Humour Classics

Here, we have a glorious ensemble of Woodhousian characters knocking elbows to foreheads in the elegant and grand Blandings Castle. Meet Freddy Threepwood, the vagrant son of doddering old Lord Emsworth of Blandings Castle. Freddy has recently become engaged to Aline Peters, the American heiress of an irascible father. The snag is that Freddy seems to have at one point become enamored of a struggling actress, Joan Valentine, and written some impetuous and imprudent letters to her.

Desperate to escape their high-pressure life in Los Angeles, the Finch family moves to rural Oregon. But it doesn’t take long to learn that “small town” is not code for “stress-free.” As the new owners of Applegate's one and only general store, the Finches find that the simple life’s anything but simple when your little store is the town's only grocery store, gas station, hardware store, fire station, and occasional dentist’s office.

Eighteen of the very best American short stories, each a classic in its own right. Stories include "The Little Frenchman and his Water Lots", by George Pope Morris; "The Angel of the Odd", by Edgar Allan Poe; "The Schoolmasters’s Progress", by Caroline M.S. Kirkland; "The Watkinson Evening", by Eliza Leslie; "Titbottom’s Spectacles", by George William Curtis; "My Double and "How He Undid Me", by Edward Everett Hale; "A Visit to the Asylum for Aged and Decayed Punsters", by Oliver Wendell; and more.

A workhouse orphan, Oliver experiences the terror and brutality of the criminal underworld. His companions, a thief, a whore, a pickpocket, and a fence, are destined for gruesome ends, but Oliver emerges unscathed from the darkness of the underworld.

P. G. Wodehouse gives us a delightful romantic comedy of two struggling artists who fantastically misunderstand each other.

“I have the honour to offer up to you, thanks to the good people of Audible, a selection of some of my very favourite Wodehouse. If these stories are new to you I hope it will be the beginning of a lifelong pleasure, if some or all are familiar I hope you will welcome them like old friends.” (Stephen Fry). Audible Studios presents this brand new performance by Stephen Fry of some of his favourite Jeeves stories from P.G. Wodehouse, with an exclusive introduction.

Adam had a fine life. He had all the food he wanted, a fine garden to live in, and miles and miles of peace and quiet. Until one day, a woman entered his life. And amongst her other garrulous qualities, she says that his beautiful garden doesn't really look like a garden at all. She thinks it looks more like a park.

'Truly extraordinary books are rare, and this is one of them' – Roddy Doyle 'His [Dominic Hofman] performance is terrific: variously wry, poignant and thoughtful as he imbues Jim with the humanity and agency denied to him by Twain' – The Guardian, Audiobook of the Week James is a profound...

The peaceful slumber of the Worcester village of Rudge-in-the-Vale is about to be rudely disrupted. First there's a bitter feud between peppery Colonel Wyvern and the Squire of Rudge Hall, rich but miserly Lester Carmody. Second, that arch-villain Chimp Twist has opened a health farm - and he and Soapy and Dolly Molloy are planning a fake burglary so Lester can diddle his insurance company.

H.H. Munro (Saki) is one of the undisputed masters of the short story. In this complete compendium, the full gamut of his subjects and themes is experienced. His stories are imbued with humorous satire, biting irony, and often the macabre, all of which have one target: the stupidities and hypocrisies of Edwardian upper-class society.

A dramatisation of A. A. Milne’s only detective novel, plus two of his sparkling comedies A.A. Milne achieved lasting fame as the creator of Winnie-the-Pooh, but he was much more than just a children’s writer. A prolific novelist, playwright and humorist, he penned numerous works for adults...

Mostly Harmless is the fifth and final part in Douglas Adams' much-loved cult classic series, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, read by Martin Freeman. Arthur Dent hadn't had a day as bad as this since the Earth had been blown up. After years of galactic wanderings, Arthur finally settles on...

Oliver Twist fu il secondo romanzo di Dickens, pubblicato a puntate mensili dal 1837 al 1839. E' una delle opere più famose dello scrittore, primo romanzo inglese ad avere un ragazzo come protagonista e uno dei primi romanzi sociali. L'umorismo feroce con cui Dickens descrive la società inglese, la povertà, l'abuso infantile, l'ipocrisia della cultura fu decisamente una novità.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize “A masterwork . . . the novel astonishes with its inventiveness . . . it is nothing less than a grand comic fugue.”—The New York Times Book Review A green hunting cap squeezed the top of the fleshy balloon of a head. The green earflaps, full of large ears and...

Three men meet on a ship bound for Haiti, where corruption and terror reign under the dictatorship of Papa Doc and the Tontons Macoute, his sinister secret police. Disillusioned and noncommittal, they are the “comedians” of Greene’s title. Brown is a disenchanted English hotel owner; the...

Tells the story of the married life of Nevis Falconer, a young woman novelist, and Simon Quinn. Temperamentally unsuited, they live this superficial existence for three years, until one day Nevis meets Marcus Chard, her American publisher, who has just arrived in London. Soon friendship develops into love. Nevis finds herself caught in a whirl of circumstances over which she has no control.

Ultima opera compiuta di Dickens, la storia si snoda lungo il Tamigi, testimone e causa di morti. Ma la storia non è cupa come il suo inizio potrebbe far sembrare; la morale sui danni della cupidigia è evidente, il lieto fine inevitabile. La scrittura è qui più moderna, ironica, graffiante, quando tratta delle ipocrisie e inutilità della "vita di società" della borghesia.

L'opera (qui nella traduzione di Silvio Spaventa Filippi) fu scritta a puntate, come le precedenti, nel 1843-44, ma la tiratura delle copie fu circa la metà dei precedenti successi di Dickens, per cui ci fu una rottura con gli editori che costrinsero Dickens a rimborsare il denaro da loro spesi. Dickens cambiò allora il titolo dell'opera in "America", approffittando del suo viaggio in America per inserire una satira di quel continente e dei suoi abitanti, satira tanto più feroce in quanto sentiva che il nuovo mondo aveva distrutto delle illusioni di quanti speravano di vedervi realizzati i propri ideali.

If Lord Ickenham had not dislodged the hat of Beefy Bastable with a well-aimed brazil nut, the latter's famous legal mind might never have been stimulated to literature. But the incident provoked Beefy to write an expose of the younger generation.

When the Little Nugget, alias of thirteen-year-old Ogden Ford, bulgy, rude, chain-smoking son of an American millionaire, arrives at Sanstead House School, the fun has just begun. Mr. Peter Burns, a none-too-dedicated schoolmaster engaged by snobbish Mr. Abney to educate his handpicked pupils...