Books published by Faber & Faber

From the author of Life of Pi, comes an edgy, funny and devastating novel. Self is the fictional autobiography of a young writer at the heart of which is a startling twist. This extraordinary life meanders through a rich, complicated, bittersweet world. The discoveries of childhood give way to the thousand pangs of adolescence, culminating in the sudden shocking news of an accident abroad. And as adulthood begins, indecisively, boundaries are crossed between countries, languages and people . . .

The Vaughans are all set to enjoy Christmas. Thomas has been promoted and Nora is delighted. Everything at last seems to be going right, until a visitor arrives uninvited and causes them to question just how perfect their marriage is.Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House caused outrage both in its style and subject matter when first staged in 1879. Zinnie Harris's retelling is played against the backdrop of British politics at the turn of the last century - to revel a world where duty, power and hypocrisy rule.Zinnie Harris's version of A Doll's House premiered at the Donmar Warehouse, London, in May 2009.

Dear Friends, I may be a small classroom hamster, but even I'm amazed at how many unsqueakably exciting adventures I've had. I've had a spooky mystery to solve on Halloween, nighttime escapades at school and even gone to Winter Wonderland. I've had so many HO-HO-HO hilarious adventures I've put some more of them into this big book to share with you! Your friend, Humphrey

From the number one bestselling author of SAFE HOUSE comes a story about friendship, family, secrets, lies, and the things we do for love.When Claire Cooper was eight, her mother disappeared during Hop-tu-naa, the Manx Halloween. When Claire was eighteen, she and her friends took part in a Hop-tu-naa dare that went terribly wrong. Now in her early twenties and a police officer, what happened that Hop-tu-naa night has come back to haunt them all, and Claire must confront her deepest fears in order to stop a killer from striking again.For fans of Stephen King and Harlan Coben, this is I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER meets THE WICKER MAN from one of the country's new generation of thriller writers. 'Ewan has become a master storyteller.' Ann Cleeves'A rising star of the genre.' Simon Kernick

First published in 1939, On Russian Music was conceived by Gerald Abraham as a sequel to his earlier Studies in Russian Music (1935, also in Faber Finds), and complements the previous work in many useful respects. Glinka moves to the forefront via close study of both of his operas. A historical account of the composition of Borodin's Prince Igor enriches the critical study made in the first book. And chapters on Mlada and Tsar Saltan round out Abraham's appreciations of the major operas of Rimsky-Korsakov.There are also critical and historical essays on works by Mussorgsky, Dargom,zhsky, Tchaikovsky and other composers, and analyses that, in their time, threw new light on the programmatic meaning of such well-known compositions as Scheherazade and the Path,tique symphony. The book is superbly illustrated with music examples throughout.

Nicholas Wiseman was not yet 26 years of age when he became rector of the English College in Rome. Pope Leo XII then made him curator of Arabic manuscripts in the Vatican, and professor of Oriental languages at the Roman University. But in 1840 this brilliant scholar returned to England, where he did much to bridge the gap between the Oxford Movement and the English Catholic community.However in 1850 Wiseman found himself at the centre of a violent political storm when Pius IX named him first Archbishop of Westminster. Wiseman's coach was pelted with stones; the cry of 'Papal Aggression' was taken up in official circles; and it was only Wiseman's eloquent pamphlet Appeal to the English People which served to usher in a more tolerant attitude.Brian Fothergill's biography, first published in 1963, is a discerning study of the man who laid the foundations of the Catholic revival.

- Idea for a story. A beautiful young girl lives by a lake all her life. She loves this lake. She's happy and free, like that bird was once. Then a man comes along and for no reason at all... what do you think he does?- He destroys her.A story about how we make stories, a story about unrequited love, The Seagull is one of the great plays of the modern era. Chekhov explores emotion and creativity with the clarity of a doctor and the heart of a poet.John Donnelly's version of Anton Chekhov's The Seagull premiered in a Headlong and The Nuffield, Southampton co-production, in association with Derby Playhouse. The play opened in April 2013, followed by a UK tour.

