell admits that he let in the troll that tried to kill Hermione on Halloween, and that he tried to kill Harry during the first Quidditch match but was knocked over by Hermione. Snape had been trying to protect Harry and suspected Quirrell. Quirrell serves Voldemort and, after failing to steal the Philosopher's Stone from Gringotts, allowed his master to possess him in order to improve their chances of success. However the only other object in the room is the Mirror of Erised, and Quirrell can see no sign of the Stone. At Voldemort's bidding, Quirrell forces Harry to stand in front of the Mirror. Harry feels the Stone drop into his pocket and tries to stall. Quirrell removes his turban, revealing the face of Voldemort on the back of his head. Voldemort/Quirrell tries to grab the Stone from Harry, but simply touching Harry causes Quirrell's flesh to burn. After further struggles Harry passes out. He awakes in the school hospital, where Professor Dumbledore tells him that he survived because his mother sacrificed her life to protect him, and Voldemort could not understand the power of such love. Voldemort left Quirrell to die, and is likely to return by some other means. Dumbledore had foreseen that the Mirror would show Voldemort/Quirrell only themselves making the elixir of life, as they wanted to use the Philosopher's Stone; Harry was able to see the Stone in the Mirror because he wanted to find it but not to use it. The Stone has now been destroyed. Harry returns to the Dursleys for the summer holiday, but does not tell them that under-age wizards are forbidden to use magic outside Hogwarts. After ten years, Harry became an eleven year-old boy. The Dursleys have kept the truth about Harry's parents from him, but it is revealed in the form of Rubeus Hagrid, who tells Harry that he is a wizard and has been accepted at Hogwarts for the autumn term. Harry takes the train to Hogwarts from King's Cross Station. On the train, Harry sits with and quickly befriends Ron Weasley; the two are also briefly visited by Neville Longbottom and Hermione Granger. Later on in the journey, Malfoy comes into Harry and Ron's compartment with his friends Crabbe and Goyle and introduces himself. After Ron laughs at Draco's name, Draco offers to help Harry distinguish the wrong sort of wizards, but Harry declines. Upon arrival, the Sorting Hat places Harry, Hermione, Neville and Ron into Gryffindor House, one of the school's four houses, while Draco and his cronies are placed in Slytherin. After a broom-mounted game to save Neville's Remembrall, Harry joins Gryffindor's Quidditch team as their youngest Seeker in over a century. Shortly after school begins, Harry and his friends hear that someone broke into a previously emptied vault at the wizarding bank, Gringotts. The mystery deepens when they discover a monstrous three-headed dog, Fluffy, who guards a trapdoor in the forbidden third floor passageway. On Halloween, a troll enters the castle and traps Hermione in one of the girls' lavatories. Harry and Ron rescue her, but are caught by Professor McGonagall. Hermione defends the boys and takes the blame, which results in the three becoming close friends. Harry's broom becomes jinxed during his first Quidditch match, nearly resulting in Harry falling from a great height. Hermione believes that Professor Snape has cursed the broom and distracts him by setting his robes on fire, allowing Harry to catch the Golden Snitch and win the game for Gryffindor. At Christmas, Harry receives his father's Invisibility Cloak from an unknown source. Later, he discovers the Mirror of Erised, a strange mirror that shows Harry surrounded by his parents and the extended family he never knew. Later, Harry learns that Nicolas Flamel is the maker of the Sorcerer's Stone, a stone that gives the owner eternal life. Harry sees Professor Snape interrogating Professor Quirrell about getting past Fluffy, seemingly confirming the suspicion that Snape is trying to steal the Philosopher's Stone in order to restore Lord Voldemort to power. The trio discover that Hagrid is hiding a dragon egg, which hatches; since dragon breeding is illegal, they convince Hagrid to send the dragon to live with others of its kind. Harry and Hermione are caught returning to their dormitories after sending Norbert off and are forced to serve detention with Hagrid in the Forbidden Forest. In the forest, Harry sees a hooded figure drink the blood of an injured unicorn. Firenze, a centaur, tells Harry that the hooded figure is Voldemort. Hagrid accidentally tells Harry, Ron, and Hermione how to get past Fluffy; and they rush to tell the headmaster, Albus Dumbledore, what they know, only to find that he has been called away from the school. Convinced that Dumbledore's summons was a red herring to take him away while the Philosopher's Stone is stolen, the trio set out to reach the Stone first. They navigate a series of complex magical challenges set up by the school's faculty, and at the end of these challenges, Harry enters the inner chamber alone, only to find that it is the timid Professor Quirrell, not Snape, who is after the Stone. The final challenge protecting the Stone is the Mirror of Erised. Quirrell forces Harry to look into the mirror to discover where the Stone is hidden; and Harry successfully resists, and the Stone drops into his own pocket. Lord Voldemort reveals himself: he has possessed Quirrell and appears as a ghastly face on the back of Quirrell's head. Quirrell tries to attack Harry, but merely touching Harry proves to be agony for him. Voldemort flees and Quirrell dies as Dumbledore arrives back in time to save Harry. As Harry recovers, Dumbledore confirms that Lily had died while trying to protect Harry as an infant. Her pure, loving sacrifice provides her son with an ancient magical protection against Voldemort's lethal spells. Dumbledore also explains that the Philosopher's Stone has been destroyed to prevent Voldemort from ever using it. He then tells Harry that only those who wanted to find the Stone, but not use it, would be able to retrieve it from the mirror, which is why Harry could acquire it. When Harry asks Dumbledore why Voldemort attempted to kill him when he was an infant, Dumbledore promises to tell Harry when he is older. At the end-of-year feast, where Harry is welcomed as a hero. Dumbledore gives a few last-minute additions, granting enough points to Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville Longbottom for Gryffindor to win the House Cup, ending Slytherin's six-year reign as house champions.

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Down and Out in Paris and London

George Orwell

1933-01-09

Autobiographical novel, Autobiography, Fiction, Memoir, Non-fiction

Two verbless sentences introduce the scene-setting opening chapters, which describe the atmosphere in the Paris quarter and introduce various characters who appear later in the book. From Chapter III to Chapter X, where the narrator obtains a job at "Hotel X," he describes his descent into poverty, often in tragi-comic terms. An Italian compositor forges room keys and steals his savings and his scant income vanishes when the English lessons he is giving stop. He begins at first to "sell" some of his clothes, and then to "pawn" his remaining clothes, and then searches for work with a Russian waiter named Boris—work as a porter at Les Halles, work as an English teacher and restaurant work. He recounts his two-day experience without any food and tells of meeting Russian "Communists" who, he later concludes, on their disappearance, must be mere swindlers. After the various ordeals of unemployment and hunger the narrator obtains a job as a plongeur (dishwasher) in the "Hôtel X" near the Place de la Concorde, and begins to work long hours there. In Chapter XIII, he describes the "caste system" of the hotel—"manager-cooks-waiters-plongeurs"—and, in Chapter XIV, its frantic and seemingly chaotic workings. He notes also "the dirt in the Hôtel X.," which became apparent "as soon as one penetrated into the service quarters." He talks of his routine life among the working poor of Paris, slaving and sleeping, and then drinking on Saturday night through the early hours of Sunday morning. In Chapter XVI, he refers briefly to a murder committed "just beneath my window [while he was sleeping .... The thing that strikes me in looking back," he says, "is that I was in bed and asleep within three minutes of the murder [....] We were working people, and where was the sense of wasting sleep over a murder?" Misled by Boris's optimism, the narrator is briefly penniless again after he and Boris quit their hotel jobs in the expectation of work at a new restaurant, the "Auberge de Jehan Cottard," where Boris feels sure he will become a waiter again; at the Hotel X, he had been doing lower-grade work. The "patron" of the Auberge, "an ex-colonel of the Russian Army," seems to have financial difficulties. The narrator is not paid for ten days and is compelled to spend a night on a bench—"It was very uncomfortable—the arm of the seat cuts into your back—and much colder than I had expected"—rather than face his landlady over the outstanding rent. At the restaurant, the narrator finds himself working "seventeen and a half hours" a day, "almost without a break," and looking back wistfully at his relatively leisured and orderly life at the Hotel X. Boris works even longer: "eighteen hours a day, seven days a week." The narrator claims that "such hours, though not usual, are nothing extraordinary in Paris." He adds by the way, that the Auberge was not the ordinary cheap eating-house frequented by students and workmen. We did not provide an adequate meal at less than twenty-five francs, and we were picturesque and artistic, which sent up our social standing. There were the indecent pictures in the bar, and the Norman decorations—sham beams on the walls, electric lights done up as candlesticks, "peasant" pottery, even a mounting-block at the door—and the patron and the head waiter were Russian officers, and many of the customers titled Russian refugees. In short, we were decidedly chic. He falls into a routine again and speaks of quite literally fighting for a place on the Paris Métro in order to reach the "cold, filthy kitchen" by seven. Despite the filth and incompetence, the restaurant turns out to be a success. The narrative is interspersed with anecdotes recounted by some of the minor characters, such as Valenti, an Italian waiter at Hotel X, and Charlie, "one of the local curiosities," who is "a youth of family and education who had run away from home." In Chapter XXII, the narrator considers the life of a plongeur: [A] plongeur is one of the slaves of the modern world. Not that there is any need to whine over him, for he is better off than many manual workers, but still, he is no freer than if he were bought and sold. His work is servile and without art; he is paid just enough to keep him alive; his only holiday is the sack [.... He has] been trapped by a routine which makes thought impossible. If plongeurs thought at all, they would long ago have formed a labour union and gone on strike for better treatment. But they do not think, because they have no leisure for it; their life has made slaves of them. Because of the stress of the long hours, he mails to a friend, "B," back in London, asking if he could get him a job that allows more than five hours' sleep a night. His friend duly replies, offering a job taking care of a "congenital imbecile," and sends him some money to get his possessions from the pawn. The narrator then quits his job as a plongeur and leaves for London. The narrator arrives in London expecting to have the job waiting for him. Unfortunately the would-be employers have gone abroad, "patient and all." Until his employers return, the narrator lives as a tramp, sleeping in an assortment of venues: lodging houses, tramps' hostels or "spikes," and Salvation Army shelters. Because vagrants can not "enter any one spike, or any two London spikes, more than once in a month, on pain of being confined for a week," he is required to keep on the move, with the result that long hours are spent tramping or waiting for hostels to open. Chapters XXV to XXXV describe his various journeys, the different forms of accommodation, a selection of the people he meets, and the tramps' reaction to Christian charity: "Evidently the tramps were not grateful for their free tea. And yet it was excellent [....] I am sure too that it was given in a good spirit, without any intention of humiliating us; so in fairness we ought to have been grateful—still, we were not." Characters in this section of the book include the Irish tramp called Paddy, "a good fellow" whose "ignorance was limitless and appalling," and the pavement artist Bozo, who has a good literary background and was formerly an amateur astronomer, but who has suffered a succession of misfortunes. The final chapters provide a catalogue of various types of accommodation open to tramps. The narrator offers some general remarks, concluding, At present I do not feel that I have seen more than the fringe of poverty. Still, I can point to one or two things I have definitely learned by being hard up. I shall never again think that all tramps are drunken scoundrels, nor expect a beggar to be grateful when I give him a penny, nor be surprised if men out of work lack energy, nor subscribe to the Salvation Army, nor pawn my clothes, nor refuse a handbill, nor enjoy a meal at a smart restaurant. That is a beginning.

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The Last Man

Mary Shelley

1826-02

Catastrophic literature, Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction

Mary Shelley states in the introduction that in 1818 she discovered, in the Sibyl's cave near Naples, a collection of prophetic writings painted on leaves by the Cumaean Sibyl. She has edited these writings into the current narrative, the first-person narrative of a man living at the end of the 21st century. Lionel's father was a friend of the king before he was cast away because of his gambling. Lionel's father left to take his life, but before he did so he left a letter for the king to take care of his family after his death. After Lionel's father died the letter was never delivered. Lionel and his sister grow up with no parental influence, and as a result grow to be uncivilized. Lionel develops a hatred of the royal family, and Perdita grows to enjoy her isolation from society. When the king leaves the throne, the monarchy come to an end and a republic is created. When the king dies the Countess attempts to raise their son, Adrian, to reclaim the throne, but Adrian opposes his mother and refuses to take the throne. Adrian moves to Cumberland where Lionel, who bears a grudge against Adrian and his family for the neglect of the Verney family, intends to terrorise and confront Adrian. He is mollified by Adrian's good nature and his explanation that he only recently discovered the letter. Lionel and Adrian become close friends, and Lionel becomes civilized and philosophical under Adrian's influence. Lionel returns to England to face the personal turmoil amongst his acquaintances. Lord Raymond, who came to renown for his exploits in the war between Greece and Turkey, has returned to England in search of political position, and soon Perdita and Evadne both fall in love with him. On discovering that his beloved, Evadne, is in love with Raymond, Adrian goes into exile, presumably mad. Raymond intends to marry Idris (with whom Lionel is in love) as a first step towards becoming king, with the help of the Countess. However, he ultimately chooses his love for Perdita over his ambition, and the two marry. Under Lionel's care Adrian recovers, although he remains physically weak. On learning of the love between Idris and Lionel, the Countess schemes to drug Idris, bring her to Austria, and force her to make a politically motivated marriage. Idris discovers the plot and flees to Lionel, who marries her soon after. The Countess leaves for Austria, resentful of her children and of Lionel. Adrian and the others live happily together until Raymond runs for Lord Protector and wins. Perdita soon adjusts to her newfound social position, while Raymond becomes well-beloved as a benevolent administrator. He discovers, however, that Evadne, after the political and financial ruin of her husband (on account of her own political schemes) is living in poverty and obscurity in London, unwilling to plead for assistance. Raymond attempts to support Evadne by employing her artistic skills in secrecy, and later nursing her in illness, but Perdita learns of the relationship and suspects infidelity. Her suspicions arouse Raymond's proud and passionate nature, and the two separate. Raymond resigns his position and leaves to rejoin the war in Greece, accompanied for a time by Adrian. Shortly after the wounded Adrian returns to England, rumors arise that Raymond has been killed. Perdita, loyal in spite of everything, convinces Lionel to bring her and Clara to Greece to find him. Lionel finds Raymond and brings him back to Greece. Lionel and Raymond then go back to fighting and go to Constantinople. Lionel discovers Evadne, dying of wounds received fighting in the war. Before she dies, Evadne prophesies Raymond's death, a prophecy which confirms Raymond's own suspicions. Raymond's intention to enter Constantinople causes dissension and desertion amongst the army because of reports of the plague. Raymond enters the city alone, and soon dies in a fire. He is taken to Athens for burial. In 2092, while Lionel and Adrian attempt to return their lives to normality, the plague continues to spread across Europe and the Americas, and reports of a black sun cause panic throughout the world. At first England is thought to be safe, but soon the plague reaches even there. Ryland, recently elected Lord Protector, is unprepared for the plague, and flees northward, later dying alone amidst a stockpile of provisions. Adrian takes command and is largely effective at maintaining order and humanity in England, although the plague rages on summer after summer. Ships arrive in Ireland carrying survivors from America, who lawlessly plunder Ireland and Scotland before invading England. Adrian raises a military force against them, but ultimately is able to resolve the situation peacefully. The few remaining survivors decide to abandon England in search of an easier climate. On the eve of their departure to Dover, Lionel receives a letter from Lucy Martin, who was unable to join the exiles because of her mother's illness. Lionel and Idris travel through a snowstorm to assist Lucy, but Idris, weak from years of stress and maternal fears, dies along the way. Lionel and the Countess, who had shunned Idris and her family out of resentment towards Lionel, are reconciled at Idris' tomb. Lionel recovers Lucy (whose mother has died), and the party reaches Dover en route to France. In France, Adrian discovers that the earlier emigrants have divided into factions, amongst them a fanatical religious sect led by a false messiah who claims that his followers will be saved from disease. Adrian unites most of the factions, but this latter group declares violent opposition to Adrian. Lionel sneaks into Paris, where the cult has settled, to try to rescue Juliet. She refuses to leave because the imposter has her baby, but she helps Lionel to escape. Later, when Juliet's baby sickens, Juliet discovers that the imposter has been hiding the effects of the plague from his followers. She is killed warning the other followers, after which the imposter commits suicide, and his followers return to the main body of exiles at Versailles. The exiles travel towards Switzerland, hoping to spend the summer in a colder climate less favorable to the plague. By the time they reach Switzerland, however, all but four (Lionel, Adrian, Clara, and Evelyn) have died. The four spend a few relatively happy seasons at Switzerland, Milan, and Como before Evelyn dies of typhus. The survivors attempt to sail across the Adriatic Sea to Greece, but a sudden storm drowns Clara and Adrian. Lionel, the last man, swims to shore. The story ends in the year 2100.

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The Transmigration of Timothy Archer

Philip K. Dick

1982

Speculative fiction, Novel

Set in the late 1960s and 1970s, the story describes the efforts of Episcopal Bishop Timothy Archer, who must cope with the theological and philosophical implications of the newly-discovered Gnostic Zadokite scroll fragments. The character of Bishop Archer is loosely based on the controversial, iconoclastic Episcopal Bishop James Pike, who in 1969 died of exposure while exploring the Judean Desert near the Dead Sea in the West Bank. As the novel opens, it is 1980. On the day that John Lennon is shot and killed, Angel Archer visits the houseboat of Edgar Barefoot, a guru, and reflects on the lives of her deceased relatives. During the sixties, she was married to Jeff Archer, son of the Episcopal Bishop of California Timothy Archer. She introduced Kirsten Lundborg, a friend, to her father-in law, and the two began an affair. Kirsten has a son, Bill, from a previous relationship, who has schizophrenia, although he is knowledgeable as an automobile mechanic. Tim is already being investigated for his gnostic, allegedly heretical views about the Zadokite scrolls, which reproduce some of Jesus Christ's statements about the world, but have been dated to the second century before the birth of Christ. Jeff commits suicide due to his romantic obsession with Kirsten. However, after poltergeist activity, he manifests to Tim and Kirsten at a seance, also attended by Angel. Angel is sceptical about the efficacy of astrology, and believes that the unfolding existential situation of Tim and Kirsten is akin to Friedrich Schiller's German Romanticism era masterpiece, the Wallenstein trilogy (insofar as their credulity reflects the loss of rational belief in contemporary consensual reality). The three are told that Kirsten and Tim will die. As predicted, Kirsten loses her remission from cancer, and also commits suicide after a barbiturate overdose. Tim travels to Israel to investigate whether or not a psychotropic mushroom was associated with the resurrection, but his car stalls, he becomes disoriented, falls from a cliff, and dies in the desert. On the houseboat, Angel is reunited with Bill, Kirsten's son who has schizophrenia. He claims to have Tim's reincarnated spirit within him, but is soon reinsitutionalised. Angel agrees to care for Bill, in return for a rare record that Edgar offers her. Transmigration is one of Dick's most overtly philosophical and intellectual works. While Dick's novels usually employ multiple narrators or an omniscient perspective, this story is told in the first person by a single narrator: Angel Archer, Bishop Archer's daughter-in-law. Dick's work was often criticized for its flat, stereotypical female characters, so Angel may represent his effort to prove he could create a rich and believable feminine voice.

