Weitere Bücher, die Sie mögen werden

• 

  Nana - Audiobook

  Émile Zola, Classic Audiobooks,...

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  In Nana, Émile Zola tells the provocative story of a beautiful but doomed courtesan who rises to fame in the decadent society of Second Empire Paris. As she ascends through the ranks of high society, she leaves a trail of ruin behind her—destroying powerful men and exposing the moral decay of the world around her.Bold, scandalous, and psychologically complex, Nana is not just the tale of one woman, but a mirror reflecting the collapse of an era. Zola's fearless exploration of desire, power, and self-destruction makes this novel both shocking and unforgettable.

  Zum Buch

• 

  The Sphinx Without A Secret - An...

  Oscar Wilde

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  "The Sphinx Without a Secret" 
  An Etching by Oscar Wilde — Narrated by Stephen Byrne 
  In this exquisitely crafted tale of mystery and melancholy, Oscar Wilde draws us into the shadowed streets of Victorian London where secrets linger behind silk veils and whispered rumours. When Lord Murchison encounters the hauntingly beautiful Lady Alroy—a woman as enigmatic as a sphinx—he becomes obsessed with uncovering the truth behind her curious behaviour and frequent visits to a private lodging house. 
  But the deeper he digs, the more elusive the answer becomes. 
  Is Lady Alroy hiding a lover, or simply hiding herself? And what happens when the truth, once unearthed, leaves only a hollow echo in its place? 
  With Wilde’s trademark wit and tragic irony, The Sphinx Without a Secret is a meditation on love, illusion, and the terrible finality of truth.

  Zum Buch

• 

  The Count of Monte Cristo

  Alexandre Dumas

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  The Count of Monte Cristo (French: Le Comte de Monte-Cristo) is an adventure novel written by French author Alexandre Dumas (père) completed in 1844. It is one of the author's most popular works, along with The Three Musketeers. Like many of his novels, it was expanded from plot outlines suggested by his collaborating ghostwriter Auguste Maquet. 
  The story takes place in France, Italy, and islands in the Mediterranean during the historical events of 1815–1839: the era of the Bourbon Restoration through the reign of Louis-Philippe of France. It begins on the day that Napoleon left his first island of exile, Elba, beginning the Hundred Days period when Napoleon returned to power. The historical setting is a fundamental element of the book, an adventure story centrally concerned with themes of hope, justice, vengeance, mercy, and forgiveness. 
  Before he can marry his fiancée Mercédès, Edmond Dantès, a French nineteen-year-old first mate of the Pharaon, is falsely accused of treason, arrested, and imprisoned without trial in the Château d'If, a grim island fortress off Marseille. A fellow prisoner, Abbé Faria, correctly deduces that romantic rival Fernand Mondego, envious crewmate Danglars, and double-dealing magistrate De Villefort are responsible. Over the course of their long imprisonment, Faria educates Dantès and tells him of a cache of treasure he found. After Faria dies, Dantès escapes and finds the treasure. As the powerful and mysterious Count of Monte Cristo, he enters the fashionable Parisian world of the 1830s to avenge himself.

  Zum Buch

• 

  The Aloe

  Katherine Mansfield

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  'It was not sadness exactly, but a kind of aching sweetness.'
  
  One of Katherine Mansfield's forgotten gems, and a precursor to what would become her acclaimed Prelude, The Aloe is a tender, impressionistic portrait of family life that transforms the mundane into the extraordinary.
  
  First written in 1915, The Aloe is a deeply personal novella that captures Mansfield's childhood in New Zealand. Through a series of finely observed domestic vignettes, the narrative follows the Burnell family, as they move to a new house on the outskirts of Wellington. Mansfield expertly conveys the subtleties of family dynamics: the exhausted yet appreciative father, the imaginative yet quickly maturing children, the inner emotional life of the mother. Through these characters, Mansfield asserts her ability to turn everyday moments into opportunities for exploring memory, belonging and identity.
  Katherine Mansfield (1888 – 1923) was a New Zealand writer and critic. She was an important figurehead of the modernist movement, befriending the likes of Virginia Woolf and D. H. Lawrence amongst others. Her works regularly explored themes such as sexuality, religion and existentialism, and have been translated into twenty-five different languages across the world.

  Zum Buch

• 

  About Love - From their pens to...

