This is an old revision of the document!
This list is a work in process. Feel free to update. It's been a while since I last reviewed this list.
--- //[[dan.malosh@state.mn.us|Dan Malosh @ MN1A Regional]] 2013/05/15 16:09//
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ANNOTATION: Epic historical novel portrays five aristocratic families against the background of Russian social life during the Napoleonic Wars (1805-1814). Depicts campaign battles, the burning of Moscow, and the French army's winter retreat.
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ANNOTATION: A satirical, frightening novel about a future time under a totalitarian regime, where the people believe ignorance is strength and war is peace. For high school and older readers.
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ANNOTATION: Deals with a single day–June 16, 1904–in the life of Leopold Bloom, a Dublin advertising salesman. The stream-of-consciousness style and the use of interior monologues expose the personalities of the characters.
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ANNOTATION: Incarcerated and awaiting trial, widowed middle-aged professor Humbert Humbert tells of his erotic obsession with preadolescent girls–particularly twelve-year-old Dolly Haze, whom he calls Lolita. Humbert details his fascination with Lolita and describes their bizarre road trip.
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ANNOTATION: In 1928 Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi, the Compson brothers–Quentin, Jason, and the “idiot” son Benjy–narrate events that trace the gradual disintegration of the family and include the ostracism of their wanton sister, Caddy.
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ANNOTATION: Classic novel of a young black man's search for identity. Follows the unnamed protagonist from his youth in a Southern town through the depression years in Harlem, where he examines and rejects the values thrust on him by both whites and blacks. National Book Award 1953.
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ANNOTATION: During summer visits to the Scottish coast, members of the Ramsey family reveal their personal challenges and innermost thoughts. Youngest child James must forfeit a yearned-for visit to the lighthouse. Ten years later, James, surviving family members, and former guests complete the long-delayed outing. Includes Eudora Welty's 1981 foreword.
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ANNOTATION: Robert Fagles's 1990 translation of the Greek epic poem written during the eighth century B.C.E. and attributed to Homer. Relates the events of a few days of battle near the end of the Trojan War. Focuses on Achilles's withdrawal from the fight and its disastrous effects on the Greek campaign.
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ANNOTATION: Robert Fagles's 1996 translation of the Greek epic poem attributed to Homer. After the Trojan War, Odysseus begins a ten-year voyage back to Ithaca during which he relies on his wit and wiliness to survive encounters with Poseidon, god of oceans, and other divine and natural forces.
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ANNOTATION: A classic novel of social customs in late eighteenth-century England. Depicts the personality clash between Elizabeth Bennet, one of five daughters of a country gentleman, and prosperous, aristocratic landowner Fitzwilliam Darcy, which eventually develops into courtship.
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ANNOTATION: Originally intended as part of a six-volume work, this volume is the only one published during the author's lifetime. Marx examines the process of producing capital, including the value of commodities, the circulation of money, the role of labor and machinery in manufacture, and the question of accumulation, particularly as it applies to agriculture and to industry.
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ANNOTATION: Compiled by Friedrick Engels, Marx's lifelong partner, and published posthumously. This volume contains an extensive introduction by Ernest Mandel. The author continues with technical analyses of aspects of capitalism that were initiated in Volume 1, including the question of supply and demand and the ownership of private property.
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ANNOTATION: Compiled by Frederick Engels and published more than a decade after Marx's death. Certain subjects, such as world markets and competition, are not fully developed in the original manuscript, but this volume examines the process of capitalist production in its totality. Controversial from the start, Marx shows how he would have solved the problems of what he believed would be the collapse of capitalism.
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ANNOTATION: The King James Version of the Old and New Testaments as read by Alexander Scourby in the early 1950s.
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ANNOTATION: A comprehensive edition of Twain's 1885 tale about a boy who runs away from home and floats down the Mississippi on a raft with an escaping slave. Includes four episodes originally deleted from the first edition, an introduction by Twain biographer Justin Kaplan, and an addendum of explanatory and interpretive notes.
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ANNOTATION: Tom Sawyer's friend young Huck Finn explains the reasons he is running away from home and recounts his exploits floating down the Mississippi River on a raft with Jim, an escaped slave.
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ANNOTATION: Argentinean-born author chronicles his rereading of twelve personal literary favorites in one year, in a diary that consists, he says, “of notes, reflections, impressions of travel, sketches of friends, of events public and private.” Selections include Atwood's Surfacing, Cervantes's Don Quixote, and Kipling's Kim.
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ANNOTATION: A complex semi-autobiographical work by the French author begins with part one, Swann's Way, which covers Marcel's youth and the love story of M. Swann. In part two, Within a Budding Grove, Marcel's boyish affair with Gilberte ends, and he goes off to the seaside for his health. Translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin.
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ANNOTATION: In part three, The Germantes Way, Marcel, now a young man of fashion, moves in the exclusive social circle of the Duchess de Guermantes. Part four, Cities of the Plain, concerns the homosexual Baron de Charlus and Marcel's growing attraction to Albertine. The Dreyfus Affair is included in the background. Translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin.
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ANNOTATION: Part five, The Captive, finds Marcel living with Albertine, but tortured by jealousy of her lesbian friends. In part six, The Fugitive, Albertine leaves Marcel and is killed in an accident. The concluding book seven, Time Regained, shows how World War I affected the lives of all the characters. Translated by C.K. Scott Moncrieff and Terence Kilmartin.
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ANNOTATION: First published in 1925 and based on an actual murder case, this classic novel depicts the dark side of the American dream in the story of a young man who will do almost anything to gain wealth and social acceptance. While he loves a poor factory worker who is carrying his child, he is dazzled by a rich woman who seems to embody all his fantasies.
