The Time Machine
H. G. Wells 1895 (A push on a lever, a blurry dizziness, a clap of thunder… and a veil falls away to reveal the world of our far distant descendants.) Breaking the rule that you have to proceed constantly forward in time at precisely one second per second is as old as the human imagination, […]
The Honorary Consul
Graham Greene 1973 (Argentinian revolutionaries abduct the wrong political figure by mistake, and one cynical acquaintance is the only one who cares… perhaps not even he does.) Graham Greene, though a writer of great variety, is known for his “seedy” settings (he popularized the adjective, much to his regret) and the moral dimension of his […]
The Hunchback of Notre-Dame
(Notre-Dame de Paris) Victor Hugo 1831 (Love for a young gypsy woman allows an ugly man to rise above the world’s hatred of him, and to show his inner beauty). Beauty and beast stories are thousands of years old. Here is how they generally go: a beautiful maiden somehow must associate with a character of […]
The Little Prince
(Le Petit Prince) Antoine de Saint-Exupéry 1943 (A little man leaves his tiny planet to explore the universe, only to discover that the most important things in life can be found anywhere.) As hackneyed as the term “gem” is in the description of short and delightful books, The Little Prince has got to be the epitome. What […]
Madame Bovary
October 21, 2020 / Leave a comment
Gustave Flaubert 1857 (An unhappily married woman pursues a lifelong quest for the fulfillment of her romantic desires, by any means necessary.) When a novelist is said to rebel against romanticism, anyone with an imaginative, adventurous, passionate, chivalrous, or spiritual streak may be forgiven for wanting to give it a pass. Such a writer sounds […]
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