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- Some pages of this manuscript were lost by Dickens in 1865 during a train accident on the train, which had departed from the port of Folkestone, taking the author to London, derailing at Staplehurst; several sheets were recovered by the writer. The incident is discussed in the book's postscript.
- Many literary critics consider "Our Mutual Friend" to be the most complex and desperate novel by the English author, in which his last "remnants" of illusions about the progressive function of the bourgeoisie have now disappeared, and even the proletariat emulates and tries to imitate it; they have compared it to a kaleidoscope, through which he analyzed social classes and people. (cit. wiki) more
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Charles Dickens — Casa Desolata | DeRank™: 0,00

- It is considered one of the author's most successful novels and contains one of the broadest, most complex, and intriguing groups of secondary characters in his entire literary corpus, intertwined with various subplots.
- The fierce attack launched by Dickens on the British judicial system is motivated in part by his personal experience as a law practitioner...
- Although Dickens' unsparing portrayal of the lawyers and judges of the Chancery is largely undeserved and exaggerated, the novel helped in the modernization of the entire judicial system, culminating in the legal reform of 1870. (source: wiki) more
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Charles Dickens — David Copperfield | DeRank™: 0,00

- Original title: "The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (which he never meant to publish on any account)"
- CD said: Of all my books, this is the one I love the most...
- Many elements of the novel are inspired by events in the author's own life; it can indeed be considered the fictionalized autobiography of the great 19th-century writer, the most autobiographical of all the books he wrote. (Anil Sehrawat)
- The work is also considered an industrial novel, because it reflects the misery experienced during the industrial revolution, when the exploitation of women and children in factories was widespread. (source: wiki) more
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- The story follows young Nell, who lives alone with her maternal grandfather (whose name is never revealed) in an old house in London called The Old Curiosity Shop because the ground floor houses a shop full of antiques. Following a series of gambling debts, the old man is forced to flee at night, accompanied by little orphan Nell.
- Throughout the narrative, the two encounter various and peculiar characters, such as puppeteers, a kind and gentle Master, the ambitious owner of a wax museum, where they work and temporarily stay, a dog trainer, and a worker who speaks with the fire of his forge... (cit. wiki) more
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Charles Dickens — Nicholas Nickleby | DeRank™: 0,00

The young Nicholas Nickleby finds himself, at a young age, having to support his family after the loss of his father. The family, having moved to the chaotic London of the 1800s, seeks support from the brother of the deceased, Ralph Nickleby, who will soon reveal his wicked and selfish nature. (from wiki) more
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Charles Dickens — Oliver Twist | DeRank™: 0,00

- It is one of Dickens' most famous and influential works. It was the first novel in the English language to feature a boy as the protagonist and one of the earliest examples of a social novel.
- Through a subversion of the coming-of-age story and a disenchanted dark humor, the novel examines the ills of Victorian England: poverty, child labor, urban crime, and the intrinsic hypocrisy of Victorian culture.
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The most gripping and delightfully irresponsible novel by Dickens, inhabited by "comic characters" that "transcend the limits of bizarre eccentricity in human significance" (Mario Praz) more
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Beginning:
A dreamer, isolated from reality and any friendships, during a night walk meets, by the riverside, a girl who awakens in him the feeling of love. Her name is Nasten'ka...
End:
Nasten'ka sends a letter... and arranges a meeting for the night that will not happen.
Then, she decides to forget him, though with little success, and in her, it seems, the same feeling that the dreamer experiences has also been born.
Everything ends when the man, who had not forgotten her, arrives at the meeting on the fourth night, reappearing in the girl's life.
(from wiki) more
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Fëdor Dostoevskij — Il giocatore | DeRank™: 0,00

- it’s a novel dictated in just under a month
- Written out of necessity (the writer needed to pay off gambling debts)
- It analyzes gambling in all its forms with the different types of players, from wealthy European nobles to the poor souls betting all their possessions, to the typical thieves of the casinos
- It is also a study of the various peculiarities of European populations
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Fëdor Dostoevskij — L'idiota | DeRank™: 0,00