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Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency

Douglas Adams

1987

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Comedy

Four billion years in Earth's past, a group of Salaxalans attempts to populate the earth; however, a mistake caused by their engineer – who used an Electric Monk to irrationally believe the proposed fix would work – causes their landing craft to explode, killing the Salaxalans and generating the spark of energy needed to start the process of life on Earth. The ghost of the Salaxalan engineer roams the earth waiting to undo his mistake, watching human life develop and waiting to find a soul that it can possess. The ghost finds it can only possess individuals that fundamentally want to do the same task it is trying to accomplish itself. Otherwise, it is only able to influence the individual in subtle ways. In the early 19th century, the ghost discovers Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and influences the writer to add a second section to "Kubla Khan" and alter parts of "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" to describe how to correct the problem that destroyed the landing craft in the distant past. The ghost then begins seeking out someone whose hardship can be influenced by Coleridge's work. It later discovers that Professor Urban "Reg" Chronotis at St Cedd's possesses a time machine disguised as his quarters. In the late 20th century, during the annual St Cedd's dinner reading of "Kubla Khan", the ghost influences Reg to use the time machine to perform a bit of trickery for a young child at the dinner, while the ghost lures another Electric Monk into Reg's quarters. Upon return to the present, the ghost finds the Monk unusable for its purposes. The Monk then goes off to kill Wayforward Technologies II's CEO, Gordon Way, due to a misunderstanding. The ghost later tries to influence Richard MacDuff, a former student of Reg and current employee of Gordon Way, who was also at the Coleridge reading. Richard finds himself breaking into the apartment of Susan Way—his girlfriend and Gordon's sister— to erase an answering machine message. His actions lead the police to consider Richard a suspect in the murder of Gordon. Richard discusses this with his former college friend Dirk Gently, who claims to be a "Holistic Detective" believing in the "fundamental interconnectedness of all things". Currently on the case of a missing cat, Dirk examines Richard and finds him to have been in a hypnotic-like state, and determines that Richard was temporarily possessed. Richard recounts the events from the Coleridge reading, including Reg's trick; Dirk, after consulting with a child, concludes that the only way the trick was possible was with a time machine. The two approach Reg, who admits to this fact. Meanwhile, the ghost has found Michael Wenton-Weakes, a recently-fired editor of an arts magazine. Through subtle influences the ghost makes Michael read Coleridge's works and convinces him to kill Albert Ross, the editor who replaced him. Both now have sought to erase those that supplant them, and the ghost is able to fully possess Michael's body. The ghost, in Michael's body, arrives at Reg's quarters while Dirk and Richard are there, and demands Reg use his time machine to return back 4 billion years in the past. They travel back, and ghost-possessed Michael, using a makeshift environmental suit, sets up to repair the damage to the Salaxalan craft. While they watch, Richard receives a call from Susan from the 20th century on Reg's phone, a quirk of the time machine due to the phone company. Richard learns of Ross's murder, and Dirk quickly surmises the ghost's plan, which if successful will erase the formation of life on Earth. Realising Michael was influenced by Coleridge's works, Dirk instructs Reg to take them to the 19th century, allowing Dirk to interrupt Coleridge long enough to disrupt the ghost's possession and prevent the second part of "Kubla Khan" from ever having been written. Upon arrival back in the 20th century, Dirk, Richard, and Reg find humanity as they expect it but with very small, subtle changes. Reg also discovers his time machine no longer functions, after having the telephone company repair the phone line to his quarters. Dirk learns that the missing cat was never missing in the first place as a result of their actions, and charges the client a small amount for the finding of the lost cat, adding "saving the entire human race from extinction – no charge".

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Dragonflight

Anne McCaffrey

1968-07

Science Fiction, Children's literature, Fantasy, Fiction

Dragonflight chronicles the story of Lessa, the sole survivor of the noble ruling family of Ruatha Hold on the northern continent of Pern. When the rest of her family is killed by a cruel usurper, Fax, she survives by disguising herself as a drudge (a menial servant) partly through simply adopting a slovenly appearance, but also by using her hereditary telepathic abilities to make others see her as far older and less attractive than she actually is. She manages to escapes notice completely. Her only friend is a watch-wher, a somewhat telepathic animal (related to dragons) that guards the hold. Lessa also psychically influences other Hold workers to do less than their best work, or to become clumsy or inefficient. Her dream is to regain control over her own hold. Her strategy is to make Ruatha economically unproductive, so that Fax will renounce it. F'lar, wingleader at Benden Weyr and rider of the bronze dragon Mnementh, finds Lessa while Searching for candidates to Impress (bond with) a new queen dragon, as the current queen has a batch of eggs due to hatch very soon, including a crucial golden egg. After killing Fax in single combat (following the rules of the Pernese code duello), he realises that she has emotionally manipulated himself to kill Fax as well as engineered Fax's renouncement. It is then that F'lar recognizes Lessa as possessing both unusually strong psychic abilities and great strength of will. He recognizes Lessa's capacity to be the strongest Weyrwoman in recent history; and potentially the path to his own leadership at Benden Weyr. F'lar convinces a reluctant Lessa to give up her birthright as Lord Holder of Ruatha Hold for the larger domain of the dragonweyr and she agree to pass the title on to Fax's newborn son (who later features in The White Dragon). F'lar takes Lessa to Benden Weyr, where she impresses the Queen dragonet Ramoth and becomes the Weyrwoman, the new co-leader of the last active Weyr. On Ramoth's first mating flight, Mnementh catches her, and by Weyr tradition, this makes F'lar the Weyrleader. Lessa and F'lar warn a dangerously unprepared Pern of the impending Thread reappearance. The general response is disbelief, as the last threadfall was 400 years ago, and the stories about threadfall have receded from recent history into legend and myth. It is not until the first Thread begins to fall that they are believed by the general populace and even by some dragon-riders. One Weyr by itself is not enough to defend the planet; there used to be six, but the other five Weyrs are now empty, deserted since the last Pass centuries before. In a desperate attempt to increase their numbers, a new queen, Prideth, and her rider, Kylara, are sent back between times (a recently rediscovered skill) ten turns, to allow Prideth time to mature and reproduce. Lessa travels four hundred turns into the past to bring the five 'missing' Weyrs forward to her present. This is a huge strain for both her and Ramoth. She convinces the dragonriders of the five Weyrs to go with her to their future, and they use the Red Star as a guide to make smaller, less strenuous hops forward in time. This not only provides much needed skilled reinforcements in the battle against Thread, but explains how and why the five Weyrs were abandoned: they came forward in time.

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The Diamond Age

Neal Stephenson

1995

Cyberpunk, Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction, Postcyberpunk

The protagonist in the story is Nell, a thete (or person without a tribe; equivalent to the lowest working class) living in the Leased Territories, a lowland slum belt on the artificial, diamondoid island of New Chusan, located offshore from the mouth of the Yangtze River, northwest of Shanghai. At the age of four, Nell receives a stolen copy of an interactive book, Young Lady's Illustrated Primer: a Propædeutic Enchiridion in which is told the tale of Princess Nell and her various friends, kin, associates, &c., originally intended for an aristocrat's child in the Neo-Victorian New Atlantis phyle. The story follows Nell's development under the tutelage of the Primer, and to a lesser degree, the lives of Elizabeth and Fiona, girls who receive similar books. The Primer is intended to intellectually steer its reader toward a more interesting life, as defined by "Equity Lord" Alexander Chung-Sik Finkle-McGraw, and grow up to be an effective member of society. The most important quality to achieving an "interesting life" is deemed to be a subversive attitude towards the status quo. The Primer is designed to react to its owners' environment and teach them what they need to know to survive and develop. The Diamond Age is characterized by two intersecting, almost equally developed story lines: Nell's education through her independent work with the Primer, and the social downfall of engineer and designer of the Primer, John Percival Hackworth, who has made an illegal copy of the Primer for his own young daughter, Fiona. His crime becomes known both to Lord Finkle-McGraw and to Dr. X, and each man attempts to exploit Hackworth to advance the opposing goals of their tribes. The text also includes fully narrated educational tales from the Primer that map Nell's individual experience (e.g. her four toy friends) onto archetypal folk tales stored in the primer's database. Although The Diamond Age explores the role of technology and personal relationships in child development, its deeper and darker themes also probe the relative values of cultures (which Stephenson explores in his other novels as well) and the shortcomings in communication between them. "Diamond Age" is an extension of labels for archeological time periods that take central technological materials to define an entire era of human history, such as the Stone Age, the Bronze Age or the Iron Age. Technological visionaries such as Eric Drexler and Ralph Merkle, both of whom receive an honorary mention in The Diamond Age, have argued that if nanotechnology develops the ability to manipulate individual atoms at will, it will become possible to simply assemble diamond structures from carbon atoms, materials also known as diamondoids. Merkle states: "In diamond, then, a dense network of strong bonds creates a strong, light, and stiff material. Indeed, just as we named the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, and the Steel Age after the materials that humans could make, we might call the new technological epoch we are entering the Diamond Age". In the novel, a near future vision of our world, nanotechnology has developed precisely to this point, which enables the cheap production of diamond structures. The title can also be seen as a reference to the Gilded Age, a time of economic expansion roughly coinciding with the late Victorian era. Likewise, it can be seen as consistent with Queen Victoria's reign, the apex of which is often seen as her Diamond Jubilee.

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The Hunchback of Notre Dame

Victor Hugo

1831-01-14

Children's literature, Fiction

The story begins on Epiphany (6 January), 1482, the day of the Feast of Fools in Paris, France. Quasimodo, a deformed hunchback who is the bell-ringer of Notre Dame, is introduced by his crowning as the Pope of Fools. Esmeralda, a beautiful Gypsy with a kind and generous heart, captures the hearts of many men, including those of Captain Phoebus and Pierre Gringoire, a poor street poet, but especially those of Quasimodo and his adoptive father, Claude Frollo, the Archdeacon of Notre Dame. Frollo is torn between his obsessive love and the rules of the church. He orders Quasimodo to kidnap her, but the hunchback is suddenly captured by Phoebus and his guards who save Esmeralda. Quasimodo is sentenced to be flogged and turned on the pillory for one hour, followed by another hour's public exposure. He calls for water. Esmeralda, seeing his thirst, offers him a drink. It saves him, and she captures his heart. Esmeralda is later charged with the attempted murder of Phoebus, whom Frollo actually attempted to kill in jealousy after seeing him about to have sex with Esmeralda, and is tortured and sentenced to death by hanging. As she is being led to the gallows, Quasimodo swings down by the bell rope of Notre Dame and carries her off to the cathedral under the law of sanctuary. Clopin, a street performer, rallies the Truands (criminals of Paris) to charge the cathedral and rescue Esmeralda. Frollo asks the king to remove Esmeralda's right to sanctuary so she can no longer seek shelter in the church and will be taken from the church and killed. When Quasimodo sees the Truands, he assumes they are there to hurt Esmeralda, so he drives them off. Likewise, he thinks the King's men want to rescue her, and tries to help them find her. She is rescued by Frollo and her phony husband Gringoire. But after yet another failed attempt to win her love, Frollo betrays Esmeralda by handing her to the troops and watches while she is being hanged. When Frollo laughs during Esmeralda's hanging, Quasimodo pushes him from the heights of Notre Dame to his death. Quasimodo then goes to the vaults under the huge gibbet of Montfaucon, and lies next to Esmeralda's corpse, where it had been unceremoniously thrown after the execution. He stays at Montfaucon, and eventually dies of starvation. About eighteen months later, the tomb is opened, and the skeletons are found. As someone tries to separate them, Quasimodo's bones turn to dust.

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Alice's Adventures in Wonderland

Lewis Carroll

1865-11-26

Children's literature, Fantasy, Speculative fiction, Absurdist fiction, Fiction

Chapter 1 – Down the Rabbit Hole: Alice is feeling bored while sitting on the riverbank with her sister, when she notices a talking, clothed White Rabbit with a pocket watch run past. She follows it down a rabbit hole when suddenly she falls a long way to a curious hall with many locked doors of all sizes. She finds a small key to a door too small for her to fit through, but through it she sees an attractive garden. She then discovers a bottle on a table labelled "DRINK ME", the contents of which cause her to shrink too small to reach the key which she has left on the table. A cake with "EAT ME" on it causes her to grow to such a tremendous size her head hits the ceiling. Chapter 2 – The Pool of Tears: Alice is unhappy and cries as her tears flood the hallway. After shrinking down again due to a fan she had picked up, Alice swims through her own tears and meets a Mouse, who is swimming as well. She tries to make small talk with him in elementary French (thinking he may be a French mouse) but her opening gambit "Où est ma chatte?" (that is "Where is my cat?") offends the mouse. Chapter 3 – The Caucus Race and a Long Tale: The sea of tears becomes crowded with other animals and birds that have been swept away by the rising waters. Alice and the other animals convene on the bank and the question among them is how to get dry again. The mouse gives them a very dry lecture on William the Conqueror. A Dodo decides that the best thing to dry them off would be a Caucus-Race, which consists of everyone running in a circle with no clear winner. Alice eventually frightens all the animals away, unwittingly, by talking about her (moderately ferocious) cat. Chapter 4 – The Rabbit Sends a Little Bill: The White Rabbit appears again in search of the Duchess's gloves and fan. Mistaking her for his maidservant, Mary Ann, he orders Alice to go into the house and retrieve them, but once she gets inside she starts growing. The horrified Rabbit orders his gardener, Bill the Lizard, to climb on the roof and go down the chimney. Outside, Alice hears the voices of animals that have gathered to gawk at her giant arm. The crowd hurls pebbles at her, which turn into little cakes. Alice eats them, and they reduce her again in size. Chapter 5 – Advice from a Caterpillar: Alice comes upon a mushroom and sitting on it is a blue Caterpillar smoking a hookah. The Caterpillar questions Alice and she admits to her current identity crisis, compounded by her inability to remember a poem. Before crawling away, the caterpillar tells Alice that one side of the mushroom will make her taller and the other side will make her shorter. She breaks off two pieces from the mushroom. One side makes her shrink smaller than ever, while another causes her neck to grow high into the trees, where a pigeon mistakes her for a serpent. With some effort, Alice brings herself back to her usual height. She stumbles upon a small estate and uses the mushroom to reach a more appropriate height. Chapter 6 – Pig and Pepper: A Fish-Footman has an invitation for the Duchess of the house, which he delivers to a Frog-Footman. Alice observes this transaction and, after a perplexing conversation with the frog, lets herself into the house. The Duchess's Cook is throwing dishes and making a soup that has too much pepper, which causes Alice, the Duchess, and her baby (but not the cook or grinning Cheshire Cat) to sneeze violently. Alice is given the baby by the Duchess and to her surprise, the baby turns into a pig. The Cheshire Cat appears in a tree, directing her to the March Hare's house. He disappears but his grin remains behind to float on its own in the air prompting Alice to remark that she has often seen a cat without a grin but never a grin without a cat. Chapter 7 – A Mad Tea-Party: Alice becomes a guest at a "mad" tea party along with the March Hare, the Hatter, and a very tired Dormouse who falls asleep frequently, only to be violently woken up moments later by the March Hare and the Hatter. The characters give Alice many riddles and stories, including the famous 'Why is a raven like a writing desk?'. The Hatter reveals that they have tea all day because Time has punished him by eternally standing still at 6 pm (tea time). Alice becomes insulted and tired of being bombarded with riddles and she leaves claiming that it was the stupidest tea party that she had ever been to. Chapter 8 – The Queen's Croquet Ground: Alice leaves the tea party and enters the garden where she comes upon three living playing cards painting the white roses on a rose tree red because the Queen of Hearts hates white roses. A procession of more cards, kings and queens and even the White Rabbit enters the garden. Alice then meets the King and Queen. The Queen, a figure difficult to please, introduces her trademark phrase "Off with his head!" which she utters at the slightest dissatisfaction with a subject. Alice is invited (or some might say ordered) to play a game of croquet with the Queen and the rest of her subjects but the game quickly descends into chaos. Live flamingos are used as mallets and hedgehogs as balls and Alice once again meets the Cheshire Cat. The Queen of Hearts then orders the Cat to be beheaded, only to have her executioner complain that this is impossible since the head is all that can be seen of him. Because the cat belongs to the Duchess, the Queen is prompted to release the Duchess from prison to resolve the matter. Chapter 9 – The Mock Turtle's Story: The Duchess is brought to the croquet ground at Alice's request. She ruminates on finding morals in everything around her. The Queen of Hearts dismisses her on the threat of execution and she introduces Alice to the Gryphon, who takes her to the Mock Turtle. The Mock Turtle is very sad, even though he has no sorrow. He tries to tell his story about how he used to be a real turtle in school, which the Gryphon interrupts so they can play a game. Chapter 10 – Lobster Quadrille: The Mock Turtle and the Gryphon dance to the Lobster Quadrille, while Alice recites (rather incorrectly) "'Tis the Voice of the Lobster". The Mock Turtle sings them "Beautiful Soup" during which the Gryphon drags Alice away for an impending trial. Chapter 11 – Who Stole the Tarts?: Alice attends a trial whereby the Knave of Hearts is accused of stealing the Queen's tarts. The jury is composed of various animals, including Bill the Lizard, the White Rabbit is the court's trumpeter, and the judge is the King of Hearts. During the proceedings, Alice finds that she is steadily growing larger. The dormouse scolds Alice and tells her she has no right to grow at such a rapid pace and take up all the air. Alice scoffs and calls the dormouse's accusation ridiculous because everyone grows and she can't help it. Meanwhile, witnesses at the trial include the Hatter, who displeases and frustrates the King through his indirect answers to the questioning, and the Duchess's cook. Chapter 12 – Alice's Evidence: Alice is then called up as a witness. She accidentally knocks over the jury box with the animals inside them and the King orders the animals be placed back into their seats before the trial continues. The King and Queen order Alice to be gone, citing Rule 42 ("All persons more than a mile high to leave the court"), but Alice disputes their judgement and refuses to leave. She argues with the King and Queen of Hearts over the ridiculous proceedings, eventually refusing to hold her tongue. The Queen shouts her familiar "Off with her head!" but Alice is unafraid, calling them out as just a pack of cards; just as they start to swarm over her. Alice's sister wakes her up for tea, brushing what turns out to be some leaves and not a shower of playing cards from Alice's face. Alice leaves her sister on the bank to imagine all the curious happenings for herself.

