Books in Stardust Classics series

His is the voice of a generation. During his own time, however, Francis Scott Fitzgerald, author of THE GREAT GATSBY and other now-revered works, was known primarily through the voice of Amory Blaine. Narrator and protagonist of Fitzgerald’s semi-autobiographical THIS SIDE OF PARADISE, Amory Blaine is the privileged son of a fading era. Handsome and intellectually ambitious—he struggles to find meaning and value during a period when those qualities are increasingly difficult to define. After the first horrific world war, Gertrude Stein labeled Fitzgerald’s contemporaries “the Lost Generation.” The post-war young found themselves unable and unwilling to revive the goals and mores of their parents. F. Scott Fitzgerald spoke for that generation as a young author and established his claim as one of the leading—if not THE leading—American writer of the first half of the twentieth century.

Considered by many to mark the advent of the English novel, Daniel Defoe’s ROBINSON CRUSOE is almost certainly the most enduring long fiction in the language. Published in 1719, it was an immediate success. Its realistic, narrative style (a major innovation in its time) makes the novel as readable today as when first introduced. The story has become familiar to all. A sailor finds himself a castaway on a deserted island of the Americas. He must create a place of shelter and every article of clothing, every tool he needs in order to survive. He must endure his loneliness and prepare to face uncertain challenges. Daniel Defoe began his career as a novelist late in life, having endured a tumultuous past, including imprisonment for his political writings. Among the novels that followed ROBINSON CRUSOE are A JOURNAL OF THE PLAGUE YEAR and MOLL FLANDERS.

Silas Marner is a simple weaver living a reclusive life is a village in the south of England. Falsely accused of theft, he has fled the home of his ancestors. Renounced by his bride-to-be and his former friends, he turns to a singular purpose—the accumulation of gold. Though the earnings from his trade are small, over time his fortune grows. And suddenly his life’s path is altered dramatically. In a short space of time, his gold is stolen and another treasure is discovered. A child appears at his doorstep. Her opium-addicted mother is found dead, and Silas takes the child in as his own. Life has new meaning—true purpose. Years pass. Then, just as suddenly, he and his beloved Eppie are dealt a stunning blow! Her realism is relieved, as in actual life, by love, helpfulness and pathos; by deep sorrow, sufferings patiently borne, and tender sympathy for others' woes. –– George Willis Cooke, GEORGE ELIOT; A CRITICAL STUDY OF HER LIFE, WRITINGS & PHILOSOPHY What a clear, incisive, masterly style! Her most perfect work. –– Mathilde Blind, GEORGE ELIOT

THE ADVENTURES OF TOM SAWYER brings to life the boyhood days of Samuel Clemens, alias Mark Twain. No American novel of its type has endured so long. Based on his experiences and those of his companions, imbued with the mystery and the majesty of the Mississippi River, Twain has made his legacy an essential part of the American literary tradition. “…a book of entertaining character, and of the greatest artistic sincerity.”—The Atlantic Monthly, May, 1876 “…the high-water mark of humor and imaginative creation for the New World,—the most genuinely American thing ever written.”—Charles Johnston, “The Essence of American Humor,” The Atlantic Monthly, February 1901