First published in 1873, The Gilded Age is both a biting satire and a revealing portrait of post-Civil War America - an age of corruption when crooked land speculators, ruthless bankers, and dishonest politicians voraciously took advantage of the nation's peace-time optimism. With his characteristic wit and perception, Mark Twain and his collaborator, Charles Dudley Warner, attack the greed, lust, and naivete of their own time in a work which endures...

Impressions of Theophrastus Such, published in 1879, marks the end of George Eliot's career and the end of her life with George Henry Lewes. In many ways this fable is a final testimony to her brilliance, and yet it is puzzling that it has traditionally been judged as inferior to her other works. It remains, on the contrary, a significant reflection of her earlier works and an experiment apart from them. As Nancy Henry points out in her comprehensive...

Aylmer is an inventor, the greatest of his age. But his heart is torn between his devotion to science and his love for his beautiful wife, Georgiana, whose appearance would be perfect were it not for the small red birthmark on her cheek. Unnaturally obsessed with the blemish, Aylmer sets out to erase it from his beloved's face-and discovers that his heedless quest to master Nature has disastrous consequences.   A Gothic romance both chilling and...