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Now Wait for Last Year

Philip K. Dick

1966

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy

Set during a war between the 'Starmen (inhabitants of the planet Lilistar) and the Reegs, Now Wait for Last Year is the story of Eric Sweetscent, an organ-transplant doctor who gets wrapped up in Earth-Lilistar politics. At the onset of the story, Sweetscent is the personal org-trans surgeon for Virgil Ackerman, the president of Tijuana Fur & Dye. Using an extraterrestrial amoeba which can imitate the cell-structure of anything it touches, TF&D had been the largest manufacturer of synthetic furs on the planet. But like all major corporations on Earth, TF&D has been requisitioned to produce for the war effort. Ackerman invites Sweetscent to "Wash-35", a recreation of his boyhood native Washington DC in a simulated 1935 and his vacation getaway on Mars, where he announces an ulterior motive in the retreat. Waiting for them when they arrive is a guest—Gino Molinari, the elected leader of Earth. Known as "the Mole", he is rumored to have the enigmatic ability to come back from the dead, and he has requested the services of Sweetscent. Ackerman gladly passes Sweetscent on to Molinari. Meanwhile, Sweetscent's wife, Kathy, tries JJ-180, a new hallucinogenic drug which proves to be highly toxic and addictive. The effects of JJ-180 are not clear at first, however, only hours off of it, Kathy finds herself unable to function and violently craving JJ-180 again. She is visited by 'Starmen who claim the Reegs invented JJ-180 as a chemical weapon against the 'Starmen and Terrans, also stating that there is no known cure for the drug's addiction and 'That's why we put you on it'. Kathy is now a slave to JJ-180. The 'Starmen inform Kathy of her husband's new position with Molinari and suspect the latter's possible defection to the Reegs. Kathy is promised more JJ-180 if she agrees to spy on her husband for Lilistar. Threatened with deportation, Kathy capitulates and agrees to their terms. Eventually, she takes a second dose of the drug as her ability to function becomes nearly impossible due the effects of the withdrawal. Jumping into a taxi-cab, both she and the cab are plunged back in time to the mid-20th century. As the effects of the drug wear off, they slowly make their way back to the present time, uncertain as to whether the past they visited was their own or an alternate one. An increasingly paranoid Kathy sets off to visit her husband. Under his new employer Eric Sweetscent is let in on certain State secrets: Molinari seems to have a psychosomatic condition that mirrors any illness or disease of anyone in his vicinity. The effects of this condition appear to be real, yet the Mole pulls through every time, always returning from the brink of death. Molinari, like everyone else, has realized that in siding with the 'Starmen Earth has doomed itself to the wrong side of a losing war. However, there does not seem to be any safe way of defecting to the Reegs, and Molinari fears that his deteriorating health will not instill confidence in the Terrans should the 'Starmen retaliate, as they are certain to do. Sweetscent is shown footage of a healthier, younger Molinari in uniform and is led to believe that an android look-alike of the President has been created for public appearances, a notion that does not account for the fact that there is at least one other Molinari on the premises, a bullet-ridden corpse that is being preserved for use in the event of certain possible future developments. Kathy arrives to inform her husband of her addiction, and in an effort to motivate him to find a cure she slips a pill of JJ-180 into his drink. Without enough time to be furious, Eric slips a year into the future of an alternate world where his colleagues inform him that he disappeared the day Kathy came to visit. Sweetscent also witnesses that in the new timeline Earth has sided with the Reegs and Lilistar has lost the war. Upon returning to the present of his own timeline, Sweetscent is eager to present this information to Molinari, who reveals that he too has been taking JJ-180, and that the effect is different for each user. Certain users are sent to the past, while others are sent to the future. Each trip is in an alternate universe, and therefore no one can effectively change their own past or future. However, aside from minor details, events in all observed universes seem to be moving in the same direction, and therefore, information obtained from one alternate world's future will most likely be applicable to another. In Molinari's case he slips sideways in time under the drug's influence and is able to pull alternate versions of his present self into his own timeline and then keep them there. Having learned the secret to Molinari's alter-aliases as well as confirming the feasibility of an alliance with the Reegs, Eric takes a larger dose of JJ-180 which propels him further into the future. While there, he obtains a cure for JJ-180's addiction, an item of wide accessibility in the future, as well as obtaining more information about the possible future of the war in his own timeline. He also gathers information as to the effects of JJ-180 on the brain as he is increasingly worried about Kathy's mental condition. Taking a fraction of a pill so as to not immediately return to his own time, Eric again ends up one year in his own future where the 'Starmen have occupied Earth after learning of the Terrans' defection to the Reegs. He is arrested by a 'Star patrol but saved by his future self, who informs him that Ackerman and the rest of the crew at TF&D have taken a stand against Lilistar, using Ackerman's getaway on Mars as their hideout. Now knowing the general future history of the next few years, Eric returns to his own time where his wife's mental condition is deteriorating every day. He resolves to check her into a clinic and is sent into deep reflection about the nature of their relationship. Feeling that he would be justified, he attempts to arrange an affair with a younger girl at Molinari's recommendation. However, he backs out of it and begins to slip into a deep depression while reflecting on his life. He goes to Mexico to purchase poison with which to commit suicide. Deciding against it at the last second, Eric watches as the 'Starmen begin their invasion of Earth. Deciding that he is destined to join Ackerman's resistance against the 'Starmen, Eric enters an automated cab bound for TF&D, asking it what it would do if its wife suffered from brain-damage without possibility of recovery (which Eric had confirmed by contacting his future self). After pointing out that robots do not marry, the cab hypothetically concludes that it would stay with her. Life, argues the cab, is made up of a series of circumstances, different for each person. To leave one's wife would be to say that he requires a uniquely easier set of circumstances than what has been provided. That reasoning, to the cab, was an irrational way of thinking. Eric agrees and decides to stay with his wife despite the challenges presented by her condition, and in the closing paragraph he is thereby commended by the cab for being a 'good man'. fr:En attendant l'année dernière it:Illusione di potere pl:A teraz zaczekaj na zeszły rok fi:Varro vain viime vuotta

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The Magician's Nephew

C. S. Lewis

1955

Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Children's literature

The story begins in London during the summer of 1900. Two children, Digory Kirke and Polly Plummer, meet while playing in the adjacent gardens of a row of terraced houses. They decide to explore the attic connecting the houses, but take the wrong door and surprise Digory's Uncle Andrew in his study. Uncle Andrew tricks Polly into touching a yellow magic ring, causing her to vanish. Then he explains to Digory that he has been dabbling in magic, and that the rings allow travel between one world and another. He persuades Digory, effectively through blackmail, to take another yellow ring to follow wherever Polly has gone, and two green rings so that both can return. Digory finds himself transported to a sleepy woodland with an almost narcotic effect; he finds Polly nearby. The woodland is filled with pools. Digory and Polly surmise that the world is not really a proper world at all but a "Wood between the Worlds," similar to the attic that links their rowhouses back in England, and that each pool leads to a separate universe. They decide to explore a different world before returning to England, and jump into one of the nearby pools. They then find themselves in a desolate abandoned city of the ancient world of Charn. Inside the ruined palace, they discover statuesque figures of Charn's former kings and queens, which degenerate from the fair and wise to the unhappy and cruel. They find a bell with a hammer, with these words: Make your choice, adventurous Stranger Strike the bell and bide the danger Or wonder, till it drives you mad What would have followed if you had Despite protests from Polly, Digory rings the bell. This awakens the last of the statues, a witch named Jadis, who, to avoid defeat in battle, had deliberately killed every living thing in Charn by speaking a "Deplorable Word." As the only survivor left in her world, she placed herself in an enchanted sleep that would only be broken by someone ringing the bell. The children realize Jadis's evil nature and attempt to flee, but she follows them back to England by clinging to them as they clutch their rings. In England, she dismisses Uncle Andrew as a mere dabbler in magic. She discovers that her magic does not work in England but she still has her strength. She enslaves Uncle Andrew and orders him to fetch her a chariot, so she can set about conquering Earth. They leave, and she returns standing atop a hansom with no driver, followed by a fire engine. There is a collision at the front door of the Kirke house, and police arrive. Jadis breaks off a rod from a nearby lamp-post and brandishes it as a weapon. Polly and Digory grab her and put on their magic rings to take her out of their world, dragging with them Uncle Andrew, Frank the cab-driver, and Frank's horse, since all were touching one another when Digory and Polly grabbed their rings. In the Wood between the Worlds they jump into a pool, hoping it leads back to Charn. Instead they stumble into a dark void that Jadis recognizes as a world not yet created. They then all witness the creation of a new world by the lion Aslan, who brings various entities, stars, plants, and animals, into existence as he sings. Jadis attempts to kill Aslan with the iron bar from the lamp-post, but it deflects harmlessly off of him and begins to sprout into a new lamp-post "tree." Jadis flees. Aslan gives some animals the power of speech, commanding them to use it for justice and merriment. Digory's uncle is frozen with fear and unable to communicate with the talking animals, who mistake him for a kind of tree. Aslan confronts Digory with his responsibility for bringing Jadis into his young world, and tells Digory he must atone by helping to protect Narnia from her evil. Aslan transforms the cabbie's horse into a winged horse named Fledge, and Digory and Polly fly on him to a garden high in the mountains. Digory's task is to take an apple from a tree in this garden, and plant it in Narnia. In the garden Digory finds a sign reading: Come in my gold gates or not at all Take of my fruit for others or forbear For those who steal or those who climb my wall Shall find their heart's desire and find despair Digory picks one of the apples for his mission, but has to resist temptation to eat one for himself after he smells the apples. As he prepares to leave he is shocked to see the witch Jadis. She has eaten one of the magic apples, thereby becoming immortal, but her face is now "deadly white;" Digory begins to understand what the last line in the sign means. She tempts Digory to either eat an apple himself and join her in immortality, or steal one back to Earth to heal his dying mother. Digory resists temptation, knowing that his mother would never condone theft. However the clincher comes when the Witch suggests he leave Polly behind, not knowing Polly can get away by her own ring. At this, Digory sees through the Witch's ploy. Foiled, the Witch departs for the North. Digory returns to Narnia with an apple, which is planted in Narnian soil. A new tree springs up, which Aslan says will repel the Witch for centuries to come. Aslan informs Digory that a stolen apple would have healed his mother, but at a terrible price: anyone who steals the apples gets their heart's desire, but it comes in a form that makes it unlikeable. In the case of the Witch, she now has her heart's desire for immortality, but it only means eternal misery because of her evil heart. Moreover, the magic apples are now a horror to her, which is why the tree repels her. With Aslan's permission, Digory then takes an apple from the new tree to heal his mother. Aslan promises the apple will now bring joy. Aslan returns Digory, Polly, and Uncle Andrew to England; Frank and his wife, Helen (transported from England by Aslan) stay to rule Narnia as its first King and Queen. Digory's apple restores his dying mother to health, and he and Polly remain lifelong friends. Uncle Andrew reforms and gives up magic but he still enjoys bragging about his adventures with the Witch on their tour of London. Digory plants the apple's core, together with Uncle Andrew's magic rings, in the back yard of his aunt's home in London. Years later the tree that grows from it blows down in a storm. Digory has its wood made into a wardrobe, thus linking the story to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, in which Digory has become the old professor in whose country house Lucy Pevensie finds the wardrobe and the way into Narnia.

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The Patchwork Girl of Oz

L. Frank Baum

1913

Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Children's literature

Ojo the Unlucky is a Munchkin boy who, devoted to life with his uncle Unc Nunkie in the wilderness but on the verge of starvation, goes to see a neighboring "magician" and old friend of Unc’s, Dr. Pipt. While there they see a demonstration of the Pipt-made Powder of Life, which animates any object it touches. Unc Nunkie and Dr. Pipt's wife are also the sufferers of the consequences of another of the Doctor's inventions, the Liquid of Petrifaction, which turns them into solid marble statues. The remainder of this book is Ojo's quest through Oz to retrieve the five components of an antidote to the Liquid: a six-leaved clover found only in the Emerald City, three hairs from the tip of a Woozy's tail, a gill (a quarter of a pint) of water from a dark well (one that remains untouched by natural light), a drop of oil from a live man's body, and the left wing of a yellow butterfly. With the help of the patchwork girl Scraps, Bungle the Glass Cat (another of Dr. Pipt's creations), the Woozy, Dorothy, the Shaggy Man, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Woodman, Ojo gathers all of these supplies but the left wing — the Tin Woodman will not allow any living thing to be killed, even to save another's life. The party returns to the Emerald City, where the Wizard of Oz (one of the few allowed to lawfully practice magic in Oz) restores Unc Nunkie and Dr. Pipt's wife. The story is also a growth process for Ojo; he learns that luck is not a matter of who you are or what you have, but what you do; he is renamed "Ojo the Lucky," and so he appears in the following Oz books.

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To Sail Beyond the Sunset

Robert A. Heinlein

1987

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction

The book is a memoir of Maureen Johnson Smith Long, mother, lover, and eventual wife of Lazarus Long. Maureen is ostensibly recording the events of the book while being held in a future prison, awaiting her uncertain fate, along with Pixel, the eponymous character of The Cat Who Walks Through Walls. Maureen, born on July 4, 1882, recounts her girlhood in Kansas City, young adulthood, discovery that her family is a member of the long-lived Howard Families (whose backstory is revealed in Methuselah's Children), marriage to Brian Smith, another member of that family, and her life until her accidental "death" in 1982. Maureen lives through, and gives her (sometimes contradictory) viewpoints on many events in other Heinlein stories, most notably the 1917 visit from the future by "Ted Bronson" (in actuality Lazarus Long), told from Long's point of view in Time Enough for Love, D. D. Harriman's space program from The Man Who Sold the Moon and the rolling roads from The Roads Must Roll. The adventures of Maureen are a series of sexual ones, starting with Heinlein describing her as a young girl who, having just had her first sexual intercourse, is examined by her father, a doctor, and finds herself desiring him sexually. Her sexual life story then continues featuring various boys, her husband, ministers, other women's husbands, boyfriends, swinging sessions, and the adult Lazarus Long/Theodore Bronson. Additionally, she continues a lifelong pursuit of her father sexually, encourages her husband to have sexual intercourse with their daughters, and accompanies him when he does; but forbids a son and daughter of hers from continuing an incestuous relationship, primarily for the sister's reluctance to share the brother with other women. All of these are set against a history lesson of an alternate 20th century in which a variety of social and philosophical commentary is delivered. She is eventually rescued by Lazarus Long and other characters drawn from various novels in the ship "Gay Deceiver" (from The Number of the Beast), and after rescuing her father from certain death in the Battle of Britain, is united with her descendants in a massive group marriage in the settlement of Boondock, on the planet Tertius. Maureen ends her memoir and the Lazarus Long saga with the phrase "And we all lived happily ever after".

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Double Star

Robert A. Heinlein

1956

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Fiction

The story, which is told in the first person, centers on down-and-out actor Lawrence Smith (stage name Lorenzo Smythe, a.k.a. "The Great Lorenzo"). A brilliant actor and mimic (or so we are told, by Smith himself), he is down to his last coin when a spaceman hires him to double for a public figure. It is only when he is on his way to Mars that he finds out how deeply he has been deceived: he will have to impersonate one of the most prominent politicians in the solar system (and one with whose views Smythe deeply disagrees): John Joseph Bonforte. Bonforte is the leader of the Expansionist coalition, currently out of office but with a good chance of changing that at the next general election. Bonforte has been kidnapped by his political opponents, and his aides want Smith to impersonate Bonforte while they try to find him. Bonforte is rescued, but he is in poor health due to the treatment inflicted on him during his imprisonment. This forces Smith to extend his performance, even to becoming temporary Supreme Minister and running in an election. (This is made plausible through Bonforte's extensive Farley Files.) The central political issue in the election is the granting of the vote to Martians in the human-dominated Solar System. Lorenzo shares the anti-Martian prejudice prevalent among large parts of Earth's population, but he is called upon to assume the persona of the most prominent advocate for Martian enfranchisement. Smith takes on not only Bonforte's appearance, but some aspects of his personality. At the moment of electoral victory, Bonforte dies of the aftereffects of his kidnapping, and Smythe realizes he has little choice but to assume the role for life. In a retrospective conclusion set twenty-five years later, Lorenzo has 'become' Bonforte, suppressing his own identity permanently. He has been generally successful and has carried forward Bonforte's ideals to the best of his ability. Penny (Bonforte's adoring secretary; now Smith/Bonforte's wife) says, "I never loved anyone else." At the end, Lorenzo looks back on his former life, including the prejudices he used to hold, commenting that they seem to him like they happened to someone else.

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Time for the Stars

Robert A. Heinlein

1956

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Children's literature, Fiction

The Long Range Foundation ("LRF") is a non-profit organization that funds expensive, long-term projects for the benefit of mankind that nobody else will touch. It has built a dozen exploratory starships (torchships) to search for habitable planets to colonize. The vessels can only gradually accelerate, and then merely to sub-light speeds, so the voyages will last many years. Therefore, each starship has a much larger than necessary crew to maintain a more stable, long-term shipboard society, as well as provide replacements for the inevitable deaths. It is found that some twins and triplets can communicate with each other telepathically. The process seems to be instantaneous and unweakened by distance, making it the only practical means of communication for ships traveling many light years away from Earth. Before announcing the discovery, the foundation first recruits as many of these people as it can. Testing shows that teenagers Tom and Pat Bartlett have this talent. Both are eager to sign up. Pat, the dominant twin, manipulates things so that he gets selected as the crewmember, leaving a fuming Tom to stay behind. However, Pat does not really want to leave and his subconscious engineers a convenient accident so that Tom has to take his place at the last minute. On board, Tom is pleased to find his uncle Steve, a military man, has arranged to get assigned to the same ship. The trip is fraught with problems as trivial as an annoying roommate and as serious as mutiny. The ship visits several star systems. Due to the nature of relativistic travel (see Twin paradox), the twin who remained behind ages faster and eventually the affinity between them is weakened to the point that they are no longer able to communicate easily. However, some of the spacefaring twins, including the protagonist, are able to connect with the descendants of the Earthbound twins. Tom works with his niece, then his grandniece and finally his great-grandniece. The last planet (Elysa) scouted proves to be particularly deadly. Unexpectedly intelligent and hostile natives capture and kill a large portion of the remaining crew, including the captain and Tom's uncle Major Steve Lucas. The reserve captain takes charge, but is unable to restore the morale of the devastated survivors. When he insists on continuing the mission rather than returning to Earth, the crew begins to consider mutiny. Shortly after he notifies Earth of the dire situation, they are surprised to hear a spaceship will rendezvous with them in less than a month and surmise it must be a more advanced LRF spaceship. Scientists on Earth have discovered faster-than-light travel, in part due to research into the nature of telepathy, and are collecting the remaining crews of the LRF torchships. The explorers return to an Earth they no longer recognize, and in most cases, no longer fit in. Tom, however, returns to marry his last telepathic partner, his own great-grandniece, who has been reading his mind since childhood.

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Citizen of the Galaxy

Robert A. Heinlein

1957

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction

Thorby is a young, defiant slave boy recently arrived on the planet Jubbul, where he is purchased by an old beggar, Baslim the Cripple, for a trivial sum and taken to the beggar's surprisingly well-furnished underground home. Thereafter Baslim treats the boy as a son, teaching him not only the trade of begging, but also mathematics, history, and several languages, and sends Thorby on errands all over the city, carefully passing along information and keeping track of the comings and goings of starships, so that Thorby realizes that his foster-father is gathering intelligence, particularly on the slave trade. In addition, Baslim has Thorby memorize a contingency plan and a message to deliver to one of five starship captains in the event of Baslim's arrest or death. When Baslim is captured and beheaded by the local authorities, Thorby and local innkeeper 'Mother Shaum' convey the message to Captain Krausa of the starship Sisu. Because the 'Free Trader' society to whom Krausa belongs owe a debt to Baslim for his release of one of their crews from a slave-trader, the captain takes Thorby aboard the Sisu at great risk to himself and his clan. Thorby is adopted by the captain (thereby gaining considerable shipboard social status) and adjusts to the insular, clannish, matriarchal culture of the traders. The advanced education provided by Baslim and the fast reflexes of youth make him an ideal fire controlman, in which position Thorby destroys a pirate craft. His immediate superior, a young woman named Mata, begins to view him as a suitable husband; but the customs of the Free Traders forbid this, and to avoid trouble she is transferred to another ship. Thorby is again transferred when against the wishes of his wife, the executive officer and head of the clan (who wants to use Thorby's connection to Baslim to enhance Sisu's prestige), the captain, obeying Baslim's last wish, entrusts the boy to a military cruiser and asks its captain to assist Thorby in finding his true place in society. In order to implement a background search without having to pay the immense cost, Thorby is enlisted in the military service of the Terran Hegemony, the dominant military power in the galaxy. Thorby is ultimately identified as Thor Bradley Rudbek, the long-lost heir of a very powerful family and a substantial shareholder in Rudbek and Associates, a large, sprawling interstellar business including one of the largest starship-manufacturing companies and the entire city of Rudbek (formerly Jackson Hole, Wyoming). In his absence, the business is run by a relative by marriage, "Uncle" John Weemsby, who encourages his stepdaughter Leda to guide Thorby in adjustment to his new situation while secretly scheming to block Thorby's growing interest and interference in the company. Thorby, investigating his parents' disappearance and his capture and sale by slavers, comes to suspect that his parents were eliminated to prevent the discovery that some portions of Rudbek and Associates were secretly profiting from the slave trade. When Weemsby quashes further investigation, Thorby seeks legal help and launches a proxy fight, which he unexpectedly wins when Leda votes her shares in his favor. He fires Weemsby and assumes full control of the firm. When Thorby realizes that it will take a lifetime to remove Rudbek and Associates from the slave trade, he reluctantly abandons his dream imitating Baslim as a member of the elite anti-slaver "X" Corps of the Hegemonic Guard. Knowing that "a person can't run out on his responsibilities", he resolves to fight the slave trade as the head of Rudbek and Associates.

