I am a sick man. ... I am a spiteful man. I am an unattractive man. I believe my liver is diseased. However, I know nothing at all about my disease, and do not know for certain what ails me. I don’t consult a doctor for it, and never have, though I have a respect for medicine and doctors. Besides, I am extremely superstitious, sufficiently so to respect medicine, anyway (I am well-educated enough not to be superstitious, but I am superstitious). No, I refuse to consult a doctor from spite. That you probably will not understand. Well, I understand it, though. Of course, I can’t explain who it is precisely that I am mortifying in this case by my spite: I am perfectly well aware that I cannot ‘pay out’ the doctors by not consulting them; I know better than anyone that by all this I am only injuring myself and no one else. But still, if I don’t consult a doctor it is from spite. My liver is bad, well—let it get worse!.....get this free ebook with click link below

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Tell me, O Muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy. Many cities did he visit, and many were the nations with whose manners and customs he was acquainted; moreover he suffered much by sea while trying to save his own life and bring his men safely home; but do what he might he could not save his men, for they perished through their own sheer folly in eating the cattle of the Sun-god Hyperion; so the god prevented them from ever reaching home. Tell me, too, about all these things, oh daughter of Jove, from whatsoever source you may know them.....

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documents precisely; and a wonderful discovery crowned my labors in a very definite fashion. It will be remembered that, later, when digging in the substructure of the Opera, before burying the phonographic records of the artist's voice, the workmen laid bare a corpse. Well, I was at once able to prove that this corpse was that of the Opera ghost. I made the acting-manager put this proof to the test with his own hand; and it is now a matter of supreme indifference to me if the papers pretend that the body was that of a victim of the Commune.

The wretches who were massacred, under the Commune, in the cellars of the Opera, were not buried on this side; I will tell where their skeletons can be found in a spot not very far from that immense crypt which was stocked during the siege with all sorts of provisions. I came upon this track just when I was looking for the remains of the Opera ghost, which I should never have discovered but for the unheard-of chance described above.

But we will return to the corpse and what ought to be done with it. For the present, I must conclude this very necessary introduction by thanking M. Mifroid (who was the commissary of police called in for the first investigations after the disappearance of Christine Daae), M. Remy, the late secretary, M. Mercier, the late acting-manager, M. Gabriel, the late chorus-master, and more particularly Mme. la Baronne de Castelot-Barbezac, who was once the "little Meg" of the story (and who is not ashamed of it), the most charming star of our admirable corps de ballet, the eldest daughter of the worthy Mme. Giry, now deceased, who had charge of the ghost's private box. All these were of the greatest assistance to me; and, thanks to them,I shall be able to reproduce those hours of sheer love and terror, in their smallest details, before the reader's eyes.............

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Great story from best novel. The Last World, famous story and was cinema. If you want get this ebook for free, click this ink below

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MR. UTTERSON the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance, that was never lighted by a smile; cold, scanty and embarrassed in discourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary, and yet somehow lovable. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was to his taste, something eminently human beaconed from his eye; something indeed which never found its way into his talk, but which spoke not only in these silent symbols of the after-dinner face, but more often and loudly in the acts of his life. He was austere with himself; drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a taste for vintages; and though he enjoyed the theatre, had not crossed the doors of one for twenty years. But he had an approved tolerance for others; sometimes wondering, almost with envy, at the high pressure of spirits involved in their misdeeds; and in any extremity inclined to help rather than to reprove..........

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Wow, this is a dramatic story. A Man who around the world just in 80 days. Read this story for free. Just click link below

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This is a famous story. Alice's adventure to Wonderland with "bunny" doll. even, this novel was goes to cinema. But if you want to read again this wonderfull story, get this ebook for free. Just click link below.

