"The first great adventure story in the Western canon, The Odyssey is a poem about violence and the aftermath of war; about wealth, poverty, and power; about marriage and family; about travelers, hospitality, and the yearning for home. In this ... version--the first English translation ... by a woman--this stirring tale of shipwrecks, monsters, and magic comes alive in an entirely new way. Written in iambic pentameter verse and a vivid, contemporary...

Featuring the Chinese text on the left and the English translation on the right, this beautifully bound edition of Sun Tzu's classic text makes a unique gift or collector's item. Written in the sixth century BCE, Sun Tzu's The Art of War is still widely read and consulted today for its timeless, piercing insights into strategy and tactics. Napoleon, Mao Zedong, General Vo Nguyen Giap, and General Douglas MacArthur all claimed to have drawn inspiration...

HarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics. Our life is what our thoughts make it The extraordinary writings of Marcus Aurelius (AD 121-180), the only Roman emperor to have also been a stoic philosopher, have for centuries been praised for their wisdom, insight and guidance by leaders and great thinkers alike. Never intended for publication, Meditations are the personal notes born from a man who studied...

The influence of Euripides on the development of the dramatic genre cannot be overstated. Along with Sophocles and Aeschylus he is regarded as one of the three great Greek tragedians from classical antiquity. One of the most important of Euripides' surviving dramas is "Medea", the story of its title character, the wife of Jason of the Argonauts, who seeks revenge upon her unfaithful husband when he abandons her for a another bride. Set in Corinth...

In The Persian Expedition, Xenophon, a young Athenian noble who sought his destiny abroad, provides an enthralling eyewitness account of the attempt by a Greek mercenary army - the Ten Thousand - to help Prince Cyrus overthrow his brother and take the Persian throne. When the Greeks were then betrayed by their Persian employers, they were forced to march home through hundreds of miles of difficult terrain - adrift in a hostile country and under constant...

The Metamorphoses, by Ovid, is part of the Barnes & Noble Classics series, which offers quality editions at affordable prices to the student and the general reader, including new scholarship, thoughtful design, and pages of carefully crafted extras. Here are some of the remarkable features of Barnes & Noble Classics: • New introductions commissioned from todays top writers and scholars • Biographies of the authors • Chronologies of contemporary...

One of the lesser known plays of the Greek tragedian Sophocles, "Electra" tells the tale of a young daughter's revenge for her father's death. Electra is one of the daughters of "Agamemnon," the leader of the Greeks during the Trojan War. He was killed by his wife's lover, and Electra wishes to avenge Agamemnon with the help of her twin brother Orestes. When she receives word that he is dead, Electra laments and fears she will not be able to avenge...

First published in English by Edward Fitzgerald in 1859 from its original Farsi, "The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam" is a collection of quatrains attributed to Omar Khayyam, a Persian astronomer and mathematician born in the later part of the 11th century. Omar Khayyam's poetry, which received very little international notoriety in its own day, achieved classic status when it was discovered and rendered into English verse by Edward Fitzgerald over seven...

Using architecture, sculpture, culture and history, Adams humanizes the medieval period and provides valuable insight on religious philosophy. Mont-Saint Michel and Chartes provides a background and description of the construction of two French landmarks built in the 11th century. The Mont-Saint Michel cathedral was built during a militant time; it was not enough to simply be steadfast in one's own beliefs, but also to make others believe them. Religious...

In his clear preface, Gilbert Murray says with truth that The Trojan Women, valued by the usage of the stage, is not a perfect play. It is only the crying of one of the great wrongs of the world wrought into music. Yet it is one of the greater dramas of the elder world. In one situation, with little movement, with few figures, it flashes out a great dramatic lesson, the infinite pathos of a successful wrong. It has in it the very soul of the tragic....