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Originally published in 1873, The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today is the only novel Twain co-wrote (C.D. Warner was a good friend and neighbor of the Clemens family in Hartford, and the collaboration sprang from their wive's challenge and encouragement). The title, The Gilded Age became synonymous with graft, materialism and corruption in public life, which are well represented in this work. Like others of his works, this one reflects truths about American Society that remain pertinent today. Many of the characters and incidents that occur in the Gilded Age had their real-life origins in Clemens relatives and history, a fact which he revealed in his newly published (2011) Autobiography. (Introduction by John Greenman & Wikipedia)...

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Fiction, Politics, Satire

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A dystopian novel about the terrible oppressions of an American oligarchy at the beginning of the Twentieth Century, and the struggles of a socialist revolutionary movement. (Introduction by Matt Soar)...

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Fiction, Politics, Science fiction

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Frank Norris based his 1901 novel The Octopus (A Story of California) on the Mussel Slough Tragedy of 1880, a bloody conflict between ranchers and agents of the Southern Pacific Railroad. The central issue was over the ownership of the ranches, which the farmers had leased from the railroad nearly ten years earlier with intentions of eventually purchasing the land. Although originally priced at $2.50 to $5 per acre, the railroad eventually opened the land for sale at prices adjusted for land improvements; the railroad’s attempts to take possession of the land led the ranchers to defend themselves as depicted in the book. (Summary by Wikipedia and Delmar H. Dolbier)...

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Fiction, Politics

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The Short Line War is a story that will appeal more particularly to the sterner sex, and we take it that the hyphenated name, Merwin-Webster, stands for two healthy-minded young men who have put their heads together and who have mapped out this story of a railroad war, in which politics form a considerable part. Jim Weeks is the central figure in the fight, and we like him so much better for knowing of the romance in his early life. He was a man 'without much instinct or imagination; he took everything seriously and literally, he could not understand a whim'--therefore a very foolish little woman came into his life only to leave it desolate. And when we meet him again after the years have rounded him, and when he stands 'before the world a man of solid achievement, calm, successful, satisfied,' we are quite prepared for the kind and tender things he does for the son of the woman he once loved. The Short Line War is not essentially a love story, which fact led us at the start to say that its healthy, vigorous style, with its politics and its railroads, will lead many a masculine novel reader to find enjoyment in its pages. -- Bookman...

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Fiction, Politics, Economics/Political Economy

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Not until after his death in 1918 was it revealed that Henry Adams was the anonymous author of Democracy, which had been published to great acclaim in 1880. Though the book avoids dates and the characters are fictitious, the setting is no doubt that of Washington in the 1870s, the age of Presidents Grant and Hayes. The young widow, Madeleine Lee, wealthy and independent, is the protagonist, who leaves her New York for Washington to turn her intelligence to politics and to see what makes her country tick. There she meets (among others) Senator Silas P. Ratcliffe of Illinois, one of the most powerful and influential (if somewhat uncultured) men of the capital, who is considering a run for the presidency, and who needs a wife to act as First Lady, a position that (he thinks) Mrs. Lee would admirably fill. Through the book Adams plays with the themes of political necessity, compromise, corruption -- particularly the kind of corporate domination of national politics that he saw becoming all too powerful. Should honest and intelligent men keep their integrity by avoiding politics? Or would that simply mean turning over the governance of t...

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Politics, Fiction

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Philip Dru: Administrator: a Story of Tomorrow, 1920-1935 is a futuristic political novel published anonymously in 1912 by Edward Mandell House, an American diplomat, politician and presidential foreign policy advisor. His book's hero leads the democratic western U.S. in a civil war against the plutocratic East, and becomes the dictator of America. Dru as dictator imposes a series of reforms that resemble the Bull Moose platform of 1912 and then vanishes....

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Fiction, Politics

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This book is all about the fictional country called Utopia. It is a country with an ‘ideal’ form of communism, in which everything really does belong to everybody, everyone does the work they want to, and everyone is alright with that. This country uses gold for chamber pots and prison chains, pearls and diamonds for children’s playthings, and requires that a man and a woman see each other exactly as they are, naked, before getting married. This book gave the word 'utopia' the meaning of a perfect society, while the Greek word actually means ‘no place’. Enjoy listening to this story about a country that really is too good to be true. (Summary by Jenilee.)...

