Enjoy a wide range of English classic books and novels; some stories might be old, but they are really worth reading!
1. 1984 (George Orwell, 1949)
The thing that he was about to do was to open a diary. This was not illegal (nothing was illegal, since there were no longer any laws), but if detected it was reasonably certain that it would be punished by death, or at least by twenty-five years in a forced-labour camp. Winston fitted a nib into the penholder and sucked it to get the grease off. The pen was an archaic instrument, seldom used even for signatures, and he had procured one, furtively and with some difficulty, simply because of a feeling that the beautiful creamy paper deserved to be written on with a real nib instead of being scratched with an ink-pencil.
2. A Christmas Carol (By Charles Dickens, 1843)
Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge’s name was good upon ‘Change, for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a door-nail. Mind! I don’t mean to say that I know, of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a door-nail.
3. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (James Joyce, 1917)
Once upon a time and a very good time it was there was a moocow coming down along the road and this moocow that was coming down along the road met a nicens little boy named baby tuckoo...
His father told him that story: his father looked at him through a glass: he had a hairy face.
He was baby tuckoo. The moocow came down the road where Betty Byrne lived: she sold lemon platt. O, the wild rose blossoms
On the little green place.
On the little green place.
4. A Tale of Two Cities (Charles Dickens, 1859)
Our booked passenger showed in a moment that it was his name. The guard, the coachman, and the two other passengers eyed him distrustfully.
The Sick Lion
All true histories contain instruction; though, in some, the treasure may be hard to find, and when found, so trivial in quantity, that the dry, shrivelled kernel scarcely compensates for the trouble of cracking the nut. Whether this be the case with my history or not, I am hardly competent to judge. I sometimes think it might prove useful to some, and entertaining to others; but the world may judge for itself.
Down, down, down. Would the fall never come to an end! ‘I wonder how many miles I’ve fallen by this time?’ she said aloud. ‘I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think—’ (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this was not a VERY good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over) ‘—yes, that’s about the right distance—but then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude I’ve got to?’ (Alice had no idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but thought they were nice grand words to say.)
There was once a poor Prince, who had a kingdom. His kingdom was very small, but still quite large enough to marry upon; and he wished to marry. It was certainly rather cool of him to say to the Emperor’s daughter, ‘Will you have me?’ But so he did; for his name was renowned far and wide; and there were a hundred princesses who would have answered, ‘Yes!’ and ‘Thank you kindly.’ We shall see what this princess said.
Our booked passenger showed in a moment that it was his name. The guard, the coachman, and the two other passengers eyed him distrustfully.
‘Keep where you are,’ the guard called to the voice in the mist, ‘because, if I should make a mistake, it could never be set right in your lifetime. Gentleman of the name of Lorry answer straight.’
‘What is the matter?’ asked the passenger, then, with mildly quavering speech. ‘Who wants me? Is it Jerry?’
("I don’t like Jerry’s voice, if it is Jerry,’ growled the guard to himself. ‘He’s hoarser than suits me, is Jerry.’)
‘Yes, Mr. Lorry.’
‘What is the matter?’
‘A despatch sent after you from over yonder. T. and Co.’
5. Aesop’s Fables (Aesop, Circa 600 BC)
The Sick Lion
A Lion had come to the end of his days and lay sick unto death at the mouth of his cave, gasping for breath. The animals, his subjects, came round him and drew nearer as he grew more and more helpless.
The Ass and the Lapdog
A Farmer one day came to the stables to see to his beasts of burden: among them was his favourite Ass, that was always well fed and often carried his master. With the Farmer came his Lapdog, who danced about and licked his hand and frisked about as happy as could be.
The Lion and the Mouse
Once when a Lion was asleep a little Mouse began running up and down upon him; this soon wakened the Lion, who placed his huge paw upon him, and opened his big jaws to swallow him.
The Swallow and the Other Birds
It happened that a Countryman was sowing some hemp seeds in a field where a Swallow and some other birds were hopping about picking up their food.
The Frogs Desiring a King
The Frogs were living as happy as could be in a marshy swamp that just suited them; they went splashing about caring for nobody and nobody troubling with them.