'This is a book begun, but not finished. I could not finish it. Many times I have come close to destroying it, thinking I should have no rest while it remained to reproach me. I could not bring myself to do it. I have therefore given instructions that it should be sealed in a box, which is to remain unopened until I, my wife Laura, our sister Marion Halcombe, and all our children are dead.'So begins James Wilson's brilliant imaginative recreation of the Victorian sensation novel as the characters from Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White - Walter Hartright and Marion Halcombe - are involved in another dramatic and dangerous conspiracy. Walter is commissioned to write a biography of the greatest of English painters, JMW Turner, whose life was shrouded in mystery. His researches take him to the dark secret at the centre of Turner's work and involve him and Marion in confronting crimes and human degradation that threaten their sanity and their lives.The Dark Clue takes us into Victorian England in all its staggering extremes; of poverty and wealth, of slums and stately homes, of public morality and private vice in an unforgettable tale of suspense.

In the Oxford Companion to Children's Literature it says of James Reeves, 'His real achievement, however, lies in his poetry, which is generally regarded as the best British ''serious'' children's verse since Walter de la Mare - though the poems are usually far from serious in subject-matter.'In this complete edition, first published in 1973, the delight is two-fold as the poems are complemented by Edward Ardizzone's beautiful and witty illustrations.

Imogen Holst's Tune (Faber, 1962) is a searching enquiry into the invention of tune and at the same time a comprehensive anthology of tunes from folksong to the present day. Plainsong, street-cries, the songs of the English lutenists, Bach's dances, and Mozart's arias - whatever the origins and character of the tunes in question, Imogen Holst (daughter of the composer, Gustav Holst) has something fresh and revealing to say about them. And she does not confine herself to familiar ground. One of her most illuminating chapters is devoted to the music of India, where a raga can provide improvised 'tune' of several hours duration. This chapter is the result of her personal experience of studying music in India, and it is typical of her vivid approach to the subject. Her book is for everyone who likes to sing, play, whistle, hum or listen to a good tune.

It is difficult now to imagine the shock that this book caused when it was first published in 1932. The author was a teacher at a Cambridge college, an intensely serious man who had been seriously wounded by poison gas on the Western Front, and he was not disposed to suffer foolishness gladly. His opening sentences were arresting: 'Poetry matters little to the modern world. That is, very little of contemporary intelligence concerns itself with poetry'. What followed was nothing less than the welcoming of a revolution in English verse, set against the moral and social crisis that followed the trauma of the First World War. It was this situation, this feeling of breakdown and disorder, that gave such force to Leavis's dismissal of most late Romantic poetry and his welcoming of the modernists T. S. Eliot and Ezra Pound, and of the writer who Leavis regarded as their forebear, Gerard Manley Hopkins. The tone of high moral urgency, and the message that the experience of literature could become an engagement with life that was almost a secular equivalent to religion, seemed new and abrasively refreshing. Leavis despised the reigning dilettantism in both poetry and criticism, and in this book he threw down the gauntlet to the establishment as he understood it. In the same year he founded the journal Scrutiny, and began his long career as the most formidably serious literary critic of his time.

This is a sad, strange and touchingly heroic book. It tells of a mad, misguided adventure: one man's attempt to conquer Mount Everest. Maurice Wilson belonged to the 'lost generation'. He fought in the First World War, winning the Military Cross, but found the transition to civilian life difficult. He led a restless, rootless life and suffered ill-health. This changed mysteriously in 1932 when through, it would seem, a combination of prayer and fasting he cured himself. His Mount Everest ambitions started to take shape. They could not have been more ambitious. His odyssey was to begin in Britain. He bought himself an airplane. He couldn't fly, was a poor student, but finally learnt the rudiments. Despite all the odds, and much official obstruction, he managed to fly to India. More obstacles followed, but on 21 March, 1934 Maurice Wilson and three Sherpas slipped out of Darjeeling disguises as Buddhist monks. Wilson's first attempt on Mount Everest was solo. It failed. He tried again this time with the three Sherpas. They made better progress initially. From the base camp, Wilson made two more attempts on the final ascent. A year later Eric Shipton's reconnaissance party found his body at the approaches to the North Col. They also found his diary: the final entry read, 'Off again, gorgeous day.' The diary provides an astonishing record of persistence, courage, and a faith that never wavered in the face of appalling hardship and adversity.Although this is a chronicle of failure, the achievement can still be marvelled at. Here was a man with no flying or mountaineering experience whatsoever who managed to fly from Britain to India and then nearly conquers Mount Everest : there are even those who speculate he might have done so but even without that fanciful embellishment it is an extraordinary story.This book, first published in 1957, has been out of print for a very long time. Its renewed availability will delight not just those interested in mountaineering but also connoisseurs of adventure stories.

