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British Literature — page 78
6,377 public-domain british literature books, summarised. Page 78 of 133.
Folly Corner
Dudeney, Henry, Mrs.
When Pamela leaves London for the quiet expanse of the Sussex countryside, she trades the shadow of a disgraced lover for a stable agrarian future, only to find that neither past choices nor quiet landscapes release their hold so easily.
Kimiko, and Other Japanese Sketches
Lafcadio Hearn
Bound by duty and devotion, women navigate the quiet sacrifices of a changing society, discovering that the deepest love often speaks through silence.
Legends of Lancashire
Peter Landreth
Civil war blights the landscape, witches brew tea alongside malevolent spells, and an ambitious tailor bargains his soul to the Devil on a snowy moss.
Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 109, August 3, 1895
Various
Victorian London comes to life not in grand histories, but in the sharp, restless murmur of its weekly satire.
Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 103, December 3, 1892
Various
A sharp, sparkling snapshot of late Victorian society, this single issue of the famous satirical periodical captures late nineteenth-century London in all its absurd, swaggering, and deeply human glory.
Sam in the Suburbs
P. G. (Pelham Grenville) Wodehouse
A restless young American leaves his uncle’s New York export firm and takes a desk at a London publishing house, only to buy a suburban house next door to the girl he loves. He has no idea the quiet neighborhood conceals buried bank loot, a trio of competing American crooks, and an increasingly chaotic web of…
Sir George Tressady
Ward, Humphry, Mrs.
A young bride in finery, a newly minted MP with a cynical streak, and the charismatic wife of a cabinet minister collide across the drawing rooms and working-class streets of 1890s London.
Some Adventures of Mr. Surelock Keys
Herbert Beeman
A master of deduction solves trivial neighborhood disputes using spring onions, blotting paper, and sheer absurdity while his long-suffering roommate faithfully records every blunder.
Tales from "Blackwood," Volume 7
Unknown
An eclectic array of nineteenth-century short fiction offers dramatic encounters, philosophical reckonings, and satirical escapades across Europe and the British Isles.
Tempest-Driven: A Romance (Vol. 3 of 3)
Richard Dowling
Cold Irish winds, dark coastal caves, and the unraveling of a dead husband’s fortune drive this Victorian gothic tale of shattered devotion.
The Celebrity at Home
Violet Hunt
A razor-sharp, satirical record of literary vanity, domestic secrets, and social climbing, kept in secret by a precocious young girl watching her family's world unravel.
The Green Casket, and other stories
Mrs. Molesworth
A quiet moment of temptation tests a child's honesty, while an act of late-night courage shows that true bravery means facing down real fears for the sake of another.
The Lone Adventure
Halliwell Sutcliffe
A frail scholar with a crooked body and an unyielding heart finds his true calling on the bitter moors of Lancashire when the Jacobite Rising sweeps through his native hills.
The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 10, No. 272, September 8, 1827
Various
A kaleidoscope of nineteenth-century British curiosity, this vintage periodical issue captures a society balancing rapid architectural progress with eccentric folklore, emerging science, and theatrical gossip.
Verena in the Midst: A Kind of a Story
E. V. (Edward Verrall) Lucas
Life unfolds in the post-war quiet through a bedridden woman’s mail, where family squabbles, economic schemes, and small domestic joys drift steadily into her sickroom.
Voces Populi
F. Anstey
Victorians of every class talk past one another in public spaces, turning ordinary leisure into a series of comedic misunderstandings.
Helena Brett's Career
Desmond Coke
When a vain London novelist marries a naive Devon girl for domestic convenience, he never suspects she will quietly write a sensationally candid bestseller based on their marriage.
Mr. Punch on the Continong
Unknown
This collection of humor captures the exasperation, pretension, and absurdity of the Victorian-era tourist. Through sharp wit and sharp satire, it explores the inevitable friction between the comfort-seeking British traveler and the realities of Continental life.
Mr. Punch's Golf Stories
Unknown
This collection gathers the wit, absurdity, and social friction of the early twentieth-century golf course, capturing the game’s transition from a niche pursuit to a national obsession. It serves as a humorous record of the anxieties, pretenses, and inevitable humiliations inherent in the sport.
The Black Dog, and Other Stories
A. E. (Alfred Edgar) Coppard
Ordinary people navigate the quiet, often bruising currents of English life, where small gestures of longing or cruelty reveal the profound fragility of the human heart.
The Gamester (1753)
Edward Moore
Despair, deceit, and the ruinous grip of addiction drag a domestic paradise down into absolute devastation.
The Shrieking Pit
Arthur J. (Arthur John) Rees
On the wild, storm-swept coast of Norfolk, an antiquary is brutally murdered inside a remote inn, leaving a shell-shocked soldier with a blank memory as the prime suspect.
A man made of money
Douglas William Jerrold
HOOK A man prays to be turned into a living embodiment of wealth, only to find that his heart of gold—literally—is a burden that destroys everything he touches.
A Merry Dialogue Declaringe the Properties of Shrowde Shrews and Honest Wives
Desiderius Erasmus
A seasoned matron imparts the delicate, strategic arts of domestic harmony to a younger, embittered friend. This conversation serves as a timeless guide to taming a volatile marriage through patience and artful influence.
A Sweet Girl Graduate
L. T. Meade
Priscilla Peel, a young woman of humble means and earnest character, enters the competitive world of St. Benet’s College, where she must navigate social cruelty, personal rivalry, and the complex influence of a charismatic, brilliant classmate.
