Vanity Fair

William Makepeace Thackeray

Editorial: CLXBX

Sinopsis

Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray is a sweeping satirical masterpiece that offers a brilliant and unflinching portrait of ambition, greed, love, and social climbing in nineteenth-century England. First published in 1847–1848, this classic novel subtitled A Novel Without a Hero presents a vivid panorama of society, exposing its hypocrisies and moral contradictions with wit, irony, and sharp social observation.

Set against the backdrop of the Napoleonic Wars and the rigid class structures of Victorian Britain, the story follows two contrasting women: the cunning and resourceful Becky Sharp and the gentle, kind-hearted Amelia Sedley. From their school days together to their entanglements in marriage, fortune, and scandal, their lives unfold in dramatically different ways. Through their journeys, Thackeray explores the complexities of character, revealing both virtue and vice in equal measure.

Becky Sharp, one of literature's most unforgettable anti-heroines, is intelligent, charming, and fiercely determined to rise above her modest origins. With sharp wit and calculated ambition, she navigates the drawing rooms of high society, manipulating situations to secure wealth and status. Amelia, by contrast, embodies loyalty and devotion, often to her own detriment. The contrast between these two women forms the emotional and moral center of the novel.

Thackeray's narrative voice is distinctive and playful, frequently addressing the reader directly and reminding us that society itself is a grand performance—a "vanity fair" where people chase wealth, prestige, and admiration. Through humor and biting satire, the novel critiques the shallow values of a world driven by appearances and self-interest.

Richly populated with memorable characters—from dashing officers and aristocrats to scheming relatives and social climbers—the novel paints a detailed portrait of a society obsessed with status and success. Yet beneath the satire lies a deeper meditation on human nature, moral compromise, and the illusions people create to sustain their ambitions.

Both entertaining and thought-provoking, Vanity Fair remains one of the great novels of English literature. Its enduring appeal lies in its lively storytelling, complex characters, and timeless insight into the pursuit of wealth and recognition. Thackeray's keen observations remind readers that while society may change, the human desire for admiration and advancement remains constant.

Disponible desde: 14/02/2026.

Longitud de impresión: 1067 páginas.

Otros libros que te pueden interesar

A Middle-Sized Artist - From...

Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Charlotte Perkins Gilman was born on 3rd July 1860 in Hartford, Connecticut, to an unaffectionate mother and a father who abandoned her and her older brother to a life of poverty.
Inevitably her schooling was limited and by 15 she had attended seven different schools but received only four years education. However Charlotte was resourceful and did spend time with her father’s aunts – the suffragist Isabella Beecher Hooker and the ‘Uncle Tom Cabin’s’ author, Harriet Beecher Stowe as well as many hours at the public library studying ancient civilisations.
In 1878, she enrolled in classes at the Rhode Island School of Design where she met Martha Luther and they developed a close relationship until Luther married in 1881. Charlotte was devastated and detested romance and love until she met and married the artist Charles Walter Stetson.
Their only child, Katharine Beecher Stetson, was born in 1885 but left Charlotte with post-natal depression, then often dismissed as a case of hysteria or nerves. Unsuited to domestic life she ruptured her life and moved to California with Katherine. She divorced in 1894 and then sent Katharine east to live with her father and his second wife confirming that his paternal rights be acknowledged and that Katherine establish a relationship with her father.
After her mother died in 1893, Charlotte moved back east and became involved with her first cousin, Wall Street attorney, Houghton Gilman who she married in 1900. After his death she moved back to California, where Katherine now lived.
Her most popular story is ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ which touched on her own post-partum depression and underlined the need for women to be responsible for their mental and physical well-being, as the narrator is ordered by her husband/doctor to take compete rest in her room where she is isolated and becomes obsessed with the revolting yellow wallpaper.
She wrote other notable short stories the best of which we also include.
Charlotte lectured widely for social reform, wrote important non-fiction works that questioned our patriarchal system and left a legacy as a leading and positive spokesperson for feminism.
She was diagnosed with incurable breast cancer in 1932 and, as she wrote in her suicide note and autobiography, she ‘chose chloroform over cancer’
Charlotte Perkins Gilman took her own life on 17th August 1935, aged 75, in Pasadena, California.

Ver libro

Mesmeric Revelation

Sampi Books, Edgar Allan Poe

"Mesmeric Revelation" is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe that explores a dialogue between a hypnotist and his dying patient. Through hypnosis, they discuss profound themes about the nature of the soul, the existence of God and the universe, revealing transcendent perspectives on life and death.

