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In London, the lawyer Mr Utterson is worried about his old friend Dr Jekyll, a respected physician. In his will, Jekyll leaves everything he owns to a certain Mr Hyde, a brutal man whom everyone fears. Utterson investigates to understand what binds these two men. This short novel is about the dark side everyone carries within, and leads to one of the most famous revelations in literature. Its fast pace makes it an ideal classic to read in the language you are learning.

One morning, Gregor Samsa, a humble travelling salesman, wakes up transformed into an enormous insect. Shut in his room, he can no longer work, and his family, who depended on his wages, have to learn to live with him. This short story, unsettling and shot through with dark humour, shows what is left of a man when his family sees him only as a burden. Kafka writes in simple, precise sentences: an ideal text for a first read in the language you are learning.

In London, a painter makes a portrait of Dorian Gray, a young man of extraordinary beauty. In front of the picture, Dorian makes a wish: to stay young for ever, and for the portrait to grow old in his place. Under the influence of the cynical Lord Henry, he throws himself into a life of pleasure, and each of his sins leaves a mark on the canvas. Dorian then hides the picture from everyone. A fascinating story about beauty, evil and the price of eternal youth, sparkling with Oscar Wilde's wit. Its witty dialogue makes it a captivating read in the language you are learning.

Orphaned, mistreated by her aunt and then brought up in a harsh boarding school, Jane Eyre becomes a governess at Thornfield Hall. There she meets her master, Mr Rochester, a dark and unpredictable man, and falls in love with him. But the house hides a secret, and strange noises echo through the corridors at night. A great story of love and mystery, carried by a heroine who refuses to give up her freedom and her dignity. Jane tells her own story, like a confidence, and the novel is a gripping read in the language you are learning.

A young woman, worn out after the birth of her baby, is taken by her husband, a doctor, to an old house rented for the summer. She is forbidden to write or work, and she spends her days in a room covered in hideous yellow wallpaper. She keeps a secret diary, and comes to believe that a figure is moving behind the pattern on the wall. Charlotte Perkins Gilman had been through such a rest cure herself, and this short story creates an unease that grows with every page. You can read it in one sitting in the language you are learning.

In Vienna, a famous writer comes home on his birthday and finds a long letter, with no name or address. A woman tells him her life story: she has loved him since she was thirteen, since the day he moved into the flat opposite hers. Over the years he has met her many times, without ever recognising her. Who is this unknown woman, and why is she writing to him now? This short story by Stefan Zweig is one of the most beautiful tales of unrequited love. Written like a confession, in a single voice, it can be read in one sitting in the language you are learning.

Back from Europe, Dr Simão Bacamarte settles in Itaguaí, a small town in Brazil, and opens an asylum there, the Green House, to study madness methodically. First he locks up a few slightly odd inhabitants, then respected people, then so many that the asylum ends up housing four fifths of the town. With biting irony, Machado de Assis, Brazil's greatest writer, asks a question that makes us smile and think: who decides what is normal? Full of humour, this short story can be read in one sitting in the language you are learning.

Out of work, Étienne Lantier arrives one March night at Le Voreux, a mine in the north of France, and gets taken on in the miner Maheu's team. Down the mine, he discovers the heat, the danger and the hunger of the families, and he is far from indifferent to Catherine, Maheu's daughter. Outraged, Étienne leads the miners into a great strike against the Company. The title recalls the spring month when seeds germinate, like the hope of a fairer world. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this great novel by Zola in the language you are learning.

Fyodor Karamazov, a miserly and dissolute father, quarrels with his eldest son Dmitri over money and over the same woman. His two other sons take opposite paths: Ivan, tormented by the existence of evil, and gentle Alyosha, a novice in a monastery. One evening, the old man is murdered, and all suspicion falls on Dmitri. Both a murder investigation and a great family novel, it is Dostoevsky's last book, and for many readers his greatest. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this masterpiece in the language you are learning.

Fifteen stories about Dublin around 1900, from childhood to adulthood. A schoolboy dreams of going to a grand bazaar, a young woman hesitates to leave everything behind for a sailor, an office clerk drowns his anger in drink, a family gathers for its annual dance at Christmas time. Joyce portrays ordinary people, caught in routine, at the moment their lives tip slightly. The collection ends with “The Dead”, one of the finest stories ever written. The stories are short and can be read one by one in the language you are learning.

One morning, Josef K., a senior bank official, is arrested at home without knowing why. Yet he is left free to go to work. The court trying him sits in suburban attics cluttered with files, and no one can tell him what he is accused of. Kafka had asked his friend Max Brod to burn this novel after his death, along with his other manuscripts. Max Brod refused. The word “Kafkaesque”, for any absurd situation where you get lost in rules and offices, comes largely from this book. With its strange, sometimes almost comic scenes, and the translation always in front of you, the novel reads well in the language you are learning.

In the north of England, Mr Earnshaw one day brings home a child found in the streets of Liverpool: Heathcliff. The boy grows up in the old farmhouse of Wuthering Heights with Catherine, the daughter of the house, who never leaves his side. But Catherine turns to Edgar Linton, the rich neighbour from the valley, and Heathcliff, wounded, does not forgive. Emily Brontë wrote only this novel, and in it she tells one of the most famous loves in literature: a dark, violent love, stronger than reason. Told mostly by the servant Nelly Dean, as if by the fireside, the story is a gripping read in the language you are learning.

