Other books that might interest you

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  The Death of Ivan Ilych -...

  Leo Tolstoy

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  Leo Tolstoy's timeless tale of a court official's long and drawn out death is both a masterful metaphysical exploration of the meaning of death, and a masterstroke of inspirational storytelling. First published in 1886, this classic of Russian literature is considered one of the great examples of the novella in all of literary fiction. An absorbing listen of a classic story. 
  The Death of Ivan Ilych, by Leo Tolstoy 
  Narrated by Edison McDaniels.

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  Voices from Ukraine: Two Plays...

  Neda Nezhdana, Natal'ya Vorozhbit

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  Two powerful plays about the shattering impact of war, and the astonishing resilience of those living through it, written by two of Ukraine's leading playwrights.
  'They've mobilised all the living now, the fifth call took the last of the living. But the war keeps on. So high command asked us.'
  Sasha, a Colonel in the Ukrainian Army, has died suddenly of a heart attack, leaving his relatives Katia and Oksana to mourn for him. But a year later, as war intensifies, the army has resorted to recruiting the dead. Sasha is anxious to be resurrected so he can rejoin the fight, but can his family bear to lose him all over again? Take the Rubbish Out, Sasha by Natal'ya Vorozhbit blends reality and the supernatural in a startling exploration of the effects of war and conflict.
  'I want to report a robbery... I was robbed. What was stolen from me? Almost everything... Home, land, car, work, friends, city, faith in goodness…'
  Donbas, 2014. A nameless woman stands in the street, trying to sell a basket of kittens. She has lost everything else she holds dear. Her only remaining hope is to find a home for the kittens, since she cannot offer them one herself. Pussycat in Memory of Darkness by Neda Nezhdana is an unflinching examination of Russia's war on Ukraine through the brutalised eyes of one woman.
  The two plays were translated by Sasha Dugdale and John Farndon, respectively, and performed in English at the Finborough Theatre, London, as part of their #VoicesFromUkraine season in 2022.
  10% of the proceeds from sales of this book will be donated to the Voices of Children Charitable Foundation, a Ukrainian charity providing urgently needed psychological and psychosocial support to children affected by the war in Ukraine.

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  The Theatre of Illusion

  Pierre Corneille

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  A magician conjures a dramatic adventure of romance and intrigue in this seventeenth-century French tragicomedy by the author of Le Cid. 
   
  In Pierre Corneille’s sparkling play The Theatre of Illusion, magicians, lovers, and heroes prove that all the world truly is a stage. First performed in 1636, it was pioneering in its use of metatheatrical storytelling. It then vanished from the stage for the next three hundred years—to be revived in 1937 at the Comédie Française. Since then it has been widely considered, in Virginia Scott’s words, “Corneille’s baroque masterpiece.” 
   
  Today this classic work is available in a translation from one of America’s finest poets and translators of French, Richard Wilbur. Widely praised for his translations of plays by Molière and Racine, Wilbur now turns his poetic grace to this celebration of the comedy of humanity and the magic of life.

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  Alice in Wonderland (Argo Classics)

  Lewis Carroll

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  William Collins Books and Decca Records are proud to present ARGO Classics, a historic catalogue of classic fiction read by some of the world’s most renowned voices. Originally released as vinyl records, these expertly abridged and remastered stories are now available to download for the first time. 
  No story captures the uneasy feeling of being in a strange new world quite like Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. 
  The beloved tale, read by the iconic Jane Asher, sees Alice following a peculiar White Rabbit into the bizarre world of Wonderland, where nothing seems to make sense and everything she knows is turned on its head. 
  For fans of Kenneth Grahame (Pagan Papers), Mary Shelley (Frankenstein), Majestic Classics (Dracula Illustrated), Jane Austen (Mansfield Park), and Rocket Classic Collection (Emma).

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  Poetry of Sa'di - A Selection

  Saadi

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  Shaikh Sa’di,  also known as  Saadi Shirazi,  the nightingale of Shiraz, as Jami poetically calls this gifted poet, was born at Shiraz, the capital of Persia, near the end of the twelfth century.By turns, a student, a water-carrier, a traveller, a soldier fighting against the Christians in the Crusades, a prisoner employed to dig trenches before Tripoli. and an honored poet in his protracted old age at home, — his varied and severe experience took away all provincial tone, and gave him a facility of speaking to all conditions. But the commanding reason of his wider popularity is his deeper sense, which, in his treatment, expands the local forms and tints to a cosmopolitan breadth.This dervish wit and linguist the Mohammedans worshipped as a saint, even attributing miracles to him. His body now lies entombed in the valley of Shiraz, and is daily visited by devout pilgrims who say of him, in true Oriental fashion, that he “perforated with the diamond of his soul the precious stones of his experiences, and, after gathering them on the string of eloquence, hung them for a talisman round the neck of posterity.”Among Sa'di's best known works are the Gulistan, or Rose Garden, and the Bustan, or the Garden of Perfume. The Gulistan is a collection of short pithy stories, based on Sa'di’s own varied experiences, and read, it is said, from the middle of China to the extreme corners of Africa, forming as it does the basis of instruction in Mohammedan schools. The Bustan, Sa'di’s other famous work, is also used as a text-book in military and civil examinations, and consists of ten chapters of didactic verse. (From the introduction by Nathan Haskell Dole and Belle Walker)

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  Building Bridges

  Marie Dunlop

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  Building Bridges is set in 1965 in Anderston, Glasgow and examines the reaction of deserted husband, Billy Speirs, and his family to the return of his estranged wife, Bernie, whose mother has been taken seriously ill.  
  It is a tale of bitterness, betrayal, and the absolute enduring strength of love when a community was sliced up to make way for a stretch of inner city motorway and the Glasgow Kingston Bridge. Just as the earmarking of Anderston as a Glasgow Comprehensive Development Area faced mixed reactions, the couple’s tentative and nervous steps back to one another faced opposition and difficulty and like the opinion of much of the community at that time, it was clear that things were never going to be the same again.  
  The heart was getting ripped out of the place, just as it had been ripped out of Billy. Decisions have to be made, loyalties examined, and painful truths faced. Better days were coming, however, in the promise of new corporation housing, and it is against this backdrop of demolition and renewal that Building Bridges opens.

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