In a stunning memoir-cum-travelogue Peter Carey charts this journey, inspired by Charley's passion for Japanese Manga and anime, and explores his own resulting re-evaluation of Japan. Although graphically violent and disturbing, the two mediums are both inherently concerned with Japan's rich history and heritage, and hold a huge popular appeal that crosses the generations.Led by their adolescent guide Takashi, an uncanny mix of generosity and derision, father and son look for the hidden puzzles and meanings, searching, often with comic results, for a greater understanding of these art forms, and for what they come to refer to as their own 'real Japan'. From Manhattan to Tokyo, Commodore Perry to Godzilla, kabuki theatre to the post-war robot craze, Wrong about Japan is a fascinatingly personal, witty and moving exploration of two very different cultures.

It's easy to underestimate the eccentric, quietly spoken Inspector James Boswell Hodge Leonard, with his bicycle and his tweeds, and his superiors who make the mistake of doing so soon discover he's not too keen on toeing the Establishment line.When the grisly corpse of a traveller is found outside a Roman bath, Leonard's orders are to clear up the mess with no fuss, but he begins to kick over Bath's social dustbins and out tumbles decades of secrets and suspects, not smelling too sweetly...The rich and sadistic Montague James, controller of people's lives; Hilary, the former adult film star; Norma, the painter of controversial nudes; they all know more than they are revealing. Leonard's problem is to find the one person who knows the truth - before the rest do, and before the powers that be put the lids back on those dustbins...

First published in 1999, Secret Kingdom was the second panel in Francis Bennett's Cold War trilogy.'For all of us now the Cold War is history... What interested me as a writer was how we survived. What went on behind the scenes?... I went looking for my own fictional explanations for historical events... In Secret Kingdom, which takes place in Hungary in the dangerous summer months [of 1956] that led directly to the Revolution, I knew that the British ambassador's warnings of trouble building up had been ignored by the Foreign Office in London. Why? What were the consequences of such an extraordinary and irresponsible act?' Francis Bennett 'The Cold War here is not just a political but also a psychological landscape... In picking out a personal history from the greater tapestry unfolding in the background Bennett has produced a literary thriller of considerable merit.' The Times

This book is a narrative history of the Austrian Monarchy from 1790 to its break-up in 1918. Its theme is the hundred year struggle between the venerable dynastic empire which ruled Central Europe, and the new national, political and social forces in conflict with it, an with one another. The author starts with the death of Emperor Joseph 11 in 1790, the event which he takes as marking the turn of the tide in the struggle between autocracy and centralisation on the one side, and the new forces on the other; but he prefixes his narrative with a brief account of Joseph's own reign, and with a comprehensive picture of the old monarchy on the threshold of the new age. C. A. Macartney takes his subject as comprising the monarchy as a whole, every people, class and province in it. He thus brings and makes intelligible the diversity within the unity, and the unity synthesising the diversity, which give the history of the Austrian Monarchy its special and unique character. The author was long acquainted with the countries and peoples that were once part of the Habsburg Empire and it was this experience, combined with linguistic accomplishments that enabled him to draw on an exceptionally wide range of sources. The result is a work of monumental scholarship written with unique insight and understanding.

'The best book on football ever written.' Franz Beckenbauer, winner of the World Cup as both player and manager.In Football Memories, Brian Glanville himself writes, 'The central character, Garry, was a Scottish inside-forward based on Danny Blanchflower. This, largely because the footballer had to be untypically intelligent and aware, as well as an accomplished performer. Danny, so fluent, so original, and in certain ways so flawed, seemed an ideal model. Yet he, or his surrogate, could not carry the whole book. I used various voices. His wife's. My own.'Ever since J. B. Priestley's pre-publication endorsement - 'I enjoyed this highly original novel' - praise has been constant:'This is a brilliant novel. Any footballer can see a little of himself in Gerry Logan, as I did when I first read it. The book tells what the pressures are like in the game, the temptations to which successful players are exposed and yet the human qualities tell us much about society and human nature in general.' Derek Dougan'The best novel on soccer I have ever read.' Daily Herald'Soars into first-class fiction.' The Spectator'An acid fable of our age, solid with expertise about football and its seamier secrets.' Daily Mail 'The whole world of big time soccer, with its glamour and bitter feuds, made very real.' Sunday Telegraph

