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Award-winning literary biographer Jenny Uglow examines the rich English tradition of book illustration that runs from Milton and Bunyan to Blake, Dickens and Lewis Carroll.

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In fiction, reportage and verse, writers including Iain Sinclair, Ali Smith, Jacob Ross and Andrew O’Hagan reflect on the diversity of contemporary London, its extremes of wealth and poverty, its streets and pubs, and its constantly evolving social landscape.

Archbishop Parker’s psalter was printed in 1567/68, following a long process of revision. This edition presents the published text facing Parker’s manuscript version; it includes two unpublished metrical psalms, together with facsimiles of the manuscript and Thomas Tallis’s eight tunes.

This volume analyses the complexity and innovation of the two great epic poems, the Iliad and the Odyssey, and explains their major themes and characters as well as investigating who Homer was and the continuing resonance of his literature.

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This chronological survey ranges from Villon in the Middle Ages, through Rabelais, Racine and the 18th-century Republic of Letters to the great novelists of the 19th and the Existentialists of the 20th. Extracts are accompanied by translations and analysis.

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While in office, President Obama received thousands of letters a day from ordinary American citizens. Every night, he read ten of these at bedtime, whether they were apologies, appreciations, thanks or rants, and he often sent handwritten responses. The author of this book has interviewed the letter-writers, members of the White House staff and Obama himself to create a vivid portrait of an empathetic leader and the people he represented.

First published in Methuen’s Old English Library in 1958, this is Pamela Gradon’s critical edition of Elene, the Vercelli Book, an important early English poem by the 9th-century poet Cynewulf. Reissued in the Exeter Medieval English Texts and Studies series. Slightly off-mint.

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Rupert Brooke’s death aboard a hospital ship in the Aegean in April 1915 turned the handsome young soldier-poet into a national hero. Drawing on archival research, including letters and diaries still in private hands, this biography reveals a more troubled character than the guardians of his posthumous reputation allowed to be known: promiscuous, unsure of his sexuality, misogynistic, and at times seriously unstable.

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Although considered a literary masterpiece now, Ulysses was widely banned as obscene for more than a decade. This account of the disputes surrounding the book is based on years of research in unpublished archival material. It traces in detail the long, painful process by which Joyce and his supporters fought to publish the novel on both sides of the Atlantic – and thereby changed the law’s definition of literature.

Covering more than a hundred 19th-century American poets, arranged alphabetically from Henry Adams (1838–1918) to Constance Fenimore Woolson (1840–1894), the Encyclopedia comprises authoritative essays on the lives and writings of the poets, the provenance of their poetry, and its literary-historical and cultural significance.

Tangier was a haven for Western writers in the mid 20th century, including Paul Bowles, Tennessee Williams and Jean Genet. Mohamed Choukri befriended all three, and each volume in this slip-cased set records their conversations, and the influence of the city on their work.

Philip Larkin (1922–1985) was the ‘unofficial Poet Laureate’ whose approachable poems about ordinary life won popularity if not laurels: at his memorial service in 1986, Westminster Abbey was filled to overflowing with his admirers. In this authorized biography, Andrew Motion, one the poet’s two literary executors, draws on and quotes extensively from a huge amount of previously unpublished material – poems, letters, stories and unfinished novels – to set Larkin's work in context while charting the complex course of his life.

In this volume from Faber’s Poet-to-Poet series, Paul Muldoon presents a personal selection of over 70 poems by John Donne and provides an introduction to the life and work of the ‘metaphysical’ poet, countering the derogatory pronouncements of Coleridge and Dr Johnson with his own critical appreciation of Donne’s poetry.

In telling ‘the story of my apprenticeship’, David Hare (b.1947) recalls his life, from suburban childhood, through Cambridge University, tiny flats in Soho and years of trial and error as a young playwright, setting his experience against the political and cultural changes and uncertainties of post-war Britain, up to 1979, a watershed year for Hare and for the country.

This collection of anecdotes from a career in music journalism that began with the Melody Maker in the mid-1970s includes stories of self-importance and rock excess in the company of stars such as David Bowie, Lou Reed and Elvis Costello.

