APRIL / MAY 2007 CLASSICS NEWSLETTER


 


One of our most anticipated Penguin Classics is The Mayflower Papers, the companion to the New York Times bestseller Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick.  The father-and-son team of Thomas Philbrick and Nathaniel Philbrick have selected and edited some of the most riveting and poignant accounts of colonial New England, giving us the Pilgrims in their own words.  Here, Thomas Philbrick shares a special discovery as he worked on The Mayflower Papers.


 



Rachel Carson


One hundred years ago, on May 27, 1907, Rachel Carson was born in the small farming town of Springdale, Pennsylvania. She would go on to spearhead the contemporary environmental movement, publishing influential books that combined a deep reverence for the natural world with an acute awareness of man's place in it--and of his potential to upset its delicate ecological balance. "Rachel Carson was one of the reasons why I became so conscious of the environment," Al Gore has written. "Her picture hangs on my office wall among those of the political leaders, the presidents, and the prime ministers.... Carson has had as much or more effect on me than any of them, and perhaps all of them together."

To honor Rachel Carson on the centennial of her birth, there will be birthday parties in public parks and other green spaces across the country, and conferences at Yale, Johns Hopkins, Carnegie Mellon, the Kennedy Presidential Library, and numerous other venues, all in tribute to her extraordinary legacy. For our part, Penguin Classics is proud to publish a centennial edition of Under the Sea-Wind, Carson's first book and her personal favorite. Featuring a new introduction by Carson's biographer, Linda Lear, and the beautiful line drawings by Howard Frech from the very first edition of the book (1941), Under the Sea-Wind takes you beneath the waves with the same kind of intimacy and wonder that made the documentaries Winged Migration and March of the Penguins such masterpieces of nature-immersion.

Click here to read an appreciation of Under the Sea-Wind offered by Linda Lear, author of Rachel Carson: Witness for Nature as well as the just-released biography Beatrix Potter: A Life in Nature.




People are (again!) talking about: Elizabeth Gaskell


Although a revered author in Penguin Classics for some time, Elizabeth Gaskell is often lost in the shadow of her contemporaries Charlotte Brontė and George Eliot, who are held held up as the female literary icons of the Victorian era. But lately there's been a resurgence of interest in Gaskell's impressive body of work, which includes 65 short stories, 11 novels, and a notable biography, The Life of Charlotte Brontė, first published in 1857 and most recently by Penguin Classics in 1998. Consistent throughout Gaskell's work is her singular voice--shrewd, observant, and bitingly perceptive. She is equally witty, sentimental, and charming, her tone often signifying a comfortable intimacy with her reader. It is no wonder then that with this revival of her work comes the renewed appreciation of Gaskell as a Victorian writer of the highest rank.

Check out some of Elizabeth Gaskell's other titles from Penguin Classics:

Sylvia's Lovers

Wives and Daughters

Gothic Tales

Mary Barton: A Tale of Manchester Life

Ruth

North and South

Cranford

Deerbrook




And don't forget Mother's Day this May 13th!





The Penguin Classics listed below, in addition to other select titles, are 15% off for Mother's Day.  Click here to see all of the the discounted Penguin Classics (only through May 14th).



Not sure what to get Mom this year on her special day? Let Penguin Classics help! In addition to Rachel Carson's Under the Sea-Wind and the rich array of Elizabeth Gaskell titles mentioned above, here are just a few Penguin Classics that make fantastic gifts:

For the poet:

Twenty Love Poems and a Song of Despair by Pablo Neruda

Decadent Poetry edited by Lisa Rodensky

For the humorist:

Cold Comfort Farm by Stella Gibbons (Classics Deluxe Edition)

Candide by Francois Voltaire (Classics Deluxe Edition)

For the sentimentalist:

Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko (Classics Deluxe Edition)

Emma by Jane Austen

 

 

 

 

   
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