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Books in World's Classics Deluxe Edition series

  • Travels with Charley in Search of America:

    John Steinbeck, Jay Parini

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Oct. 2, 2012)
    A collectible 50th anniversary deluxe edition featuring an updated introduction by Jay Parini and first edition cover art and illustrated maps of Steinbeck’s route by Don FreemanA Penguin Classic In September 1960, John Steinbeck embarked on a journey across America. He felt that he might have lost touch with the country, with its speech, the smell of its grass and trees, its color and quality of light, the pulse of its people. To reassure himself, he set out on a voyage of rediscovery of the American identity, accompanied by a distinguished French poodle named Charley; and riding in a three-quarter-ton pickup truck named Rocinante. His course took him through almost forty states: northward from Long Island to Maine; through the Midwest to Chicago; onward by way of Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana (with which he fell in love), and Idaho to Seattle, south to San Francisco and his birthplace, Salinas; eastward through the Mojave, New Mexico, Arizona, to the vast hospitality of Texas, to New Orleans and a shocking drama of desegregation; finally, on the last leg, through Alabama, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey to New York.Travels with Charley in Search of America is an intimate look at one of America's most beloved writers in the later years of his life—a self-portrait of a man who never wrote an explicit autobiography. Written during a time of upheaval and racial tension in the South—which Steinbeck witnessed firsthand—Travels with Charley is a stunning evocation of America on the eve of a tumultuous decade. This Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition also features French flaps and deckle-edged paper.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
  • Middlemarch:

    George Eliot, Rebecca Mead

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Nov. 17, 2015)
    George Eliot’s beloved masterpiece in a Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition with a foreword by Rebecca Mead, author of the bestselling memoir My Life in Middlemarch A triumph of realist fiction, George Eliot’s Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life explores a fictional nineteenth-century Midlands town in the midst of sweeping change. The proposed Reform Bill, the new railroads, and scientific advances are threatening upheaval on every front. Against this backdrop, the quiet drama of ordinary lives is played out by the novel’s complexly portrayed characters—until the arrival of two outsiders further disrupts the town’s equilibrium. Every bit as powerful and perceptive in our time as it was in the Victorian era, Middlemarch displays George Eliot’s clear-eyed yet humane understanding of characters caught up in the mysterious unfolding of self-knowledge. In this elegant Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition, Rebecca Mead introduces the novel that shaped her life and reflects on its joys and its timeless relevance.For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
  • The Acts of King Arthur and His Noble Knights:

    John Steinbeck, Chase Horton, Christopher Paolini

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Dec. 30, 2008)
    Steinbeck's only work of fantasy literature—in a deluxe edition with a foreword by Christopher Paolini, New York Times bestselling author of Eragon, Eldest and BrisingrA Penguin Classic Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur was the first book that John Steinbeck truly enjoyed reading as a child. Fascinated by Arthurian tales of adventure, knighthood, honor and friendship, in addition to the challenging nuances of the original Anglo-Saxon language, Steinbeck set out to render these stories faithfully and with keen animation for a modern audience. Here then is Steinbeck’s modernization of the adventure of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table, featuring the icons of Arthurian legend—including King Arthur, Merlin, Morgan le Fay, the incomparable Queen Guinevere, and Arthur's purest knight, Sir Lancelot of the Lake. These enduring tales of loyalty and betrayal in the time of Camelot flicker with the wonder and magic of an era past but not forgotten. Steinbeck's retelling will capture the attention and imagination of legions of Steinbeck fans, including those who love Arthurian romances, as well as countless readers of science fiction and fantasy literature. This edition features a new foreword by Christopher Paolini, author of the number-one New York Times bestselling novels Eragon, Eldest, and Brisingr. It also includes the letters John Steinbeck wrote to his literary agent, Elizabeth Otis, and to Chase Horton, the original editor of this volume.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
  • The Wonderful O:

    James Thurber, Marc Simont, Ransom Riggs

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, June 6, 2017)
    Great American humorist James Thurber’s beloved, madcap, and eerily timely fairy tale about an island society robbed of the wonders of the letter O—in a stunning Deluxe Edition featuring flaps, deckle-edged paper, and the original, full-color illustrations Littlejack has a map that indicates the existence of a treasure on a far and lonely island, and Black has a ship to get there. So the two bad men team up and sail off on Black’s vessel, the Aeiu. The name, Black explains, is all the vowels except for O—which he hates since his mother got wedged in a porthole: They couldn’t pull her in, so they had to push her out. Black and Littlejack arrive at the port and demand the treasure. No one knows anything about it, so they have their henchmen ransack the place—to no avail. But Black has a better idea: He will take over the island and purge it of O. (“I'll issue an edict!”) The harsh limits of a life sans O (where shoe is she and woe is we) and how finally with a little luck and lots of pluck the islanders shake off their overbearing interlopers and discover the true treasure for themselves (Oh yes—and get back their O’s)—these are only some of the surprises that await readers of James Thurber’s timelessly zany fairy tale about two louts who try to lock up the language—and lose. It is a tour de force of wordplay that will delight fans of Lewis Carroll, Dr. Seuss, Edward Lear, and Roald Dahl, and a timely reminder of how people can band together in the name of freedom to overthrow a tyrant. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
  • Anne of Green Gables:

