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English Literature
English literature is the literature written in the English language, including literature composed in English by writers not necessarily from England; Joseph Conrad was born in Poland, Robert Burns was Scottish, James Joyce was Irish, Dylan Thomas was Welsh, Edgar Allan Poe was American, V.S....
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Animal Farm
Animal Farm is a dystopian novella in the form of an allegory by George Orwell. Published in England on 17 August 1945, the book reflects events leading up to and during the Stalin era before World War II. Orwell, a democratic socialist and a member...
Copyright date:
- Aug 17, 1945
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Date of first publication:
- Aug 17, 1945
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ISFDB ID:
- 2423
Fahrenheit 451
Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopian novel authored by Ray Bradbury and first published in 1953.
The novel presents a future American society in which the masses are hedonistic and critical thought through reading is outlawed. The central character, Guy...
Copyright date:
- 1953
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 1972
Heart of Darkness
Heart of Darkness is a novella written by Joseph Conrad. Before its 1902 publication, it appeared as a three-part series (1899) in Blackwood's Magazine. It is widely regarded as a significant work of English literature and part of the Western canon....
Copyright date:
- 1902
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Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (often referred to as The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn or shortened to Huckleberry Finn or simply Huck Finn) is a novel by Mark Twain, first published in December 1884. Commonly recognized as one of the Great...
Date of first publication:
- 1884
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Ivanhoe
Ivanhoe is a novel by Sir Walter Scott. It was written in 1819 and set in 12th century England, an example of historical fiction. Ivanhoe is sometimes given credit for helping to increase popular interest in the Middle Ages in 19th century Europe...
Copyright date:
- 1819
Date of first publication:
- 1819
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Author:
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Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice is a novel by Jane Austen. First published in 1813, as her second novel, she started it 1796 as her first persevering effort for publication. She finished the original manuscript by 1797 in Steventon, Hampshire, where she lived...
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Date of first publication:
- Jan 28, 1813
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Author:
Peter Pan
Peter Pan: or, The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up (1904) is the title of Scottish playwright and novelist James M. Barrie's most famous play, and Peter and Wendy is the title of Barrie's 1911 novelization of it. Both tell the story of Peter Pan, a...
Copyright date:
- 1904
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ISFDB ID:
- 20417
Sense and Sensibility
Sense and Sensibility is a novel by the English novelist Jane Austen. Published in 1811, it was Austen's first published novel, which she wrote under the pseudonym "A Lady".
The story revolves around Elinor and Marianne, two daughters of Mr....
Date of first publication:
- 1811
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Lord of the Flies
Lord of the Flies is an allegorical novel by Nobel Prize-winning author William Golding. It discusses how culture created by man fails, using as an example a group of British schoolboys stuck on a deserted island who try to govern themselves, but...
Copyright date:
- 1954
Date of first publication:
- 1954
Original language:
ISFDB ID:
- 828338
Brave New World
Brave New World is a novel by Aldous Huxley, written in 1931 and published in 1932. Set in the London of AD 2540 (632 A.F. in the book), the novel anticipates developments in reproductive technology and sleep-learning that combine to change society....
Copyright date:
- 1932
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 2319
Northanger Abbey
Northanger Abbey was the first of Jane Austen's novels to be completed for publication, though she had previously made a start on Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice. According to Cassandra Austen's Memorandum, Susan (as it was first...
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Date of first publication:
- Dec 1817
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The Wind in the Willows
The Wind in the Willows is a classic of children's literature by Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908. Alternately slow moving and fast paced, it focuses on four anthropomorphised animal characters in a pastoral version of England. The novel is...
Copyright date:
- 1908
Date of first publication:
- 1908
Original language:
Author:
Part of series:
ISFDB ID:
- 835
Emma
Emma, by Jane Austen, is a comic novel about the perils of misconstrued romance. The novel was first published in December 1815. As in her other novels, Austen explores the concerns and difficulties of genteel women living in Georgian-Regency...
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Date of first publication:
- Dec 1815
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The Day of the Triffids
The Day of the Triffids is a post-apocalyptic novel written in 1951 by the English science fiction author John Wyndham. Although Wyndham had already published other novels, this was the first published under the John Wyndham pen-name. It established...
Copyright date:
- 1951
Next in series:
Date of first publication:
- Dec 1951
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 2139
Harriet the Spy
Harriet the Spy is a children's book by Louise Fitzhugh published in 1964. It won the Sequoyah Book Award and the New York Times Outstanding Book Award in 1964.