6. Agnes Grey (Anne Brontë, 1847)
All true histories contain instruction; though, in some, the treasure may be hard to find, and when found, so trivial in quantity, that the dry, shrivelled kernel scarcely compensates for the trouble of cracking the nut. Whether this be the case with my history or not, I am hardly competent to judge. I sometimes think it might prove useful to some, and entertaining to others; but the world may judge for itself.
7. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Lewis Caroll, 1865)
Down, down, down. Would the fall never come to an end! ‘I wonder how many miles I’ve fallen by this time?’ she said aloud. ‘I must be getting somewhere near the centre of the earth. Let me see: that would be four thousand miles down, I think—’ (for, you see, Alice had learnt several things of this sort in her lessons in the schoolroom, and though this was not a VERY good opportunity for showing off her knowledge, as there was no one to listen to her, still it was good practice to say it over) ‘—yes, that’s about the right distance—but then I wonder what Latitude or Longitude I’ve got to?’ (Alice had no idea what Latitude was, or Longitude either, but thought they were nice grand words to say.)
8. Andersen’s Fairy Tales (Hans Christian Andersen, 1835)
There was once a poor Prince, who had a kingdom. His kingdom was very small, but still quite large enough to marry upon; and he wished to marry. It was certainly rather cool of him to say to the Emperor’s daughter, ‘Will you have me?’ But so he did; for his name was renowned far and wide; and there were a hundred princesses who would have answered, ‘Yes!’ and ‘Thank you kindly.’ We shall see what this princess said.
9. Anne of Green Gables (Lucy Maud Montgomery, 1908)
With this Mrs. Rachel stepped out of the lane into the backyard of Green Gables. Very green and neat and precise was that yard, set about on one side with great patriarchal willows and the other with prim Lombardies. Not a stray stick nor stone was to be seen, for Mrs. Rachel would have seen it if there had been. Privately she was of the opinion that Marilla Cuthbert swept that yard over as often as she swept her house. One could have eaten a meal off the ground without overbrimming the proverbial peck of dirt.
Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Everything was in confusion in the Oblonskys’ house. The wife had discovered that the husband was carrying on an intrigue with a French girl, who had been a governess in their family, and she had announced to her husband that she could not go on living in the same house with him.
It was at least certain that Phileas Fogg had not absented himself from London for many years. Those who were honoured by a better acquaintance with him than the rest, declared that nobody could pretend to have ever seen him anywhere else. His sole pastimes were reading the papers and playing whist. He often won at this game, which, as a silent one, harmonised with his nature; but his winnings never went into his purse, being reserved as a fund for his charities.
With this Mrs. Rachel stepped out of the lane into the backyard of Green Gables. Very green and neat and precise was that yard, set about on one side with great patriarchal willows and the other with prim Lombardies. Not a stray stick nor stone was to be seen, for Mrs. Rachel would have seen it if there had been. Privately she was of the opinion that Marilla Cuthbert swept that yard over as often as she swept her house. One could have eaten a meal off the ground without overbrimming the proverbial peck of dirt.
10. Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy , 1865)
Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way. Everything was in confusion in the Oblonskys’ house. The wife had discovered that the husband was carrying on an intrigue with a French girl, who had been a governess in their family, and she had announced to her husband that she could not go on living in the same house with him.
11. Around the World in 80 Days (Jules Verne, 1873)
It was at least certain that Phileas Fogg had not absented himself from London for many years. Those who were honoured by a better acquaintance with him than the rest, declared that nobody could pretend to have ever seen him anywhere else. His sole pastimes were reading the papers and playing whist. He often won at this game, which, as a silent one, harmonised with his nature; but his winnings never went into his purse, being reserved as a fund for his charities.
12. Beyond Good and Evil (Friedrich Nietzsche, 1886)
Philosophers are accustomed to speak of the will as though it were the best-known thing in the world; indeed, Schopenhauer has given us to understand that the will alone is really known to us, absolutely and completely known, without deduction or addition. But it again and again seems to me that in this case Schopenhauer also only did what philosophers are in the habit of doing-he seems to have adopted a POPULAR PREJUDICE and exaggerated it.
