Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol under financial duress, but it became one of his most popular and enduring stories. The old miser Ebenezer Scrooge cares nothing for family, friends, love or Christmas. All he cares about is money. Then one Christmas Eve he is visited by three ghosts: Christmas Past, Christmas Present and Christmas Yet To Come. These encounters leave Scrooge deeply moved and forever changed. Historians believe that A Christmas

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First published in 1895, Time machine, follows the adventures of a hypothetical Time Traveller who journeys into the future to find that humanity has evolved into two races: the peaceful Eloi -- vegetarians who tire easily -- and the carnivorous, predatory Morlocks. After narrowly escaping from the Morlocks, the Time Traveller undertakes another journey even further into the future where he finds the earth growing bitterly cold as the heat and energy...

In fifteenth-century Paris, a disfigured man named Quasimodo, who was abandoned as an infant in the cathedral of Notre-Dame and now lives in its bell tower, must come to the aid of a beautiful gypsy girl named Esmeralda after she repels the advances of the cruel archdeacon Don Claude Frollo.

A story of a family fued between the Capulets and the Montagues continuing through the ages, as one generation picked up where the last one left off and of the forbidden love between two teenagers, Romeo, the son of the Montagues and Juliet, the daughter of the Capulets. This is a story of two young people in love, but the families do not approve.

"The classic boyhood adventure tale, updated with a new introduction by noted Mark Twain scholar R. Kent Rasmussen. A consummate prankster with a quick wit, Tom Sawyer dreams of a bigger fate than simply being a "rich boy." Yet through the novel's humorous escapades-from the famous episode of the whitewashed fence to the trial of Injun Joe-Mark Twain explores the deeper themes of the adult world, one of dishonesty and superstition, murder and revenge,...

Captains Courageous is a novel by Rudyard Kipling, that follows the adventures of fifteen-year-old Harvey Cheyne Jr., the spoiled son of a railroad tycoon, after he is saved from drowning by a Portuguese fisherman in the north Atlantic. The book's title comes from the ballad "Mary Ambree", which starts, "When captains courageous, whom death could not daunt". Kipling had previously used the same title for an article on businessmen as the new adventurers,...

Scientist Pierre Aronnax and his colleagues set out on an expedition to find a strange sea monster and are captured by the infamous and charismatic Captain Nemo and taken abroad the Nautilus submarine as his prisoners. As they travel the world's oceans, they become embroiled in adventures and events beyond their wildest dreams. Visionary in its outlook, Vern's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea is a legendary science fiction masterpiece.

This Applause edtiion allows the reader and student to look beyond the scholarly reading text to the more sensuous, more collaborative, more malleable performance text which emerges in conjunction with the commentary and notes. Readers and students are faced with real theatrical choices in each speech as the editors point out the challenges and opportunities to the actor and director at each juncture. Readers will not only discover an enlivened Shakespeare,...

Unparalleled adventure of one Hans Pfaall -- Balloon-hoax -- Mesmeric revelation -- Ms. found in a bottle -- Descent into the maelström -- Von Kempelen and his discovery -- Gold-bug -- Facts in the case of M. Valdemar -- Thousand-and-second tale of Scheherazade -- Murders in the Rue Morgue -- Mystery of Marie Rogêt -- Fall of the House of Usher -- Purloined letter -- Tell-tale heart -- Black cat -- Imp of the perverse -- Premature burial -- Island...

Selected stories from Kipling's two "Jungle Books" chronicle the adventures of Mowgli, the boy reared by a pack of wolves in an Indian jungle. Also includes "Rikki-Tikki-Tavi."