  Anton Chekhov

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was born on 29th January 1860 in Taganrog, on the south coast of Russia.  
  His family life was difficult; his father was strict and over-bearing but his mother was a passionate story-teller, a subject Chekhov warmed to. As he later said; ‘our talents we got from our father, but our soul from our mother’.  
  At school Chekhov was distinctly average. At 16 his father mis-managed his finances and was declared bankrupt. His family fled to Moscow. Chekhov remained and eked out a living by various means, including writing and selling short sketches to newspapers, to finish his schooling. That completed and with a scholarship to Moscow University obtained he rejoined his family. 
  He was able to help support them by selling satirical sketches and vignettes of Russian lifestyles and gradually obtained further commissions. In 1884, he qualified as a physician and, although it earned him little, he often treated the poor for free, he was fond of saying ‘Medicine is my lawful wife, and literature is my mistress.’ 
  His own health was now an issue as he began to cough up blood, a symptom of tuberculosis.  Despite this his writing success enabled him to move the family into more comfortable accommodation.  
  Chekhov wrote over 500 short stories which included many, many classics including ‘The Kiss’ and ‘The Lady with a Dog’.  His collection ‘At Dusk’ won him the coveted Pushkin Prize when was only 26.  
  He was also a major playwright beginning with the huge success of ‘Ivanov’ in 1887.   
  In 1892 Chekhov bought a country estate north of Moscow. Here his medical skills and money helped the peasants tackle outbreaks of cholera and bouts of famine. He also built three schools, a fire station and a clinic.  It left him with less time for writing but the interactions with real people gained him detailed knowledge about the peasantry and their living conditions for his stories.  
  His most famous work, ‘The Seagull’ was received disastrously at its premiere in St Petersburg. It was later restaged in Moscow to highlight its psychological aspects and was a huge success. It led to ‘Uncle Vanya’, ‘The Three Sisters’ and ‘The Cherry Orchard’.  
  Chekhov suffered a major lung hemorrhage in 1897 while visiting Moscow. A formal diagnosis confirmed tuberculosis and the doctors ordered changes to his lifestyle.  
  Despite a dread of weddings the elusive literary bachelor quietly married the actress Olga Knipper, whom he had met at rehearsals for ‘The Seagull’, on 25th May 1901. 
  By May 1904 with his tuberculosis worsening and death imminent he set off for the German town of Badenweiler writing cheerful, witty letters to his family and assuring them his health was improving.  
  On 15th July 1904 Anton Chekhov died at Badenweiler.  He was 44.

  Zum Buch

• 

  Ella D'Arcy - A Short Story...

  Ella D'Arcy

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  Ella D'Arcy was born on 23rd August 1857 in London, one of nine children.  
   
  Her education spanned London, Germany, France and the Channel Islands. A student of fine art, her poor eyesight meant a switch to literature was needed and with this she had hopes to be an author. 
   
  She worked as a contributor and unofficial editor, alongside Henry Harland, to The Yellow Book, Aubrey Beardsley’s sensational quarterly magazine that combined art, stories, poetry, essays and much else besides.  D'Arcy wrote several stories for the magazine and her stories have an undeniable psychological and realist style through her engagement with various themes from marriage, the family, imitation through to deception.  
   
  Recognition of her talents grew after the publication of ‘Irremediable’, in the Yellow Book, where it received much praise from critics.   
   
  She also wrote and published in the Argosy, Blackwood's Magazine, and Temple Bar.  
   
  However, D’Arcy’s canon was small and, apart from her magazine stories, her book publishing was limited to ‘Monochromes’ (1895), ‘Modern Instances’ and ‘The Bishop’s Dilemma’ (1898). She also translated André Maurois's biography of Percy Bysshe Shelley entitled ‘Ariel’ (1924). 
   
  Her diligence with work aside she was notorious for her inability to maintain relationships with friends.  When she did appear to them it was often unannounced.  This earned her the sobriquet 'Goblin Ella.' 
   
  D'Arcy spent much of her life living alone, though she had a constant urge to travel, but usually she resided on the edge of poverty. Her writing was often motivated by this need. 
   
  Much of her later life was spent in Paris before returning to London in 1937, where she died, in hospital, on 5th September 1937. 
   
  01 - Ella D'Arcy - A Short Story Collection - An Introduction 
  02 - At Twickenham by Ella D'Arcy 
  03 - White Magic by Ella D'Arcy 
  04 - Irremediable by Ella D'Arcy 
  05 - The Death Mask by Ella D'Arcy 
  06 - Sir Julian Garve by Ella D'Arcy

  Zum Buch