Ancient Classics

Religion has fascinated people for centuries. But with so many faiths practiced by so many followers, it can be difficult to understand why one religion believes one thing while another believes something entirely different. This guide gives you everything you need to know to sort through the...

This collection presents the works of the three fathers of ancient Greek tragedies: Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. The reader of this collection will be able to comprehend how the plots and conflicts populating classical tragedy developed. The principle theme of Aeschylus' tragedies is the idea of fate being omnipotent and the futility in struggling against it. The tragedies of Sophocles reflect the era of the Greeks' victorious war against the Persians, which opened up commercial prosperity through trade.

Matthew Arnold praised the Iliad for its "nobility", as has everyone ever since - but ancient critics praised it for its enargeia, its "bright unbearable reality" (the word used when gods come to earth, not in disguise but as themselves). To retrieve the poem's energy, Alice Oswald has stripped away its story, and her account focuses by turns on Homer's extended similes and on the brief 'biographies' of the minor war-dead, most of whom are little more than names, but each of whom lives and dies unforgettably - and unforgotten - in the copiousness of Homer's glance.

Falstaff is both a comic and tragic central protagonist in Shakespeare's three Henry plays. He is companion to Prince Hal (the future Henry V), who loves him, goads him, teases him, indulges his vast appetites, and commits all sorts of mischief with him. Award-winning author and esteemed professor Harold Bloom examines Falstaff with the deepest compassion and sympathy and also with unerring wisdom. He uses the relationship between Falstaff and Hal to explore the devastation of severed bonds and the heartbreak of betrayal.

2,300 years ago an unbeaten army of the West invaded the homeland of a fierce Eastern tribal foe. This is one soldier’s story . . . The bestselling novelist of ancient warfare returns with a riveting historical novel that re-creates Alexander the Great’s invasion of the Afghan kingdoms in...

Much about Nalanda remains shrouded in mystery. When was it founded? Who founded it? Who studied and taught there? What subjects were offered? How many students and teachers were there? Was Nalanda a university in the modern sense? And what ultimately led to its downfall? Nalanda by Abhay K...

Have you ever been to a King Lear performance with the impression of not having understood everything? It's normal. Shakespeare's plays are the most beautiful of the theatrical repertoire, but you cannot go to a Shakespeare play if you do not have a minimum prepared this show: understand the issues, characters, context, cultural or historical references is indispensable. The same is true if you intend to read a play by William Shakespeare: our summaries will help you better understand what you have read.

Oedipus Rex & Antigone: two of the most famous plays by Sophocles. Both are a part of the same trilogy, and they are arguably the most important parts of the trilogy. To truly complete your journey with Sophocles, you will need to also check out Oedipus at Colonus.

Rolf, son of Hiarandi the Unlucky, is a character who exemplifies the effect of Christ's teachings upon the Icelandic people during their heroic age. The book is set in Iceland in the days when Christianity has come to the island though the old customs still linger. Hiarandi, at the urging of his wife, does an unprecedented thing: he lights a signal fire on a dangerous point of his land, thereby challenging the accepted custom which places lucrative salvage at higher value than the saving of life.

A tragic epic love story before Romeo and Juliet, by one of the greatest medieval Persian romance poets, in a modern-verse English translation by Dick Davis A Penguin Classic Based on historical characters of the seventh-century Iranian court and written 850 years ago, the narrative poem about...

This is a full-cast, unabridged performance with comprehensive commentary and analysis, enabling any student to fully understand and appreciate the play. Judge for yourself whether Lear is "a man more sinned against than sinning" in this moral tale that pits wisdom and age against ambition and youth. Experience and examine the power of Shakespeare's most cruel and violent tragedy.

A magical journey through the world’s oldest tales, retold with clarity and wonder and brought to life with striking original linocut art. Travel across centuries and continents with Storyland, a captivating collection of myths, legends, and folklore that have shaped human imagination for...

Robert Benjamin Lewis (1802 - 1858) was an African American and Native American author, inventor, and entrepreneur. In the ethnological work Light and Truth, Lewis claims that Adam and Eve were people of color, as were the Egyptians and many great figures of the ancient world, including Julius Caesar and Plato. Denouncing notions of white superiority, he asserts that all humans have a common origin, and pointed to a shared cultural history between Africans and Native Americans.

The Persian epic that inspired Eric Clapton's unforgettable love song "Layla" and that Lord Byron called "the Romeo and Juliet of the East," in a masterly new translation The iconic love story of the Middle East, by a twelfth-century Persian poet who has been compared to Shakespeare for his...

It should have been a beautiful moment between a man and his dog. Philip Womack made a quip about Cerberus, the three-headed hell-hound, but for Una, the beloved lurcher, it was all Greek. Then she ran off after a squirrel. And Womack was left to wonder what else she didn’t know about the great civilisations of the past. The Greeks and the Romans laid the foundations of so much of what we read, listen to and watch today, from the baked pies of Game of Thrones to the Lotus-eaters of Love Island.

The Seven Tablets of Creation is Leonard W. King's translation of the Babylonian creation myth. There is a resemblance to the Hebrew narrative of Genesis, which broadened the translation’s appeal to a large public. It also has the title, Enuma Elish, meaning "When on High".

This superbly written, highly listenable account of the tumult of A.D. 69 focuses on the four men who sought imperial power in the void left by Nero: an old man, a soldier, a playboy, and an extravagant debaucher. The empire-wide, year-long civil war that resulted is brought to life in this sustained narrative, which is rich in detail, intrigue, and insight, as well as the aristocratic biases of the author.

The Traveler’s Secret offers an ancient story of one man’s choices - and the principles that make the difference between failure and success. In this fable about following dreams, Michael V. Ivanov's latest masterpiece reveals the journey of Agisillus, a vagabond in ancient Gaul, and his extraordinary encounter with a mysterious traveler. This audiobook reveals secrets to living an extraordinary and purposeful life, amassing personal wealth, and leaving a legacy that continues to sow seeds of life into the world.

Whether searching for the buried treasure of Captain Kidd in "The Gold Bug" or seeking revenge in "The Cask of Amontillado," the words of the master storyteller will thrill and envelop the listener.

On the Shortness of Life was written by Seneca around the year 49AD. He argues that we waste so much time because we do not properly value it. We expend great effort in protecting other valuables such as money and property, but because time appears intangible, we allow others to occupy it and take time away from us. Wise people, on the other hand, understand that time is the most valuable of all resources, and with effort can free themselves from external control to engage in meaningful introspection and create an intentional life.