Harriet M. Welsch is an outgoing 11-year-old girl aspiring to be a spy, who lives on the...
Date of first publication:
- 1964
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To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird is a Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Harper Lee published in 1960. It was instantly successful and has become a classic of modern American literature. The plot and characters are loosely based on the author's observations of...
Date of first publication:
- Jul 11, 1960
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The Prisoner of Zenda
The Prisoner of Zenda is an adventure novel by Anthony Hope, published in 1894. The king of the fictional country of Ruritania is abducted on the eve of his coronation, and the protagonist, an English gentleman on holiday who fortuitously resembles...
Date of first publication:
- 1894
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The Great Gatsby
The Great Gatsby is a novel by the American author F. Scott Fitzgerald. First published on April 10, 1925, it is set on Long Island's North Shore and in New York City during the summer of 1922 and is a critique of the American Dream.
The novel...
Date of first publication:
- Apr 10, 1925
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Author:
Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four (also 1984), by George Orwell, published in 1949, is a dystopian novel about the totalitarian regime of the Party, an oligarchical collectivist society where life in the Oceanian province of Airstrip One is a world of perpetual...
Copyright date:
- Jun 8, 1949
Date of first publication:
- 1949
Original language:
Author:
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ISFDB ID:
- 15862
Sons and Lovers
Sons and Lovers is a 1913 novel by the English writer D. H. Lawrence.
The third published novel of D. H. Lawrence, taken by many to be his earliest masterpiece, tells the story of Paul Morel, a young man and budding artist. Richard Aldington...
Date of first publication:
- 1913
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The Jungle
The Jungle is a 1906 novel written by author and journalist Upton Sinclair. Sinclair wrote this novel to highlight the plight of the working class and to remove from obscurity the corruption of the American meatpacking industry during the early 20th...
School or Movement:
Date of first publication:
- Feb 28, 1906
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Date written:
- 1906
The Railway Children
The Railway Children is a children's book by Edith Nesbit, originally serialised in The London Magazine during 1905 and first published in book form in 1906. It has been adapted for the screen several times, of which the 1970 film version is the...
Date of first publication:
- 1906
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Night Must Fall
Night Must Fall is a play, a psychological thriller, by Emlyn Williams, first performed in 1935.
Mrs Bramson, a bitter, fussy, self-pitying elderly woman, resides in a remote part of Essex, England, with her intelligent yet subdued niece, Olivia....
Author:
The Old Man and the Sea
The Old Man and the Sea is a novella by Ernest Hemingway, written in Cuba in 1951 and published in 1952. It was the last major work of fiction to be produced by Hemingway and published in his lifetime. One of his most famous works, it centers upon...
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Date of first publication:
- 1952
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Billy Liar
Billy Liar (1959) is a novel by Keith Waterhouse that was later adapted into a play, film, musical and TV series.
The semi-comical story is about Billy Fisher, a working-class 19-year-old living with his parents in the fictional town of...
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Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life
Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life is a novel by George Eliot, the pen name of Mary Anne Evans, later Marian Evans. It is her seventh novel, begun in 1869 and then put aside during the final illness of Thornton Lewes, the son of her companion...
Date of first publication:
- 1874
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Treasure Island
Treasure Island is an adventure novel by Robert Louis Stevenson, narrating a tale of "pirates and buried gold". First published as a book in 1883, it was originally serialised in the children's magazine Young Folks between 1881-82 under the title...
Copyright date:
- 1881 ,
- 1969
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Translations:
View entire collection »ISFDB ID:
- 21321 ,
- 175202
The Hundred and One Dalmatians
The Hundred and One Dalmatians, or the Great Dog Robbery is a 1956 children's novel by Dodie Smith. A sequel entitled The Starlight Barking continues from the end of the first novel.
At a dinner party attended by the Dearly couple, Cruella de Vil...
Date of first publication:
- 1956
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The Adventures of Tom Sawyer
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, by Mark Twain, is a popular 1876 novel about a young boy growing up in the antebellum South, in the town of "St Petersburg", inspired by the town of Hannibal, Missouri, on the Mississippi River, where Mark Twain grew up...
Date of first publication:
- 1876
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The Moonstone
The Moonstone (1868) by Wilkie Collins is a 19th-century British epistolary novel, generally considered the first detective novel in the English language.
The Moonstone was originally serialized in Charles Dickens' magazine All the Year Round. The...
