This is the first study of noblewomen in twelfth-century England and Normandy, and of the ways in which they exercised power. It draws on a rich mix of evidence to offer an important reconceptualisation of women's role in aristocratic society, and in doing so suggests new ways of looking at lordship and the ruling elite in the high middle ages. The book considers a wide range of literary sources such as chronicles, charters, seals and governmental records to draw out a detailed picture of noblewomen in the twelfth-century Anglo-Norman realm. It asserts the importance of the life-cycle in determining the power of these aristocratic women, thereby demonstrating that the influence of gender on lordship was profound, complex and varied. This work will be of importance to specialists in history and medieval studies, as well as those interested in the experience of women and those working on lordship and feudalism.

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During a trip to Europe, Christopher Newman, a wealthy American businessman, asks the charming Claire de Cintré to be his wife. To his dismay, he receives an icy reception from the heads of her family, who find Newman to be a vulgar example of the American privileged class. Brilliantly combining elements of comedy, tragedy, romance and melodrama, this tale of thwarted desire vividly contrasts nineteenth-century American and European manners. Oxford's edition ofThe American, which was first published in 1877, is the only one that uses James' revised 1907 text. About the Series:For over 100 yearsOxford World's Classicshas made available the broadest spectrum of literature from around the globe. Each affordable volume reflects Oxford's commitment to scholarship, providing the most accurate text plus a wealth of other valuable features, including expert introductions by leading authorities, voluminous notes to clarify the text, up-to-date bibliographies for further study, and much more.

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The Merchant of Venice is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. Although classified as a comedy in the First Folio, and while it shares certain aspects with Shakespeare's other romantic comedies, the play is perhaps more remembered for its dramatic scenes, and is best known for the character of Shylock. The title character is the merchant Antonio, not the Jewish moneylender Shylock, who is the play's most prominent and more famous villain. Though Shylock is a tormented character, he is also a tormentor, so whether he is to be viewed with disdain or.

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Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, KBE (1881-1975) was a comic writer who has enjoyed enormous popular success for more than seventy years. Wodehouse's main canvas remained that of prewar English upper-class society, reflecting his birth, education, and youthful writing career. Wodehouse was admired both by contemporaries like Rudyard Kipling as well as by modern writers like Terry Pratchett. Best known today for the Jeeves and Blandings Castle novels and short stories, Wodehouse was also a talented playwright and lyricist who was part author and writer of fifteen plays and of 250 lyrics for some thirty musical comedies. He worked with Cole Porter on the musical Anything Goes. His other works include: A Prefect's Uncle (1903), Tales of St. Austin's (1903), The Gold Bat (1904), The Head of Kay's (1905), Love Among the Chickens (1906), The White Feather (1907), Mike (1909), Psmith, Journalist (1909), Psmith in the City (1910), The Little Nugget (1913), Something New (1915), The Man with Two Left Feet, and Other Stories (1917), Piccadilly Jim (1917), A Damsel in Distress (1919), Indiscretions of Archie (1921) and The Clicking of Cuthbert (1922).

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[from Wikipedia] War and Peace (pre-reform Russian: Война́ и миръ; post-reform Russian: Война́ и мир, translit. Voyná i mir[vɐjˈna i ˈmʲir]) is a novel by the Russian author Leo Tolstoy. It is regarded as one of the central works of world literature.[1][2][3] War and Peace and Tolstoy's other major prose work, Anna Karenina (1875–77), are considered Tolstoy's finest literary achievements.

The novel charts the history of the French invasion of Russia, and the impact of the Napoleonic era on Tsaristsociety, through the stories of five Russian aristocratic families. Portions of an earlier version, titled The Year 1805,[4] were serialized in The Russian Messenger between 1865 and 1867. The novel was first published in its entirety in 1869.[5] Newsweek in 2009 ranked it first in its Top 100 Books.[6] In 2007, Time magazine ranked War and Peace third in its poll of the 10 greatest books of all time while Anna Karenina was ranked first.[7]

Tolstoy himself said that War and Peace was "not a novel, even less is it a poem, and still less a historical chronicle". Large sections, especially in the later chapters, are philosophical discussion rather than narrative.[8]He also said that the best Russian literature does not conform to standards and hence hesitated to call War and Peace a novel. Instead, he regarded Anna Karenina as his first true novel. According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, "no single English novel attains the universality of Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace."[9]

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