Much of Mikhail Bulgakov’s career was a struggle with Soviet censorship, and his greatest novel, The Master and Margarita, remained unpublished in his lifetime. These chronological extracts from his diaries and letters – their recipients included Stalin himself – run from 1921 to 1940, and record his initial success and subsequent fall from favour, including his interrogation by the secret police.

Spanning more than four centuries, this anthology of 90 stories related to the life and legacy of William Shakespeare considers such diverse topics as his passion for litigation, the company that stage silent performances of his plays and the Orson Welles production of Macbeth set in Haiti.

During the 15th and 16th centuries Europe rediscovered the ancient world and underwent a revolution in scientific knowledge. This classic anthology, first published in 1953, brings together selections from a range of Renaissance texts illustrating ‘characteristic tendencies, themes and seminal forms of the self-expression of the age’. It features the words of more than 100 writers including scientists and scholars (Erasmus, Copernicus), poets and artists (Petrarch, Michelangelo), and prelates and saints (Pius II, Teresa of Avila). Slightly off-mint and felt-tip mark on lower trimmed edge.

This collaboration pairs lines by Shakespeare with 70 photographs of landscapes reflected in antique bottles. Michael Witmore, who chose the texts, discusses the playwright’s visual imagination, while artist Rosamund Purcell tells how the distressed glass transforms sky, trees and human forms into something rich and strange.

The American drama and cultural critic Mel Gussow (1933–2005) first met Samuel Beckett in Paris in 1978 and over the following ten years spoke informally with the playwright and with some of his collaborators, including the actor Billie Whitelaw and director Mike Nichols. In these candid conversations Beckett offers glimpses of his method of writing and, in Gussow’s words, ‘the extreme difficulty and urgency of his creativity’. Slightly off-mint.

James’s commentaries on 20th-century culture include reactions to WH Auden’s death, the media response to Germaine Greer’s writing and his thoughts on MGM musicals. This collection, originally published as As of This Writing, contains 49 essays, with postscripts penned in 2003 reflecting upon his earlier views.

Contributors to this study of Modernist literature were asked to consider what ‘this cosmopolitan movement in the arts can teach us about life as a citizen of Europe and of the world’. The 15 essays examine Modernism within national and regional literatures – including studies of the former Habsburg Empire and pre-revolutionary Russia – but also discuss the movement across borders of ideas and forms and of writers such as Rilke, Joyce, Svevo and Maiakovskii. Off-mint.

In the essays assembled in Clearing a Space, the novelist, musician and critic Amit Chaudhuri draws on his own experience as an Indian writer of fiction in English to reflect on what it means to be a modern Indian in relation to history, and on aspects of Indian culture and literature.

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Identifying Ellis Peters’ Cadfael books as a starting point for a huge expansion in the writing of historical crime, this review of the genre profiles key writers, novels, TV programmes and films, and includes a number of interviews with authors.

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From the Life and Times series of concise, accessible and authoritative biographies, this volume offers a fresh appraisal of PG Wodehouse (1881–1975), author of the much-loved comic adventures of Jeeves and Wooster.

Ted Hughes (1930–1998) was one of the 20th century's greatest writers, the poet of The Hawk in the Rain, Lupercal and Crow, but also a children's storyteller, translator, critic, letter writer and the husband of Sylvia Plath. In this biography, Bates draws on the complete archive of writings that Hughes left for posterity, exploring the mental landscape it reveals to give the full story of the poet's life as it was lived, remembered and shaped in his art.

Mme Marie Williams, the wife of an American dentist, lived in the apartment directly above Marcel Proust’s in 102 Boulevard Haussmann and, despite their proximity, Proust and Mme Williams wrote to one another. Proust’s were often about the noise, yet always exquisitely expressed and often accompanied by flowers; the 23 letters are presented here with a foreword by Jean-Yves Tadié. Translated, with an afterword, by Lydia Davis.

Throughout her troubled childhood, Sally Bayley found refuge from her overbearing family in the world of literature. This is a coming of age memoir, told through the prism of the books she loved, from nursery rhymes and fairy tales to Dickens.

Having been raised in an Irish family in South Africa, the poet-novelist Christopher Hope grew up with a deep insight into apartheid. He returned to the country, after twelve years’ absence, during the 1987 whites-only election. Recalling a childhood road trip (as a white boy running through the landscape) he gives an objective account of the historic grievances of both Afrikaners and the black townships.

