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  The Voice in the Night

  William Hope Hodgson

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  William Hope Hodgson (1877-1918) was an English author. He produced a large body of work including horror, fantastic fiction, and science fiction stories. "The Voice in the Night" is an uncanny story about a ship becalmed in fog in the middle of the Pacific. In the night, the watch hears a voice hailing the ship. It would seem to be a lone man in a rowing boat, but the individual does not wish to be seen. He is starving and urgently wants them to give him food - but despite this, he will not approach the ship and vehemently rejects the idea of being rescued. Instead they have to float some provisions out to him in a crate, which he takes off to a nearby island where his fiancée is dying of hunger. A few hours later he returns and tells a horrifying and incredible tale.

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  Vicar of Wakefield The (Unabridged)

  Oliver Goldsmith

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  This novel depicts the fall and rise of the Primrose family, presided over by the benevolent vicar, the narrator of a fairy-tale plot of impersonation and deception, the abduction of a beautiful heroine and the machinations of an aristocratic villain. By turns comic and sentimental, the novel's popularity owes much to its recognizable depiction of domestic life and loving family relationships.

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  The Charles Dickens Collection...

  Charles Dickens

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  Three of Dickens’s most compelling orphan protagonists—Oliver Twist, Pip, and Esther Summerson—in three of his greatest novels. Perhaps no writer in the English language is more closely associated with orphaned characters than Charles Dickens. The trials and dangers for children without parental protection play a significant part in nearly all his work, as both a source of highly entertaining melodrama and pointed social criticism.  Oliver Twist: Having endured deplorable conditions in an orphans’ workhouse, Oliver Twist eventually escapes to London, where he falls in with the Artful Dodger, one of a gang of young pickpockets led by the criminal Fagin. Dickens’s heartrending descriptions of institutional abuses as well as the brutal reality of life on London’s streets for homeless children argued strongly for social reform.  Great Expectations: Dickens’s penultimate novel centers on the orphan Pip and his anonymous benefactor, whom he assumes is the wealthy and eccentric recluse Miss Havisham, and whose adopted daughter, the beautiful but emotionally distant Estella, he falls hopelessly in love with. John Irving called it “the most wonderful and most perfectly worked-out plot for a novel in the English language.”  Bleak House: Dickens’s masterful satire of the English judicial system features his only female narrator, Esther Summerson, who is raised as an orphan. Esther’s true identity forms much of the mystery and drama of a complex novel involving an endless legal case—“the family curse”—and all the lives it affects.   As an entertainer and a moralist, Dickens utilized his vulnerable young protagonists to great effect, creating some of the most unforgettable characters in the history of literature.  This ebook has been professionally proofread to ensure accuracy and readability on all devices.

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  War Of The Worlds - The Classic...

  H. G. Wells

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  The War of the Worlds is a science fiction novel by English author H. G. Wells, first serialized in 1897 by Pearson's Magazine in the UK and by Cosmopolitan magazine in the US. The novel's first appearance in hardcover was in 1898 from publisher William Heinemann of London. Written between 1895 and 1897, it is one of the earliest stories to detail a conflict between mankind and an extraterrestrial race. The novel is the first-person narrative of both an unnamed protagonist in Surrey and of his younger brother in London as southern England is invaded by Martians. The novel is one of the most commented-on works in the science fiction canon. 
   
  The plot has been related to the invasion literature of the time. The novel has been variously interpreted as a commentary on evolutionary theory, British imperialism, and generally Victorian superstitions, fears, and prejudices. Wells said that the plot arose from a discussion with his brother Frank about the catastrophic effect of the British on indigenous Tasmanians. What would happen, he wondered, if Martians did to Britain what the British had done to the Tasmanians? At the time of publication, it was classified as a scientific romance, like Wells's earlier novel The Time Machine. 
   
  The War of the Worlds has been both popular (having never been out of print) and influential, spawning half a dozen feature films, radio dramas, a record album, various comic book adaptations, a number of television series, and sequels or parallel stories by other authors. It was most memorably dramatized in a 1938 radio program directed by and starring Orson Welles that allegedly caused public panic among listeners who did not know the Martian invasion was fictional. The novel has even influenced the work of scientists, notably Robert H. Goddard, who, inspired by the book, helped develop both the liquid-fuelled rocket and multistage rocket.

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  What Christmas is as We Grow...

  Charles Dickens

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  Charles Dickens is just great, this is just a short little note about how we change as we get older and how Christmas becomes more for others and less about ourselves as we get older.

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  Much Ado About Nothing (Argo...

  William Shakespeare

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  William Collins Books and Decca Records are proud to present ARGO Classics, a historic catalogue of classic prose and verse read by some of the world’s most renowned voices. Originally released as vinyl records, these expertly remastered stories are now available to download for the first time. 
  ‘Let me be that I am and seek not to alter me.’ 
  Much Ado About Nothing is Shakespeare’s most frequently performed comedy. 
  Count Claudio falls in love with Hero, the daughter of his host. Hero's cousin Beatrice (a confirmed spinster) and Benedict (an eternal bachelor) are each duped into believing the other is in love with them. Claudio is deceived by a malicious plot and denounces Hero as unchaste before they marry. She faints and is believed dead, but recovers to be proved innocent by a chance discovery. Benedict wins Beatrice’s love defending her cousin’s honour, and to his surprise, Claudio is reunited with Hero, who he believed dead. 
  All of the Shakespeare plays within the ARGO Classics catalogue are performed by the Marlowe Dramatic Society and Professional Players. The Marlowe was founded in 1907 with a mission to focus on effective delivery of verse, respect the integrity of texts, and rescue neglected plays by Shakespeare’s contemporaries and the less performed plays of Shakespeare himself. The Marlowe has performed annually at Cambridge Arts Theatre since its opening in 1936 and continues to produce some of the finest actors of their generations. 
  Thurston Dart, Professor of Music at London University and a Fellow of Jesus College Cambridge, directed the music for this production. 
  The full cast includes: William Squire; Patrick Creean; Gary Watson; John Gielgud; Michael Hordern; Donald Layne-Smith; Peter Pears; Peter Orr; Cyril Luckham; Clive Swift; Peter Woodthorpe; Ian Holm; Josephine Stuart; Peggy Ashcroft; Gillian Webb; Janette Richer. 
  This short play, a top-performing piece in the European theatre, is among the best of Shakespeare's works. Its timeless themes and captivating dialogue continue to draw in audiences worldwide. 
  For fans of Richard Parsons (GCSE English Shakespeare Text Guide), and Arthur Miller (Incident at Vichy).

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