When Elizabeth Bennet first meets eligible bachelor, Fitzwilliam Darcy, she thinks him arrogant and conceited; he is indifferent to her good looks and lively mind. This novel shows the folly of judging by first impressions and evokes the friendships, gossip and snobberies of provincial middle-class life.
Tony Tanner Books






Thomas Pynchon
- 98 pages
- 4 hours of reading
Focusing on the work of Thomas Pynchon, this introduction delves into his early short stories and provides insights into his novels. Set against the backdrop of Pynchon's life, it offers a detailed examination of his literary contributions, including lesser-known stories. Originally published in 1982, the book serves as a valuable guide for readers looking to navigate Pynchon's complex narratives and themes.
City of Words: American Fiction 1950-1970
- 464 pages
- 17 hours of reading
Nabokov - Borges - Ellison - Bellow - Heller - Purdy - Hawkes - Barth - Plath - Updike - Roth - Mailer - Kesey.
Nietzsche said that he never travelled anywhere without a volume of Emerson's essays in his pocket, while Mathew Arnold described Emerson as 'the greatest prose writer of the century'. It is a remarkable writer who could at once appeal to a man considered a pillar of Victorian society, and to a man dedicated to bringing down such pillars. In his own time Emerson was considered a profoundly radical thinker, but after his death he was increasingly seen as a bland Boston Brahmin, contentedly ripening with the new England melons, benignly meditating on such viperous notions as the Over–soul.He is now appreciated as one of the truly seminal American writers, refusing all orthodoxies, complacencies and fixities—both a truly celebratory and deeply adversarial thinker. A unique paperback edition, with introduction and chronology of Emerson's life and times.
Sense and Sensibility
- 368 pages
- 13 hours of reading
Jane Austen's first published work, meticulously constructed and sparkling with her unique wit Marianne Dashwood wears her heart on her sleeve, and when she falls in love with the dashing but unsuitable John Willoughby she ignores her sister Elinor's warning that her impulsive behaviour leaves her open to gossip and innuendo. Meanwhile Elinor, always sensitive to social convention, is struggling to conceal her own romantic disappointment, even from those closest to her. Through their parallel experience of love - and its threatened loss - the sisters learn that sense must mix with sensibility if they are to find personal happiness in a society where status and money govern the rules of love. This edition also includes explanatory notes and textual variants between first and second edition. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
A Farewell to Arms
- 304 pages
- 11 hours of reading
In 1918 Ernest Hemingway went to war, to the 'war to end all wars'. He volunteered for ambulance service in Italy, was wounded and twice decorated. Out of his experiences came A Farewell to Arms. Hemingway's description of war is unforgettable. He recreates the fear, the comradeship, the courage of his young American volunteer and the men and women he meets in Italy with total conviction. But A Farewell to Arms is not only a novel of war. In it Hemingway has also created a love story of immense drama and uncompromising passion.
Tanner guides us through Austen's novels from optimistic early works to the darker Persuasion and fragmentary Sanditon--a journey that takes her from acceptance of a society maintained by landed property, family, money, and strict propriety through an insistence on the need for authentication of these values to a final skepticism and even rejection.
The great gatsby
- 254 pages
- 9 hours of reading
Englische Literatur in Reclams Roter Reihe: das ist der englische Originaltext – mit Worterklärungen am Fuß jeder Seite, Nachwort und Literaturhinweisen. Fitzgerald war der literarische Wortführer des „Jazz Age“. Er hat das glitzernde New York der Zwischenkriegsjahre, das sich für die Rhythmen von Duke Ellington und Louis Armstrong begeisterte, eingefangen, ohne die Frage auszublenden, ob dieser Glanz trügerisch sei. Seine Helden, kaum verhüllte Selbstporträts, strotzen nur so vor Selbstbewusstsein und leiden zugleich an ihrem Ausbeuten der eigenen Seele. Englische Lektüre: Niveau B2 - C1 (GER)
The Europeans
- 192 pages
- 7 hours of reading
In the hope of making a wealthy marriage, Eugenia, the Baroness M©ơnster, and her younger brother, the artist Felix, descend on the Wentworths, in Boston. Installed in a nearby house, they become close friends with the younger Wentworths, Gertrude, Charlotte and Clifford. Eugenia's wit, guile and sophistication, and Felix's debonair vivacity form an uneasy alliance with the Puritan morality and the frugal, domestic virtues of the Americans. A rich and delicately balanced commedy of manners, The Europeans weighs the values of the established order against thos of New England society, but makes no simple judgements, only subtle contrasts and beautifully observed comparisons.
Dr Tanner investigates American literature with regards to wonder and cultivated naivety.



