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THE DUEL
One of the few works written in Casanova’s native Italian, The Duel is an important example of the infamous Lothario’s vivid prose and inimitable style. Having escaped from the infamous Piombi Prison in Venice, Casanova became an exile, travelling through Western Europe and being given shelter on account of his fame. The story recounts the duel he fought with a Polish nobleman, Count Branicky, who had insulted Casanova over a ballerina. Describing the deadly encounter and the surprising events it precipitated with sardonic and even blase wit, Casanova proves his literary prowess.
₨ 2,260 -
LOIS THE WITCH
Recently orphaned, Lois is forced to leave the English parsonage that had been her home, and sail to America. A Godfearing and honest girl, she has little to fear in this new life. Yet as she joins her distant family, she finds jealousy and dissention are rife, and her cousins quick to point the finger at the ‘impostor’. With the whole of Salem gripped by a fear of the supernatural, it seems her home is where she is in most danger. Lonely and afraid, the words of an old curse return to haunt her.
₨ 950 -
THE FATAL EGGS
An inspired work of science fiction and a biting political allegory, Bulgakov’s The Fatal Eggs tells of a brilliant scientist whose experiments with life spiral terribly – and fatefully – out of control. Quite by chance, Professor Persikov discovers a new form of light ray whose effect, when directed at living cells, is to accelerate growth in primitive organisms. But when this ray is shone on the wrong batch of eggs, the Professor finds himself both the unwilling creator of giant hybrids, and the focus of a merciless press campaign. For it seems the propaganda machine has turned its gaze on him, distorting his nature in the very way his ‘innocent’ tampering created the monster snakes and crocodiles that now terrorise the neighbourhood.
₨ 2,260 -
DIRECTIONS TO SERVANTS
Taking the form of a handbook of manners, and addressed to each servant individually, Directions to Servants is the ultimate upstairs/downstairs battle. With scathing wit, Swift pits master against servant in an endless struggle for order, frugality and the best bits of the roast. His servants are lazy, profligate, and acquisitive: always on the lookout for a shilling to be made on the sale of leftovers, or a half-bottle of wine to share with the cook. Written in Swift’s final years of sanity, Directions to Servants is a last hilarious outpouring of cynicism at a lifetime’s accumulation of poor service.
₨ 2,260 -
INCOGNITA
This is the only available edition of a brilliant novel by the leading Restoration dramatist and author of The Way of the World. Masked balls, mistaken identity, and fanciful deceits run riot in this hilarious tale of love and intrigue by the master of the Restoration comedy. Returning to Florence on the occasion of his eighteenth birthday, Aurelian – together with his sworn companion Hippolito – dons his disguise in anticipation of the famous Florentine ball. Once there, the two are soon separated, and each finds himself paired off with a beautiful – and masked – woman. Whilst Aurelian yearns to learn the true identity of his ‘love’, Hippolito is mistaken for another and brazenly plays along with the conceit. Chaos abounds as masks are dropped, truth revealed, and, somehow, all ends happily.
₨ 950 -
RAPPACCINI’S DAUGHTER
Taking up his place at the University of Padua, the youthful Giovanni Guasconti is enchanted to discover a nearby garden of the most exquisite beauty. In it abides a young woman, perhaps the most beautiful Giovanni has ever seen. Yet as he looks out from an upstairs window, he soon learns that, far from stemming from the gentle hand of Mother Nature, the garden – and the matchless Beatrice – are in fact the result of a monstrous abomination of creativity.
₨ 2,260 -
THE WELL-EDUCATED MIND
An engaging, accessible guide to educating yourself in the classical tradition. Surrounded by more books than ever, readers today are frequently daunted by the classics they have left unread. The Well-Educated Mind, debunking our own inferiority complexes, is a wonderful resource for anyone wishing to explore and develop the mind’s capacity to read and comprehend the “greatest hits” in fiction, autobiography, history, poetry, and drama. Far from tossing readers into the swarming sea of classics and demanding that they swim, this book offers brief, entertaining histories of five literary genres, accompanied by detailed instructions on how to read each type. The annotated lists at the close of each chapter–ranging from Cervantes to A. S. Byatt, Herodotus to Paul Gilroy – preview recommended reading and encourage readers to make vital connections between ancient traditions and contemporary writing. Based on the same classical method as Bauer’s terrifically successful The Well-Trained Mind, The Well-Educated Mind provides not only a grounding.
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GARGANTUA
Gargantua introduces Pantagruel’s father – another wondrous giant. As he tells Gargantua’s life story – from his birth and education to his later life – Rabelais uses the events of the giant’s life to parody medieval and classical learning, mock traditional ecclesiastical authority, and proffer his own thoughts on humanism and society. Marked with the same warm humour, obsession with food, and scatological wit of Pantagruel, Gargantua is a further striking burlesque on Rabelais’ contemporaries and a glorious outpouring of Renaissance plenitude.
₨ 2,260 -
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