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Stranger in a Strange Land

Robert A. Heinlein

1961-06-01

Science Fiction, Fiction

The story focuses on a human raised on Mars and his adaptation to, and understanding of, humans and their culture, which is portrayed as an amplified version of the consumerist and media-driven 20th-century United States. Protagonist Valentine Michael Smith is the son of astronauts of the first expedition to the planet Mars. Orphaned after the crew died, Smith was raised in the culture of the Martian natives, who possess full control over their minds and bodies (learned skills which Smith acquires). A second expedition some twenty years later brings Smith to Earth. Because he is heir to the fortunes of the entire exploration party, which includes several valuable inventions (most particularly his mother's Lyle Drive, which makes interplanetary travel economical), Smith becomes a political pawn in government struggles. Moreover, despite the existence of the Martians, under terrestrial law Mars was terra nullius, wherefore according to some interpretations of law, Smith could be considered to own the planet Mars itself. Because Smith is unaccustomed to the atmosphere and gravity of Earth, he is confined at Bethesda Hospital, where having never seen a human female, he is attended by male staff only. Seeing this restriction as a challenge, Nurse Gillian Boardman eludes guards to see Smith and in doing so inadvertently becomes his first female "water brother" by sharing a glass of water with him, considered a holy relationship by the standards of arid Mars. When Gillian tells reporter Ben Caxton about her experience with Smith, they attempt to counteract the government's lies about Smith. After Ben disappears at the behest of the World Government, Gillian persuades Smith to leave the hospital with her; but they are attacked by government agents. Smith discards the agents irretrievably into a fourth dimension, then is so shocked by Gillian's terrified reaction that he enters a semblance of catatonia. Gillian, remembering Ben's reference to Jubal Harshaw, a famous author who is also a physician and a lawyer, conveys Smith to the latter. Smith continues to demonstrate psychic abilities and superhuman intelligence coupled with a childlike naïveté. When Jubal tries to explain religion to him, Smith understands the concept of God only as "one who groks", which includes every extant organism. This leads him to express the Martian concept of life as the phrase "Thou art God", although he knows this is a bad translation. Many other human concepts such as war, clothing, and jealousy are strange to him, while the idea of an afterlife is a fact he takes for granted because the government on Mars is composed of "Old Ones", the spirits of Martians who have died. It is also customary for loved ones and friends to eat the bodies of the dead, in a spirit of Holy Communion. Eventually Harshaw arranges freedom for Smith and recognition that human law, which would have granted ownership of Mars to Smith, has no applicability to a planet already inhabited by intelligent life. Now free to travel, Smith becomes a celebrity and is feted by the elite of Earth. He investigates many religions, including the Fosterite Church of the New Revelation, a populist megachurch wherein sexuality, gambling, alcoholism, and similar are not considered sinful but encouraged, even within the church building. The church is organized in a complexity of initiatory levels; an outer circle, open to the public; a middle circle of ordinary members who support the church financially; and an inner circle of the "eternally saved" — attractive, highly-sexed men and women, who serve as clergy and recruit new members. The Church owns many politicians and takes violent action against those who oppose it. Smith also has a brief career as a magician in a carnival, where he and Gillian befriend the show's tattooed lady, an "eternally saved" Fosterite woman named Patricia Paiwonski. Eventually Smith begets a Martian-influenced "Church of All Worlds" combining elements of the Fosterite cult (especially the sexual aspects) with Western esotericism, whose members learn the Martian language and acquire psychokinetic abilities. The church is eventually besieged by Fosterites for practicing "blasphemy" and the church building destroyed; but Smith and his followers teleport to safety. Smith is arrested by the police, but escapes and returns to his followers, later explaining to Jubal that his gigantic fortune has been bequeathed to the Church. With it and their new abilities, Church members will be able to re-organize human societies and cultures. Eventually those who cannot or will not learn Smith's methods will die out, leaving Homo superior. Incidentally, this may save Earth from eventual destruction by the Martians, who we are told were responsible for the destruction of Planet V. Smith is killed by a mob raised against him by the Fosterites; but speaks briefly to Jubal from the afterlife, saving him from an attempted suicide after the horror of Smith's own death. Having consumed Smith's remains in keeping with his own wishes, Jubal and some of the Church members return to Jubal's home to re-create their former conditions. Meanwhile Smith re-appears in the afterlife to replace the Fosterites' eponymous founder, amid hints that Smith was an incarnation of the Archangel Michael.

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Glory Road

Robert A. Heinlein

1963

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Fiction, Novel

Evelyn Cyril "E.C." Gordon (also known as "Easy" and "Flash") has been recently discharged from an unnamed war in Southeast Asia. He is pondering what to do with his future and considers spending a year traveling in France. He is presented with a dilemma: follow up on a possible winning entry in the Irish Sweepstakes or respond to a newspaper ad which asks "Are you a coward?". He settles on the latter discovering it has been placed by Star, a stunningly gorgeous woman he had previously met on Île du Levant. Star informs him that he is the one to embark on a perilous quest to retrieve the Egg of the Phoenix. When she asks what to call him, he wants to suggest Scarface, referring to the scar on his face, but she stops him as he is saying "Oh, Scar..." and repeats this as "Oscar", and thus gives him his new name. Along with Rufo, her assistant, who appears to be a man in his fifties, they tread the "Glory Road" in swashbuckling style, slaying minotaurs, dragons, and other creatures. Shortly before the final quest for the Egg itself, Oscar and Star get married. The team then proceeds to enter the tower in which the Egg has been hidden, navigating a maze of illusions and optical tricks. Oscar scouts ahead and finds himself crossing swords with a fearsome foe who resembles Cyrano de Bergerac. He then defeats the final guardian of the Egg, known only as the "Never-Born", in a mental fight, and the party escapes with the Egg. While they arrive in the universe of Star, Rufo informs Oscar that Star is actually the empress of many worlds—and Rufo's grandmother. The Egg is a cybernetic device that contains the knowledge and experiences of most of her predecessors. Despite her youthful appearance, she is the mother of dozens of children, and has undergone special medical treatments that extend her life much longer than usual. She has Oscar unknowingly receive the same treatments. Initially, Oscar enjoys his new-found prestige and luxurious life as the husband of the empress of worlds across the Twenty Universes. However, as time goes on, he grows bored and feels out of place and useless. When he demands Star's professional judgment, she tells him that he must leave; her world has no place or need for a hero of his stature. It will be decades before she can complete the transfer of the knowledge held in the Egg, so he must go alone. He returns to Earth, but has difficulty readjusting to his own world, despite having brought great wealth along with him. He begins to doubt his own sanity and whether the adventure even happened. The story ends as he is contacted by Rufo to set up another trip on the Glory Road, which is, by this point, revealed as an allegory for Life's Adventure.

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The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

Robert A. Heinlein

1966

Science Fiction, Fantasy, Fiction

In 2075, underground colonies are scattered across the Moon (Luna), of whom most inhabitants (called "Loonies") are criminals, political exiles, or descendants thereof. The total population is about three million, with men outnumbering women 2:1, so that polyandry is the norm. Although Earth's Protector of the Lunar Colonies (called the "Warden") holds power, in practice there is little intervention in the loose Lunar society. HOLMES IV ("High-Optional, Logical, Multi-Evaluating Supervisor, Mark IV") is the Lunar Authority's master computer, having almost total control of Luna's machinery on the grounds that a single computer is cheaper than (though not as safe as) multiple independent systems. The story is narrated by Manuel Garcia "Mannie" O'Kelly-Davis, a computer technician who discovers that HOLMES IV has achieved self-awareness and has developed a sense of humor. Mannie names it "Mike" after Mycroft Holmes, brother of Sherlock Holmes, and they become friends. At the beginning of the story, Mannie, at Mike's request, places a recorder in an anti-Authority meeting. When the authorities raid the gathering, Mannie flees with Wyoming ("Wyoh") Knott, a statuesque blonde agitator, whom he introduces to Mike and with whom he goes to see his former teacher, the elderly Professor Bernardo de la Paz, who claims that Luna must stop exporting hydroponic wheat to Earth or its resources will be exhausted. In connection with this, Mike calculates that if no prevention occurs, there will be food riots in seven years and cannibalism in nine. Wyoh and the Professor decide to start a revolution, which Mannie is persuaded to join at Mike's behest. Mannie, Wyoh, and de la Paz thereafter form covert cells, protected by Mike, who adopts the persona of "Adam Selene", leader of the movement, and communicates via the telephone system. Mannie saves the life of Stuart Rene LaJoie, a rich, well-connected, sympathetic tourist, who begins turning public opinion on Earth in favor of lunar independence. When soldiers brought to quell the mounting unrest rape and kill a local young woman, then kill another who finds her body, rioting erupts. The Loonies overcome military opposition and overthrow the Lunar Authority's Protector, called "the Warden." When Earth tries to reclaim the colony, the revolutionaries plan to use in defense a smaller duplicate of the electromagnetic catapult formerly used to export wheat. Mike impersonates the Warden in messages to Earth, to give the revolution time to organize their work. Meanwhile, the Professor sets up an "Ad-Hoc Congress" to distract dissenters. When Earth finally learns the truth, Luna declares its independence on July 4, 2076, the 300th anniversary of the United States' Declaration of Independence. Mannie and the Professor go to Earth to plead Luna's case, where they are received in Agra by the Federated Nations, and embark on a world tour advertising the benefits of a free Luna, while urging various governments to build a catapult to transfer supplies to Luna in exchange for grain. Their proposals are rejected and they are imprisoned; but they are freed by Stuart LaJoie and returned, with him, to Luna. Public opinion on Earth has become fragmented, while on Luna the news of Mannie's arrest and the attempt to bribe him with the appointment of himself as Warden have unified the normally fractious Loonies. An election is held in which Mannie, Wyoh, and the Professor are elected (possibly by the intervention of Mike). (The title is an acronym for There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch!) The Federated Nations on Earth send armies to destroy the Lunar revolution; but these are vanquished, with great loss of life, by the revolutionaries. The rumor is circulated that Mike's alter-ego Adam Selene was among those killed; thus removing the need for him to appear in the flesh. When Mike launches rocks at sparsely-populated locations on Earth, warnings are released to the press detailing the times and locations of the bombings; but disbelieving people, as well as people on religious pilgrimages, travel to the sites and die. As a result, public opinion turns against the fledgling nation. A second attack destroys Mike's original catapult; but the Loonies have built a secondary smaller one in a secret location, and with Mannie acting as its on-site commander, the Loonies continue to attack Earth until it concedes Luna's independence. Professor Bernardo de la Paz, as leader of the nation, proclaims victory to the gathered crowds; but collapses and dies. Mannie takes control; but he and Wyoh eventually withdraw from politics altogether, and find that the new government falls short of their expectations. When Mannie tries to speak to Mike afterwards, the latter's replies indicate that the computer has lost its self-awareness and its human-like qualities, as a result either of damage suffered in the war or of shock undergone therein.

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I Will Fear No Evil

Robert A. Heinlein

1970

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction, Fiction

The story takes place about 2015 AD, against a background of an overpopulated Earth, whose dysfunctional society is clearly an attempt to extrapolate into the future the rapid social changes taking place in the U.S. during the 1960s. Ancient billionaire Johann Sebastian Bach Smith is dying, and wants to have his brain transplanted into a new body. Smith advertises an offer of a million dollars for the donation of a body from a brain-dead patient. Coincidentally, his beautiful young female secretary, Eunice Branca, is murdered, so her body is used, since Smith never thought to place any restriction on the sex of the donor. He is rechristened Joan Eunice Smith. For reasons never made clear, Eunice's personality continues to co-inhabit the body. (Whether Eunice's personality is real or a figment of Johann's imagination is addressed but never fully resolved in the novel.) Joan and Eunice agree never to reveal her continued existence, fearing that they would be judged insane and locked up. The two of them speculate that it may have something to do with the supposed ability of animals to remember things using RNA rather than the nervous system. (At the time the book was published, biologist J.V. McConnell had done a series of experiments in which he taught a behavior to flatworms, ground them up, and fed them to other flatworms, which supposedly exhibited the same behavior. McConnell's experiments were later discredited, but ideas drawn from them were used in science fiction by several authors, including Heinlein, Larry Niven, Joe Haldeman and Dean Koontz.) However, Joan and Eunice decide that this possible explanation is irrelevant, and near the end of the book, a third personality, that of Joan's new husband, joins them by means that can only be explained via delusion, religion or mysticism, not science.

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The Cat Who Walks Through Walls

Robert A. Heinlein

1985

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction

A writer seated at the best restaurant of the space habitat "Golden Rule" is approached by a man who urges him that "Tolliver must die" and is himself shot before the writer's eyes. The writer–Colonel Colin Campbell, living under a number of aliases including his pen name "Richard Ames"–is joined by a beautiful and sophisticated lady, Gwendolyn Novak, who helps him flee to Luna with a bonsai maple and a would-be murderer ("Bill"). After escaping to the moon, Gwen refers to the now ancient Lunar Revolt (as described in The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress) and Mike (Mycroft), the self-aware computer responsible for the uprising's victory, and claims to have been present during the revolt; despite her claim that she was only a girl at the time, Campbell grows suspicious, and learns that she is a rejuvenation of the revolution's most prominent female leader. Still pursued by assassins, Campbell and Novak are rescued by an organization known as the Time Corps under the leadership of Lazarus Long. After giving Campbell a new leg to replace one lost in combat years before, the Time Corps attempt to recruit Campbell for a special mission. Accepting only on Gwen's account, Campbell agrees to assist a team to retrieve the decommissioned Mike. Engaged in frequent time-travel, the Time Corps has been responsible for changing various events in the past, creating an alternate universe with every time-line they disrupt. Mike's assistance is needed in order to accurately predict the conditions and following events in each of the new universes created. Campbell's frequent would-be assassins are revealed to be members of contemporary agencies also engaged in time manipulation who, for unknown reasons, do not want to see Mike rescued by the Time Corps. During the mission, Gwen is grievously wounded and Campbell loses his foot again, though the Time Corps succeed in retrieving Mike. The story ends with Campbell talking into a recorder (presumably the source of the first-person medium through which the story is told) reflecting on the mission and his relationship with Gwen.

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Methuselah's Children

Robert A. Heinlein

1958

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction

The Howard Families derive from Ira Howard, who became rich in the California Gold Rush, but died young and childless. Fearing death, he left his money for the prolongation of human life, and the trustees of his will carried out his wishes by financially encouraging those with long-lived grandparents to marry and have children. While the Families (who, by the 22nd Century, have a life expectancy of 150 years) have kept their existence secret, with the enlightened human society established under The Covenant, they decide to reveal themselves. Society refuses to believe the Howard Families simply 'chose their ancestors wisely', instead insisting they have developed a method to extend life, and the Families are persecuted and interned. Though the beleaguered Administrator of the planet, Slayton Ford, is convinced the Families are telling the truth, he is helpless to control an increasingly irrational public and their efforts to force the Howard Families to reveal their "secret" or face execution. The eldest member of the Howard Families, Lazarus Long, realizes this as well, and proposes to the Administrator that he help the Families hijack the colony starship New Frontiers, so they can escape. In the process of escaping, they are driven too near the Sun by military spacecraft. When they are a few minutes away from overheating, Heinlein invokes a deus ex machina: it turns out that one member of the Families, Andrew Jackson Libby, (known as "Slipstick" Libby because he is a mathematical genius), has managed to invent a device that removes inertia from any mass to which it is attached. Libby applies the device, and instantaneously, New Frontiers is accelerated by light-pressure from the Sun to nearly the speed of light. The Families leave the Solar System, with the deposed Ford joining them at the last minute. The first planet they discover has humanoid inhabitants who seem friendly and advanced - however, they are merely domesticated animals belonging to the planet's true masters, indescribable beings of equally indescribable power. When humans prove incapable of similar domestication, they are expelled from the planet and sent to another world. The second planet is a lush environment with no predators and mild weather. Its inhabitants are part of a group mind, with the mental ability to manipulate the environment on the genetic and molecular level. They have no independent personalities; anyone who joins the group mind ceases to exist as a unique individual. This becomes evident when Mary Sperling, second oldest of the Families, who has always been fearful of death, joins the group mind in an attempt to become truly immortal. The Families are further horrified when the group mind, in a mistaken effort to be helpful, genetically modifies the first baby born on the planet into a new, alien form. Lazarus calls a meeting of the Families. He states that humans are what they are because they are individuals, and that they have no place on this world. The Families vote, and a majority of the Families decide to go back to Earth and claim their rights. Libby, with the help of the group mind, builds a new faster than light drive that will take them home in months instead of years. The Families return to the Solar System seventy-five years after their original departure. To their surprise they find that on Earth great longevity is commonplace. Spurred on by the belief that there was a specific "technique" to the Howards' longevity, Earth's scientists developed a series of treatments that extended lifespans to several centuries. The Families are now free to return, and are even welcomed due to their discovery of faster than light travel. Thanks to humanity's increased lifespan, the Solar System is overcrowded; faster than light travel will allow emigrants to ease the population explosion. Libby and Long decide to recruit other members of the Families, and explore space with the new drive.

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Life: A User's Manual

Georges Perec

1978

Between World War I and II, a tremendously wealthy Englishman, Bartlebooth (whose name combines two literary characters, Herman Melville's Bartleby and Valery Larbaud's Barnabooth), devises a plan that will both occupy the remainder of his life and spend his entire fortune. First, he spends 10 years learning to paint watercolors under the tutelage of Valène, who also becomes a resident of 11 Rue Simon-Crubellier. Then, he embarks on a 20-year trip around the world with his loyal servant Smautf (also a resident of 11 rue Simon-Crubellier), painting a watercolor of a different port roughly every two weeks for a total of 500 watercolors. Bartlebooth then sends each painting back to France, where the paper is glued to a support board, and a carefully selected craftsman named Gaspard Winckler (also a resident of 11 rue Simon-Crubellier) cuts it into a jigsaw puzzle. Upon his return, Bartlebooth spends his time solving each jigsaw, re-creating the scene. Each finished puzzle is treated to re-bind the paper with a special solution invented by Georges Morellet, another resident of 11 rue Simon-Crubellier. After the solution is applied, the wooden support is removed, and the painting is sent to the port where it was painted. Exactly 20 years to the day after it was painted, the painting is placed in a detergent solution until the colors dissolve, and the paper, blank except for the faint marks where it was cut and re-joined, is returned to Bartlebooth. Ultimately, there would be nothing to show for 50 years of work: the project would leave absolutely no mark on the world. Unfortunately for Bartlebooth, Winckler's puzzles become increasingly difficult and Bartlebooth himself becomes blind. A crazed art fanatic also intervenes in an attempt to stop Bartlebooth from destroying his art. Bartlebooth is forced to change his plans and have the watercolors burned in a furnace locally instead of couriered back to the sea, for fear of those involved in the task betraying him. By 1975, Bartlebooth is 16 months behind in his plans, and he dies while he is about to finish his 439th puzzle. Ironically, the last hole in the puzzle is in the shape of the letter X while the piece that he is holding is in the shape of the letter W.