Drawn from Western erotic literature this compilation of readings, with commentary, aims to bring into the open sometimes quite shocking sex fantasies (‘psychological stimulants underlying “normal” sexual behaviour’) and thereby reduce sexual anxieties. First published in 1969. Off-mint. Sexually explicit.

Since receiving a terminal diagnosis of leukaemia in 2010, Clive James has produced an extraordinary late harvest of poetry and prose. In this collection of essays, he looks back with characteristic wit, humour and perception on a lifetime’s reading, offering his unique insights into writers from Conrad, Hemingway and Larkin to VS Naipaul and WG Sebald. Woven throughout these literary ruminations, moreover, is a thoughtful and moving reflection on life and death.

In this collection of 20 essays drawn from the first 50 years of the Modern Fiction Studies journal, Brenda Silver’s ‘What’s Woolf Got to Do with It?’ (1992) serves as an introduction to Woolf criticism, followed by sections on the art of fiction, subjectivity, and Woolf’s ethical and political imagination.

Concentrating on his great loves – literature, which ‘invites you to ask whether you might be somewhat wrong’, and birds, from East African warblers to Antarctic penguins – Franzen’s collection of frank, ironic pieces reflect his thoughts on the modern world and environmental changes in particular.

One of the mysteries of EM Forster's life is why, after the appearance of A Passage to India in 1924, he never published another novel, despite living to be 90. Based on new interviews and access to Forster's previously restricted diaries, this sensitive biography shows how deeply his ideas on individual freedom, love and sexuality permeated his subsequent career as an essayist, broadcaster and public intellectual, and how they have shaped the more tolerant society we enjoy today. Off-mint.

First published in 1929, Robert Graves’s classic account of his experiences in the First World War recreates the horror of trench warfare and the shell shock that followed, while reflecting on the irony of his own German ancestry.

Letters written as editor of the school magazine, love letters, begging letters, letters to literary editors, fellow poets and friends: the collected letters of Dylan Thomas trace his life from the age of 16 to shortly before his death in New York in 1953, at the age of 39. Outspoken, and often indiscreet, they form the poet’s own narrative, telling of his love of Caitlin, his opinions on poets and poetry, and a life famously marred by drink and debt. Second edition. The two titles included in this set are: Dylan Thomas The Collected Letters Volume I: 1931–1939 (Read more...)Dylan Thomas The Collected Letters Volumes II: 1939–1953 (Read more...)

Her Staffordshire Quaker upbringing gave Mary Howitt (1799–1888) material for the childrens’ stories that made her famous. It is explored here, as are her travels with her journalist husband William, and friendships with Byron, Wordsworth, Dickens and Hans Christian Andersen, whose work she translated.

Nineteenth-century Scotland had other heroes besides Robert Burns (1759–96), notably William Wallace and Sir Walter Scott, but the ‘ploughman poet’ was first among equals, a figure who inspired pilgrimage, relic-collectors, ‘Burns suppers’, commemorative editions, monuments and statues. In investigating what Burns meant to ordinary Scots and how he was read and understood, Whatley treats the afterlife of the poet, not only as a literary phenomenon, but as a moving force within the mainstream of Scottish history.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a concise critical study of William Langland’s Piers Plowman, discussing new approaches to the poem’s complex allegory. The book sets Langland’s work in literary and historical context and provides a narrative synopsis of the poem.

With one chapter on each of Sophocles’ seven surviving plays, Morwood surveys recent critical approaches to the analysis of their themes and protagonists, as well as discussing modern adaptations by playwrights including Jean Anouilh and Seamus Heaney.

Based on a lost Greek original, Terence’s Phormio is an entertaining comedy of love, deception and mistaken identity engineered by the scheming parasite of the title. Maltby provides the Latin text together with facing translation, an introduction and commentary.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Shelley. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the poet’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Stanley Ireland’s critical edition of these two social comedies – The Arbitration (Epitrepontes) and The Shield (Apsis) – aims to make Menander’s sophisticated dramatic technique and use of language accessible to the modern reader. Greek text with facing English translation.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Sterne. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Swift. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Keats. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the poet’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

