The originality, concentrated power and ‘fierce indignation’ of his satirical writing have earned Jonathan Swift a reputation as the greatest prose satirist in English literature. Gulliver’s Travels is, of course, his world renowned masterpiece in the genre; however, Swift wrote other, shorter works that also offer excellent evidence of his inspired lampoonery. Perhaps the most famous of these is A Modest Proposal, in which he straight-facedly suggests that Ireland could solve its hunger problems by using its children for food.

Also included in this collection are The Battle of Books, A Meditation upon a Broomstick, A Discourse Concerning the Mechanical Operations of the Spirit and An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity in England. This inexpensive edition will certainly be welcomed by teachers and students of English literature, but its appeal extends to any reader who delights in watching a master satirist wield words as weapons.

Su Yen left Taiwan feeling hopeless and broken. In England, specifically in Oxford, her tutor introduces her to the sympathy, understanding, and beauty of English poetry and its potential healing power. Through the beauty of the language and the humanity of culture, she slowly revives.

This real-life story tells of a young woman from Taiwan, an interior designer, who comes to England for further study. She has two ambitions: to find a new meaning for her life, which has been broken by her experiences in Taiwan, and to immerse herself in the English culture she has read and dreamed about since childhood. Overcoming problems of lack of money and the difficulties of engaging with an unfamiliar language and culture, Su Yen achieves both her goals through her discoveries of the beauties and sympathy of English poetry, painting, and architecture, and the friendliness of many of the people she meets.

Su Yen's forgotten past is gradually revealed and healed with the magic of English poetry, which leads her to see the profound meaning of life. This book will appeal to readers with an interest in discovering English history and culture.

Few first novels have created as much popular excitement as The Pickwick Papers–-a comic masterpiece that catapulted its 24-year-old author to immediate fame. Readers were captivated by the adventures of the poet Snodgrass, the lover Tupman, the sportsman Winkle &, above all, by that quintessentially English Quixote, Mr Pickwick, & his cockney Sancho Panza, Sam Weller. From the hallowed turf of Dingley Dell Cricket Club to the unholy fracas of the Eatanswill election, via the Fleet debtor’s prison, characters & incidents sprang to life from Dickens’s pen, to form an enduringly popular work of ebullient humour & literary invention.