Barnes Noble: 2826 books

This 1884 biography of Thomas Gray was the first full-length treatment of its subject.  Gosse was an authority on Gray, the editor of his collected works, and his knowledge and affinity for the poet makes this a first-class literary biography.

In the midst of the Atlantic Ocean, far enough away from mainland Europe to have consistent outside influence from it early on, rests Iceland. By the year 900 the small island country is flourishing with poetry; by 1120 its prose writing has surpassed the amount of British literature. Icelandic Sagas preserves the oral history of this fascinating country.

These essays, or “pamphlets,” published in 1850, are a vehement denunciation of what Thomas Carlyle believed to be the political, social, and religious injustices of the era. The collection’s best known essay is “Hudson’s Statue,” an attack on plans to erect a monument in honor of the bankrupted financier and “railway king” George Hudson.

This 1869 miscellany of articles, letters, and speeches by and about Carlyle highlights his restless intellect and wide-ranging interests. The volume begins; “The general belief that Carlyle is a gloomy misanthrope…is quite an error.” Contents include “Goethe and Carlyle,” “Preface to Emerson’s Essays,” “Advice to a Young Man,” and more.

Distinguished critic and essayist Thomas Carlyle turns his keen intellect to a range of subjects in this collection of nine essays. This second volume includes “The Diamond Necklace,” a fiction piece about Marie Antoinette’s famous necklace; “Parliamentary History of the French Revolution,” and “The Opera,” among other selected pieces.

This 1919 collection includes recollections of George Bernard Shaw, Frank Harris, G. K. Chesterton, A. A. Milne, Max Beerbohm, Aleister Crowley, and Edward Grieg. Also included are “Some Writers,” “Intellectual Freaks,” “More Writers,” “Some Musicians,” “Fleet Street,” “Musical...

Sinclair’s first Book of Life covered Mind and Body. A year later, in 1922, the crusading novelist followed it up with Love and Society.  Sinclair attempted to establish what is known about life and truth, beyond cliché and self-deception. Here the author examines marriage, sex, money, “Love versus...

This 1870 work, by one of the great journalists of the time, aims to teach economics to the student and general reader. Topics include labor, commerce, capital, company, money, slavery, monopoly, agriculture, the state, manufacturing, trade, consumers, iron, sugar, shipbuilding, credit, taxation, wool, immigration, foreign commerce, and more.

As the amiable Parson Yorick travels through France and Italy, he relishes his encounters with the men and women—especially the pretty women—he meets along the way. A novel without a typical plot, a journey without a physical destination, Sterne’s witty and tender tale is a treasury of portraits, dramatic sketches, and philosophical musings.

This short biography of John Greenleaf Whittier, published in 1917, was part of the Poetry and Life series, combining biography and poetry to present a fully rounded portrait of its subject. Hudson was of the opinion that Whittier “was not a great poet… He produced nothing on a large scale which...

The first novel of a family saga, Clayhanger (1910) is a coming-of-age story set in the Midlands of Victorian England.  It follows Edwin Clayhanger as he leaves school, takes over the family business and falls in love. The triumph of the book is the minute detailing of the effect of bourgeois respectability on Edwin’s life and finally his submission to it.  

Entertaining and invaluable for anyone passionate about Swinnerton and his work, this collection of reminiscences by such highly regarded authors as Bennett, Wells, and Overton will surprise and delight readers with anecdotes about how the authors met Swinnerton, their relationship with him, and their...

Baltasar Gracián’s Art of Worldly Wisdom offers practical advice on how to make your way in a chaotic world, and how to make it well. The three hundred aphorisms contained here, first published as Oraculo Manual y Arte de Prudencia in 1647, remain remarkably relevant today.  The political and...

The author of the influential The Wages Question was often ahead of the economic thinking of his contemporaries. In this 1883 series of Harvard lectures he argues that constriction of the money supply, not land speculation, is the main cause of economic depressions. The author also takes on fellow economist Henry George over such questions as labor, technology, and currency.