In Paris at the end of the nineteenth century, Georges Duroy, a penniless former soldier, runs into an old comrade who has become a journalist and gets him a job on his newspaper. Handsome, with neither talent nor scruples, Duroy soon realises that women can open every door for him. Maupassant paints the portrait of a seducer who will stop at nothing to succeed, and shows plainly what goes on behind the scenes of the press, politics and money. With its lively chapters and clear style, the novel is easy to read in the language you are learning.

Ivan Ilyich is a respected judge who has built himself a comfortable, honourable and well-ordered life. One day, after an ordinary fall, a strange pain appears in his side, and never leaves him. Little by little he realises that his illness is serious, and that his family would rather pretend to see nothing. Facing death, he wonders whether he has really lived. This short story by Tolstoy has lost none of its force: it asks the question everyone ends up asking, about what really matters. Written in a simple, direct style, it is easy to read in the language you are learning.

After years in Paris, Lyubov Ranevskaya returns to her country estate, which is riddled with debt. A decision must be made about the cherry orchard, the garden of her childhood. Around her gather her brother, her daughters, the old manservant, an eternal student and a merchant whose father was a serf of the family. It is Chekhov's last play, which he himself called a comedy: it blends laughter and melancholy in a gentle farewell to a world that is fading away. Written entirely in dialogue, this short play is easy to read in the language you are learning.

“I am a sick man… I am a spiteful man.” So begins the confession of a former minor civil servant, bitter and solitary, shut away in a corner of St Petersburg. First he explains, provocatively, why he rejects reason and progress. Then he tells of a humiliating evening with old schoolfellows, and of his meeting with a young woman, Liza. This narrator mocks everything, himself as much as the reader, and yet he fascinates. This book is often seen as the way into Dostoevsky's great novels. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this feverish text in the language you are learning.

A young governess goes to look after two children, Miles and Flora, in an isolated manor house in the English countryside. The children are charming, almost too charming. Soon she glimpses, on a tower and then near a pond, two figures who should not be there. Real ghosts, or the governess's madness? Henry James leaves the question open to the very last line, and it is this doubt that makes the tale one of the most famous ghost stories. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this classic in the language you are learning.

Gustav von Aschenbach, a famous ageing writer worn out by work, goes to Venice to rest. In his grand hotel on the Lido, he is fascinated by a young Polish boy, Tadzio, whose beauty seems perfect to him. Meanwhile, an epidemic is secretly spreading through the city. This short novel is about the fascination of beauty, and about a very self-controlled man who little by little loses all control. It is one of the most famous stories of the twentieth century. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this masterpiece in the language you are learning.

The son of a sawmill owner in the Jura, Julien Sorel is poor, proud and ambitious, and secretly admires Napoleon. Taken on as tutor in the household of the mayor of Verrières, he seduces his wife, Madame de Rênal. Then, from the seminary in Besançon to the Paris mansion of the Marquis de La Mole, he climbs through a society that despises him. It is Stendhal's great novel of ambition and love. Julien, alone against a whole society, is one of the most fascinating heroes in literature. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this masterpiece in the language you are learning.

Young Werther settles in a quiet German village. At a ball he meets Charlotte, a radiant young woman who looks after her little brothers and sisters, but who is already promised to another man. In the letters he writes to his friend Wilhelm, Werther tells of his happiness, then of his torment. This short novel made Goethe famous overnight. All Europe was gripped by Werther, so much so that young men began to dress like him, in a blue coat and a yellow waistcoat. Written in the form of letters, it is easy to read in the language you are learning.

On Wall Street, a lawyer takes on a new copyist, Bartleby, a pale, quiet young man who is very diligent at first. One day, when his employer asks him to check a copy with him, Bartleby simply replies: “I would prefer not to.” Then he gives the same answer to every request, without ever leaving the office. Funny and unsettling at once, this short story asks a question you do not forget: what do you do with someone who refuses everything, politely and without anger? His phrase, “I would prefer not to”, has become famous all over the world. You can read the story in one sitting in the language you are learning.

On a fine June morning in London, Clarissa Dalloway is preparing the party she is giving that evening. As the day goes by, marked by the chimes of Big Ben, she thinks back to her youth and to Peter Walsh, the man she did not marry. Elsewhere in the city, Septimus, a former soldier, still carries the war inside him. The whole novel takes place in a single day, and we move from one character to another as if we could hear them think. Its first line, in which Mrs Dalloway says she will buy the flowers herself, has become famous. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this great classic in the language you are learning.

Paris, 1819. In the modest Vauquer boarding house, old Goriot, a retired vermicelli maker, goes without everything for his two daughters, who have married into high society. His young neighbour, Rastignac, a poor student from the provinces, dreams of entering that glittering world. The mysterious Vautrin, another lodger, explains its ruthless rules to him. This novel made Rastignac a common noun in French for an ambitious young man. It is one of the high points of “The Human Comedy”, about money, ambition and a father's love. With the translation always in front of you, you can read this great novel by Balzac in the language you are learning.

Born in a workhouse, Oliver Twist grows up hungry, and one day dares to ask for a little more gruel, which causes an outrage. He runs away to London, where he falls into the hands of Fagin, an old man who trains a gang of children to pick people's pockets. Dickens shows the misery of London's poor children, and his characters, like the cunning Fagin, have remained famous. A moving story about innocence in the face of a merciless world. With chapters full of twists, this novel is a gripping read in the language you are learning.