Серия книг «Modern Classics (Penguin)» — 90 книг

'People say that on the first night Francis Sancher spent in Riviere au Sel the wind in its temper screamed down from the mountains...'
Francis Sancher always said he would come to an unnatural end. So when this handsome newcomer to the Guadeloupean village of Riviere au Sel is found dead, face down in the mud, no one is particularly surprised. Loved by some - especially women - and reviled by others, Francis was an enigmatic figure. Where did he come from? What caused his strange nocturnal wanderings? What devils haunted him? As the villagers come to pay their respects, they each reveal another piece of the mystery behind his life and death - and their own buried secrets and stories come to light.

'People say that on the first night Francis Sancher spent in Riviere au Sel the wind in its temper screamed down from the mountains...'
Francis Sancher always said he…

A cult classic since its publication in the early years of this century, Caliban and the Witch is Silvia Federici's history of the body in the transition to capitalism. Moving from the peasant revolts of the late Middle Ages through the European witch-hunts, the rise of scientific rationalism and the colonisation of the Americas, it gives a panoramic account of the often horrific violence with which the unruly human material of pre-capitalist societies was transformed into a set of predictable and controllable mechanisms. It Is a study of indigenous traditions crushed, of the enclosure of women's reproductive powers within the nuclear family, and of how our modern world was forged in blood.

A cult classic since its publication in the early years of this century, Caliban and the Witch is Silvia Federici's history of the body in the transition to capitalism.…

'As I crammed the cream horn voraciously into my mouth, at once I heard Francin's voice saying that no decent woman would eat a cream puff like that'
In a quiet town where not much happens, Maryska, the flamboyant brewer's wife, stands out. She cuts her skirt short so that she can ride her bicycle, her golden hair flying out behind her. She butchers pigs. She drinks and eats with relish. And when the garrulous ranconteur Uncle Pepin comes to visit the locals are scandalized even further, in Bohumil Hrabal's affecting, exuberant portrayal of a small central European community between the wars.

'As I crammed the cream horn voraciously into my mouth, at once I heard Francin's voice saying that no decent woman would eat a cream puff like that'
In a quiet…

Hayes's masterpiece is an exquisite depiction of a doomed love affair set in noirish, 1950s New York.
In a Manhattan bar, a middle-aged man tells a pretty girl a story: of how he fell into a relationship with a lonely young divorcee; of how one night she was offered a thousand dollars to sleep with a stranger; and of how he and she would subsequently betray each other in turn. In Alfred Hayes's exquisite novella, love - in all its bewildering turns of longing, elation, heartbreak and regret - is dissected with unforgettable honesty and heartbreaking clarity.

Hayes's masterpiece is an exquisite depiction of a doomed love affair set in noirish, 1950s New York.
In a Manhattan bar, a middle-aged man tells a pretty girl a story: of…

An extraordinary selection of the letters of Che Guevara
'Always be capable of feeling deeply any injustice committed against anyone, anywhere in the world'
Che Guevara was an inveterate letter writer and diarist throughout his short but extraordinary life. This selection of his letters begins with his youthful motorcycle travels around Latin America as a wide-eyed medical student, and goes on to cover the Cuban Revolutionary War - including his letter to Castro after its success - his subsequent role as a government leader, travels to the Congo and finally Bolivia at the end of his life. Together they map the emergence of a dedicated revolutionary, but also reveal him as a master narrator: honest and insightful, with a razor-sharp wit, an iron will and, in his intimate writings to his family, a great capacity to express affection for those closest to him.

An extraordinary selection of the letters of Che Guevara
'Always be capable of feeling deeply any injustice committed against anyone, anywhere in the world'
Che Guevara…

The American Deep South, in the 1970s. Velma Henry, once a formidable political activist, has grown weary and disillusioned with the fight for civil rights. She wants to end it all. But then she finds herself in the hands of a Black faith community, and the fabled healer Minnie Ransom. As she works through the rage and fear of her traumatic past, Velma finds herself changing, becoming whole and, maybe, free. The Salt Eaters is a boldly optimistic, profound exploration of memory, the self, power and Black health as liberation.

The American Deep South, in the 1970s. Velma Henry, once a formidable political activist, has grown weary and disillusioned with the fight for civil rights. She wants to end it…

A Moment of War is the powerful and harrowing final book in Laurie Lee's acclaimed trilogy that began with Cider with Rosie
Laurie Lee was still a young man when he decided to fight for the Republican cause in Spain's civil war. But though he braved icy, storm-swept mountains alone to contact Republican sympathisers, he was immediately suspected of being a Nationalist spy. Imprisoned and almost executed by his own side, he eventually joined the International Brigade. This is the story of his experiences as a Republican soldier, fighting for the losing side in a doomed war.

A Moment of War is the powerful and harrowing final book in Laurie Lee's acclaimed trilogy that began with Cider with Rosie
Laurie Lee was still a young man when he decided to…

The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition was perhaps the most ambitious, elaborate and confident of all the British attempts to master the South Pole. Like the others it ended in disaster, with the Endeavour first trapped and then crushed to pieces in the ice and its crew trapped in the Antarctic, seemingly doomed to a slow and horrible death. In the face of extraordinary odds, Shackleton, the expedition's leader, decided on the only course that might just save them: a 700 nautical mile voyage in a small boat across the ferocious Southern Ocean in the forelorn hope of reaching the only human habitation within range: a small whaling station on the rugged, ice-sheeted island of South Georgia.
South tells the story both of the whole astonishing expedition and of Shackleton's journey to rescue his men - one of the greatest feats of navigation ever recorded.

The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition was perhaps the most ambitious, elaborate and confident of all the British attempts to master the South Pole. Like the others it ended in…

One of the greatest, most entertaining reading experiences in any language, Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time Vol. 1: The Way by Swann's is published in a new translation from the French by Lydia Davis in Penguin Classics.
The Way by Swann's is one of the great novels of childhood, depicting the impressions of a sensitive boy of his family and neighbours, brought dazzlingly back to life by the famous taste of a madeleine. It contains the separate short novel, A Love of Swann's, a study of sexual jealousy that forms a crucial part of the vast, unfolding structure of In Search of Lost Time. This book established Proust as one of the greatest voices of the modern age - satirical, sceptical, confiding and endlessly varied in his responses to the human condition.
Since the original pre-war translation Remembrance of Things Past by C. K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin, there has been no completely new rendering of Proust's French original into English. This translation brings to the fore a more sharply engaged, comic and lucid Proust. As the great story unfolds from its magical opening scenes to its devastating end, it is this Penguin Classics edition of In Search of Lost Time that makes Proust accessible to a new generation.
Marcel Proust (1871-1922) is generally viewed as the greatest French novelist and perhaps the greatest European novelist of the 20th century. He lived much of his later life as a reclusive semi-invalid in a sound-proofed flat in Paris, giving himself over entirely to writing his masterpiece In Search of Lost Time (A la recherche du temps perdu).

One of the greatest, most entertaining reading experiences in any language, Marcel Proust's In Search of Lost Time Vol. 1: The Way by Swann's is published in a new translation…

Since the original, prewar translation there has been no completely new rendering of the French original into English. This translation brings to the fore a more sharply engaged, comic and lucid Proust. In Search of Lost Time is one of the greatest, most entertaining reading experiences in any language. As the great story unfolds from its magical opening scenes to its devastating end, it is the Penguin Proust that makes Proust accessible to a new generation.
Each book is translated by a different, superb translator working under the general editorship of Professor Christopher Prendergast, University of Cambridge.

Since the original, prewar translation there has been no completely new rendering of the French original into English. This translation brings to the fore a more sharply engaged,…