The English Collection: 19th-Century British Fictions (Penguin Classics Complete Collections)

These timeless British classics are instantly recognizable and beloved. Fascinating in their diversity, they reveal the rich, evolving texture of England and society in the Romantic and Victorian era. A small sampling of this broad collection includes the science fiction of Edwin Abbott, in which he satirizes Victorian society with his fantasy about life in a two-dimensional world ( Flatland ); Jane Austen's magnificent novels of social order and morality (from Emma to Sense and Sensibility to perhaps her most mature novel, Persuasion ); the extraordinary output of Charles Dickens, famous in his lifetime but iconic in the pantheon of world literature; the Sherlock Holmes adventures from Arthur Conan Doyle; the sensation novels of Wilkie Collins, which include ghost stories and plot lines to rival those of Jackie Collins and Jacqueline Susann; the works of Thomas Hardy, from his first published novel Desperate Remedies to the haunting Jude the Obscure to the poetic Tess of the D’Urbervilles ; and Oscar Wilde's scandalous Picture of Dorian Gray and his Complete Short Fiction . These are but a few of the magnificent authors writing during this era. Informed by the changes brought on by the end of the French Revolution, the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, and the age of Victoria, each brings their unique station and style to the English literary canon. This is a collection to wallow in. They are books that reference the heart and mind, the source material for hundreds of 20th-century films, and the inspiration for so many novelists to come. Included in The English Collection are 119 titles: Flatland by Edwin A. Abbott Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen Lady Susan; The Watsons; Sanditon by Jane Austen Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen Emma by Jane Austen Mansfield Park by