Catalog Search Results

Emigrating from Bohemia to Black Hawk, Nebraska, with her family, Antonia finds no white-framed farmhouse or snug barn. Instead, the cultured Shimerda family finds itself huddled into a primitive sod house buffeted by the ceaselessly, blowing winds of the Midwest prairie. For her childhood friend Jim Burden, Antonia comes to embody the elemental spirit of this frontier, despite the events that nearly destroy her family and leave her seduced and...

O. Henry's most famous short story, "The Gift of the Magi" has a universal appeal that extends beyond the Christmas season. Set in New York at the turn of the 19th century, the story centers on a young couple and the sacrifices each must make in order to buy the other a gift.

The American master of the short story presents twenty-two tales, including "A Retrieved Reformation," that twist and turn in unexpected ways. One of the most popular authors of his day, O. Henry penned stories that surprised and delighted his many fans. His characters were people whom readers knew from places they recognized, everyday folks who sometimes found themselves in sticky, shocking, and sobering situations. This volume includes many of...

America's most popular short story writer saddles up and heads west in nineteen frontier-themed tales, including "The Caballero's Way." Known for his surprise endings, O. Henry turns his attention to the American West in tales of lawmen and outlaws, cowboys and prairie princesses-running the gamut from laugh-out-loud humor to tear-jerking pathos. "The most memorable stories from this collection are both a bit different from the rest. 'The Sphinx...

Knut Hamsun believed that modern literature should express the complexity of the human mind and nowhere is that philosophy more evident than in this stunning modern masterpiece, "Hunger." First published in 1890 in Norwegian and based on Hamsun's own experiences with poverty prior to his success as an author, "Hunger" tells the story of an unnamed vagrant who stumbles around the streets of Norway's capital city of Kristiania (now Oslo) looking for...

American author and poet Carl Sandburg (1878-1967), best known for the poetry that attributed to two of his three Pulitzer Prizes, also wrote histories, biographies, novels, and children's stories. Born in Illinois, Sandburg spent most of his life in the Midwest before moving to North Carolina in 1945, where he lived till his death. In the early 1920s Sandburg began writing children's stories for his three daughters, beginning with his "Rootabaga...

Excerpt: "[Lumbermen] are in such a hurry to get rich that they'll leave their grandchildren a desert. They cut and slash in every direction, and then fires come and the country is ruined. Our rivers depend upon the forests for water. The trees draw the rain; the leaves break it up and let it fall in mists and drippings; it seeps into the ground, and is held by roots. If the trees are destroyed the rain rushes off on the surface and floods the rivers....

From America's favorite storyteller: A rich selection of twenty-five tales by the author of "The Gift of the Magi." Writing under the pseudonym O. Henry, William Sydney Porter was an incredibly prolific and popular master of the short story in the early twentieth century. His stories are known for being witty, playful, full of plot twists, and marked by surprise endings. The author had a special fondness for New York City and a deep interest and appreciation...

In this fascinating and comprehensive collection of Chinese myths and legends, E. T. C. Werner drew upon material readily available to him as a member of the Chinese government's Historiographical Bureau in Peking. A former barrister and British consul in Foochow, Werner presents a wealth of information illuminating the ideas and beliefs that governed the daily lives of the Chinese people long before the revolutions of the 20th century. Offering a...