"Man was born free, but everywhere he is in chains. This man believes that he is the master of others, and still he is more of a slave than they are. How did that transformation take place? I don't know. How may the restraints on man become legitimate? I do believe I can answer that question …"Thus begins Rousseau's influential 1762 work, Du Contract Social. Arguing that all government is fundamentally flawed, and that modern society is based on a system that fosters...
A special edition of Bengal Lights, Bangladesh's leading English language literary journal, guest-edited by the editors of the Unnamed Press and Phoneme Media. A liberal exploration of the concept of “the guest” featuring Etgar Keret, Mario Bellatin, Sesshu Foster, Ben Ehrenreich, Stacy Hardy, Douglas Kearney, Amjad Nasser, Rita Indiana, Pavel Šrut, Inongo-vi-Makomè, Angie Cruz, Antonella Anedda, Sharbari Z. Ahmed, Paul Holzman, Carly J. Hallman,...
He was an ordained minister, renowned orator, and beloved author and poet whose ideas on nature, philosophy, and religion influenced authors such as Henry David Thoreau and Walt Whitman. Through his writings, Emerson ardently professed the importance of being an individual, resisting the comfort of conformity, and creating an art of living in harmony with nature. This soul-satisfying anthology of twelve favorite essays is a treasure.In the title essay, Emerson writes about the extraordinary...
Never give all the heart, for loveWill hardly seem worth thinking ofTo passionate women if it seemCertain, and they never dreamThat it fades out from kiss to kiss;For everything that's lovely isBut a brief, dreamy, kind delight. — W. B. YeatsDown through the millennia the emotion of love has inspired countless poets to great heights of lyrical expression. In this volume readers can sample more than 150 great love poems by English and American poets. Spanning over four centuries of...
One of the most influential writers and reformers of his age, Thomas Paine successfully publicized the issues of his time in pamphlets that clearly and persuasively argued for political independence and social reform. Rights of Man, his greatest and most widely read work, is considered a classic statement of faith in democracy and egalitarianism.The first part of this document, dedicated to George Washington, appeared in 1791. Defending the early events of the French Revolution, it spoke on...
A woman of many gifts, Margaret Fuller (1810–1850) is most aptly remembered as America's first true feminist. In her brief yet fruitful life, she was variously author, editor, literary and social critic, journalist, poet, and revolutionary. She was also one of the few female members of the prestigious Transcendentalist movement, whose ranks included Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Elizabeth Palmer Peabody, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and many other prominent New England...
“In all of life, the greatest moments are those that have no words. The deepest communication is a knowing; a thing expressed that needs no expression. At such moments there’s a meeting of the eyes, a shared recognition, but no words. In fact the quieter such moments are, the more they are packed with meaning.” This little excerpt from “The Other Side of the Ring” illustrates the way in which this story seeks out what cannot be spoken. Told in a series of essays which form a story, “The...
Lucian of Samosata (2nd century A.D.) was a famed Syrian philosopher, satirist, and novelist. His broad range of style and prolific output have made him immensely popular throughout the ages. Very little is authentically known of the life of Lucian. He was born in the Roman province of Syria though selected Greek as his literary language. Collected here are all of Lucian's major works. This includes his satires, dialogues, apologias, essays, and proto-novels. Lucian's sharp wit and...
Aphra Behn (1640-1689) is historically recognized as the first woman to make a living through writing; her plays, novels, poems and pamphlets have met with fresh notoriety since the 20th Century. Her work was particularly significant to a group of contemporary writers known as The Female Wits, as well as to later feminist writers like Virginia Woolf. Stories of comedy and intrigue, complete with masks, mistaken identities, visual deceptions, and complicated love triangles which reflect...
"The Essential Tales and Poems" is a large, yet thorough, collection of the poems and stories written by horror master Edgar Allen Poe. Admirers will be happy to see Poe's most famous works present in the collection: «The Fall of the House of Usher,» «The Pit and the Pendulum,» «The Tell-Tale Heart,» and «The Cask of Amontillado.» These works have struck fear in audiences for generations, solidifying Poe's place in the American literature canon. Fans of Poe will not be...