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ANNOTATION: A man arrives in Hollywood hoping for success as a scene designer, but he becomes only another nondescript, unsuccessful character on the fringes of Hollywood studios.
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ANNOTATION: Recounts the experiences, sensations, and thoughts of a young expatriate American writer and his friends in 1930s Paris as they scrounge for food, read and converse, and have relationships. The author's autobiographical first novel initially published in 1934.
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ANNOTATION: In searching for the murderer of his partner, Sam Spade runs afoul of the police and several characters all in search of a mysterious statuette.
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ANNOTATION: A tale set in Victorian England on an alternate Earth. Young Lyra Belacqua and her daemon enjoy an idyllic life among the scholars at Jordan College. Then her friend Roger and other children are abducted by the Gobblers. Venturing north in pursuit, Lyra encounters an alien and sinister world.
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ANNOTATION: Lyra and her daemon are joined in Ci'gazze by twelve-year-old Will, who is searching for his long-lost explorer father. Will proves his mettle–losing two fingers in a fight–and now bears the magical Subtle Knife.
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ANNOTATION: In this continuation of The Subtle Knife Lyra is hidden in a cave by her mother, Mrs. Coulter. Two angels want Will and his magic knife to accompany them to Lord Asriel, but Will is determined to find Lyra first.
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ANNOTATION: A tale about the exploits of Bishop Jean Latour and Father Joseph Vaillant, French Catholic priests who organized pioneer and Indian missions throughout the newly created diocese of New Mexico in the second half of the nineteenth century.
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ANNOTATION: Joyce Crick's new translation of Freud's first edition of his classic work written in 1899. Introductory material describes how Freud incorporated autobiography into his theoretical writing; also provides glimpses of daily life in late-nineteenth-century Vienna.
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ANNOTATION: The 19th-century American historian wrote this partial autobiography in 1905. He described his early education as “18th-century” and found it inadequate preparation for dealing with the complex forces of modern life.
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ANNOTATION: Selections taken from the writings of Chairman Mao Tsetung showing his aims for the communist revolution in China and the development of his political and social philosophy.
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ANNOTATION: Often called the father of American psychology, the author published this “study in human nature” in 1902. A pragmatist, he argues that any article of religious faith is “true” if it provides emotional satisfaction, and that all religious experiences are of equal value.
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ANNOTATION: Waugh's classic exploration of faith, tradition, and moral values in a rapidly changing Britain. Charles Ryder narrates the story of an aristocratic English Catholic family between the First and Second World Wars. Charles first meets alcoholic Sebastian Flyte at Oxford and later falls in love with his married sister, Julia.
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ANNOTATION: The author criticizes man's large-scale use of chemical insecticides and weed killers, warning that such a policy jeopardizes the environment and damages wildlife.
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ANNOTATION: Outlines and explains the author's theory of economics, which has been of tremendous significance in the world economic situation.
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ANNOTATION: The hero of this novel is a young, untested chief mate who was disgraced by yielding to panic in a crisis, so he spends the rest of his life in a vain effort to redeem his honor in his own eyes.
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ANNOTATION: At the age of 34, the English poet published this autobiography, with much attention to his service with the Royal Welsh Fusiliers in World War I.
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ANNOTATION: A Harvard economist appraises the effects of prosperity on the United States and international economic and social systems, maintaining that an over-production of goods and an under-investment of people is responsible for inflation and recession.
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ANNOTATION: The adventures of Mole, Water Rat, Badger, bumptious Mr. Toad, and other animals who live along the river and in the woods.
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ANNOTATION: The life of African American religious leader Malcolm X (1925-1965). The author describes his boyhood in Lansing, Michigan, street life in Harlem, conversion to the Black Muslim movement while imprisoned for robbery, and evolution into a high-profile spokesman for black dignity, power, and separatism. Foreword by Alex Haley.
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ANNOTATION: Critical examination of the Victorian era as seen through the lives of four prominent figures of that age: an ecclesiastic, a woman of action, an educator, and an adventurer.
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ANNOTATION: Follows two black sisters–Nettie, a missionary, and Celie, raped by her father and married to a cruel man. Nettie's letters do not reach Celie, and Celie's shame is so great that she writes only to God. Anniversary edition includes Walker's 1992 preface.
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ANNOTATION: Volume I of “The Second World War” series covers the period from 1919 to 1939 and includes chapters on the mistakes of the Allies after World War I, the rise and rearmament of European dictatorships, and the failure to preserve Austria and uphold Czechoslovakia.
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ANNOTATION: Volume II of 'The Second World War' series describes the problems confronted by Churchill as he assumes the office of Prime Minister in 1940. Covers the battle for France, the tragic story of Dunkirk, the rebuilding of the British army, and the victorious Africa campaign ending at Tobruk.
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ANNOTATION: Volume III of “The Second World War” series covers the military operations of the critical year of 1941, with the attack on Russia by Germany and America's entry into the war.
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ANNOTATION: Volume IV of “The Second World War” series covers the period from 1942 to 1943. Describes the events leading to the invasion of Sicily, warfare in Africa, the reconquest of Europe, meetings with Roosevelt, and efforts at collaboration with Stalin.
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ANNOTATION: Volume V of “The Second World War” series focuses on the conflict from June 1943 to June 1944. Aided by the command of the ocean, mastery of the U-boats, and growing superiority in the air, the Allies are able to conquer Sicily and invade Italy.
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ANNOTATION: Volume VI, the concluding volume of 'The Second World War' series covers the military campaigns ending in the defeat of Germany and Japan, the Yalta and Potsdam conferences, President Roosevelt's death, and the beginnings of peace negotiations.