    L. M. Montgomery, Benjamin Lefebvre, J. Courtney Sullivan

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Nov. 14, 2017)
    The beloved coming-of-age tale of a spunky heroine named Anne “with an E”, for the first time as a Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition, with a foreword by bestselling author J. Courtney Sullivan. Nominated as one of America’s best-loved novels by PBS’s The Great American Read L. M. Montgomery’s novel Anne of Green Gables recounts the adventures of Anne Shirley, an 11-year-old orphan mistakenly sent to a pair of siblings who intended to adopt a boy to help work on their farm in Prince Edward Island. Yet Anne’s quirky personality and good-natured spirit causes the siblings to grow to love her anyway, and soon the entire town falls for the precocious little girl with bright red hair. Cherished by both children and adults, Anne of Green Gables is a celebration of fierce individualism, and the families we create, rather than the ones we are born into. This Deluxe edition is enhanced with a foreword by bestselling author J. Courtney Sullivan, and an introduction and suggestions for further reading by Benjamin Lefebvre, as well as a selection of early writing by L. M. Montgomery about the process of writing Anne. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,800 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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  • The Road Not Taken and Other Poems:

    Robert Frost, David Orr

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Aug. 18, 2015)
    Frost’s early poems, selected by poet David Orr for the centennial of “The Road Not Taken”A Penguin Classics Deluxe edition For one hundred years, Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” has enchanted and challenged readers with its deceptively simple premise—a person reaches a fork in the road, facing a choice full of doubt and possibility. The Road Not Taken and Other Poems presents Frost’s best-loved poem along with other works from his brilliant early years, including such poems as “After Apple-Picking,” “The Oven Bird,” and “Mending Wall.” Award-winning poet and critic David Orr’s introduction discusses why Frost remains so central (if often misunderstood) in American culture and how the beautiful intricacy of his poetry keeps inviting generation after generation to search for meaning in his work.For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
  • Great Expectations:

    Charles Dickens, Tom Haugomat, Tanya Agathocleous

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Dec. 28, 2010)
    A newly repackaged edition of Dickens’s classic coming-of-age tale, with an introduction, contextual essays, a map, and suggestions for further exploration by Victorian scholar Tanya Agathocleous. A terrifying encounter with an escaped convict in a graveyard on the wild Kent marshes; a summons to meet the bitter, decaying Miss Havisham and her beautiful, cold-hearted ward Estella; the sudden generosity of a mysterious benefactor-these form a series of events that change the orphan Pip's life forever, as he eagerly abandons his humble origins to begin a new life as a gentleman. Dickens's haunting novel depicts Pip's education and development through adversity as he discovers the true nature of his great expectations. Published nine years before Dickens's death, it remains one of his most celebrated works.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
  • The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn:

    Mark Twain, Guy Cardwell, Lilli Carre, John Seelye

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Oct. 27, 2009)
    The classic boyhood adventure tale in a beautiful Deluxe Edition illustrated by Lilli CarreMark Twain's tale of a boy's picaresque journey down the Mississippi on a raft conveyed the voice and experience of the American frontier as no other work had done before. When Huck escapes from his drunken father and the 'sivilizing' Widow Douglas with the runaway slave Jim, he embarks on a series of adventures that draw him to feuding families and the trickery of the unscrupulous 'Duke' and 'Dauphin'. Beneath the exploits, however, are more serious undercurrents - of slavery, adult control and, above all, of Huck's struggle between his instinctive goodness and the corrupt values of society, which threaten his deep and enduring friendship with Jim.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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  • Les Miserables:

