Raskolnikov is a desperately impoverished young student and intellectual who robs and murders a moneylender to ease his own financial problems and, he rationalises, to better the world by expelling it of her evil doings. However, after he falls ill, he is eventually burdened by his past actions and seeks salvation. Was it justifiable homicide? Captivating and often disturbing, this novel explores this and other profound life concepts. Crime and Punishment is considered to be the one of the most influential Russian novels ever written. Read it and see why.

In this comic novel, Mr. Polly is a timid man who prefers reading books of adventure rather than working in a draper's shop. A life with little money and a spiteful wife is one of woe. A disenchanted Mr.Polly plans to burn down his shop and kill himself. His plan fails and a turn of events leads him to a genuinely brighter future, especially after a dead man has been mistakenly identified as Mr.Polly.

War and Peace is the critically acclaimed epic novel by Leo Tolstoy. Set between 1805 - 1813, it tells of the Napoleonic wars and in particular Napoleon's invasion of Russia. Against this backdrop, Tolstoy tells the story of various Russian aristocratic families - their personal lives, fortunes, loves and dramas. Ranked No.3 on Time magazine's list of the "10 Greatest Books of all time", January 2007.

The Lady With the Dog is one of Chekhov's most famous stories. What seems like a brief affair between two married people becomes a threat to their family lives as they find they cannot forget each other. Chekhov is now the most popular playwright in the English-speaking world after Shakespeare, but many think that his short stories are his greatest achievement. Chekhov's stories are ranked No.9 on Time magazine's list of the "10 Greatest Books of all time", January 2007.

Shakespeare's best known play and the most quoted work of the English language.

Hamlet's father is dead and he struggles with the desire for revenge. The play uses this backdrop to explore intrigue, incest, desire, and what is important in life.

Regularly included in lists of the greatest works of all time.

This is one of the most colorful and fascinating autobiographies and what a wild, wild ride it is. Benvenuto Cellini the untameable goldsmith, sculptor, musician, artilleryman, sharpshooter, wheedler, and brute gives us the story of his life in his own words. Although esteemed for his art, when push came to shove he could as effectively dispatch an enemy with his words as with his sword. Cellini lived as the Italian renaissance was peaking where he was able to create masterpieces for his patrons - kings, popes, and leaders of sometimes waring Italian city-states.

A seminal work of Realism, and one of the most influential novels ever written.

"What is remarkable in Madame Bovary is that its mediocre beings, with their earthbound ambitions and pedestrian problems, impress us, by virtue of the structure and the writing that create them, as beings who are out of the ordinary within their ordinary manner of being." - Mario Vargas Llosa, in The Perpetual Orgy

The novel focuses on a doctor's wife, Emma Bovary, as she spirals out of control trying to escape the banalities and emptiness of provincial life.