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The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

L. Frank Baum

1900

Speculative fiction, Fantasy, Children's literature

Dorothy is a young orphaned girl raised by her Uncle Henry and Aunt Em in the bleak landscape of a Kansas farm. She has a little black dog Toto, who is her sole source of happiness on the dry, gray prairies. One day the farmhouse, with Dorothy and Toto inside, is caught up in a cyclone and deposited in a field in Munchkin Country, the eastern quadrant of the Land of Oz. The falling house kills the evil ruler of the Munchkins, the Wicked Witch of the East. The Good Witch of the North comes with the Munchkins to greet Dorothy and gives Dorothy the silver shoes (believed to have magical properties) that the Wicked Witch had been wearing when she was killed. In order to return to Kansas, the Good Witch of the North tells Dorothy that she will have to go to the "Emerald City" or "City of Emeralds" and ask the Wizard of Oz to help her. Before she leaves, the Good Witch of the North kisses her on the forehead, giving her magical protection from trouble. On her way down the road of yellow bricks, Dorothy frees the Scarecrow from the pole he is hanging on, restores the movements of the rusted Tin Woodman with an oil can, and encourages them and the Cowardly Lion to journey with her and Toto to the Emerald City. The Scarecrow wants to get a brain, the Tin Woodman a heart, and the Cowardly Lion, courage. All four of the travelers believe that the Wizard can solve their troubles. The party finds many adventures on their journey together, including overcoming obstacles such as narrow pieces of the yellow brick road, vicious Kalidahs, a river, and the Deadly Poppies. When the travelers arrive at the Emerald City, they are asked to wear green spectacles by the Guardian of the Gates as long as they remain in the city. The four are the first to ever successfully meet with the Wizard. When each traveler meets with the Wizard, he appears each time as someone or something different. To Dorothy, the Wizard is a giant head; the Scarecrow sees a beautiful woman; the Tin Woodman sees a ravenous beast; the Cowardly Lion sees a ball of fire. The Wizard agrees to help each of them—but only if one of them kills the Wicked Witch of the West who rules over the western Winkie Country. The Guardian of the Gates warns them that no one has ever managed to harm the very cunning and cruel Wicked Witch. As the friends travel across the Winkie Country, the Wicked Witch sees them coming and attempts various ways of killing them: * First, she sends her 40 great wolves to kill them. The Tin Woodman manages to kill them all. * Then the Wicked Witch of the West sends her 40 crows to peck their eyes out. The Scarecrow manages to kill them by grabbing them and breaking their necks. * Then the Wicked Witch summons a swarm of bees to sting them to death. Using the Scarecrow's extra straw, the others hide underneath them while the bees try to sting the Tin Woodman. * Then the Wicked Witch of the West uses her Winkie soldiers to attack them. They are scared off by the Cowardly Lion. * Using the power of the Golden Cap, the Wicked Witch of the West summons the Winged Monkeys to capture Dorothy, the Cowardly Lion and Toto, and to destroy the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman. When the Wicked Witch gains one of Dorothy's silver shoes by trickery, Dorothy in anger grabs a bucket of water and throws it on the Wicked Witch. To her shock, this causes the Witch to melt away, allowing Dorothy to recover the shoe. The Winkies rejoice at being freed of the witch's tyranny, and they help to reassemble the Scarecrow and the Tin Woodman. The Winkies love the Tin Woodman, and they ask him to become their ruler, which he agrees to do after helping Dorothy return to Kansas. Dorothy, after finding and learning how to use the Golden Cap, summons the Winged Monkeys to carry her and her companions back to the Emerald City. and the King of the Winged Monkeys tells how he and the other monkeys were bound by an enchantment to the cap by the sorceress Gayelette. When Dorothy and her friends meet the Wizard of Oz again, he tries to put them off. Toto accidentally tips over a screen in a corner of the throne room, revealing the Wizard to be an ordinary old man who had journeyed to Oz from Omaha long ago in a hot air balloon. The Wizard has been longing to return to his home and be in a circus again ever since. The Wizard provides the Scarecrow with a head full of bran, pins, and needles ("a lot of bran-new brains"), the Tin Woodman with a silk heart stuffed with sawdust, and the Cowardly Lion a potion of "courage", respectively. Because of their faith in the Wizard's power, these otherwise useless items provide a focus for their desires. In order to help Dorothy and Toto get home, the Wizard realizes that he will have to take them home with him in a new balloon, which he and Dorothy fashion from green silk. Revealing himself to the people of the Emerald City one last time, the Wizard appoints the Scarecrow, by virtue of his brains, to rule in his stead. Dorothy chases Toto after he runs after a kitten in the crowd, and before she can make it back to the balloon, the ropes break, leaving the Wizard to rise and float away alone. Dorothy turns to the Winged Monkeys to carry her and Toto home, but they cannot cross the desert surrounding Oz, subsequently wasting her second wish. The Soldier with the Green Whiskers advises that Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, may be able to send Dorothy and Toto home. Dorothy, Toto, the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, and the Cowardly Lion journey to Glinda's palace in the Quadling Country. Together they escape the Fighting Trees, tread carefully through the China Country where they meet Mr. Joker, and dodge the armless Hammer-Heads on their hill. The Cowardly Lion kills a giant spider who is terrorizing the animals in a forest and he agrees to return there to rule them after Dorothy returns to Kansas. Dorothy uses her third wish to fly over the Hammer-Heads' mountain, almost losing Toto in the process. At Glinda's palace, the travelers are greeted warmly, and it is revealed by Glinda that Dorothy had the power to go home all along. The Silver Shoes she wears can take her anywhere she wishes to go. She tearfully embraces her friends, all of whom will be returned, through Glinda's use of the Golden Cap, to their respective kingdoms: the Scarecrow to the Emerald City, the Tin Woodman to the Winkie Country, and the Cowardly Lion to the forest. Then she will give the Golden Cap to the King of the Winged Monkeys, so they will never be under its spell again. Having bid her friends farewell one final time, Dorothy knocks her heels together three times, and wishes to return home. When she opens her eyes, Dorothy and Toto have returned to Kansas to a joyful family reunion.

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King Ottokar's Sceptre

Hergé

1939

Tintin finds a lost briefcase and returns it to the owner, Professor Hector Alembick, who is a sigillographer, an expert on seals (as in the sort used to make state documents official). He shows Tintin his collection of seals, including one which belonged to the Syldavian King Ottokar IV. Tintin then discovers that he and Alembick are under surveillance by some strange men. Tintin's flat is even bombed in an attempt to kill him. Suspecting a Syldavian connection, Tintin offers to accompany Alembick to Syldavia via Frankfurt and Prague for research. On the plane Tintin begins to suspect his companion. The Alembick travelling with him does not smoke and doesn't seem to need the spectacles he wears – to the point that he can make out a pretty pattern made by the sheep in a field that the plane passed over – while the Alembick he first met did smoke and had poor eyesight. During a layover, Tintin fakes a fall and grabs Alembick's beard, thinking it is false and Alembick is an imposter. However, the beard proves to be real and Tintin decides to let the matter drop, assuming that Alembick simply gave up smoking and is better at long distances than close-up- but then, while flying over Syldavia, it is the pilot of the plane who opens a trap door and Tintin drops out, landing in a haywagon. Tintin has a hunch that a plot is afoot to steal the sceptre of King Ottokar IV. In Syldavia, the reigning King must possess the sceptre to rule or he will be forced to abdicate, a tradition established after a past king used the sceptre to defeat a would-be assassin. Every year he rides in a parade during St. Vladimir's Day carrying it, while the people sing the national anthem. Tintin succeeds in warning the reigning King Muskar XII, despite the efforts of the conspirators. He and the King rush to the royal treasure room to find Alembick, the royal photographer and some guards unconscious and the sceptre missing. Tintin's friends Thomson and Thompson are summoned to investigate but their theory on how the sceptre was stolen – the thief throwing the sceptre through the iron bars over the window – proves to be inaccurate. Later on, Tintin notices a spring cannon in a toy shop and this gives him the clue. Professor Alembick had asked for some photographs to be taken of the sceptre, but the camera was a spring cannon in disguise, which allowed him to 'shoot' the sceptre out of the castle through the window bars into a nearby forest. Searching the forest, Tintin spots the sceptre being found by agents of the neighbouring country, Borduria. Following them all the way to the border, he wrestles the sceptre from them. In the wallet of one of the thieves he discovers papers that show that the theft of the sceptre was just part of a major plan for a takeover of Syldavia by their long-time political rival, Borduria. Tintin steals a Me-109 from a Bordurian airfield (whose squadron is being kept ready to take part in the envisioned invasion of Syldavia) to fly it back to the King in time. He is shot down by the Syldavians who have naturally opened fire on an enemy aircraft violating their airspace. He manages to make the rest of the journey by foot. Meanwhile the Interior Minister informs the King that rumours have been spreading that the sceptre has been stolen and that there have been riots against local Bordurian businesses, acts which would justify a Bordurian takeover of the country. The King is about to abdicate when Snowy runs in with the sceptre (which had fallen out of Tintin's pocket). Tintin then gives the King the papers he took from the man who stole the sceptre. They prove that the plot was masterminded by Müsstler, leader of the Zyldav Zentral Revolutzionär Komitzät, a political organisation. The King takes action by having Müsstler and his associates arrested and the army mobilised along the Bordurian frontier. In response, the Bordurian leader pulls his own troops back from the border. The next day is St. Vladimir's Day and Tintin is made a Knight of the Order of the Golden Pelican, the first non-Syldavian to receive such an honour. Further inquiries by the authorities reveal that Professor Alembick is one of a pair of identical twins: Hector Alembick was kidnapped and replaced with his brother Alfred who left for Syldavia in his place. Tintin and Snowy return home by a flying boat with Thomson and Thompson, who suffer momentary panic when the aircraft appears to be falling into the sea at the end of the flight. The reader is treated to a rare "wink to the camera" from Tintin, who points out their error, and they laugh about it so much that they do indeed fall into the sea as they disembark.

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Wuthering Heights

Emily Brontë

1847-12

Gothic fiction, Fiction, Novel

In 1801, Mr. Lockwood, a rich man from the south of England, rents Thrushcross Grange in the north of England for peace and recuperation. Soon after his arrival, he visits his landlord, Mr. Heathcliff, who lives in the remote moorland farmhouse called "Wuthering Heights." He finds the inhabitants of Wuthering Heights to be a rather strange group: Mr. Heathcliff appears a gentleman but his mannerisms suggest otherwise; the reserved mistress of the house is in her mid-teens; and a young man appears to be one of the family, although he dresses and talks like a servant. Being snowed in, Mr. Lockwood stays the night and is shown to an unused chamber, where he finds books and graffiti from a former inhabitant of the farmhouse named Catherine. When he falls asleep, he has a nightmare in which he sees Catherine as a ghost trying to enter through the window. Heathcliff rushes to the room after hearing him yelling in fear. He believes Mr. Lockwood is telling the truth, and inspects the window, opening it in a futile attempt to let Catherine's spirit in from the cold. After nothing eventuates, Heathcliff shows Mr. Lockwood to his own bedroom, and returns to keep guard at the window. As soon as the sun rises, Mr. Lockwood is escorted back to Thrushcross Grange by Heathcliff. There, he asks his housekeeper, Nelly Dean, to tell him the story of the family from the Heights. Thirty years prior, the Earnshaw family lived at Wuthering Heights. The children of the family are the teenaged Hindley and his younger sister, Catherine. Mr. Earnshaw travels to Liverpool, where he finds a homeless dark-skinned boy whom he decides to adopt, naming him "Heathcliff." Hindley finds himself robbed of his father's affections and becomes bitterly jealous of Heathcliff. However, Catherine grows very attached to him. Soon, the two children spend hours on the moors together and hate every moment apart. Because of the domestic discord caused by Hindley's and Heathcliff's sibling rivalry, Hindley is eventually sent to college. However, he marries a woman named Frances and returns three years later, after Mr. Earnshaw dies. He becomes master of Wuthering Heights, and forces Heathcliff to become a servant instead of a member of the family. Several months after Hindley's return, Heathcliff and Catherine travel to Thrushcross Grange to spy on the Linton family. However, they are spotted and try to escape. Catherine, having been caught by a dog, is brought inside the Grange to have injuries tended to while Heathcliff is sent home. Catherine eventually returns to Wuthering Heights as a changed woman, looking and acting as a lady. She laughs at Heathcliff's unkempt appearance. When the Lintons visit the next day, Heathcliff dresses up to impress her. It fails when Edgar, one of the Linton children, argues with him. Heathcliff is locked in the attic, where Catherine later tries to comfort him. He swears vengeance on Hindley. In the summer of the next year, Frances gives birth to a son, Hareton, but she dies before the year is out. This leads Hindley to descend into a life of drunkenness and waste. Two years pass and Catherine has become close friends with Edgar, growing more distant from Heathcliff. One day in August, while Hindley is absent, Edgar comes to visit Catherine. She has an argument with Nelly, which then spreads to Edgar who tries to leave. Catherine stops him and, before long, they declare themselves lovers. Later, Catherine talks with Nelly, explaining that Edgar had asked her to marry him and she had accepted. She says that she does not really love Edgar but Heathcliff. Unfortunately she could never marry Heathcliff because of his lack of status and education. She therefore plans to marry Edgar and use that position to help raise Heathcliff's standing. Unfortunately, Heathcliff had overheard the first part about not being able to marry him and runs away, disappearing without a trace. After three years, Edgar and Catherine are married. Six months after the marriage, Heathcliff returns as a gentleman, having grown stronger and richer during his absence. Catherine is delighted to see him although Edgar is not so keen. Edgar's sister, Isabella, now eighteen, falls in love with Heathcliff, seeing him as a romantic hero. He despises her but encourages the infatuation, seeing it as a chance for revenge on Edgar. When he embraces Isabella one day at the Grange, there is an argument with Edgar which causes Catherine to lock herself in her room and fall ill. Heathcliff has been staying at the Heights, gambling with Hindley and teaching Hareton bad habits. Hindley is gradually losing his wealth, mortgaging the farmhouse to Heathcliff to repay his debts. While Catherine is ill, Heathcliff elopes with Isabella. The fugitives marry and return two months later to Wuthering Heights. Heathcliff hears that Catherine is ill and arranges with Nelly to visit her in secret. In the early hours of the day after their meeting, Catherine gives birth to her daughter, Cathy, and then dies. The day after Catherine's funeral, Isabella flees Heathcliff and escapes to the south of England where she eventually gives birth to Linton, Heathcliff's son. Hindley dies six months after Catherine. Heathcliff finds himself the master of Wuthering Heights and the guardian of Hareton. Twelve years later, Cathy has grown into a beautiful, high-spirited girl who has rarely passed outside the borders of the Grange. Edgar hears that Isabella is dying and leaves to pick up her son with the intention of adopting him. While he is gone, Cathy meets Hareton on the moors and learns of her cousin's and Wuthering Heights' existence. Edgar returns with Linton who is a weak and sickly boy. Although Cathy is attracted to him, Heathcliff wants his son with him and insists on having him taken to the Heights. Three years later, Nelly and Cathy are on the moors when they meet Heathcliff who takes them to Wuthering Heights to see Linton and Hareton. He has plans for Linton and Cathy to marry so that he will inherit Thrushcross Grange. Cathy and Linton begin a secret friendship. In August of the next year, while Edgar is very ill, Nelly and Cathy visit Wuthering Heights and are held captive by Heathcliff who wants to marry his son to Cathy and, at the same time, prevent her from returning to her father before he dies. After five days, Nelly is released and Cathy escapes with Linton's help just in time to see her father before he dies. With Heathcliff now the master of both Wuthering Heights and Thrushcross Grange, Cathy has no choice but to leave Nelly and to go and live with Heathcliff and Hareton. Linton dies soon afterwards and, although Hareton tries to be kind to her, she retreats into herself. This is the point of the story at which Lockwood arrives. After being ill with a cold for some time, Lockwood decides that he has had enough of the moors and travels to Wuthering Heights to inform Heathcliff that he is returning to the south. In September, eight months after leaving, Lockwood finds himself back in the area and decides to stay at Thrushcross Grange (since his tenancy is still valid until October). He finds that Nelly is now living at Wuthering Heights. He makes his way there and she fills in the rest of the story. Nelly had moved to the Heights soon after Lockwood left to replace the housekeeper who had departed. In March, Hareton had had an accident and been confined to the farmhouse. During this time, a friendship had developed between Cathy and Hareton. This had continued into April when Heathcliff began to act very strangely, seeing visions of Catherine. After not eating for four days, he was found dead in Catherine's room. He was buried next to Catherine. Lockwood departs but, before he leaves, he hears that Hareton and Cathy plan to marry on New Year's Day. Lockwood passes the graves of Catherine, Edgar and Heathcliff, pausing to contemplate the peaceful quiet of the moors.

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Jane Eyre

Charlotte Brontë

1847-10-16

Novel, Social criticism, Romance novel, Fiction, Bildungsroman, Gothic fiction

The novel begins with a ten-year-old orphan named Jane Eyre, who is living with her maternal uncle's family, the Reeds, as her uncle's dying wish. Jane's parents died of typhus. Jane’s aunt Sarah Reed does not like her and treats her worse than a servant and discourages and at times forbids her children from associating with her. She claims that Jane is not worthy of notice. She and her three children are abusive to Jane, physically and emotionally. She is unacceptably excluded from the family celebrations and had a doll to find solace in. One day Jane is locked in the red room, where her uncle died, and panics after seeing visions of him. She is finally rescued when she is allowed to attend Lowood School for Girls. Before she leaves, she stands up to Mrs. Reed and declares that she'll never call her "aunt" again, that she'd tell everyone at Lowood how cruel Mrs. Reed was to her, and says that Mrs. Reed and her daughter, Georgiana, are deceitful. John Reed, her son, is very rude and disrespectful, even to his own mother, who he sometimes had called "old girl", and his sisters. He treats Jane worse than the others do, and she hates him above all the others. Mr. Reed had been the only one in the Reed family to be kind to Jane. The servant Abbot is also always rude to Jane. The servant Bessie is sometimes scolding and sometimes nice. Jane likes Bessie the best. Jane arrives at Lowood Institution, a charity school, the head of which (Brocklehurst) has been told that she is deceitful. During an inspection, Jane accidentally breaks her slate, and Mr. Brocklehurst, the self-righteous clergyman who runs the school, brands her a liar and shames her before the entire assembly. Jane is comforted by her friend, Helen Burns. Miss Temple, a caring teacher, facilitates Jane's self-defense and writes to Mr. Lloyd, whose reply agrees with Jane's. Ultimately, Jane is publicly cleared of Mr. Brocklehurst's accusations. The eighty pupils at Lowood are subjected to cold rooms, poor meals, and thin clothing. Many students fall ill when a typhus epidemic strikes. Jane's friend Helen dies of consumption in her arms. When Mr. Brocklehurst's neglect and dishonesty are discovered, several benefactors erect a new building and conditions at the school improve dramatically. After six years as a student and two as a teacher, Jane decides to leave Lowood, like her friend and confidante Miss Temple. She advertises her services as a governess, and receives one reply. It is from Alice Fairfax, the housekeeper at Thornfield Hall. She takes the position, teaching Adele Varens, a young French girl. While Jane is walking one night to a nearby town, a horseman passes her. The horse slips on ice and throws the rider. She helps him to the horse. Later, back at the mansion she learns that this man is Edward Rochester, master of the house. He teases her, asking whether she bewitched his horse to make him fall. Adele is his ward, left in Mr. Rochester's care when her mother died. Mr. Rochester and Jane enjoy each other's company and spend many hours together. Odd things start to happen at the house, such as a strange laugh, a mysterious fire in Mr. Rochester's room, on which Jane throws water, and an attack on Rochester's house guest, Mr. Mason. Jane receives word that her aunt was calling for her, after being in much grief because her son has died. She returns to Gateshead and remains there for a month caring for her dying aunt. Mrs. Reed gives Jane a letter from Jane's paternal uncle, Mr John Eyre, asking for her to live with him. Mrs. Reed admits to telling her uncle that Jane had died of fever at Lowood. Soon after, Jane's aunt dies, and she returns to Thornfield. Jane begins to communicate to her uncle John Eyre. After returning to Thornfield, Jane broods over Mr. Rochester's impending marriage to Blanche Ingram. But on a midsummer evening, he proclaims his love for Jane and proposes. As she prepares for her wedding, Jane's forebodings arise when a strange, savage-looking woman sneaks into her room one night and rips her wedding veil in two. As with the previous mysterious events, Mr. Rochester attributes the incident to drunkenness on the part of Grace Poole, one of his servants. During the wedding ceremony, Mr. Mason and a lawyer declare that Mr. Rochester cannot marry because he is still married to Mr. Mason’s sister Bertha. Mr. Rochester admits this is true, but explains that his father tricked him into the marriage for her money. Once they were united, he discovered that she was rapidly descending into madness and eventually locked her away in Thornfield, hiring Grace Poole as a nurse to look after her. When Grace gets drunk, his wife escapes, and causes the strange happenings at Thornfield. Jane learns that her own letter to her uncle John Eyre, which happened to be seen by Mr. Mason, who knew John Eyre and was there, was how Mr. Mason found out about the bigamous marriage. Mr. Rochester asks Jane to go with him to the south of France, and live as husband and wife, even though they cannot be married. Refusing to go against her principles, and despite her love for him, Jane leaves Thornfield in the middle of the night. Jane travels through England using the little money she had saved. She accidentally leaves her bundle of possessions on a coach and has to sleep on the moor, trying to trade her scarf and gloves for food. Exhausted, she makes her way to the home of Diana and Mary Rivers, but is turned away by the housekeeper. She faints on the doorstep, preparing for her death. St. John Rivers, Diana and Mary's brother and a clergyman, saves her. After she regains her health, St. John finds her a teaching position at a nearby charity school. Jane becomes good friends with the sisters, but St. John remains reserved. The sisters leave for governess jobs and St. John becomes closer with Jane. St. John discovers Jane's true identity, and astounds her by showing her a letter stating that her uncle John Eyre has died and left her his entire fortune of 20,000 pounds (equivalent to over £1.3 million in 2011, calculated using the RPI). When Jane questions him further, St. John reveals that John is also his and his sisters' uncle. They had once hoped for a share of the inheritance, but have since resigned themselves to nothing. Jane, overjoyed by finding her family, insists on sharing the money equally with her cousins, and Diana and Mary come to Moor House to stay. Thinking she will make a suitable missionary's wife, St. John asks Jane to marry him and to go with him to India, not out of love, but out of duty. Jane initially accepts going to India, but rejects the marriage proposal, suggesting they travel as brother and sister. As soon as Jane's resolve against marriage to St. John begins to weaken, she mysteriously hears Mr. Rochester's voice calling her name. Jane then returns to Thornfield to find only blackened ruins. She learns that Mr. Rochester's wife set the house on fire and committed suicide by jumping from the roof. In his rescue attempts, Mr. Rochester lost a hand and his eyesight. Jane reunites with him, but he fears that she will be repulsed by his condition. When Jane assures him of her love and tells him that she will never leave him, Mr. Rochester again proposes and they are married. He eventually recovers enough sight to see their first-born son.