In a combination of commentary and critique, Robert Miles explores how Jane Austen ‘creates the illusion of personality within her work’; addresses the issues of class, money and gender in the novelist’s cultural background; and discusses the contemporary conventions of the novel.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Tolkein. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Emily Brontë. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Dickens. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of CS Lewis. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Lord Byron. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the poet’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Now the focus of much historical and feminist study, Aphra Behn (c1640-1689) was a prolific writer, famous for her novel Oroonoko and the play, The Rover. In this critical study, published in the Writers and Their Work series, Wiseman offers concise essays on the principal literary genres in which she worked.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Trollope. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Anne Brontë. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the novelist’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Andrew Marvell. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the poet’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

Part of the Writers and their Work series, this is a brief yet rigorous critical study of Tennyson. Beginning with a biographical outline, the book provides an original reappraisal of the poet’s work, examines critical responses and concludes with a detailed bibliography and index.

One of the less well-known works by Gregory, Bishop of Tours (575 to 594), this text is a series of anecdotes about ‘confessors’, whose faith was manifest in their exemplary lives, and their miracles. Translated, with introduction and notes for the Translated Texts for Historians series

In addition to giving an account of Dostoyevsky’s eventful life, this biography studies his main novels and stories, and demonstrates their lasting accessibility and relevance. Judith Gunn describes the writer's struggles with deadlines, debt, epilepsy, gambling and imprisonment; examines the ways in which his themes and characters have been reinterpreted in television shows including Columbo and The X-Files; and explores the strong and enduring connection between his work and modern media.

From Leitch Richie’s The Man-Wolf (1831) to Running Wolf (1920) by Algernon Blackwood, this collection of twelve short stories and two poems shows the great literary versatility of the werewolf, with celebrated authors including WB Yeats, Kipling and Saki unable to resist the lure of the lycanthrope.

Written during or shortly after the war, these twelve short stories include Roald Dahl’s A Piece of Cake, based on his own experience as a Gladiator pilot in North Africa; Elizabeth Bowen’s famous story The Demon Lover; and The Disinherited by HE Bates, writing as ‘Flying Officer X’.

Since her death in 1992 Angela Carter’s reputation as a novelist has risen steadily. These essays explore her originality, daring and wit, providing an indispensible companion to the work. The contributors include Margaret Atwood, Hermione Lee, Marina Warner and Ali Smith, who provides the introduction.

Anomalies in the storylines of over 30 mainly 19th-century literary classics, including Vanity Fair, Wuthering Heights and The Pickwick Papers, are pulled apart and mostly resolved in this second collection of literary whodunnits.

John Sutherland explores the hors texte, or life that goes on in the opaque world behind the characters and events in over 30 classic novels, including Bleak House, Middlemarch and Frankenstein.

The author of The Long View and the much-loved Cazalet Chronicles, Elizabeth Jane Howard (1923–2014) lived, worked and loved in literary circles. Her candid autobiography describes her marriages – to Peter Scott and Kingsley Amis – love affairs with Arthur Koestler and Laurie Lee (among others), other much-valued friendships and her years alone after leaving Amis. Slightly off-mint.

Joan Bakewell reflects on her past in this collection of musings. Focusing on one theme per chapter (work, shame, bodies, money and death), she describes her memories of the world that shaped her and her thoughts about how it has changed.

The letters in this second volume cover the years of fame, the exhilaration and pain of Thomas’s tempestuous marriage to Caitlin Macnamara, his drinking and his hell-raising. They record the creation of Under Milk Wood, and the slide into alcoholism that claimed his life during a poetry-reading tour in New York.

Spanning Thomas’s Welsh childhood, his early career and marriage, this volume charts his growing confidence as a poet as he experiments with ideas, submits work for publication, and corresponds with prominent figures in the literary world, including TS Eliot, Stephen Spender and Edith Sitwell.

Beginning with Wings (1906), Russia’s first gay-themed novel, this selection of works by Mikhail Kuzmin (1872–1936) includes 13 short stories, two collections of poetry (The Trout Breaks the Ice and Alexandrian Songs) and a play. Translated, edited and introduced by Michael Green.

This decadent and very provocative novel by the symbolist writer and poet Fyodor Sologub (1863–1927) narrates the lurid story of Peredonov, a sadistic and generally repellent schoolmaster, descending into madness in his provincial town. Translated and introduced by SD Cioran, along with short critical essays. Slightly off-mint.