Using, or rather mimicking, traditional forms of storytelling, Gogol created stories that are complete within themselves and only tangentially connected to a meaning or moral. His work belongs to the school of invention, where each twist and turn of the narrative is a surprise unfettered by obligation to an overarching theme.Selected from Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka, Mirgorod, and Petersburg Tales and arranged in order of composition, the 13 stories i...

Also known as Demons, The Possessed is a powerful socio-political novel about revolutionary ideas and the radicals behind them. It follows the career of Pyotr Stepanovitch Verhovensky, a political terrorist who leads a group of Nihilists on a demonic quest for societal breakdown. They are consumed by their desires and ideals, and have surrendered themselves fully to the darkness of their ‘demons’. This possession leads them to engulf a quiet provincial town and subject it to a storm of vio...

A century after it first appeared, Crime and Punishment remains one of the most gripping psychological thrillers. A poverty-striken young man, seeing his family making sacrifices for him, is faced with an opportunity to solve his financial problems with one simple but horrifying act: the murder of a pawnbroker. She is, he feels, just a parasite on society. But does the end justify the means? Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikov makes his decision and then has to live with it. Dostoyevsky, in mas...

Fyodor Dostoyevsky is a titanic figure among the world’s great authors, and The Brothers Karamazov is often hailed as his finest novel. A masterpiece on many levels, it transcends the boundaries of a gripping murder mystery to become a moving account of the battle between love and hate, faith and despair, compassion and cruelty, good and evil.

Prince Lyov Nikolayevitch Myshkin is one of the great characters in Russian literature. Is he a saint or just naïve? Is he an idealist or, as many in General Epanchin’s society feel, an ‘idiot’? Certainly his return to St Petersburg after years in a Swiss clinic has a dramatic effect on the beautiful Aglaia, youngest of the Epanchin daughters, and on the charismatic but wilful Nastasya Filippovna. As he paints a vivid picture of Russian society, Dostoyevsky shows how principles conflict wi...

Raymond Carver called Anton Chekhov 'the greatest short story writer who has ever lived.' This unequivocal verdict on Chekhov's genius has been echoed many times by writers as diverse as Katherine Mansfield, Somerset Maugham, John Cheever and Tobias Wolf. While his popularity as a playwright has sometimes overshadowed his achievements in prose, the importance of Chekhov's stories is now recognized by readers as well as by fellow authors. Their themes--alienation, the absurdity and tragedy ...

Exiled to four years in Siberia, but hailed by the end of his life as a saint, prophet, and genius, Fyodor Dostoevsky holds an exalted place among the best of the great Russian authors. One of Dostoevsky's five major novels, Devils follows the travails of a small provincial town beset by a band of modish radicals - and in so doing presents a devastating depiction of life and politics in late 19th-century Imperial Russia. Both a grotesque comedy and a shocking illustration of clashing ideol...

Elegant, enigmatic Jay Gatsby yearns for his old love, the beautiful Daisy. But she is married to the insensitive if hugely successful Tom Buchanan, who won’t let her go despite having a mistress himself. In their wealthy haven, these beguiling lives are brought together by the innocent and entranced narrator, Nick until their decadent deceits spill into violence and tragedy. Part morality tale, part fairy tale, The Great Gatsby is the consummate novel of the Jazz Age. Its tenderness and p...

In the early 1950s, an eleven-year-old boy in Colombo boards a ship bound for England. At mealtimes he is seated at the “cat’s table”—as far from the Captain’s Table as can be—with a ragtag group of “insignificant” adults and two other boys, Cassius and Ramadhin. As the ship makes its way across the Indian Ocean, through the Suez Canal, into the Mediterranean, the boys tumble from one adventure to another, bursting all over the place like freed mercury. But there are other diversions as we...

A young New Yorker grieving his mother's death is pulled into a gritty underworld of art and wealth in this “extraordinary” and beloved novel that "connects with the heart as well as the mind" (Stephen King, New York Times Book Review), named a New York Times Best Book of the 21st Century.Theo Decker, a 13-year-old New Yorker, miraculously survives an accident that kills his mother. Abandoned by his father, Theo is taken in by the family of a weal...

A larger-than-life old man with a fondness for vodka goes on an unexpected adventure in this whimsical novel — perfect for fans of Forrest Gump and A Man Called Ove*.*After a long and eventful life, Allan Karlsson ends up in a nursing home, believing it to be his last stop. The only problem is that he’s still in good health—and tomorrow is his hundredth birthday. A big celebration is in the works, but Allan really isn’t interested, and he’d like a...

A BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of the evergreen classic novel by Louisa May Alcott.With their father away fighting in the American Civil War, the four March girls are facing a lean Christmas with their mother. But the sisters’ close bond and determination to make the best of things enables them to find happiness despite their poverty.As the years go by we follow their fortunes as they journey into womanhood. Meg the beauty, Jo the tomboy, shy Beth and precocious Amy ...