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Catch-22

Joseph Heller

1961-11-11

Anti-war, War novel, Absurdist fiction, Historical fiction, Satire, Black comedy

The development of the novel can be split into segments. The first (chapters 1–11) broadly follows the story fragmented between characters, but in a single chronological time in 1943. The second (chapters 12–20) flashes back to focus primarily on the "Great Big Siege of Bologna" before once again jumping to the chronological "present" of 1943 in the third part (chapter 21–25). The fourth (chapters 26–28) flashes back to the origins and growth of Milo's syndicate, with the fifth part (chapter 28–32) returning again to the narrative "present" but keeping to the same tone of the previous four. In the sixth and final part (chapter 32 on) while remaining in the "present" time the novel takes a much darker turn and spends the remaining chapters focusing on the serious and brutal nature of war and life in general. While the first five parts "sections" develop the novel in the present and through use of flash-backs, the novel significantly darkens in chapters 32–41. Previously the reader had been cushioned from experiencing the full horror of events, but now the events are laid bare, allowing the full effect to take place. The horror begins with the attack on the undefended Italian mountain village, with the following chapters involving despair (Doc Daneeka and the Chaplain), disappearance in combat (Orr and Clevinger), disappearance caused by the army (Dunbar) or death (Nately, McWatt, Mudd, Kid Sampson, Dobbs, Chief White Halfoat and Hungry Joe) of most of Yossarian's friends, culminating in the unspeakable horrors of Chapter 39, in particular the rape and murder of Michaela, who represents pure innocence. In Chapter 41, the full details of the gruesome death of Snowden are finally revealed. Despite this, the novel ends on an upbeat note with Yossarian learning of Orr's miraculous escape to Sweden and Yossarian's pledge to follow him there.

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Robinson Crusoe

Daniel Defoe

1719-04-25

Speculative fiction, Children's literature, Fiction, Adventure novel, Novel

Crusoe (the family name corrupted from the German name "Kreutznaer") sets sail from the Queen's Dock in Hull on a sea voyage in August 1651, against his parents' wishes, who want him to pursue a career, possibly in law. After a tumultuous journey where his ship is wrecked in a storm, his lust for the sea remains so strong that he sets out to sea again. This journey, too, ends in disaster as the ship is taken over by Salé pirates (the Salé Rovers) and Crusoe is enslaved by a Moor. Two years later, he escapes in a boat with a boy named Xury; a Captain of a Portuguese ship off the west coast of Africa rescues him. The ship is en route to Brazil. With the captain's help, Crusoe procures a plantation. Years later, Crusoe joins an expedition to bring slaves from Africa but he is shipwrecked in a storm about forty miles out to sea on an island (which he calls the Island of Despair) near the mouth of the Orinoco river on September 30, 1659. Only he and three animals, the captain's dog and two cats, survive the shipwreck. Overcoming his despair, he fetches arms, tools, and other supplies from the ship before it breaks apart and sinks. He builds a fenced-in habitat near a cave which he excavates. By making marks in a wooden cross, he creates a calendar. By using tools salvaged from the ship, and ones he makes himself, he hunts, grows barley and rice, dries grapes to make raisins, learns to make pottery, and raises goats. He also adopts a small parrot. He reads the Bible and becomes religious, thanking God for his fate in which nothing is missing but human society. More years pass and Crusoe discovers native cannibals, who occasionally visit the island to kill and eat prisoners. At first he plans to kill them for committing an abomination but later realizes he has no right to do so, as the cannibals do not knowingly commit a crime. He dreams of obtaining one or two servants by freeing some prisoners; when a prisoner escapes, Crusoe helps him, naming his new companion "Friday" after the day of the week he appeared. Crusoe then teaches him English and converts him to Christianity. After more natives arrive to partake in a cannibal feast, Crusoe and Friday kill most of the natives and save two prisoners. One is Friday's father and the other is a Spaniard, who informs Crusoe about other Spaniards shipwrecked on the mainland. A plan is devised wherein the Spaniard would return to the mainland with Friday's father and bring back the others, build a ship, and sail to a Spanish port. Before the Spaniards return, an English ship appears; mutineers have commandeered the vessel and intend to maroon their captain on the island. Crusoe and the ship's captain strike a deal in which Crusoe helps the captain and the loyal sailors retake the ship and leave the worst mutineers on the island. Before embarking for England, Crusoe shows the mutineers how he survived on the island and states that there will be more men coming. Crusoe leaves the island 19 December 1686 and arrives in England on 11 June 1687. He learns that his family believed him dead; as a result, he was left nothing in his father's will. Crusoe departs for Lisbon to reclaim the profits of his estate in Brazil, which has granted him much wealth. In conclusion, he transports his wealth overland to England to avoid travelling by sea. Friday accompanies him and, en route, they endure one last adventure together as they fight off famished wolves while crossing the Pyrenees.

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King Lear

William Shakespeare

King Lear, who is elderly and wants to retire from power, decides to divide his realm among his three daughters, and offers the largest share to the one who loves him best. Goneril and Regan both proclaim in fulsome terms that they love him more than anything in the world, which pleases him. For Cordelia, there is nothing to compare her love to, nor words to properly express it; she speaks honestly but bluntly, which infuriates him. In his anger he disinherits her, and divides the kingdom between Regan and Goneril. Kent objects to this unfair treatment. Lear is further enraged by Kent's protests, and banishes him from the country. Lear summons the Duke of Burgundy and the King of France, who have both proposed marriage to Cordelia. Learning that Cordelia has been disinherited, the Duke of Burgundy withdraws his suit, but the King of France is impressed by her honesty and marries her anyway. Lear announces he will live alternately with Goneril and Regan, and their husbands, the Dukes of Albany and Cornwall respectively. He reserves to himself a retinue of one hundred knights, to be supported by his daughters. Goneril and Regan speak privately, revealing that their declarations of love were fake, and they view Lear as an old and foolish man. Edmund resents his illegitimate status, and plots to dispose of his legitimate older brother Edgar. He tricks their father Gloucester with a forged letter, making him think Edgar plans to usurp the estate. Kent returns from exile in disguise under the name of Caius, and Lear hires him as a servant. Lear discovers that now that Goneril has power, she no longer respects him. She orders him to behave better and reduces his retinue. Enraged, Lear departs for Regan's home. The Fool mocks Lear's misfortune. Edmund fakes an attack by Edgar, and Gloucester is completely taken in. He disinherits Edgar and proclaims him an outlaw. Kent meets Oswald at Gloucester's home, quarrels with him, and is put in the stocks by Regan and her husband Cornwall. When Lear arrives, he objects, but Regan takes the same line as Goneril. Lear is enraged but impotent. Goneril arrives and echoes Regan. Lear yields completely to his rage. He rushes out into a storm to rant against his ungrateful daughters, accompanied by the mocking Fool. Kent later follows to protect him. Gloucester protests against Lear's mistreatment. Wandering on the heath after the storm, Lear meets Edgar, in the guise of a madman named Tom o' Bedlam. Edgar babbles madly while Lear denounces his daughters. Kent leads them all to shelter. Edmund betrays Gloucester to Cornwall, Regan, and Goneril. He shows a letter from his father to the King of France asking for help against them; and in fact a French army has landed in Britain. Gloucester is arrested, and Cornwall gouges out Gloucester's eyes. As he is doing so, a servant is overcome with rage by what he is witnessing and attacks Cornwall, mortally wounding him. Regan kills the servant, and tells Gloucester that Edmund betrayed him; then she turns him out to wander the heath too. Edgar, in his madman's guise, meets his blinded father on the heath. Gloucester, not recognising him, begs Tom to lead him to a cliff at Dover so that he may jump to his death. Goneril meets Edmund and discovers that she finds him more attractive than her honest husband Albany, whom she regards as cowardly. Albany has developed a conscience- he is disgusted by the sisters' treatment of Lear, and the mutilation of Gloucester, and denounces Goneril. Kent leads Lear to the French army, which is accompanied by Cordelia. But Lear is half-mad and terribly embarrassed by his earlier follies. Albany leads the British army to meet the French. Regan too is attracted to Edmund, and the two sisters fall out over him. Regan sends Oswald with love letters to Edmund and also tells Oswald to kill Gloucester if he sees him. Edgar pretends to lead Gloucester to a cliff, then changes his voice and tells Gloucester he has miraculously survived a great fall. Lear, who is now completely mad appears. Lear rants that the whole world is corrupt and runs off. Oswald tries to kill Gloucester but is killed by Edgar. In Oswald's pocket, Edgar finds a letter from Goneril to Edmund, telling him to kill Albany and marry her. Kent and Cordelia take charge of Lear, whose madness slowly passes. Regan, Goneril, Albany, and Edmund meet with their forces. Albany insists that they fight the French invaders but not harm Lear or Cordelia. The two sisters lust for Edmund, who has inadvertently made promises to both. He considers the dilemma and plots the deaths of Albany, Lear, and Cordelia. Edgar gives Goneril's letter to Albany. The armies meet in battle, the British defeat the French, and Lear and Cordelia are captured. Edmund sends them off with secret orders for execution. The victorious British leaders meet, and Regan now declares she will marry Edmund. But Albany exposes the intrigues of Edmund and Goneril and proclaims Edmund a traitor. Regan falls ill, and is escorted offstage, where she dies. It is stated that Goneril slipped poison into her food. Edmund defies Albany, who calls for a trial by combat. Edgar appears in his own clothes, and challenges Edmund to a duel. Edgar wounds Edmund fatally, though he does not die immediately. Albany confronts Goneril with the letter which was intended to be his death warrant; she flees in shame and rage. Edgar reveals himself, and reports that Gloucester died offstage from the shock and joy of learning that Edgar is alive, after Edgar revealed himself to his father. Offstage, Goneril, with all her evil plans thwarted, commits suicide. The dying Edmund decides, though he admits it is against his own character, to try and save Lear and Cordelia: however, he is too late. Cordelia has already been killed. Lear, however, has survived- he killed his daughter's murderer and escaped. Lear carries Cordelia's corpse in his arms. Lear now immediately recognizes Kent. Albany urges Lear to resume his throne, but like Gloucester, the trials Lear has been through have finally overwhelmed him, and he dies. Albany offers to share power between Kent and Edgar. Kent declines, with implications that he himself is not long for this world. It is unclear whether he intends to commit suicide out of his great regard for Lear, or feels he is going to die in the same manner as Lear and Gloucester. Finally, either Albany (in the Quarto version) or Edgar (in the Folio version) has the final speech, with the implication that he will now become king

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Clear and Present Danger

Tom Clancy

Thriller, Mystery, Children's literature, Fiction, Suspense

When U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Panache intercepts a yacht in the Caribbean Sea, the crew discovers two men cleaning up the vessel after murdering a man and his family. Through a mock execution, the Coast Guardsmen force the killers to confess to the crime. It is later learned that the murdered man was involved in a money laundering scheme for a drug cartel. Upon hearing of this atrocity, the President of the United States, who is running for re-election, feels compelled to take drastic measures against drug trafficking; his challenger, J. Robert Fowler, has rallied the public behind the administration's failures in the War on Drugs. The president initiates covert operations within Colombia and a step-up of operations against aircraft believed to be distributing narcotics. Aiding the president are U.S. National Security Advisor James Cutter, Central Intelligence Agency's Deputy Director of Operations Robert Ritter, and Director of Central Intelligence Arthur Moore. The plan consists of four operations: *Operation CAPER is the interception of mobile phone communications between cartel management. It is also the communications arm for SHOWBOAT and the light-fighters' only means of contact with the outside world. John Clark is dispatched with CAPER to coordinate the effort. *Operation EAGLE EYE uses F-15 Eagles to intercept drug flights. Several aircraft are destroyed and others are forced to land, where the pilots are interrogated for information regarding the cartel. *Operation SHOWBOAT involves four teams of soldiers infiltrating Colombia to stake-out airstrips used by drug-trafficking aircraft. They report departure times of aircraft, allowing the EAGLE EYE team to intercept them. Later the troops attack the airstrips and coca processing sites. The soldiers are seconded from U.S. light infantry battalions, and are all Hispanic in order to blend in with the local population. *Operation RECIPROCITY involves using ground-attack aircraft and laser-guided bombs to attack cartel locations discovered by intercepts. The bombs have a casing that will be consumed in the blast to give the impression of a car-bomb. Meanwhile, Félix Cortez, a former intelligence officer from Cuba employed by the cartel, feigns romantic interest in the aide of Emil Jacobs, the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The aide unknowingly reveals information regarding the date of Jacobs' official visit to the Attorney General of Colombia. Cortez delivers this information to the cartel, which orders Jacobs' assassination as retaliation for the U.S. seizure of cartel money. During his visit, Jacobs and several other Americans in his delegation are killed. Jack Ryan suspects the CIA's involvement in the situation in Colombia. As acting Deputy Director of the Intelligence Directorate, Ryan should be privy to most operations but he realizes he is being put out of the loop. After Robby Jackson, assigned to the Pentagon, makes an inquiry into activity in the region, Ryan goes to Moore to demand an explanation. Moore is evasive, yet orders Ryan to withhold information about Colombia from a congressional oversight committee. Cortez eventually uncovers the U.S. operations. He suppresses this information, planning to engineer a war within the cartel that will leave him in a position to seize power. Cortez orders mercenaries to hunt down the U.S. troops, and blackmails Cutter into ending SHOWBOAT, promising the intra-cartel war will slow drug imports to the States. Cutter's meeting with Cortez is shadowed by Ryan and Clark. Clark is outraged at Cutter's abandonment of the troops and, with Ryan, plans a rescue operation with personnel from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and U.S. Air Force. Clark makes radio contact with two of the SHOWBOAT teams, ordering them to alternate pickup points to await extraction. The other two teams encounter mercenaries and take casualties. Clark makes radio contact with some survivors of these remaining teams—which include Domingo Chavez—then flies into Colombia to retrieve them. Ryan uses an Air Force helicopter to pick up other survivors. Together, Clark and Ryan launch a raid on the cartel's command post, capturing Cortez and extracting the remaining ground team. Due to a hurricane and damage to the helicopter, they land on the deck of the Panache. Cortez is returned to Cuba, where he is a marked as a traitor. Upon being confronted by Clark with evidence of his treason, Cutter commits suicide. Ryan confronts the defiant president, informing him that despite his classifying the drug cartel as a "clear and present danger," Ryan must brief U.S. Congress over the illegal operations. After Ryan briefs the committee, the president deliberately loses the election in order to hide the covert operations and protect the honor of those involved. Ryan realizes that the president has more honor and dignity than he originally thought.

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Castle Rackrent

Maria Edgeworth

Fiction, Historical novel

The novel is set prior to the Constitution of 1782 and tells the story of four generations of Rackrent heirs through their steward, Thady Quirk. The heirs are: the dissipated spendthrift Sir Patrick O'Shaughlin, the litigious Sir Murtagh Rackrent, the cruel husband and gambling absentee Sir Kit Stopgap, and the generous but improvident Sir Condy Rackrent. Their sequential mismanagement of the estate is resolved through the machinations - and to the benefit - of the narrator's astute son, Jason Quirk.

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Julius Caesar

William Shakespeare

Marcus Brutus is Caesar's close friend and a Roman praetor. Brutus allows himself to be cajoled into joining a group of conspiring senators because of a growing suspicion—implanted by Caius Cassius—that Caesar intends to turn republican Rome into a monarchy under his own rule. The early scenes deal mainly with Brutus's arguments with Cassius and his struggle with his own conscience. The growing tide of public support soon turns Brutus against Caesar (this public support was actually faked; Cassius wrote letters to Brutus in different handwritings over the next month in order to get Brutus to join the conspiracy). A soothsayer warns Caesar to "beware the Ides of March," which he ignores, culminating in his assassination at the Capitol by the conspirators that day, despite being warned by the soothsayer and Artemidrous, one of Caesar's supporters at the entrance of the Capitol. Caesar's assassination is one of the most famous scenes of the play, occurring in Act 3 (the other is Mark Antony's oration "Friends, Romans, countrymen".) After ignoring the soothsayer as well as his wife's own premonitions, Caesar comes to the Senate. The conspirators create a superficial motive for the assassination by means of a petition brought by Metellus Cimber, pleading on behalf of his banished brother. As Caesar, predictably, rejects the petition, Casca grazes Caesar in the back of his neck, and the others follow in stabbing him; Brutus is last. At this point, Caesar utters the famous line "Et tu, Brute?" ("And you, Brutus?", i.e. "You too, Brutus?"). Shakespeare has him add, "Then fall, Caesar," suggesting that Caesar did not want to survive such treachery. The conspirators make clear that they committed this act for Rome, not for their own purposes and do not attempt to flee the scene. After Caesar's death, Brutus delivers an oration defending his actions, and for the moment, the crowd is on his side. However, Mark Antony, with a subtle and eloquent speech over Caesar's corpse—beginning with the much-quoted "Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears"—deftly turns public opinion against the assassins by manipulating the emotions of the common people, in contrast to the rational tone of Brutus's speech. Antony rouses the mob to drive the conspirators from Rome. Amid the violence, the innocent poet, Cinna, is confused with the conspirator Lucius Cinna and is murdered by the mob. The beginning of Act Four is marked by the quarrel scene, where Brutus attacks Cassius for soiling the noble act of regicide by accepting bribes ("Did not great Julius bleed for justice' sake? / What villain touch'd his body, that did stab, / And not for justice?") The two are reconciled; they prepare for war with Mark Antony and Caesar's adopted son, Octavian (Shakespeare's spelling: Octavius). That night, Caesar's ghost appears to Brutus with a warning of defeat ("thou shalt see me at Philippi"). At the battle, Cassius and Brutus knowing they will probably both die, smile their last smiles to each other and hold hands. During the battle, Cassius commits suicide after hearing of the capture of his best friend, Titinius. After Titinius, who wasn't really captured, sees Cassius's corpse, he commits suicide. However, Brutus wins that stage of the battle - but his victory is not conclusive. With a heavy heart, Brutus battles again the next day. He loses and commits suicide. The play ends with a tribute to Brutus by Antony, who proclaims that Brutus has remained "the noblest Roman of them all" because he was the only conspirator who acted for the good of Rome. There is then a small hint at the friction between Mark Antony and Octavius which will characterise another of Shakespeare's Roman plays, Antony and Cleopatra.