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Do you know The Legend of Moby Dick? if you don't know that legends, you can read this ebook for free. Click here to get this ebook from planetPDF

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Now "The Arabian Nights," some of which, but not nearly all, are given in this volume, are only fairy tales of the East. The people of Asia, Arabia, and Persia told them in their own way, not for children, but for grown−up people. There were no novels then, nor any printed books, of course; but there were people whose profession it was to amuse men and women by telling tales. They dressed the fairy stories up, and made the characters good Mahommedans, living in Bagdad or India. The events were often supposed to happen in the reign of the great Caliph, or ruler of the Faithful, Haroun al Raschid, who lived in Bagdad in 786−808 A.D. The vizir who accompanies the Caliph was also a real person of the great family of the Barmecides. He was put to death by the Caliph in a very cruel way, nobody ever knew why. The stories must have been told in their present shape a good long while after the Caliph died, when nobody knew very exactly what had really happened. At last some storyteller thought of writing down the tales, and fixing them into a kind of framework, as if they had all been narrated to a cruel Sultan by his wife. Probably the tales were written down about the time when Edward I. was fighting Robert Bruce. But changes were made in them at different times, and a great deal that is very dull and stupid was put in, and plenty of verses. Neither the verses nor the dull pieces are given in this book.

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The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of twelve stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, featuring his famous detective and illustrated by Sidney Paget.

These are the first of the Sherlock Holmes short stories, originally published as single stories in the Strand Magazine from July 1891 to June 1892. The book was published in England on October 14, 1892 by George Newnes Ltd and in a US Edition on October 15 by Harper. The initial combined print run was 14,500 copies.

The book was banned in the Soviet Union in 1929 for occultism, although the book shows few to no signs of such material. Later, the embargo was lifted.

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The novel, however, is far from simple hagiography, avoiding conventional narrative and pious language, Instead, it recreates the process by which Jean Sulivan discovered Strozzi's life and the meaning of his priesthood. Because the narrator is called "Sul" within the text, and the name Jean Sulivan appears on the cover, there is a mixture of genres, including a personal and intimate journal with a spiritual journey of its own. Indeed, the narrator has resisted Strozzi's influence on the book he is writing. Sulivan had started out to do a book about the reformed prostitute Elizabeth, anticipating a lurid underworld.

But Elizabeth kept speaking about Strozzi; from the outset Sulivan complains, "Strozzi stole my novel."

The psychological and spiritual journey that marks Sulivan's work is especially challenging for a Catholic writer who is aware of the rich but burdensome tradition of images and symbols that western Christianity has created. The art of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance each provide a representation of the spiritual ideals, religious institutions, and historical actualities of their age; how can a Catholic writer invent a form and language that will reflect our post-Christian age? In his 1964 novel, Mais il y a la mer (The Sea Remains, 1969. o.p.), Sulivan embodies the problem in Ramon Rimaz, a retired Spanish Cardinal living in a cottage next to the sea. Rimaz has, in a sense, been stripped of his vestments, his office, and his function. As a man he must confront his present existence (a housekeeper, a chance friendship with a boy on the beach, an encounter with a neighbor) and make sense of a life devoid of the imagery and authority of his history. The anonymous narrator finds in the image of nature, spec ifically the sea, a basis for a lyrical reconciliation with the immanent God.

In a sense Eternity, My Beloved might be seen as an historical text, a novel about the state of religious life in Paris before and after World War II, seen from the perspective of a writer living in the 60s, shortly before May 1968 produced the rebellion of the young against an entrenched bourgeois system of education. Mauriac's Woman of the Phraisees had already attacked the rigidity and hypocrisy of bourgeois religious life. Although Bernanos's Diary of a Country Priest is set in a poor rural parish, its description of the crisis of religion in France and its diary form obviously influenced Sulivan. (Like Bernanos, Sulivan writes in short units, from a few lines to several pages, 107 sections in 136 pages, arranged arbitrarily, without chronology, reflecting the fractured disorder of discovery.) Eternity, My Beloved, however, was written after Vatican II and reflects the renewed sense of hope that the Council engendered. With Latin no longer the universal language of the church, Sulivan attempts to find a new language for what the translator calls "that" -- the inexpressible, the mystical, the representation of the presence of God here and now - particularly in the character of Strozzi.

In this historical moment in the U.S., marked by a plethora of spiritual autobiographies, Eternity, My Beloved offers an unusual artistic experience and a challenging spiritual analysis. Whatever differences they are between the social and religious histories of France and the United States, we share the same post-Christian culture, at the heart of which, as Sulivan shows in this book, is the attitude toward sex. The epigraph, which provides the title, is from Nietzsche: "I have never found the woman by whom I would want to have a child, except this woman that I love, for I love you, eternity, my beloved." Strozzi is represented as a man beyond social and institutional constraints who faithfully maintains a spiritual presence among the marginalized members of his parish.