    Victor Hugo, Christine Donougher, Jillian Tamaki, Robert Tombs

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Feb. 24, 2015)
    The first new Penguin Classics translation in forty years of Victor Hugo’s masterpiece, the subject of The Novel of the Century by David Bellos—published in a stunning Deluxe edition. Winner of the French-American Foundation & Florence Gould Foundation’s 29th Annual Translation Prize in Fiction.The subject of the world’s longest-running musical and the award-winning film, Les Misérables is a genuine literary treasure. Victor Hugo’s tale of injustice, heroism, and love follows the fortunes of Jean Valjean, an escaped convict determined to put his criminal past behind him, and has been a perennial favorite since it first appeared over 150 years ago. This exciting new translation with Jillian Tamaki’s brilliant cover art will be a gift both to readers who have already fallen for its timeless story and to new readers discovering it for the first time. For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
  • The Wind in the Willows:

    Kenneth Grahame, Rachell Sumpter, Gregory Maguire

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, April 24, 2012)
    The coveted and award-winning Penguin Threads series continues with three more enchanting, beautifully sewn covers by a talented visual artistWith paper and pen or needle and thread, storytelling has many traditions. Penguin's award-winning art director Paul Buckley presents Penguin Threads, a series of Penguin Classics Deluxe Editions inspired by the aesthetic of handmade crafts with specially commissioned cover art. Jillian Tamaki's embroidered artwork appears on The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett,Emma by Jane Austen, and Black Beauty by Anna Sewell. This latest set features three beloved classics for both adults and children with cover art by painter and illustrator Rachell Sumpter. Sketched in a traditional illustrative manner, the final covers are sculpt embossed and present full front and reverse hand-stitched designs. Through story, style and texture, the Penguin Threads is an exciting chapter in Penguin's long history of excellence in book design, for true lovers of the book, design, and handcrafted beauty.Meek little Mole, willful Ratty, Badger the perennial bachelor, and petulant Toad. In the more than one hundred years since their first appearance in 1908, they've become emblematic archetypes of eccentricity, folly, and friendship. And their misadventures–in gypsy caravans, stolen sports cars, and their beloved Wild Wood- continue to capture readers' imaginations and warm their hearts long after they grow up. The Wind in the Willows is a timeless tale of animal cunning and human camaraderie.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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  • The Wizard of Oz: And Other Wonderful Books of Oz: The Emerald City of Oz and Glinda of Oz

    L. Frank Baum, Jack Zipes, Rachell Sumpter

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, April 24, 2012)
    The coveted and award-winning Penguin Threads series continues with three more enchanting, beautifully sewn covers by a talented visual artistWith paper and pen or needle and thread, storytelling has many traditions. Penguin's award-winning art director Paul Buckley presents Penguin Threads, a series of Penguin Classics Deluxe Editions inspired by the aesthetic of handmade crafts with specially commissioned cover art. Jillian Tamaki's embroidered artwork appears on The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, Emma by Jane Austen, and Black Beauty by Anna Sewell. This latest set features three beloved classics for both adults and children with cover art by painter and illustrator Rachell Sumpter. Sketched in a traditional illustrative manner, the final covers are sculpt embossed and present full front and reverse hand-stitched designs. Through story, style and texture, the Penguin Threads is an exciting chapter in Penguin's long history of excellence in book design, for true lovers of the book, design, and handcrafted beauty.This fully annotated volume collects three of Baum's fourteen Oz novels in which he developed his utopian vision and which garnered an immense and loyal following. The Wizard of Oz (1900) introduces Dorothy, who arrives from Kansas and meets the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman, the Cowardly Lion, and a host of other characters. The Emerald City of Oz (1910) finds Dorothy, Aunt Em, and Uncle Henry coming to Oz just as the wicked Nome King is plotting to conquer its people. In Baum's final novel, Glinda of Oz (1920), Dorothy and Princess Ozma try to prevent a battle between the Skeezers and the Flatheads. Tapping into a deeply rooted desire in himself and his loyal readers to live in a peaceful country which values the sharing of talents and gifts, Baum's imaginative creation, like all great utopian literature, holds out the possibility for change. Also included is a selection of the original illustrations by W. W. Denslow and John R. Neill.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.
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  • The Canterbury Tales: A Retelling by Peter Ackroyd

    Peter Ackroyd, Geoffrey Chaucer, Ted Stearn

    Paperback (Penguin Classics, Nov. 2, 2010)
    "A romp for the ages" (Vanity Fair)—now with a graphic cover and deluxe packaging Renowned novelist, historian, and biographer Peter Ackroyd takes on what is arguably the greatest poem in the English language and presents it in a prose vernacular that makes it accessible to readers while preserving the spirit of the original. A mirror for medieval society, The Canterbury Tales concerns a motley group of pilgrims who meet in a London inn on their way to Canterbury and agree to take part in a storytelling competition. Ackroyd's contemporary prose emphasizes the humanity of these characters-as well as explicitly rendering their bawdy humor-yet still masterfully evokes the euphonies and harmonies of Chaucer's verse.For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.