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Emma

Jane Austen

1815-12

Children's literature, Reference, Novel, Comedy of manners, Romance novel, Comedy, Fiction

Emma Woodhouse, aged 20 at the start of the novel, is a young, beautiful, witty, and privileged woman in Regency England. She lives on the fictional estate of Hartfield in Surrey in the village of Highbury with her elderly widowed father, a hypochondriac who is excessively concerned for the health and safety of his loved ones. Emma's friend and only critic is the gentlemanly George Knightley, her neighbour from the adjacent estate of Donwell, and the brother of her elder sister Isabella's husband, John. As the novel opens, Emma has just attended the wedding of Miss Taylor, her best friend and former governess. Having introduced Miss Taylor to her future husband, Mr. Weston, Emma takes credit for their marriage, and decides that she rather likes matchmaking. Against Mr. Knightley's advice, Emma forges ahead with her new interest, and tries to match her new friend Harriet Smith, a sweet, pretty, but none-too-bright parlour boarder of seventeen —described as "the natural daughter of somebody"— to Mr. Elton, the local vicar. Emma becomes convinced that Mr. Elton's constant attentions are a result of his attraction and growing love for Harriet. But before events can unfold as she plans, Emma must first persuade Harriet to refuse an advantageous marriage proposal. Her suitor is a respectable, educated, and well-spoken young gentleman farmer, Robert Martin, but Emma snobbishly decides he isn't good enough for Harriet. Against her own wishes, the easily-influenced Harriet rejects Mr. Martin. Emma's schemes go awry when Mr. Elton, a social climber, fancies Emma is in love with him and proposes to her. Emma's friends had suggested that Mr. Elton's attentions were really directed at her, but she had misread the signs. Emma, rather shocked and a bit insulted, tells Mr. Elton that she had thought him attached to Harriet; however Elton is outraged at the very idea of marrying the socially inferior Harriet. After Emma rejects Mr. Elton, he leaves for a while for a sojourn in Bath, and Harriet fancies herself heartbroken. Emma feels dreadful about misleading Harriet and resolves—briefly—to interfere less in people's lives. Mr. Elton, as Emma's misconceptions of his character melt away, reveals himself to be arrogant, resentful, and pompous. He soon returns from Bath with a pretentious, nouveau-riche wife who becomes part of Emma's social circle, though the two women soon loathe each other. The Eltons treat the still lovestruck Harriet deplorably, culminating with Mr Elton very publicly snubbing Harriet at a dance. Mr Knightley, who had until this moment refrained from dancing, gallantly steps in to partner Harriet, much to Emma's gratification. An interesting development is the arrival in the neighbourhood of the handsome and charming Frank Churchill, Mr. Weston's son, who had been given to his deceased wife's wealthy brother and his wife, the Churchills, to raise. Frank, who is now Mrs. Weston's stepson, and Emma have never met, but she has a long-standing interest in doing so. The whole neighborhood takes a fancy to him, with the partial exception of Mr. Knightley, who becomes uncharacteristically grumpy whenever his name is mentioned and suggests to Emma that while Frank is clever and engaging, he is also a rather shallow character. A third newcomer is the orphaned Jane Fairfax, the reserved, beautiful, and elegant niece of Emma's impoverished neighbour, the talkative Miss Bates, who lives with her deaf, widowed mother. Miss Bates is an aging spinster, well-meaning but increasingly poor; Emma strives to be polite and kind to her, but is irritated by her constant chattering. Jane, very gifted musically, is Miss Bates' pride and joy; Emma envies her talent, and although she has known Jane all her life has never warmed to her personally. Jane had lived with Miss Bates until she was nine, but Colonel Campbell, a friend of her father's, welcomed her into his own home, where she became fast friends with his daughter and received a first-rate education. But now Miss Campbell has married, and the accomplished but penniless Jane has returned to her Bates relations, ostensibly to regain her health and to prepare to earn her living as a governess. Emma is annoyed to find the entire neighborhood, including Mrs. Weston and Mr. Knightley, singing Jane's praises, but when Mrs. Elton, who fancies herself the new leader of Highbury society, patronizingly takes Jane under her wing and announces that she will find her the ideal governess post, Emma begins to feel some sympathy for Jane's predicament. Still, Emma sees something mysterious in Jane's sudden return to Highbury and imagines that Jane and Miss Campbell's husband, Mr. Dixon, were mutually attracted, and that is why she has come home instead of going to Ireland to visit them. She shares her suspicions with Frank, who had become acquainted with Jane and the Campbells when they met at a vacation spot a year earlier, and he apparently agrees with her. Suspicions are further fueled when a piano, sent by an anonymous benefactor, arrives for Jane. Emma tries to make herself fall in love with Frank largely because almost everyone seems to expect it. Frank appears to be courting Emma, and the two flirt and banter together in public, at parties, and on a day-trip to Box Hill, a local beauty spot. However, when his demanding and ailing aunt, Mrs. Churchill, summons Frank home, Emma discovers she does not miss her "lover" nearly as much as she expected and sets about plotting a match between him and Harriet, who seems to have finally gotten over Mr. Elton. Harriet breathlessly reports that Frank has "saved" her from a band of Gypsies, and seems to be confessing her admiration for him. Meanwhile, Mrs. Weston wonders if Emma's old friend Mr. Knightley has taken a fancy to Jane. Emma immediately dismisses that idea and protests that she does not want Mr. Knightley to marry anyone, and that her little nephew Henry must inherit Donwell, the Knightley family property. When Mr. Knightley scolds her for a thoughtless insult to Miss Bates, Emma is stunned and ashamed and tries to atone by going to visit Miss Bates. Mr. Knightley is surprised and deeply impressed by Emma's recognition of her wrongdoing, but this meaningful rapprochement is broken off when he announces he must leave for London to visit his brother. Meanwhile, Jane reportedly becomes ill, but refuses to see Emma or accept her gifts, and it is suddenly announced that she has accepted a governess position from one of Mrs. Elton's friends. On the heels of this comes word that Frank Churchill's aunt has died, and with it the astonishing news that Frank and Jane have been secretly engaged since they first met on holiday a year ago. They had been keeping the engagement quiet because they knew that Frank's imperious aunt would disapprove and likely disinherit him if he went through with the match. The strain of the clandestine relationship had been much harder on the conscientious Jane than the carefree Frank, and the two had quarreled bitterly; but now that his aunt has died, his easygoing uncle has already given his blessing. The engagement becomes public, the secrets behind Jane and Frank's behavior are revealed, and Emma is chagrined to discover that once again she has been so wrong about so much. Emma is certain that Harriet will be devastated by Frank's engagement, but Harriet reassures her that this is not the case. In fact, Harriet tells Emma, it is Mr. Knightley who has captured her heart, and she believes he returns her feelings. Emma is dumbstruck over what she at first thinks is the impropriety of the match, but as she faces her feelings of dismay and jealousy, she realizes in a flash that she has long been in love with Mr. Knightley herself. She is shattered to think that it may be too late and resolves to support her dear friends in whatever they do, even at the cost of her own broken heart. However, when Mr. Knightley hurries back to Highbury to console Emma over what he imagines to be the loss of Frank Churchill, she discovers that he is also in love with her. He proposes and she joyfully accepts. There is one more match to be made: With encouragement from Mr. Knightley, the farmer Robert Martin proposes again to Harriet, and this time she accepts. Jane and Emma reconcile and all misunderstandings are cleared up before Jane and Frank leave for their wedding and life with his uncle in Yorkshire. Emma and Mr. Knightley decide that after their marriage they will live with Emma's father at Hartfield to spare Mr. Woodhouse loneliness and distress. They seem headed for a union of "perfect happiness," to the great joy of their friends. Mrs. Weston gives birth to a baby girl, to the great satisfaction of Emma, who looks forward to introducing little Miss Weston to her young nephews.

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Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Roald Dahl

1964

Children's literature, Fantasy, Speculative fiction, Fiction

The story revolves around a poor young boy named Charlie Bucket born to a penniless, starving family. His two sets of grandparents reside in their children's dilapidated, tiny house and lead a bedridden existence, and Charlie is fascinated by the universally-celebrated candy factory located in his hometown owned by famous chocolatier Willy Wonka. His Grandpa Joe often narrates stories to him about the chocolate factory and about its mysterious proprietor, and the mysteries relating to the factory itself; how it had gone defunct for years until it mysteriously re-opened after Wonka's secret candy recipes had been discovered (albeit no employees are ever seen leaving the factory). Soon after, an article in the newspaper reveals that Willy Wonka has hidden a Golden Ticket in five chocolate bars being distributed to anonymous locations worldwide, and that the discovery of a Golden Ticket would grant the owner with passage into Willy Wonka's factory and a lifetime supply of confectionary. Charlie longs for chocolate to satisfy his hunger and to find a Golden Ticket himself, but his chances are slim (his father has recently lost his job, leaving the family all but destitute) and word on the discovery of the tickets keeps appearing in various news articles read by the Bucket family, each one discovered by far going to self-centered, bratty children: an obese, gluttonous boy named Augustus Gloop, a spoiled brat named Veruca Salt, a record-breaking gum chewer named Violet Beauregarde, and Mike Teavee, an aspiring gangster who is unhealthily obsessed with television. Charlie continues to grow in emaciation day by day, and is given money from his grandfather to buy chocolate and winds up discovering a 50p piece in the snow on his way to the corner store. Charlie uses the money to purchase two Wonka bars and winds up discovering a Golden Ticket in one of them, much to the shock of the shopkeeper and his family. Grandpa Joe even leaps out of bed in delight, offering to accompany Charlie to the factory. The following day, the discoverers of the Golden Tickets gather at Wonka's factory and are welcomed inside by the candy maker himself, who gives them a tour through his whimsically-designed factory. There, they learn of the unseen workers behind the re-opening of the factory; small, elfin beings known as Oompa-Loompas, who work in exchange for cocoa beans. However, while touring through a room designed as a meadow made of candy, Augustus Gloop is sucked through a pipe while drinking from a river of chocolate, resulting in his elimination from the competition. Not long afterward, Wonka unveils a product he's working on; chewing gum designed to replace any need for cooking or daily meals, which is stolen by Violet Beauregarde. However, because Wonka still needed to perfect the candy, she winds up inflating into a giant blueberry that must be juiced immediately, resulting in her elimination, and before long Veruca Salt is eliminated after falling down a garbage chute with her parents while trying to snatch one of Willy Wonka's specially-trained squirrels used for selecting the nuts baked into Wonka bars after being dismissed as a "bad nut." Soon, Wonka reveals one of his confectionary products in development; chocolate bars that can be transported to customers via television, which quickly captures Mike Teavee's interest. He escapes to test out the device on himself, only to be shrunken to an inch tall so that his original height must be restored by a taffy pull. The four eliminated children do receive their lifetime supplies of chocolate but leave the factory as: thin (Augustus), purple (Violet), covered in trash (Veruca), and overstretched to ten feet (Mike). Charlie, the only child who has not been eliminated, has won the contest and the legendary prize mentioned before as a result: the position of heir to Willy Wonka's factory. A thrilled Charlie rides in Wonka's glass flying elevator to deliver his family to the factory from their little home, no longer having to worry about poverty.

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Anne of Green Gables

Lucy Maud Montgomery

1908-06

Children's literature, Novel

Anne, a young orphan from fictional community of Bolingbroke, Nova Scotia, (based upon the real community of New London) is sent to Prince Edward Island after a childhood spent in strangers' homes and orphanages. Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert, siblings in their fifties and sixties, had decided to adopt a boy from the orphanage to help Matthew run their farm. They live at Green Gables, their Avonlea farmhouse on Prince Edward Island. Through a misunderstanding, the orphanage sends Anne Shirley. Anne is described as bright and quick, eager to please, talkative, and extremely imaginative. She has a pale face with freckles, and usually braids her red hair. When asked her name, Anne tells Marilla to call her Cordelia, which Marilla refuses; Anne insists that if she is to be called Anne, it must be spelled with an e, as that spelling is "so much more distinguished." Marilla at first says the girl must return to the orphanage, but after a few days, she decides to let her stay - she pities her and is curious about the girl. As a child of imagination, Anne takes much joy in life, and adapts quickly, thriving in the close-knit farming village. Her talkativeness initially drives the prim, duty-driven Marilla to distraction, although shy Matthew falls for her immediately. Anne says that they are 'kindred spirits'. The book recounts Anne's adventures in making a home: the country school, where she quickly excels in her studies; her friendship with Diana Barry (her best or "bosom friend" as Anne fondly calls her); her budding literary ambitions; and her rivalry with classmate Gilbert Blythe, who teases her about her red hair. For that he earned her instant hatred, although he apologizes many times. As for Anne, she realizes she feels sorry about the events and no longer hates Gilbert, but cannot bring herself to admit it; by the end of the book, they finally become friends. The book also follows Anne's adventures in quiet, old-fashioned Avonlea. Episodes include her play time with friends (Diana, Jane Andrews and Ruby Gillis), her run-ins with the unpleasant Pye sisters (Gertie and Josie), and domestic mishaps such as dyeing her hair green (while intending to dye it black), or accidentally getting Diana drunk (by giving her what she thinks is raspberry cordial but is currant wine). At sixteen, Anne goes to Queen's Academy to earn a teaching license, along with Gilbert, Ruby, Josie, Jane and several other students. She obtains her license in one year instead of the usual two, and wins the Avery Scholarship for the top student in English, which would allow her to pursue a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) degree at the fictional Redmond College (based on the real Dalhousie University) on the mainland in Nova Scotia. Near the end of the book, Matthew dies of a heart attack after learning that all of his and Marilla's money has been lost in a bank failure. Out of devotion to Marilla and Green Gables, Anne gives up the Avery Scholarship to stay at home and help Marilla, whose eyesight is diminishing. She plans to teach at the Carmody school, the nearest school available, and return to Green Gables on weekends. In an act of friendship, Gilbert Blythe gives up his teaching position at the Avonlea School to work at White Sands School instead. Anne can teach in Avonlea and stay at Green Gables all through the week. After this kind act, Anne and Gilbert's friendship is cemented, and Anne looks forward to the next "bend in the road."

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The Wasp Factory

Iain Banks

1984

Fiction, Novel

The 'Wasp Factory' of the title is a huge clock face encased in a glass box and salvaged from the local dump. Behind each of the 12 numerals is a trap which leads to a different ritual death (for example burning, crushing, or drowning in Frank's urine) for the wasp that Frank puts into the hole at the center within tubes. Frank believes the death 'chosen' by the wasp predicts something about the future. There are also Sacrifice Poles, upon which hang the bodies and heads of larger animals, such as seagulls, that Frank has killed and other sacred items. They define and 'protect' the borders of Frank's territory - the island upon which he lives with his father. Frank occupies himself with his rituals and maintaining an array of weapons (from his catapult, to pipe bombs and a crude flame thrower) to control the island. Frank is haunted by an accident which resulted in the loss of his genitalia, and resents others for his impotence, particularly women. He goes for long walks and runs patrolling the island, and occasionally gets drunk with his dwarf friend Jamie in the local pub. Other than that, Frank has almost no contact with the outside world and admits that he is afraid of it due to what it did to his brother, Eric. Frank's older brother Eric is in an insane asylum after being arrested for brutalizing the town's dogs. He escapes at the start of the novel and throughout the book rings Frank from phone boxes to inform Frank of his progress back to the island. Their conversations invariably end badly, with Eric exploding in fits of rage. Frank is confused as to whether or not he is looking forward to seeing Eric, but it is clear Frank loves his brother dearly. Frank remembers his older brother as being extremely sensitive before "the incident" that drove him mad: a tragic case of neglect in a hospital where Eric was a volunteer. While attempting to feed a smiling brain-damaged child with acalvaria, Eric realizes that the patient is unresponsive and only smiling off into space. He checks the usually-alert patient's head dressings to find the child's exposed brain tissue infested with day-old maggots. At the end of the novel, Eric's imminent return precipitates a series of events that result in Frank discovering male hormone drugs in his father's study. After confronting his father, Frank finds out that he is in fact female, and that when he thought he was castrated by a dog mauling at an early age, Frank's father had simply pumped her full of male hormones to see if she would transition from female to male. The father said it was simply "an experiment" and there are hints it was in order to distance himself from the women he felt had ruined his life.

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Espedair Street

Iain Banks

1987

Fiction, Novel

"Two days ago I decided to kill myself. I would walk and hitch and sail away from this dark city to the bright spaces of the wet west coast, and there throw myself into the tall, glittering seas beyond Iona (with its cargo of mouldering kings) to let the gulls and seals and tides have their way with my remains, and in my dying moments look forward to an encounter with Staffa’s six-sided columns and Fingal’s cave; or I might head south to Corryvrecken, to be spun inside the whirlpool and listen with my waterlogged deaf ears to its mile-wide voice ringing over the wave-race; or be borne north, to where the white sands sing and coral hides, pink-fingered and hard-soft, beneath the ocean swell, and the rampart cliffs climb thousand-foot above the seething acres of milky foam, rainbow-buttressed. Last night I changed my mind and decided to stay alive. Everything that follows is . . . just to try and explain." Weir starts out in the Ferguslie Park area of Paisley in a very underprivileged Catholic family. He is impressed by a group named Frozen Gold when he sees them live, in the Union of Paisley College of Technology, and auditions with them. Christine Brice likes his songs, and he joins the band. He ends up writing all their material and playing bass guitar, (after trying unsuccessfully to get them to change their name) as the band rises in the drug- and booze-fuelled rock and roll of the 1970s, assisted by A&R man Rick Tumber of ARC Records. In the Three Chimneys tour, singer Davey Balfour takes Dan along on an attempt to break an unofficial (and illegal) speed record for flying around three power station chimneys in Kent in his private plane. He reminisces about this from 1980s Glasgow, where he lives as a recluse in a Victorian folly (St Jutes), ever since the tragic events which led to the demise of the band. He is posing as his own caretaker, and his friends McCann and Wee Tommy know him as Jimmy Hay. After a memorable fight in a nightclub called 'Monty's', his real identity is revealed. He has grown uncomfortable with fame and wealth, and eventually visits his first girlfriend, Jean Webb, now living in Arisaig.