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Pride and Prejudice, first published on 28 January 1813, is the most famous of Jane Austen's novels and one of the first "romantic comedies" in the history of the novel. The book is Jane Austen's second published novel. Its manuscript was initially written between 1796 and 1797 in Steventon, Hampshire, where Austen lived in the rectory. Called First Impressions, it was never published under that title, and following revisions it was retitled Pride and Prejudice.

Background

The novel was originally titled First Impressions, and was written between October 1796 and August 1797. Jane Austen's father wrote to London bookseller Thomas Cadell on November 1, 1797, offering it for publication, but it was rejected unseen by return of post. The unpublished manuscript remained with Austen, and it was not until 1811 that the first of her novels would be published, Sense and Sensibility.

Buoyed by the release of her first published novel, Austen revised the manuscript for First Impressions, likely between 1811 and 1812.[1] She renamed the story Pride and Prejudice, an "apparent cliche" phrase of the times. In renaming the novel, Jane Austen probably had in mind the "sufferings and oppositions" summarized in the final chapter of Fanny Burney's Cecilia called "Pride and Prejudice". Literary scholar Robert Fox cautions against reading too much into the title when discerning the novel's themes since commercial factors may have played a role in its selection: "After the success of Sense and Sensibility, nothing would have seemed more natural than to bring out another novel of the same author using again the formula of antithesis and alliteration for the title". It is also possible that the novel's original title was altered to avoid confusion with other works. In the years between the completion of First Impressions and its revision into Pride and Prejudice, two other works had been published under that name: a novel by Margaret Holford and a comedy by Horace Smith.

Austen sold the copyright for the novel to Thomas Egerton of Whitehall in exchange for £110 (Austen had asked for £150). This proved a costly decision. Austen had published Sense and Sensibility on a commission basis, whereby she indemnified the publisher against any losses and received any profits, less costs and the publisher's commission. Unaware that Sense and Sensibility would sell out its edition, making her £140, she passed the copyright to Egerton for a one-off payment, meaning that all the risk - and all the profits - would be his. Jan Fergus has calculated that Egerton subsequently made around £450 from just the first two editions of the book.

Plot introduction

Mr and Mrs Bennet's five daughters are all unmarried, and when a rich, amiable young man moves into the neighbourhood, Mrs Bennet hopes to secure him as a husband for her beautiful, eldest daughter. The growing relationship, however, is sabotaged by the young man's haughty friend, who regards the match as unsuitable. When the friend in turn falls in love with the second Bennet daughter, his condescending offer is rejected with scorn and the connection seems over. However, events conspire to bring the various parties together despite the obstacles and misunderstandings that separate them. Pride on one side and prejudice on the other are slowly overcome and the characters come to a better knowledge of themselves and each other.

Plot summary

The novel opens with the line, "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife." The arrival of such a man in the neighbourhood greatly excites Mrs Bennet, whose sole interest in life is to see her five daughters married. The wealthy young man in question, Mr Bingley, has leased the Netherfield estate and plans to settle for a while with his two sisters and his brother-in-law.

The newcomers excite great interest locally, particularly amongst mothers of marriageable daughters. They attend a public ball in the village of Meryton, where Mr Bingley shows himself to be amiable and unpretentious, dancing with many young ladies and showing his decided admiration for Jane Bennet. His friend Mr Darcy, however, makes himself unpopular despite his fine figure and income of £10,000 a year, being proud and disagreeable. Of Elizabeth Bennet he is heard to say, "She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me." Following the ball, Jane is invited for an evening to Netherfield, but catches a bad cold and is forced to stay for some days. Elizabeth comes to nurse her, engaging Darcy's guarded attention and the not-so-guarded hostility of Miss Bingley, who appears to have in interest in Darcy herself.

