Henry Hitchings Books

What happens when we listen to others instead of our heart? That is the subject of Jane Austen's final novel, and her most mature work. After Anne Elliot heeds the advice of her dearest friend and breaks off her engagement to Frederick Wentworth, happiness eludes her. Eight years later, Anne remains unmarried, and her father's spendthrift ways have brought her family down materially in the world. When a newly wealthy Frederick returns from the Napoleonic Wars, Anne realizes her feelings remain unchanged. But will Frederick forgive her and offer Anne a second chance at love?

Recalling the story of the first great lexicon of English, the author reveals how Samuel Johnson arduously assembled his eighteenth-century dictionary--a task that ultimately helped make English into a major European language.

The English language is a battlefield. Since the age of Shakespeare, arguments over correct usage have been acrimonious, and those involved have always really been contesting values to do with morality, politics and class.

Edited and introduced by the writer and critic Henry Hitchings, these fearless, passionate, inquiring essays by award-winning international writers celebrate one of our most essential, but endangered, institutions: the bookshop. From Denmark to Egypt, from the USA to China, Browse brings together some of the world's leading authors to investigate bookshops both in general and in particular - the myriad pleasures, puzzles and possibilities they disclose. The fifteen essays reflect their authors' own inimitable style - romantic, elegant, bold, argumentative, poetic or whimsical - as they ask probing questions about the significance, the cultural and social (even political) function as well as the physical qualities of the institution, and examine our very personal relationship to it. Contributors include: Alaa Al Aswany (Egypt) Stefano Benni (Italy) Michael Dirda (USA) Daniel Kehlmann (Germany) Andrey Kurkov (Ukraine) Yiyun Li (China) Pankaj Mishra (India) Dorthe Nors (Denmark) Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor (Kenya) Elif Shafak (Turkey) Ian Sansom (UK) Iain Sinclair (UK) Ali Smith (UK) Saša Stanišic (Germany/Bosnia) Juan Gabriel Vásquez (Colombia)

Journey into the history of English and discover how words have been absorbed into our language to make it what it is today.

Henry Hitchings presents an amusing, illuminating and quirky audit of English manners. Ranging from basic table manners to appropriate sexual conduct, via hospitality, chivalry, faux pas and online etiquette, he traces the history of our country's customs and courtesies. Putting under the microscope some of our most astute observers of humanity, including Jane Austen and Samuel Pepys, he uses their lives and writings to pry open the often downright peculiar secrets of English behaviour.

The misadventures of Lemuel Gulliver certainly are extraordinary. First he is shipwrecked in a strange land, and finds himself a prisoner of the tiny inhabitants of Lilliput. Then he washes up in Brobdingnag, where the people are giants of extraordinary proportions. Further exploits see him stranded with the scientists and philosophers of Laputa, and meeting a race of talking horses who rule over bestial humans. One of the finest satires in the English language, Gulliver's Travels delights in the mockery of everything from government to religion and - despite the passing of nearly three centuries - remains just as funny and relevant today. This gorgeous Macmillan Collector's Library edition of Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels features the beautiful artwork of the celebrated English illustrator Arthur Rackham, and an afterword by author and critic, Henry Hitchings. Designed to appeal to the booklover, the Macmillan Collector's Library is a series of beautiful gift editions of much loved classic titles. Macmillan Collector's Library are books to love and treasure.