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The Crow Road

Iain Banks

1992

Mystery, Novel, Fiction, Suspense

This Bildungsroman is set in the fictional Argyll town of Gallanach (by its description, reminiscent of Oban but on the north east shore of Loch Crinan), the real village of Lochgair, and in Glasgow where Prentice McHoan lives. Prentice's uncle Rory has disappeared eight years previous while writing a book called The Crow Road. Prentice becomes obsessed with papers his uncle left behind and sets out to solve the mystery. Along the way he must cope with estrangement from his father, unrequited love, sibling rivalry, and failure at his studies. The estrangement from his father concerns belief in God or an afterlife. Prentice cannot accept a universe without some higher power, some purpose; he can't believe that people can just cease to exist when they die. His father dogmatically denies the existence of God, universal purpose, and the afterlife. A parallel plot is Prentice's gradual transition from an adolescent fixation on one young woman to a more mature love for another. Prentice's efforts to piece together Uncle Rory's fragmentary notes and the minimal clues surrounding his disappearance mirror his efforts to make sense of the world, love, and life in general. The narrative is also fragmentary, leaping days, months, years, or decades back and forth with little or no warning, so the reader must also piece things together.

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Consider Phlebas

Iain Banks

1987

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction

The Culture and the Idiran Empire are at war in a galaxy-spanning conflict. Horza, a mercenary capable of altering his appearance at will (a Changer), is assigned the task of retrieving a dispossessed Culture Mind by his Idiran handlers. The Mind, while fleeing attacking Idirans who consider its existence an abomination, has taken refuge on Schar's World, a Planet of the Dead. Planets of the Dead are nominally forbidden to both the Culture and the Idirans, being under the control of god-like incorporeal beings called Dra'Azon. Horza, however, was one of a group of Changers allowed to be on the planet as stewards and witnesses to its devastation. He may be the only person in the Galaxy, and certainly the only one known to the Idirans, who would be allowed to return. On the way to Schar's World he encounters, and joins, a band of mercenaries and pirates, led by Kraiklyn, on their ship, the Clear Air Turbulence. All the while he is doggedly pursued by a Culture Special Circumstances agent, Perosteck Balveda. The Culture also realizes that Horza is the key to getting to Schar's World and retrieving the Mind. Their plan is to place an agent with him and hope that the agent can get to the Mind first and somehow leave with it. The plot takes many digressions on the way to the denouement. As the book opens, Horza is about to die an extremely unpleasant death after killing and impersonating a member of the gerontocracy on a world not yet part of the Culture. Here he meets Balveda for the first time. He is rescued by the Idirans and given his mission to find the Culture Mind, but the Idiran ship on which he is travelling is soon captured by a Culture ship. Drifting in an escape suit, he is picked up by an independent ship, the Clear Air Turbulence, crewed by a Free Company of mercenaries, and he has to fight and kill one of them (while still in the form of a very old man) in order to prevent them dumping him back into space. Horza soon resolves to take over the ship by replacing the Captain, Kraiklyn, who leads them on some disastrous pirate raids which kill several of the crew. The first raid backfires because the team is unaware that the temple they plan to rob has been built of laser-reflecting crystal, which turns their beams back on themselves. The next raid takes place on the Orbital Vavatch, a massive artificial "ringworld" 14 million kilometres in diameter, which the Culture is about to destroy to prevent the Idirans taking it over. The crew lands on an abandoned Megaliner cruising the Vavatch ocean, hoping to salvage its powerful laser weapons before the Orbital is destroyed, but one of the crew is killed soon after landing because he missed the briefing warning them that their antigravity devices would not work there, and more die when the ship crashes into a massive ice wall, which Kraiklyn had mistaken for a cloud bank, although Horza later discovers that Kraiklyn and several others managed to escape. Horza flees the disaster in the damaged CAT shuttle, but it crashes into the sea near an isolated island, killing the pilot. There he is taken prisoner by a bizarre cult, led by a monstrously obese homicidal cannibal, whose followers subsist on food that has been cooked to remove almost all nutritive value and mixed with effluent. Horza escapes his impending sacrifice by killing the cult leader and his henchman with his poisoned fingernails and teeth, and eventually makes his way to the main city on Vavatch to find Kraiklyn. Having now changed his appearance to mimic that of the CAT captain, Horza witnesses a game of "Damage", which Kraiklyn has joined in the hopes of winning enough to make up the losses from his foolhardy expeditions with the crew. Damage is a card game enhanced with psychological and emotional pressure by direct mind-to-mind contact, where the "tokens" of play are actual living beings who are killed when a player loses a round. The game is illegal and only played in places where the normal order is breaking down, as in the case of Vavatch, which is being evacuated. Kraiklyn is wiped out of the game, and Horza then follows him on his way back to his ship, kills him and returns to the CAT. There, to his dismay, he is introduced to the newest crew member - although disguised, he immediately recognises her as Perosteck Balveda. Just as Horza immobilises her with a stun gun, Culture agents outside try to capture the ship. Horza manages to lift off and takes the Clear Air Turbulence on a wild ride through the massive spaces of the ex-Culture GSV which is carrying out the evacuation, and they escape into space after shaking off their Culture pursuers, although a Culture drone, Unaha-Closp, is also trapped on the escaping ship and becomes a reluctant member of the team. As the fugitives warp away from Vavatch, they see the Orbital destroyed by the Culture warships. Balveda, now exposed as a Culture agent, in turn exposes Horza; seeing no reason to continue his deception, he instead recruits the remnants of the crew to carry out his mission. The final chapters are action-packed. Horza and his crew land on Schar's World and go in search for the Mind in the labyrinthine Command System, a vast subterranean complex built as a nuclear warfare command centre (ultimately, though, it was germ warfare which wiped out all life on the Planet of the Dead). They soon discover that the Mind is also being hunted by a pair of Idiran soldiers, survivors of a larger commando group, who have killed all the Changers stationed on the planet, and who regard Horza and his crew as enemies, having no knowledge of the Changers' alliance with the Idirans. Horza has kept Balveda alive, possibly as a hostage, and she goes along with the mission, awaiting her chance to swing the outcome in the Culture's favour. Horza's situation is further complicated when his crewmate Yalson reveals that she is pregnant to him. The Free Company encounter the Idirans in one of the Command System stations but after an intense firefight, they apparently kill one and manage to capture the other. After tracking the Mind to another station, the drone Unaha-Closp discovers it hiding in the reactor car of a Command System train, but while the team are distracted, the captured Idiran, Xoxarle, frees itself, kills the guard and sets an ambush for the others. Meanwhile, the second Idiran, who was mortally wounded but not killed, has managed to set one of the trains for a collision course, and as it smashes into the station, Xoxarle springs his ambush, and Yalson is killed. The enraged Horza pursues Xoxarle, who catches Balveda and leaves her for dead, although she is saved by Horza. In the climactic fight, Horza is overwhelmed, but thanks to the combined action of the drone and Balveda, Xoxarle is finally killed. Although the Mind has been rescued the cost has been terrible - all the crew of the Clear Air Turbulence have been killed, the drone is severely damaged, and the fatally wounded Horza dies just as Balveda gets him back to the surface.

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Inversions

Iain Banks

1998

Science Fiction, Speculative fiction

The book takes place on a fictional planet based on late-Middle Ages Europe. It alternates chapter-by-chapter between two concurrent storylines. The first storyline is presented as a written account from Oelph, publicly a doctor's assistant, but privately a spy for an individual identified only as "Master", to whom much of the account is addressed. Oelph is the assistant to Vosill, the personal doctor to King Quience of Haspidus and a woman. The latter is unheard of in the patriarchal kingdom, and is tolerated only because Vosill claims citizenship in the far-off country of Drezen. The King himself is appreciative of her and her talents, but nonetheless her elevated position in defiance of the kingdom's social mores inspires hostility among others of the court. Oelph's account follows Vosill as she attends to the King regularly, as well as more charitable ministrations to the impoverished and those in need. Her methods are unconventional by kingdom standards, for example forgoing the use of leeches and instead using alcohol to "[kill] the ill humours which can infect a wound," but are more often than not successful. This only serves to inspire more distrust amongst her detractors, notably including a number of Dukes as well as the King's Guard Commander, Adlain. On this topic, Oelph includes a transcript he claims to have found in Vosill's journal, purported to be an exchange between Duke Walen and Adlain in which they make an agreement, "should it become necessary", to covertly kidnap the lady doctor and have Nolieti, the King's chief torturer, "put her to the question." Oelph notes that while the transcript appears to have been obtained under impossible circumstances, he somehow does not doubt its veracity. While Vosill attends to the King, Nolieti's is murdered, nearly decapitated, presumably by his assistant Unoure. Vosill examines the body and determines that Unoure could not have killed his master, but her explanation is disregarded. Unoure is captured, but before he can be questioned he is found in his cell dead from a cut throat, apparently self-inflicted. Following this account Oelph includes another found transcript, this time between Walen and Duke Quettil, though Walen is unable to obtain Quettil's agreement for the use of Ralinge, his own chief torturer, in Walen's kidnapping plan. Some days later at a masked ball Walen is found murdered, this time by a stab to the heart. The Duke's murder disquiets much of the royal house, as it occurred in a room no one entered or left. Resentment towards Vosill continues to build, particularly after King Quience begins implementing somewhat radical reforms, such as permitting commoners to own farmland without the oversight of a noble, reforms which Vosill has discussed with the King publicly and at length. Following these reforms Vosill confesses to the King that she loves him, a sentiment he rebuffs, and further hurts her when he states that he prefers "pretty, dainty, delicate women who [have] no brains." Oelph finds her after this, drunk, and hints at his own feelings of love towards her; she rebuffs him as well, albeit gently. Some days later Vosill receives a note from Adlain, asking her to meet him and two other Dukes elsewhere in the castle. She leaves alone, but Oelph opts to follow her in secret; he arrives in time to see her stumble across the body of a murdered Duke, stabbed with one of her scalpels, and catches a glimpse of the real murderer fleeing the room. Vosill and Oelph are almost immediately taken into custody by guards and delivered to Ralinge, who binds the two to separately and then strips, intending to rape Vosill. The woman issues what sounds to Oelph like commands, albeit in a language he does not recognize even partially. Oelph's eyes are closed at this point, and in his narrative he is unable to adequately describe what he hears next, other than an impression of wind and metal. When he opens his eyes he finds Ralinge and his assistants dead, dispatched bloodily, and Vosill free and in the process of removing his bindings, no indication of how she was freed. Later, she claims that Oelph fell unconscious and the three men fought over who would rape her first, though she indicates to him that this is what he "should" remember. The two are taken from the torturer's chamber shortly thereafter, as the King has abruptly taken ill and appears to be dying. Vosill is able to cure King Quience's condition, and is there to witness as the conspiracy against her is revealed to the King, inadvertently, when news of Ralinge's death reaches the conspirators: Commander Adlain and Dukes Quettil and Ulresile. Ultimately the blame is publicly taken by Ulresile, who escapes with being exiled for several months; the King makes it clear that further plots against the doctor will not be tolerated. Because Oelph is not present for these events, his account comes second-hand from his master, revealed to be Guard Commander Adlain. Vosill requests the King release her from her duties, which he does. She leaves just a few days later on a ship for Drezen, and is seen off at the dock by Oelph. Though he tries, he cannot bring himself to bluntly declare his love for her before she boards. The ship leaves sometime later, Vosill nowhere to be seen on board. The second, interleaved storyline is told by an initially unnamed narrator, remaining unnamed so as to provide a neutral context for the narrative. The story focuses on DeWar, bodyguard to General UrLeyn, the Prime Protector of the Protectorate of Tassasen. Protector UrLeyn is the leader of Tassasen, having killed the previous monarch in a revolt; subsequently he eliminated official terms such as "King" and "Empire" within Tassasen. At the beginning of the story the Protectorate is fast approaching a war with the neighboring land of Ladenscion, led by barons who initially supported UrLeyn's revolution but now intend to establish themselves as independent. DeWar is the sometimes-confidant of UrLeyn, but the bodyguard also maintains a friendly, conversational relationship with Perrund, a member of the Tassasen harem. Perrund was once the Protector's prized concubine, which changed following an assassination attempt on UrLeyn; Perrund shielded the Protector with her body, saving his life at the cost of crippling her left arm. Though no longer as prized as a concubine, Perrund is highly regarded by UrLeyn, DeWar, and most of Tassasen society. DeWar in particular finds her easy to confide in, and spends much of his off-time playing board games with her while the two tell each other stories. DeWar is on high alert as the conflict with Ladenscion approaches, believing that someone within the court may be a traitor. An attempt is made on UrLeyn's life by an assassin disguised as an ambassador, though DeWar anticipates the threat and kills the man before he can succeed. Nonetheless, this act only reinforces DeWar's fears of a traitor. A surprising, unwelcome turn comes when UrLeyn's young son, Lattens, has a seizure and subsequently falls ill. While the boy slowly recovers, DeWar tells him stories of a "magical land" called Lavishia, a place where "every man was a king, every woman a queen". Eventually the boy recovers, and UrLeyn and his bodyguard depart for the front lines, where the war with Ladenscion is flagging. However, no sooner they are there than word arrives that Lattens has fallen ill again, prompting a distraught UrLeyn to rush back to the castle. While DeWar is gone, Perrund tells Lattens a story about a girl named Dawn, who spent most of her life locked in a basement by her cruel family and was eventually rescued by a traveling circus. When he returns, Perrund tells DeWar about the story, then tells him it was a shadow of the real story: her story. Rather than her parents locking her in the basement to be cruel, they locked her in to hide her from Imperial soldiers—high-ranking men of the former King's regime. Rather than being rescued, the soldiers found her, raped her, her mother and her sisters, and then forced her to watch as they murdered her father and brothers. The soldiers were eventually killed, but Perrund still feels she is now dead inside. DeWar attempts to in some way comfort her, but she quickly demands he return her to the harem. Lattens' condition continues to worsen, causing UrLeyn to act more and more erratically, spending less time focusing on the war and more time at his son's bedside. The Protector goes so far as to bar all visitors to his chambers, and even prohibits DeWar from speaking to him unless he is spoken to. His only real contact is with Perrund, who spends most nights holding UrLeyn as he cries himself to sleep. DeWar enlists Perrund's help in focusing UrLeyn on the war, but to no success. An epiphany strikes DeWar when he finds he has drooled on his pillow in his sleep, and he proceeds to Lattens' room. A guard restrains the boy's nurse while DeWar examines his comforter, finding it has been soaked in an unknown fluid, presumably poison. Under threat of death the nurse reveals who has been orchestrating the poisoning: Perrund. DeWar storms into the harem chambers, intent on revealing the conspiracy to UrLeyn, but arrives too late; Perrund has already killed the Protector, and calmly waits for the bodyguard. Holding her at swordpoint, DeWar tearfully demands to know why she conspired against the Protector. Perrund replies that she did it for revenge, for killing her and her family. The soldiers who raped her were not the former King's men at all, not even men allied to UrLeyn, but the man himself, as well as his current, closest advisers. Afterward she was taken in by men from Haspidus, and recruited as a spy by King Quience directly. Saving UrLeyn from the assassin was simply to prevent him from dying while he was a strong leader; instead, her orders were to ensure he died in "utter ruin". After her confession, Perrund demands DeWar kill her. He silently refuses, lowering his sword. Perrund grabs his knife and brings it to her own throat, but it is quickly knocked away by DeWar's blade, which he lowers once more. Oelph gives a brief, personal epilogue for both stories. The three conspirators who attempted to kill Vosill died of various diseases, only Adlain lasting longer than a few years. King Quience reigned for 40 years before his death, and was succeeded by one of his many daughters, giving the kingdom its first ruling Queen. Vosill disappeared from the ship she departed on; her disappearance was only discovered after a sudden burst of wind and chain-fire struck the ship, then vanished as quickly. Attempts to notify Vosill's family in Drezen were unsuccessful: nobody in the island country could be found who had ever met her. Oelph himself became a doctor, eventually taking Vosill's post as the royal physician. Tassasen endured a civil war after the death of Protector UrLeyn; eventually King Lattens took control of the Empire, ruling it quietly. Oelph explains that he stopped DeWar's story as he did because that is where versions of the story differ dramatically. The more popular version has DeWar personally execute Perrund, followed by a return to the Half-Hidden Kingdoms where he reclaims his hidden title as Prince, and eventually King. A second version, supposedly written by Perrund herself, instead has DeWar telling the waiting guards and staff that UrLeyn is fine but sleeping, this and other distractions providing enough time for him and the former concubine to flee Tassasen before the Protector's body is discovered. The two elude capture and arrive in the Half-Hidden Kingdoms, eventually marry, have several children, and die many years later in an avalanche in the mountains. Finally, Oelph ends his epilogue by revealing that he expects his wife, whom he loves dearly, to return soon, quite possibly with his grandchildren accompanying her.

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An Inspector Calls

John Boynton Priestley

At dinner at the Birlings' home in 1912, Arthur Birling, a wealthy mill owner and local politician, and his family are celebrating the engagement of daughter Sheila to Gerald Croft, son of a competitor of Birling's. In attendance are Sybil Birling, Arthur's wife and Sheila and Eric's mother, and Eric Birling, Sheila's younger brother, who has a drinking problem that is discreetly ignored. After dinner, Arthur speaks about the importance of self-reliance. A man, he says, must "make his own way" and protect his own interests. Inspector Goole arrives and explains that a woman called Eva Smith killed herself by drinking strong disinfectant. He implies that she has left a diary naming names, including members of the Birling family. Goole produces a photograph of Eva and shows it to Arthur, who acknowledges that she worked in one of his mills. He admits that he dismissed her 18 months ago for her involvement in an abortive workers' strike. He denies responsibility for her death. Sheila enters the room and is drawn into the discussion. After prompting from Goole, she admits to recognizing Eva as well. She confesses that Eva served her in a department store and Sheila contrived to have her fired for an imagined slight. She admits that Eva's behaviour had been blameless and that the firing was motivated solely by Sheila's jealousy and spite towards a pretty working-class woman. Sybil enters the room and Goole continues his interrogation, revealing that Eva was also known as Daisy Renton. Gerald starts at the mention of the name and Sheila becomes suspicious. Gerald admits that he met a woman by that name in a theatre bar. He gave her money and arranged to see her again. Goole reveals that Gerald had installed Eva as his mistress, and gave her money and promises of continued support before ending the relationship. Arthur and Sybil are horrified. As an ashamed Gerald exits the room, Sheila acknowledges his nature and credits him for speaking truthfully but also signals that their engagement is over. Goole identifies Sybil as the head of a women's charity to which Eva/Daisy had turned for help. Despite Sybil's haughty responses, she eventually admits that Eva, pregnant and destitute, had asked the committee for financial aid. Sybil had convinced the committee that the girl was a liar and that her application should be denied. Despite vigorous cross-examination from Goole, Sybil denies any wrongdoing. Sheila begs her mother not to continue, but Goole plays his final card, making Sybil admit that the "drunken young man" should give a 'public confession, accepting all the blame'. Eric enters the room, and after brief questioning from Goole, he breaks down, admitting that he drunkenly forced Eva to have sex and stole £50 from his father's business to pay her off when she became pregnant. Arthur and Sybil break down, and the family dissolves into screaming recriminations. Goole accuses them of contributing to Eva's death. He reminds the Birlings (and the audience) that actions have consequences. "If men will not learn that lesson, then they will be taught it in fire and blood and anguish." Gerald returns, telling the family that there may be no 'Inspector Goole' on the police force. Arthur makes a call to the Chief Constable, who confirms this. Gerald points out that as Goole was lying about being a policeman, there may be no dead girl. Placing a second call to the local infirmary, Gerald determines that no recent cases of suicide have been reported. The elder Birlings and Gerald celebrate, with Arthur dismissing the evening's events as "moonshine" and "bluffing". The younger Birlings, however, realise the error of their ways and promise to change. Gerald is keen to resume his engagement to Sheila, but she is reluctant, since with or without a dead girl he still admitted to having had an affair. The play ends abruptly with a telephone call, taken by Arthur, who reports that the body of a young woman has been found, a suspected case of suicide by disinfectant, and that the local police are on their way to question the Birlings. The true identity of Goole is never explained, but it is clear that the family's confessions over the course of the evening are true, and that they will be disgraced publicly when news of their involvement in Eva's demise is revealed.