13. Bleak House (Charles Dickens, 1852)
A Chancery judge once had the kindness to inform me, as one of a
company of some hundred and fifty men and women not labouring under any
suspicions of lunacy, that the Court of Chancery, though the shining
subject of much popular prejudice (at which point I thought the judge’s
eye had a cast in my direction), was almost immaculate. There had
been, he admitted, a trivial blemish or so in its rate of progress, but
this was exaggerated and had been entirely owing to the ‘parsimony of
the public,’ which guilty public, it appeared, had been until lately
bent in the most determined manner on by no means enlarging the number
of Chancery judges appointed—I believe by Richard the Second, but any
other king will do as well.
14. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoevsky, 1866)
Raskolnikov was not used to crowds, and, as we said before, he avoided
society of every sort, more especially of late. But now all at once he
felt a desire to be with other people. Something new seemed to be
taking place within him, and with it he felt a sort of thirst for
company. He was so weary after a whole month of concentrated
wretchedness and gloomy excitement that he longed to rest, if only for
a moment, in some other world, whatever it might be; and, in spite of
the filthiness of the surroundings, he was glad now to stay in the
tavern.
15. David Copperfield
(Charles Dickens, 1850)
Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that
station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show. To begin
my life with the beginning of my life, I record that I was born (as I
have been informed and believe) on a Friday, at twelve o’clock at night.
It was remarked that the clock began to strike, and I began to cry,
simultaneously.
16. Down and Out in Paris and London
(George Orwell, 1933)
There were eccentric characters in the hotel. The Paris slums are a
gathering-place for eccentric people—people who have fallen into
solitary, half-mad grooves of life and given up trying to be normal or
decent. Poverty frees them from ordinary standards of behaviour, just as
money frees people from work. Some of the lodgers in our hotel lived
lives that were curious beyond words.
17. Dracula
(Bram Stoker, 1897)
All day long we seemed to dawdle through a country which was full of
beauty of every kind. Sometimes we saw little towns or castles on the
top of steep hills such as we see in old missals; sometimes we ran by
rivers and streams which seemed from the wide stony margin on each side
of them to be subject to great floods. It takes a lot of water, and
running strong, to sweep the outside edge of a river clear.
18. Dubliners
(James Joyce, 1914)
THERE was no hope for him this time: it was the third stroke. Night
after night I had passed the house (it was vacation time) and studied
the lighted square of window: and night after night I had found it
lighted in the same way, faintly and evenly. If he was dead, I thought, I
would see the reflection of candles on the darkened blind for I knew
that two candles must be set at the head of a corpse. He had often said
to me: ‘I am not long for this world,’ and I had thought his words idle.
Now I knew they were true. Every night as I gazed up at the window I
said softly to myself the word paralysis.
19. Emma
(Jane Austen, 1816)
Emma Woodhouse, handsome, clever, and rich, with a comfortable home and happy disposition, seemed to unite some of the best blessings of existence; and had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her. She was the youngest of the two daughters of a most affectionate, indulgent father; and had, in consequence of her sister’s marriage, been mistress of his house from a very early period.
20. Erewhon (Samuel Butler, 1872)
It may be readily understood that when once Europeans set foot upon this
territory they were not slow to take advantage of its capabilities.
Sheep and cattle were introduced, and bred with extreme rapidity; men
took up their 50,000 or 100,000 acres of country, going inland one
behind the other, till in a few years there was not an acre between the
sea and the front ranges which was not taken up, and stations either for
sheep or cattle were spotted about at intervals of some twenty or
thirty miles over the whole country.
21. For the Term of His Natural Life (Marcus Clarke, 1874)
Sir Richard Devine, knight, shipbuilder, naval contractor, and
millionaire, was the son of a Harwich boat carpenter. Early left an
orphan with a sister to support, he soon reduced his sole aim in life to
the accumulation of money. In the Harwich boat-shed, nearly fifty
years before, he had contracted—in defiance of prophesied failure—to
build the Hastings sloop of war for His Majesty King George the Third’s
Lords of the Admiralty.
22. Frankenstein (Mary Shelley, 1818)
So strange an accident has happened to us that I cannot forbear
recording it, although it is very probable that you will see me before
these papers can come into your possession.
Last Monday (July 31st) we were nearly surrounded by ice, which
closed in the ship on all sides, scarcely leaving her the sea-room in
which she floated. Our situation was somewhat dangerous, especially as
we were compassed round by a very thick fog. We accordingly lay to,
hoping that some change would take place in the atmosphere and weather.
wow!!! Awesome :)
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