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Philosophy, Politics

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H. G. Wells's proposal for social reform was the formation of a world state, a concept that would increasingly preoccupy him throughout the remainder of his life. One of his most ambitious early attempts at portraying a world state was A Modern Utopia (1905). A Modern Utopia was intended as a hybrid between fiction and 'philosophical discussion'. Like most utopists, he has indicated a series of modifications which in his opinion would increase the aggregate of human happiness. Basically, Wells' idea of a perfect world would be if everyone were able to live a happy life. This book is written with an intimate knowledge of former ideal commonwealths and is a conscious attempt to describe a utopia that is not utopian....

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Politics, Economics/Political Economy, Fiction

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The Prime Minister is the fifth in Trollope's series of six Palliser novels. With Phineas' difficulties resolved, Trollope introduces new characters. A respectable young girl forsakes the man her family had always intended her to marry when she falls in love with a man of foreign extraction and an unknown family. He has a gentleman's education and manners, but his family background and financial means are mysterious. Is he really a gentleman? Meanwhile, Plantagenet Palliser becomes Prime Minister of a shaky coalition government, and Glencora and Madame Goessler are busy with the ensuing social obligations. (Summary by Karen Merline)...

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Historical Fiction, Politics, Romance

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Ann Veronica was a controversial book detailing the development of a naive school girl into a New Woman. When it was published, the Spectator described it as a poisonous book ... capable of poisoning the minds of those who read it. Although it is unlikely to offend modern listeners in this way, this novel addresses many feminist issues that are still relevant today. (Summary by Joy Chan)...

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Romance, Politics

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Believing as I do that James Thomson is, since Shelley, the most brilliant genius who has wielded a pen in the service of Freethought, I take a natural pride and pleasure in rescuing the following articles from burial in the great mausoleum of the periodical press. There will doubtless be a diversity of opinion as to their value. One critic, for instance, has called “The Story of a Famous Old Jewish Firm” a witless squib; but, on the other hand, the late Professor Clifford considered it a piece of exquisite mordant satire worthy of Swift. Such differences are inevitable from the very nature of the subject. Satire, more than any other form of composition, rouses antipathy where it does not command applause; and the greater the satire, the more intense are the feelings it excites. (G. W. Foote in his Preface)...

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Humor, Politics, Satire, Short stories

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John Henry Mackays Buch „Die Anarchisten“ ist überwiegend biographisch gefärbt und basiert auf eigenen Erlebnissen. Anhand zweier Charaktere mit unterschiedlichen philosophischen Grundsätzen, wobei einer der beiden sein Alter Ego darstellt, illustriert er das Wesen sowohl des individualistischen Anarchismus‘ als auch des Kommunismus‘ seiner Zeit. Auban, Mackays Alter Ego, wird nicht nur mit den Widrigkeiten in einer Bewegung, die sich zwar anarchistisch nennt, aber mit seinen individualistischen Grundsätzen nicht konform geht, sondern auch mit der zunehmenden Entfremdung seines Freundes Trupp gegenüber, der ein glühender Anhänger der kommunistischen Arbeiterbewegung ist, konfrontiert. Obschon ein philosophisches Buch, liest sich „Die Anarchisten“ stellenweise wie ein Roman, was nicht nur der konfliktreichen Situation, sondern auch der sprachlichen Fähigkeiten Mackays geschuldet ist. Ferner hatte dieses Werk einen nicht zu verachtenden Einfluß auf die europäische Arbeiterbewegung, der bis dato Mackays Gedanken, die überwiegend der individualanarchistischen Bewegung in Amerika entsprangen, ausgesprochen fremd war. So wurde das Buch na...

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Politics, Literature

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Noli Me Tangere (Latin for Touch Me Not) is a novel by the National Hero of the Philippines, Dr. José Rizal. It was originally written in Spanish, and first published in Germany in 1887. Noli Me Tangere exposed the corruption and abuse of the Spanish government and clergy towards the Philippine people and the ills of the Philippine society. This novel, and its sequel El Filibusterismo were banned in many parts of the Islands. Rizal was later arrested for inciting rebellion, based largely on his writings, and was excuted in Manila. Noli Me Tangere, and the execution of Rizal, indirectly influenced the Philippine revolution from Spain. Today, Noli Me Tangere is required reading in all Philippine Schools. (Summary by JoeD)...

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Literature, Politics

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The Home and the World is a Bengali novel by Rabindranath Tagore, set during India's struggle for independence. It is a story of the beautiful Bimala who is married to Nikhil and who gets attracted to Nikhil's friend Sandip due to his strikingly zealous nature that is in stark contrast to the peace-loving character of Nikhil. (Summary by Accent)...

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Romance, Politics, Historical Fiction