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Charged with treason under Theodoric the Great in sixth-century Rome, Boethius served one year's imprisonment, awaiting trial and eventual execution. During this time, he wrote The Consolation of Philosophy, which would go on to be one of the most popular philosophical works of all time, contributing much to medieval thought and influencing the likes of Dante and Chaucer, as well as Renaissance writers, such as Milton and Shakespeare.

One of Tolstoy’s most important shorter works, The Kreutzer Sonata presents a problematic view of the relationship between the sexes and promotes abstinence as the solution. Pozdnyshev jealously observes the intimacy that emerges between his wife and a violin player. Haunted by The Kreutzer Sonata, over which they bonded, it plays round and round in Pozdnyshev’s head driving him to distraction and to an unquenchable rage.

Here young Adeline escapes danger with the La Motte family, finding refuge in the darkness of a decaying abbey, with its hidden passages… but what secrets are held here? Whom can she trust? Threatened and tested, she gradually uncovers her mysterious heritage. Sublime landscapes and psychological tension enrich a thrilling story—which, thanks to this superb audio performance that includes original song settings, can now be enjoyed in the dark for full effect!

The oldest long poem in Old English, written about AD 1,000, Beowulf tells the story of a great warrior of southern Scandinavia, in both youth and maturity. The monster Grendel terrorizes the Scyldings of Hrothgar's Danish Kingdom until Beowulf defeats him. As a result, he has to face her enraged mother. Beowulf dies after a battle against a fierce dragon.

Returned from Ireland after the death of his wife, Phineas Finn has a newfound ambition to rise through the ranks of English politics. But not long after regaining his seat in parliament, Phineas's luck begins to desert him. His reputation is tarnished after the press circulate rumours of an affair with Laura Kennedy, and his ambitions are frustrated by opposition from within the Party. Then, when his Party rival Mr Bonteen is discovered dead, all fingers point towards Phineas, leading to his incarceration and humiliation at the dock.

Undoubtedly one of the most celebrated tales of all time, this is both high-octane thriller and fascinating travelogue. Phileas Fogg, intrepid Victorian gentleman about town, accepts a wager that he cannot travel around the world in 80 days. Naturally, he immediately sets off, accompanied by his French manservant, Passepartout. They are pursued by a police officer, Detective Fix, who is foolishly convinced that Fogg is a bank robber. Much hilarity ensues.

The Trial and the Death of Socrates gives a powerful first-hand account of the end of one of the greatest figures in history. In Apology, Socrates defends himself before the Athenian court against charges of corrupting youth. Phaedo is the account of the actual last words and moments of Socrates. Tom Griffith presents these with scene-setting introductions to the historical situation in this new translation.

In our own time, when the dark threat of a dystopian world is not an alien or avoidable concept, The Last Man (1826) is revealed as a trailblazing novel. With a truly global view, Mary Shelley’s futuristic romain à clef–containing portraits of her husband Percy (Adrian), Lord Byron (Raymond) and several others–spearheaded the apocalyptic genre for an intimidated 19th-century readership that rejected her ‘diseased imagination’ and ‘polluted taste’.

After her lover abandons her and their two children, Gervaise marries a tin worker, Coupeau, who helps her rebuild her life. She starts her own business, and the two have a daughter, Anna (the protagonist of Zola's later novel Nana). But their happiness is short-lived as a freak accident leaves Coupeau seriously injured, beginning the family's fall into alcohol, desperation, and violence.

Against a backdrop of modernisation, extravagant luxury, political intrigue and sexual immorality, Saccard treats close relationships as money-making opportunities and loved ones as mere commodities. As one character puts it: ‘You see, everything is fine, as long as you make money from it.’

Famous for his political treatise The Prince, which advises would-be kings on the best strategies for governing, Machiavelli turns his attention to the inner workings of a successful republic and the people necessary to maintain it in his Discourses on Livy. Comparing contemporary societies to ancient Rome, with examples from Livy’s The History of Rome, Machiavelli tries to identify the foundations of a well-working republic, examining social and political aspects, such as voting, citizenship, warfare and religion.

After spending some years abroad, Gerard Roylake returns to England to take up his inheritance at Trimley Deen. As he assumes his complicated new life amongst strangers, his encounter with Cristel Toller, the miller’s daughter, recalls happier childhood memories and brings him into contact with a strangely beautiful man known only as the Lodger.

In Natural Theology (1802) William Paley delivers one of the most influential arguments for the existence of God, inviting audiences to explore the wonders of the natural world through the lens of reason. With his iconic watchmaker analogy, Paley contends that the intricate design and purposeful order found in living organisms and the universe point unmistakably to an intelligent Creator. Drawing from biology, anatomy and astronomy, he builds a compelling case for faith grounded in observation and rational thought.

Owen Lucton, senior accountant and family man, feels trapped by his life. He buys a luxury motor car, which he loves; but an accident sends the vehicle headlong into the river and presents him with an opportunity for change. Wandering incognito across the Malvern Hills, he encounters eccentric locals, the warmth of country pubs, the camaraderie of cricket matches, and a sense of belonging–until he is presented with a dilemma: will he risk his anonymity and freedom to help his friends?

A vivid and haunting collection of interconnected stories, Winesburg, Ohio portrays a cast of isolated individuals in a small midwestern town at the end of the 19th century. Central to the book is George Willard, a young newspaper writer, to whom a variety of Winesburg’s residents, past and present, attempt to confide their secret desires, failures and innermost truths.

Published in 1888, The Legacy of Cain is the last of Wilkie Collins’s completed novels. Two sisters, Helen and Eunice, are brought up by their father, Reverend Gracedieu. He has deliberately kept the girls in ignorance of their true ages, to disguise the fact that one of them was adopted after her birth mother was executed for the brutal murder of her husband. In time, both girls fall for the same man, Philip Dunboyne, but when he eventually chooses one of the sisters, events take a sinister turn.

In the stifling confines of Edwardian Yorkshire, Muriel Hammond is waiting for her life to begin. Marriage, respectability, duty–these are all part of the script–but just as she believes that ‘men do as they like’ while women ‘wait to see what they will do’, she dreams of a life beyond those boundaries. As war transforms the village of Marshington and friends slot into their expected roles, Muriel needs courage to reframe her sad fate as a ‘surplus woman’ and look towards her own independent future.

At the age of 23, in 1846, Francis Parkman Jr set off on an audacious journey across the "wild" American West. From the bustling Missouri River outposts to the sweeping Great Plains and the shadow of the Rockies, Parkman and his companion Quincy Shaw immerse themselves in the world of trappers, emigrants, and Native American tribes.

The Diary of a Madman and Other Stories is a bizarre and colorful collection containing the finest short stories by the iconic Russian writer Nikolai Gogol. From the witty and Kafkaesque "The Nose", where a civil servant wakes up one day to find his nose missing, to the moving and evocative "The Overcoat", about a reclusive man whose only ambition is to replace his old, threadbare coat, Gogol gives us a unique take on the absurd.

Peter Wickham talks about the infamous libertine Giacomo Casanova, and his explosive autobiography, The Story of My Life. Perhaps best known for his serial womanizing, Casanova led an extraordinary life with many wild and incredible adventures, many of which are contained in The Story of My Life. Listen to The Story of My Life, read by Peter Wickham.