An Isle of Surrey: A Novel
Richard Dowling
A haunting drama of quiet lives and long-held secrets, this tale explores the shadows cast by a mysterious stranger upon an isolated enclave of Victorian London.
Illustrations of political economy, Volume 8 (of 9)
Harriet Martineau
This volume blends narrative fiction with rigorous economic analysis, dramatizing how individual labor and public policy shape the prosperity of both frontier settlements and historical kingdoms.
Laid up in Lavender
Stanley John Weyman
In these tales of Victorian and Edwardian life, the veneer of social propriety often conceals profound human secrets, sudden reversals, and the quiet weight of long-held regrets.
Love in a Cloud: A Comedy in Filigree
Arlo Bates
A flurry of anonymous authorship and social maneuvering turns a quiet Boston circle upside down, proving that gossip is the most potent engine of the heart.
Maid Margaret of Galloway
S. R. (Samuel Rutherford) Crockett
The Fair Maid of Galloway, as she is known to history, recounts her turbulent life as a pawn of the powerful Douglas clan, finding an unexpected, quiet redemption far from the carnage of political betrayal.
Nobody's fault
Netta Syrett
The life of a brilliant, ambitious woman is fractured by the impossible social divide between her humble origins and her refined aspirations. Caught between two worlds, she must navigate the heavy cost of personal independence.
Notes and Queries, Vol. IV, Number 103, October 18, 1851: A Medium of Inter-communication for Literary Men, Artists, Antiquaries, Genealogists, etc
Various
This issue of a Victorian periodical functions as a bustling clearinghouse for historical curiosities, literary scholarship, and the obscure minutiae that fascinated the nineteenth-century intellectual amateur. It captures a specific moment when global information exchange relied on the patient, handwritten…
Poems, &c. (1790): Wherein It Is Attempted To Describe Certain Views Of Nature And Of Rustic Manners
Joanna Baillie
A keen observer of the natural world and the quiet struggles of the heart, these verses map the beauty of the English countryside and the profound, often tragic, interior lives of those who inhabit it.
Poems
George Crabbe
These verses peer into the rugged, often harsh reality of village life, stripping away romantic illusions to reveal the quiet struggles and distinct characters that define a rural community.
Tempest-Driven: A Romance (Vol. 1 of 3)
Richard Dowling
A tranquil London suburb becomes the stage for a chilling death, drawing an unsuspecting young man into a web of dark history, suspicion, and a woman’s fatal magnetism.
The avenger
Edgar Wallace
HOOK A detective pursues a shadowy serial killer who claims victims with terrifying precision, leaving only their severed heads behind as a grim calling card.
The Brooklyn murders
G. D. H. (George Douglas Howard) Cole
An aging theatrical titan’s birthday celebration ends in carnage, pulling his niece and her resourceful partner into a labyrinthine investigation where the obvious clues are the most dangerous deceptions.
The Gentleman Who Vanished: A Psychological Phantasy
Fergus Hume
A man commits a murder, then vanishes into a stolen body to escape the law. But the soul he inhabits is trapped in a web of occult secrets and a treacherous valet’s blackmail.
The Laird of Norlaw
Mrs. (Margaret) Oliphant
The house of Norlaw stands beneath the ancient Eildon hills, a modest dwelling burdened by the shadow of a ruined, silent castle and the weight of a family’s vanished prosperity. It is a story of endurance, where brothers strive to restore a fallen name and mothers hold fast to their own through the long, quiet…
The old English dramatists
James Russell Lowell
This collection of lectures explores the immense, untamed genius of the Elizabethan and Jacobean playwrights, inviting readers to rediscover a foundational era of English literature through a lens of deep, personal appreciation.
The Rover
Joseph Conrad
A weathered mariner returns to his native shores during the Napoleonic Wars, only to find his final, quiet vigil transformed into a desperate gamble for the lives of those he has come to love.
The storm of London: a social rhapsody
Fernande Blaze de Bury
When London is suddenly stripped of every garment, the city’s rigid social hierarchies dissolve, forcing an entire population to face the raw, unadorned reality of their own humanity.
Witness for the Defence
A. E. W. (Alfred Edward Woodley) Mason
HOOK A celebrated barrister discovers that the acquittal he engineered years ago for a woman accused of murder was built upon a lie, forcing a confrontation that threatens his career and her future.
Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 308: New Series, Saturday, November 24, 1849
Various
This nineteenth-century periodical offers a varied glimpse into the Victorian mind, blending practical life advice with travel observations and serialized fiction. It serves as a window into an era defined by professional ambition, class consciousness, and a burgeoning interest in the wider world.
Dolly Dialogues
Anthony Hope
This collection of sketches captures the art of the 1890s London drawing room, where the most dangerous weapon is a well-timed witticism. It is a portrait of a social circle that survives entirely on the strength of its own cleverness and the delicate, shifting boundaries of its members' affections.
Legend Land, Vol. 1: Being a Collection of Some of the Old Tales Told in Those Western Parts of Britain Served by the Great Western Railway
G. Basil (George Basil) Barham
This collection of folklore bridges the gap between the ancient, oral traditions of Britain’s western reaches and the modern age of railway travel, inviting readers to explore the landscapes that birthed these myths.
Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 108, June 15th, 1895
Various
A snapshot of Victorian life through a satirical lens, capturing the shifting social landscape, political absurdities, and the relentless pulse of London’s humor.
The Cost of Kindness
Jerome K. (Jerome Klapka) Jerome
A well-meaning act of superficial polite hypocrisy backfires completely, trapping a quiet village with the very rector they were desperate to see depart.