Copyright date:
- 1868
Next in series:
Date of first publication:
- 1868
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 21283
The Sound and the Fury
The Sound and the Fury is a novel written by the American author William Faulkner. It employs a number of narrative styles, including the technique known as stream of consciousness, pioneered by 20th century European novelists such as James Joyce...
Date of first publication:
- 1929
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The Chrysalids
The Chrysalids (U.S. title: Re-Birth) is a science fiction novel by John Wyndham, first published in 1955 by Michael Joseph. It is the least typical of Wyndham's major novels, but is regarded by some people as his best.
The novel was adapted for BBC...
Copyright date:
- 1955
Date of first publication:
- 1955
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 7700
Freaky Friday
Freaky Friday is a classic comedic children’s novel written by Mary Rodgers first published in the USA in 1972, and adapted for film several times.
A willful, disorganized teenage girl, Annabel Andrews, awakens one Friday morning to find herself in...
Copyright date:
- 1977
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 25756
On the Road
On the Road is a novel by American writer Jack Kerouac, written in April 1951, and published by Viking Press in 1957. It is a largely autobiographical work that was based on the spontaneous road trips of Kerouac and his friends across mid-century...
Copyright date:
- 1957
School or Movement:
Date of first publication:
- 1957
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Date written:
- Apr 1951
Moll Flanders
The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders (commonly known as simply "Moll Flanders") is a novel written by Daniel Defoe in 1722.
Defoe wrote this after his work as a journalist and pamphleteer. By 1722, Defoe had become recognised as...
Copyright date:
- 1722
Date of first publication:
- Jan 1722
Original language:
Author:
Skellig
Skellig is a children's novel by David Almond, for which Almond was awarded the Carnegie Medal in 1998 and also the Whitbread Children's Book of the Year Award. In 2007 it was selected by judges of the CILIP Carnegie Medal for children's literature...
Copyright date:
- 1998
Date of first publication:
- 1999
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 21576
Arrowsmith
Arrowsmith is a novel by American author and playwright Sinclair Lewis that was published in 1925. It won the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for Lewis but he refused to accept it. Lewis was greatly assisted in its preparation by science writer Dr. Paul de...
Date of first publication:
- 1925
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Black Beauty
Black Beauty is an 1877 novel by English author Anna Sewell. It was composed in the last years of her life, during which she was confined to her house as an invalid. The novel became an immediate bestseller, with Sewell living just long enough (five...
Date of first publication:
- Nov 24, 1877
Original language:
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One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (Russian: Один день Ивана Денисовича Odin den' Ivana Denisovicha) is a novel written by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, first published in November 1962 in the Soviet literary magazine Novy Mir (New World). The story...
Date of first publication:
- 1963
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The Mill on the Floss
The Mill on the Floss is a novel by George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans), first published in three volumes in 1860.
The novel details the lives of Tom and Maggie Tulliver, a brother and sister growing up on the River Floss near the village of St. Oggs in...
Date of first publication:
- 1860
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The Secret Garden
The Secret Garden is a novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett. It was initially published in serial format starting in autumn 1910; the book was first published in its entirety in 1911.
Its working title was Mistress Mary, in reference to the English...
Copyright date:
- 1909
Date of first publication:
- 1909
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 13434
The Sea, the Sea
The Sea, the Sea is the 19th novel by Iris Murdoch. It won the Booker Prize in 1978.
The Sea, the Sea is a tale of the strange obsessions that haunt a self-satisfied playwright and director as he begins to write his memoirs. Played out against a...
Date of first publication:
- 1978
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City of Illusions
City of Illusions is a 1967 science fiction novel by Ursula K. Le Guin, set on Earth in the distant future in her Hainish Cycle. City of Illusions was republished in 1978 along with Rocannon's World and Planet of Exile in a volume called Three...
Copyright date:
- 1967
Date of first publication:
- 1967
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Part of series:
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ISFDB ID:
- 7658
The Awakening
The Awakening is a novella by Kate Chopin, first published in 1899 (see 1899 in literature). Set in New Orleans and the Southern Louisiana coast at the end of the nineteenth century, the plot centers on Edna Pontellier and her struggle to reconcile...
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Things Fall Apart
Things Fall Apart is a 1958 English-language novel by Nigerian author Chinua Achebe. It is a staple book in schools throughout Africa and widely read and studied in English-speaking countries around the world. It is seen as the archetypal modern...