"For a long time, an idea has been tormenting me, but I was afraid to turn it into a novel because it is an idea that is too difficult, and I am not prepared for it, even though it is extremely seductive and I love it. This idea is to depict an absolutely good man. Nothing, in my opinion, can be more difficult than this, especially nowadays."
.: Fëdor Michajlovic Dostoevskij :. more
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An unnamed space of literature and soul emerges and is outlined: the underground, a place of all that consciousness vainly attempts to set aside.
And it is like the sudden emergence of a continent: no one, after having explored it, will ever forget the shrill, penetrating, shameless voice that speaks in these pages and poses questions that leave one speechless.
Are we really "convinced that only the normal and the positive, in short only well-being, is advantageous for man?
That reason cannot be mistaken about these advantages?
Is it not possible that man does not only like to feel well?
That he actually equally likes suffering?
That feeling bad is just as advantageous to him as feeling good?" (from Adelphi) more
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Re-read later in life, in its entirety, it will appear to us as a new book: for example, as a parable of modern man, eager, determined to dominate the world outside of him, and who finds his salvation in the creation of objects, which "restores dignity and beauty to common actions, to common things." The fundamental data of the story are now known to us, and our attention will be free to focus on the details, on those minute facts that Defoe's art employs (and it can also be said that he was the first great modern "reporter") to make such an "extraordinary" story plausible. "Reiterating that in the foreground there is nothing but a clay bowl," as Virginia Woolf says, "he persuades us to see remote islands, and the solitude of the human soul." (from Adelphi) more
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Frank Zappa — Them or Us | DeRank™: 0,00

There’s also an unreleased version of Valley Girl (with Moon Zappa on vocals) overdubbed and played in reverse. more
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Joseph Conrad — La linea d'ombra | DeRank™: 0,00

It deals with the growth and development of the protagonist's personality and character during his journey to become the captain of the ship Orient. Upon closer inspection, for Conrad, the shadow line is that undefined, personal, and at the same time universal moment and journey of realizing one's independence and, simultaneously, the feeling of being alone in front of and in the world. Keys to this sudden, almost instantaneous passage are the overcoming of guilt and the seemingly opposite feeling of unworthiness for one's being: a overcoming that occurs alongside the acceptance of the responsibility to be oneself as a human being. (cit. wiki) more
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Joseph Conrad — Il duello | DeRank™: 0,00

The Duel: A Military Tale, this story was brought to the screen by Ridley Scott in the 1977 film "The Duellists" featuring Keith Carradine and Harvey Keitel; since then, some Italian translations of the tale have been titled "I duellanti." It is the story of two French officers, whose lives are shaped by a grotesque duel that began in 1801 and ended 30 years later. more
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Joseph Conrad — Nostromo | DeRank™: 0,00

The book features the largest number of fully developed characters of any of his novels, but two dominate the narrative: Señor Gould and the eponymous anti-hero, the incorruptible Nostromo. The inspiration for the characters comes from a group of mentally ill individuals that Conrad had encountered before writing the book. (from wiki) more
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Joseph Conrad — Tifone | DeRank™: 0,00

Typhoon is a classic sea story, likely based on Conrad's real experience as a sailor and probably also on a true misadventure aboard the real steamship John P. Best. The long tale describes the exploits of Captain MacWhirr as he faces a tropical typhoon at the helm of the Siamese-flagged steamer Nan-Shan, with its human cargo of Chinese coolies heading towards their homeland. (from wiki) more
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Joseph Conrad — Al limite estremo | DeRank™: 0,00

Al limite estremo (The End of the Tether) is a semi-autobiographical story.
Captain Henry Whalley is an honest and experienced sailor, 67 years old, and the commander of the Fair Maid, a ship he owns. A widower, Whalley has only one daughter who lives in Australia and is in financial trouble after marrying an incompetent man. During the voyage, Whalley begins to experience severe visual disturbances; he knows he poses a risk to the ship and the crew, but he cannot relinquish command to protect his daughter: he believes he can still maintain control of the ship despite his near-blindness; however, he does not realize that...
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Joseph Conrad — Giovinezza | DeRank™: 0,00

Youth (A Narrative) is an autobiographical tale by the Polish writer Joseph Conrad, who wrote in English.
The second mate of the ship Judea must reach the port of Bangkok with a cargo of coal, but a storm holds them back twice. Then, on the third journey, the cargo catches fire and ignites the ship, and the sailors manage to transfer part of the cargo to the lifeboats... more
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Joseph Conrad — Cuore di tenebra | DeRank™: 0,00

"She had taken stock and had judged. 'The horror!'" Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
This work by Conrad is strongly representative of the author's style and his suggestions. The wild jungle seems to come alive around the reader, with its rustlings and its gloomy mystery. The figure of Kurtz, in particular, holds an hypnotic and magical power, which sometimes transforms into a tragic sense of pity. The stories encountered in Heart of Darkness reference the journey that Conrad took in 1890 aboard the steamer Roi des Belges along the Congo River, in the heart of Africa. Even the characters that populate this book are portraits of real figures whom the author met during that time. (from wiki) more
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