Showing results for "Laurel" in Classics

Professor Godfrey St. Peter, on the cusp of moving to a new home, finds himself clinging to his old study and the memories it holds. His mind is gripped by the absence of his brilliant former student, Tom Outland, and the marriages of his daughters have introduced changes that he cannot embrace.

Little Women, closely based on Louisa May Alcott’s own experience of family life, was first published in 1869 and follows the lives of the four March sisters and their mother, "Marmee". With the heartrending story of gentle Beth, the humorous adventures of tomboyish Jo, Meg’s vain attempts to cut a fashionable figure in "society", and the artistic ambitions of the youngest sister Amy, it has never lost its extraordinary power to move and delight.

A magnificent portrayal of 1890's America and the harsh realities of a dog-eat-dog world, Sister Carrie lies at the forefront of American Naturalism. When poor young provincial woman Carrie Meeber arrives in Chicago, she little expects to be catapulted from lower-class woman to prominent Broadway actress. Passive and yielding, she lets circumstances coerce her into action and by good fortune she arrives at fame. It is in Chicago that Carrie meets a successful businessman, Hurstwood, who helps her establish her name.

Best known for her short story The Yellow Wallpaper, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, an almost exact contemporary of Edith Wharton, is celebrated as one of America’s foremost feminist writers. This collection includes 28 of her short stories. In addition to The Yellow Wallpaper are The Unexpected (her first published work), The Great Wistaria, An Extinct Angel, The Unnatural Mother and Deserted. These stories range from the subversive to the humorous, and are often imbued with satire and social commentary.

The first part of Willa Cather’s Great Plains trilogy, O Pioneers! follows the tragedies and triumphs of Alexandra Bergson, a strong and independent young woman who inherits the family farm following the death of her father.

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was born on 24th September 1896 in Saint Paul, Minnesota into an upper-middle class family. His classic "Bernice Bobs Her Hair" carefully pulls apart the relationship between two cousins one hot summer. Something has to give and with Fitzgerald its an absolute certainty that the brittle lives of young women finally snap in unique ways.

William Sydney Porter was born on 11th September 1862 in Greensboro, North Carolina. At age 3 his mother died from tuberculosis. From an early age it was clear Porter had a large appetite for reading as he absorbed the world around him. He was a member of several singing and dramatic groups when he met 17 year old Athol Estes, daughter of a wealthy Austin family. Despite her mother’s objection owing to Athol’s tuberculosis, they began courting and in July 1887, they eloped and soon married.

William Sydney Porter was born on 11th September 1862 in Greensboro, North Carolina. At age 3 his mother died from tuberculosis. From an early age it was clear Porter had a large appetite for reading as he absorbed the world around him. He was a member of several singing and dramatic groups when he met 17 year old Athol Estes, daughter of a wealthy Austin family. Despite her mother’s objection owing to Athol’s tuberculosis, they began courting and in July 1887, they eloped and soon married.

Louisa May Alcott was born on 29th November 1832 in Germantown, Pennsylvania. She is most definitely a writer of her own experiences. Her father was a transcendentalist, philosopher and educational experimenter who founded, Fruitlands, a utopian community. Well-loved for her classic ‘Little Women’ she was a superb writer in difficult times for any woman, a strong advocate of women’s issues, the anti-slavery movement, temperance and social reform.

Zona Gale was born on 26th August 1874, in Portage, Wisconsin. Her first novel ‘Romance Island’ was published in 1906 and she also began the popular ‘Friendship Village’ series of stories. In 1920 came ‘Miss Lulu Bett’, which depicts life in the Midwest. Adapted into a play it won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1921. It was a stellar achievement.

Susan Keating Glaspell was born on July 1st, 1876 in Davenport, Iowa. Glaspell, a precocious child, was an active student at Davenport High School. By 18 she was earning a salary at the local newspaper as a journalist, and by 20 she was the author of a weekly 'Society' column. With her husband Glaspell founded the Provincetown Playhouse for plays that reflected contemporary issues. Her first play, ‘Trifles’ (1916), was based on the murder trial she covered as a young reporter and later adapted as the short story ‘A Jury of Her Peers’. S

Willa Sibert Cather had Welsh ancestry but like her parents Charles and Mary, was born in Virginia, on 7th December 1873. Acknowledged as one of America's greatest writers’ further honours flowed. In 1943 she was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The following year Cather received the gold medal for fiction from the National Institute of Arts and Letters. A determinedly private person, Cather destroyed many old drafts, personal papers, and letters. Her will would also restrict the ability of scholars to quote from personal papers that remained.

Katherine O'Flaherty was born on the 8th February 1850 in St Louis, Missouri to parents of French and Irish descent. At age 5, she was sent to the Sacred Heart Academy and, apart from a 2 year period at home when her father died, remained there until graduating in 1868...

By the early 1890’s Kate's short stories were published nationally. With this widespread audience also came negative reviews, controversy, and cries of immorality as themes such as interracial relationships, the rights of women and other burning issues of the day were written about.

Sherwood Anderson was born on 13th September 1876 in Camden, Ohio. That same year his first book ‘Windy McPherson’s Son’ was released and in 1919, his most famous book, ‘Winesburg, Ohio’, a collection of short stories about life in an Ohio town was released. Anderson continued to write short stories, novels and non-fiction but his only true bestseller came with ‘Dark Laughter’. His influence on writers that followed, from Faulkner to Hemingway, was immense. He also married a further two times.