Ver libro

Emma - A classic retelling

Jane Austen

Emma, is a novel about youthful hubris and romantic misunderstandings. It is set in the fictional country village of Highbury and the surrounding estates of Hartfield, Randalls and Donwell Abbey, and involves the relationships among people from a small number of families. The novel was first published in December 1815, with its title page listing a publication date of 1816. As in her other novels, Austen explores the concerns and difficulties of genteel women living in Georgian–Regency England. Emma is a comedy of manners, and depicts issues of marriage, sex, age, and social status.

Before she began the novel, Austen wrote, "I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like." In the first sentence, she introduces the title character as "Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and a happy disposition... had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her." Emma is spoiled, headstrong, and self-satisfied; she greatly overestimates her own matchmaking abilities; she is blind to the dangers of meddling in other people's lives; and her imagination and perceptions often lead her astray.

Emma, written after Austen's move to Chawton, was her last novel to be published during her lifetime, while Persuasion, the last complete novel Austen wrote, was published posthumously.

The novel has been adapted for a number of films, television programmes and stage plays.

Jane Austen was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots often explore the dependence of women on marriage in the pursuit of favorable social standing and economic security. Her works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of the 18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century literary realism.

Ver libro

The Beautiful and Damned

F. Scott Fitzgerald

'Things are sweeter when they're lost. I know – because once I wanted something and got it. It was the only thing I ever wanted badly, Dot, and when I got it, it turned to dust in my hand.'

One of F. Scott Fitzgerald's earlier novels, The Beautiful and the Damned was first published in 1922 to much commercial success. Modelled on the early years of Fitzgerald's own marriage to Zelda Fitzgerald, the reader is given an acute insight into the ups and downs of a mismatched love affair.

Anthony Patch, a young yet unambitious graduate from Harvard University, moves to New York and soon meets fellow socialite and flapper, Gloria Gilbert. Infatuated by her beauty, Anthony soon proposes to Gloria, and the pair embark on a doomed whirlwind romance. Their marriage is combative and tense; Anthony expects Gloria to be more domesticated while Gloria expects Anthony to fund her extravagant lifestyle. They both commit to ignoring their issues, attending glamorous social events and drinking in excess. But, of course, this arrangement can only last so long…
F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896 – 1940) was an American essayist and novelist. Renowned for his colourful and lively depictions of the 1920s and 1930s Jazz Age, his works were also deeply concerned with love, class and materialism. He published four novels and over one hundred short stories in his lifetime.

Ver libro

The House of Pride

Jack London

The House of Pride, written by iconic American author Jack London (1876-1916), was first published in December 1910 issue of The Pacific Monthly. Author Jack London wrote The Call of the Wild and many other books. A pioneer in the then-burgeoning world of commercial magazine fiction, he was one of the first Americans to make a lucrative career exclusively from writing. 
Narrator Patrick Girard Lawlor, a classically trained stage actor, has performed on-stage throughout the United States and Europe. He has appeared in several feature films, as well as on the TV series L.A. Heat. His extensive work as an audio-book narrator has garnered numerous awards, including the Audie Award nomination. 
(P)2011 Listen & Live Audio, Inc.

Ver libro

The Call of Cthulhu

H. P. Lovecraft

Title: The Call of Cthulhu 
Author: H. P. Lovecraft 
Narrator: Jonathan Dunne 
Original Publication: 1928 
Public Domain: Yes 
Series Placement: Number 34 in the Timeless Terrors series 
Description: 
The Call of Cthulhu by H. P. Lovecraft is the cornerstone of cosmic horror — a vast and terrifying revelation that humanity is but a fleeting whisper beneath the gaze of ancient, indifferent gods. Told through fragmented reports, journal entries, and the haunted memories of those who have glimpsed forbidden truths, it weaves a chilling investigation into the cult of Cthulhu — a monstrous being sleeping beneath the Pacific, whose awakening would end all that we know. 
Lovecraft constructs his myth through suggestion and implication, blending mystery, anthropology, and existential terror into a narrative that expands horror beyond the human scale. This is not merely a story of monsters, but of meaning undone — where sanity erodes in the face of incomprehensible reality. 
Narrated by Amazon bestselling horror author  Jonathan Dunne, this performance captures the story’s investigative tension and creeping dread — the inexorable uncovering of truths too vast for the mind to hold. While the text itself is in the public domain, this narration is an original performance and copyright © 2025 Jonathan Dunne. 
Part of Timeless Terrors, a series devoted to resurrecting the masters of the macabre, The Call of Cthulhu stands as Lovecraft’s defining vision — a tale of cosmic insignificance, ancient worship, and the terrible awakening of what should forever sleep. 
Prepare for a descent into madness, mystery, and myth — where knowledge itself is the most dangerous horror of all.

Ver libro