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The Pelican Brief
The Pelican Brief is a legal-suspense thriller written by John Grisham in 1992. The hardcover edition was published by Doubleday in that same year. Two paperback editions were published, both by Dell Publishing in 1993.
The story begins with the...
Date of first publication:
- 1992
Original language:
Author:
Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio
Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio or Liaozhai Zhiyi (also Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio or Strange Tales of Liaozhai, simplified Chinese: 聊斋志异; traditional Chinese: 聊齋誌異; pinyin: Liáozhāi zhìyì) is a collection of nearly five hundred...
Date of first publication:
- 1740
Author:
The Client
The Client (1994) is a legal thriller written by American author John Grisham, set mostly in Memphis, Tennessee and New Orleans, Louisiana. It is a mix with various legal elements and suspense.
The Client begins with eleven-year old boy, Mark Sway...
Author:
A Time to Kill
A Time to Kill is a 1989 legal suspense thriller by John Grisham. Grisham's first novel, it was rejected by many publishers before Wynwood Press eventually gave it a modest 5,000-copy printing. After The Firm, The Pelican Brief, and The Client...
Copyright date:
- Aug 2004
Date of first publication:
- 1989
Original language:
Part of series:
ISFDB ID:
- 152440
The Witches
The Witches is a book for children by Roald Dahl, first published in London in 1983 by Jonathan Cape. The book, like many of Dahl's works, is illustrated by Quentin Blake. Its content has made the book the frequent target of censors. It appears on...
Copyright date:
- 1983
Date of first publication:
- 1983
Original language:
Author:
ISFDB ID:
- 170110
White Fang
White Fang is the title of a novel by American author Jack London. The novel was first serialized in The Outing Magazine in May to October 1906. It is the story of a wild wolfdog's journey toward becoming civilized in Yukon Territory, Canada, during...
Date of first publication:
- May 1906
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The Rainbow
The Rainbow is a 1915 novel by British author D. H. Lawrence. It follows three generations of the Brangwen family, particularly focusing on the sexual dynamics of, and relations between, the characters.
Lawrence's frank treatment of sexual desire...
Date of first publication:
- 1915
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The Indian in the Cupboard
The Indian in the Cupboard is a 1980 children's book written by British author Lynne Reid Banks, and illustrated by Brock Cole. It has received numerous awards, and was made into a film in 1995. The book was followed by four sequels: The Return of...
Copyright date:
- 1980
Date of first publication:
- 1980
Author:
Part of series:
ISFDB ID:
- 15521
To the Lighthouse
To the Lighthouse (5 May 1927) is a novel by Virginia Woolf. A landmark novel of high modernism, the text, centering on the Ramsay family and their visits to the Isle of Skye in Scotland between 1910 and 1920, skillfully manipulates temporality and...
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Date of first publication:
- May 5, 1927
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The Secret Agent
The Secret Agent: A Simple Tale is a novel by Joseph Conrad published in 1907. The story is set in London in 1886 and deals largely with the life of Mr. Verloc and his job as a spy. The Secret Agent is also notable as it is one of Conrad's later...
Date of first publication:
- Sep 1907
Original language:
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Lord Jim
Lord Jim is a novel by Joseph Conrad originally published in Blackwood's Magazine from October 1899 to November 1900.
The central occurrence of Lord Jim appears to be based on true events. Although Conrad never confirmed this, there seems to be too...
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The Chamber
The Chamber (1994) is a legal thriller written by American author John Grisham.
The Chamber, set largely in and around the Mississippi State Penitentiary, is the story of Sam Cayhall, a former Klansman who has been convicted of murder and sentenced...
Date of first publication:
- 1994
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Goodnight Mister Tom
Goodnight Mister Tom (also Good Night, Mr Tom) is a 1981 novel by Michelle Magorian. It follows a young boy named William Beech who is evacuated from London during the air-raids that formed part of the Blitz of World War II, and put into the care of...
Date of first publication:
- Mar 1, 1981
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The Firm
The Firm is a 1991 legal thriller and the second novel by John Grisham. It was his first widely recognized piece of work, and in 1993, was made into a film starring Tom Cruise. Grisham's first novel, A Time to Kill, was successful but did not bring...
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A Light in the Attic
A Light in the Attic is a collection of poems by the American poet, Playboy Magazine writer, and children's writer Shel Silverstein. It was first published by HarperCollins in 1981. The poems for children are accompanied by illustrations also...
Date of first publication:
- 1981