Mr Collins, a cousin who will inherit the Bennet estate as Mr Bennet's nearest male relative, arrives for a visit. He is also "in want of a wife", and intends to marry one of his cousins, thus atoning for his position as entailed heir and healing the breach in the family. A pompous buffoon of a clergyman, he has been ordered by his imperious patroness, Lady Catherine de Bourgh (who is also Darcy's aunt), to find himself a suitable wife. Finding that Jane appears destined for Bingley he switches his sights to Elizabeth, who refuses him absolutely despite the threats and entreaties of her mother. Eventually, to Elizabeth's surprise, he is accepted by her friend Charlotte Lucas, who neither loves nor respects him, but wishes to escape the fate of becoming an old maid. Elizabeth does not regret the loss of her suitor, but is disppointed in Charlotte and unsure how happy she will be as Mrs. Collins.

For some time Meryton has been home to a regiment of soldiers, delighting the giddy, young Bennet sisters Kitty and Lydia. Elizabeth is introduced to a pleasant young officer, Mr Wickham, who tells her that he has known Mr Darcy from childhood, and has been cheated by him of a bequest by Darcy's late father. This reinforces Elizabeth's growing dislike of Darcy and she is relieved when he leaves the neighbourhood, although Bingley and his party also leave, dashing the hopes of Jane, who has fallen very much in love with him. However, Elizabeth encounters Darcy again on a visit to the newlywed Mr and Mrs Collins, as he arrives to visit Lady Catherine at Rosings Park, the estate to which Mr Collins's living is attached. She tolerates him, unaware of his growing admiration, and is astounded when he suddenly proposes to her. His offer is high-handed and condescending – he does so, he says, "against his own will" and in spite of her objectionable family. He is stunned and mortified to be rejected in no uncertain terms: Elizabeth tells him he is "the last man in the world whom [she] could ever be prevailed on to marry." She has recently learnt that it was Darcy who persuaded Mr Bingley to sever ties with Jane, increasing her dislike for him, and also cites his treatment of Wickham, his arrogance and his ungentlemanly conduct as reasons for her refusal.

The next day, Mr Darcy intercepts Elizabeth on her morning walk and hands her a letter before coldly taking his leave. In it, he justifies his actions over Bingley and Jane, and reveals the true nature of Wickham, who has misrepresented his treatment by Darcy, and, shockingly, even attempted to seduce and elope with Darcy's young and vulnerable sister. New light is shed on Mr Darcy's personality and Elizabeth begins to reconsider her opinion. Later, on holiday with her aunt and uncle, the Gardiners, Elizabeth is persuaded to tour Pemberley, Mr Darcy's estate, on the understanding that he is away. To her embarrassment he returns unexpectedly; however, his altered behaviour toward her – distinctly warmer than at their last meeting – and his polite and friendly manner toward her aunt and uncle, begin to persuade her that underneath his pride lies a true and generous nature. Her revised opinion is reinforced on meeting his sister Georgiana, a gentle, shy young girl upon whom he dotes.

Just as her relationship with Mr Darcy is beginning to thaw, Elizabeth receives the dreadful news that her headstrong younger sister Lydia has apparently eloped with Mr Wickham, who has resigned his commission to evade gambling debts. She returns home, believing that this scandal can only further disgust Darcy with the idea of a connection with her family, whatever he may feel for her personally. All is in chaos at home, particularly when it becomes apparent that Wickham has not married Lydia and the two are living together in London. Mr Gardiner apparently traces them and arranges the wedding, delighting the foolish Mrs Bennet. Only from a careless remark of Lydia's does Elizabeth discover that it was really Darcy who secretly intervened, buying Wickham's compliance and saving Lydia's reputation at great financial cost. This completes the reversal in Elizabeth's sentiments, and she regrets having turned down his earlier proposal of marriage.

Lady Catherine discovers Mr Darcy's feelings for Elizabeth, which threaten her long-cherished desire for him to marry her daughter. She pays Elizabeth an unannounced visit and brusquely tries to intimidate her into refusing such an engagement. Unfortunately for Lady Catherine, her visit only serves to consolidate Elizabeth's intentions. Furthermore, Lady Catherine later visits Mr Darcy, and relates the entire conversation to him – giving him the hope that if he proposes to Elizabeth again, she may accept him. After ensuring the rekindling of Mr Bingley and Jane Bennet's relationship, Mr Darcy and Elizabeth become engaged.

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