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Lysistrata is an ancient Greek comedy by Aristophanes, which was originally performed in Athens in 411 BC. It is a comic account of a woman's extraordinary quest to terminate the Peloponnesian War between Greek city states, by advocating that the women deny all the men of the land any sex. At a meeting, Lysistrata persuades the women of the warring cities to withhold sexual privileges from their men. She has also persuaded the older women of Athens to seize the Acropolis.

Dante's Paradise is the third of the three cantos of the Divine Comedy, after Hell and Purgatory. Hell and purgatory are places on Earth, but paradise is a non-material and ethereal place, divided into nine heavens.

Mary Ann Evans (1819-1880), known by her pen name George Eliot, was one of the leading writers of the Victorian era. Her novels are known for their realism and psychological insight. Four of them are included in this volume: Middlemarch, Daniel Deronda, The Mill on the Floss, and The Lifted Veil.

True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin is one of the greatest and most celebrated books ever written about Our Lady. Unpublished during the saint's lifetime, it was discovered in 1842. The author views Mary as the essential key to the heart of Jesus and "consecration to Jesus in Mary" as a special path to being united with and consecrated to Christ.

The Kalevala is a 19th-century work of epic poetry compiled by Elias Lönnrot from Karelian and Finnish oral folklore and mythology. The Kalevala was instrumental in the development of the Finnish national identity and the sense of nationality that led to Finland's independence from Russia in 1917. Beginning with the traditional Finnish creation myth, the Kalevala branches out into stories of the creation of the earth, plants, creatures, and the sky. There are many stories of, romance, kidnapping, seduction, and magical spell casting and singing.

De Vita Caesarum ("About the Life of the Caesars"), commonly known as The Twelve Caesars, is a set of 12 biographies of Julius Caesar and the first 11 emperors of the Roman Empire written by Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus. The work was considered highly significant in antiquity and remains a primary source on Roman history. It examines the critical period of the Principate from the end of the Republic to the reign of Domitian.

The Analects or Selected Sayings is an ancient Chinese text comprising sayings and wisdom teachings attributed to Confucius and his contemporaries, as well as fragmentary dialogues between the philosopher and his students. The Analects has been one of the most influential books in China for the last two millennia, and continues to contribute to Chinese and East Asian culture and thought.

Arthur Machen’s novella explores the disturbing consequences of toying with the line between the earthly world and the spiritual realm. The Great God Pan centers around an ominous woman named Helen, who lives in the woods and invites morbid happenings. The book faced harsh censure upon its publication in 1894 for its explicit content, but today it is considered a hallmark of horror fiction. Stephen King himself called it “one of the best horror stories ever written”, making it essential reading for any dedicated fans of the genre.

The Mill on the Floss is a novel by George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans), which was first published in 1860. The book chronicles the lives of Tom and Maggie Tulliver, who are siblings growing up at Dorlcote Mill situated at the junction of the River Floss and the River Ripple. Maggie is the main character, and the story begins when she is nine years old, 13 years into her parents' marriage. The most important threads concern her relationship with her brother and her romantic relationships with Philip Wakem and Stephen Guest.

Willa Cather achieved recognition for her novels depicting American life on the prairie frontier.

Silas Marner: The Weaver of Raveloe (1861) is the third novel by George Eliot. Set in the early years of the 19th century, it seems at first to be only a simple story about the weaver Silas Marner. However, the complex plot and wide cast of characters soon reveal its scope and realism.

First published in 1918, My Antonia is the final book of Willa Cather’s "prairie trilogy" of novels, preceded by O Pioneers! and The Song of the Lark. This is a coming-of-age story about the orphaned boy Jim Burden growing up on his grandparents' farm in Nebraska and his lifelong friendship with Ántonia Shimerda, the eldest daughter of an immigrant family from Bohemia.

O Pioneers! is a 1913 novel by Willa Cather, the first of her “prairie trilogy” of novels. It tells the story of the Bergsons, a family of Swedish immigrants in the farm country near the fictional town of Hanover, Nebraska, at the turn of the 20th century. The protagonist, Alexandra Bergson, inherits the family farm when her father dies, and devotes her life to making the farm a success at a time when many other families are giving up and leaving the land.

Villette (1853), was Charlotte Brontë's third novel and the last published during her lifetime. After an unspecified family catastrophe, the main character, Lucy Snowe, travels to Belgium to teach in a boarding school in the fictional town of Villette. She falls in love with a man she cannot marry, which triggers a nervous breakdown. Ultimately, a new, strong Lucy emerges who becomes the owner and head of her own school.

The novel Shirley by Charlotte Brontë (1849) followed the huge popular success of her debut, Jane Eyre. The setting is an environment which is industrializing at a rapid pace during the Napoleonic Wars. This is the story of two heroines occupying vastly different social positions in life. Caroline Helstone, trapped in a Yorkshire rectory, serves as a symbol of all the single women of the time. On the other hand, there’s Shirley Keeldar, an independent woman whose wealth has liberated her.

The novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë was published under the pen name "Currer Bell" in 1847. Considered one of the most famous romance novels of all time, Jane Eyre is a Bildungsroman which chronicles the experiences of Jane, including her childhood as an orphan, her growth to adulthood and her love for Mr. Rochester, the master of Thornfield Hall. It was the first English novel that focused on its protagonist's moral and spiritual development by way of an intimate first-person narrative, in which events are marked by psychological intensity.

Set in the wild, stormy moorland of England. It tells the tale of the Linton and Earnshaw families: Edgar and Isabella Linton and Catherine and Hindley Earnshaw and their strange adopted brother, Heathcliff. Now considered a classic of English literature, upon publication it received mix reviews due to its Gothic undertones and savage passions. Wuthering Heights has inspired many adaptations, including film, radio, and television dramatizations and a hit song by Kate Bush.

Peer Gynt, the five-act romantic play in verse by the Norwegian dramatist Henrik Ibsen, is one of the most widely performed Norwegian plays. Based on a Norwegian folk hero, the title character is a rogue who will be destroyed unless the love of a woman saves him. At a wedding he meets Solveig, who falls in love with him, but Peer ruins the wedding by abducting, then abandoning the bride. Then Peer goes global, misbehaving in a trail of adventures around the world. When he finally returns to Norway, old and embittered, Solveig welcomes him home, and he's redeemed by her love.

Henry Reginald Holland Hall (1873-1930) was an English Egyptologist and historian. His in-depth study of the ancient near east examines the region’s civilizations and history, starting with the early Bronze age civilizations such as that of the Minoans on Crete. He explores the history of ancient Egypt in detail, and the civilizations of Mesopotamia and Iran, like Babylonia, Assyria and Persia.

Henrik Ibsen’s play The Master Builder was published in 1892 and performed the next year. The architect and builder Halvard Solness receives a visit from the young Hilda, who persuades him to employ her in the household. When Hilda learns of the completion of Halvard’s project - a tall building with a towering steeple - she makes a point of persuading him to climb the steeple at the public opening ceremony. Halvard of course, suffers from acrophobia, a morbid fear of extreme heights....