To Horace Walpole's house at Strawberry Hill, in Twickenham, came a remarkable assortment of poets and writers, artists and antiquaries, politicians and society figures. Among them were Thomas Gray, whose great 'Elegy' might never have been published without Walpole's encouragement; that 'laughter-loving dame' Kitty Clive, the greatest comic actress of her day; Lady Suffolk who entertained Walpole with stories of the days when she was George II's mistress; the epicene John Chute, whose architectural knowledge and enthusiasm helped to inspire Strawberry Hill; the gentle Berry sisters, who comforted Walpole's old age; George Selwyn, celebrated for his wit, languor, and necrophilia. 'If Mr Selwyn calls', said Mr Fox on his death-bed, 'show him up. If I'm still alive I'll be glad to see him and if I'm dead he'll be glad to see me.' The most fascinating member of this circle was Horace Walpole himself. Son of Sir Robert, Member of Parliament for many years, author of the first Gothic romance, The Castle of Otranto, passionate collector, influential amateur of architecture and, above all, prince of English letter-writers, he emerges gradually but clearly through the eyes of his friends. Brian Fothergill, always an accomplished biographer, perhaps found his most congenial subject in this book: the result is a work as entertaining as it is informative.

A compassionate portrait of an elderly - and frustrated - woman adjusting to new town life and finding a new purpose in living.Illness forces Sylvia Calvert to live with her son Harold, a headmaster in Carshall New Town. At first, Sylvia cannot adjust to the jungle of supermarkets, 10-pin bowling alleys and recreation areas; to the committees and purposeful entertaining involved in the creation of a new society.Above all, Sylvia can't understand Harold's odd, thrusting idealism and the strange behaviour of her grandchildren.But a chance meeting and a family crisis give her the chance to fulfil herself ...

In one of his Independent pieces Miles Kington once referred to a volume of Edward Lear's limericks translated into French. Not an easy task, you might think, and in translating Alphonse Allais into English, Miles Kington set himself a similar challenge. He carried it off with panache. As Max Harrison said in The Times, '... has done a difficult job well, even preserving some of Allais's puns'.Alphonse Allais has been described as the greatest humorous writer ever. In the words of Lisa Appignanesi, 'Allais was a consummate absurdist. From an ordinary phenomenon, simple sentiment or situation, he would logically deduce the looniest, most macabre and most unexpected result ... His humour kept all Paris, high and low, waiting breathlessly for the paper which would carry his next tale ...'On first publication, in 1976, Clive James in the Observer said 'Allais has been dead 70 years but his mocking tone ensures him a permanently relevant after-life'. And John Sturrock in the New Statesman, 'Allais stands, along with Jarry, at the head of the most dazzling and highly educated tradition of French humour, as witty as it is whimsical'. Faber Finds offers this rare book as a tribute not only to Alphonse Allais but also Miles Kington, two great humorists in tandem.

The Wind in the Willows needs no introduction - children have enjoyed the exploits of its characters for generations. Few would guess that its author, Kenneth Grahame, was a tortured soul. Marriage to the predatory Elspeth Thomson, when both seemed destined for the single life, was a shared fantasy of invented truth. Out of that union came a catastrophically spoiled son, 'Mouse', for whom that greatest of children's stories was written. It was the child's tragedy that he was sucked into the unreality of his parents' lives and did not survive it, ending his life in suicide.Alison Prince brings her own highly acclaimed expertise as a children's writer to this remarkably perceptive biography of Kenneth Grahame. Drawing on hitherto unpublished material she uncovers layer upon layer of Grahame's personality to reveal the truth behind the myth of this intriguing man, 'the tortured soul of Mr Toad'.'Alison Prince describes the grim story of Grahame's marriage and fatherhood squarely and sensitively.' Independent'A meaty, well-constructed biography.' Allan Massie Daily Telegraph

Does the habit of taking drugs make authors write better, or worse, or differently? Does it alter the quality of their consciousness, shape their imagery, influence their technique? For the Romantic writers of the nineteenth century, many of whom experimented with opium and some of whom were addicted to it, this was an important question, but it has never been fully answered. In this study Alethea Hayter examines the work of five writers - Crabbe, Coleridge, De Quincey, Wilkie Collins and Francis Thompson - who were opium addicts for many years, and of several other writers - notably Keats, Edgar Allan Poe and Baudelaire, but also Walter Scott, Dickens, Mrs Browning, James Thomson and others - who are known to have taken opium at times. The work of these writers is discussed in the context of nineteenth-century opinion about the uses and dangers of opium, and of Romantic ideas on the creative imagination, on dreams and hypnagogic visions, and on imagery, so that the idiosyncrasies of opium-influenced writing can be isolated from their general literary background. The examination reveals a strange and miserable region of the mind in which some of the greatest poetic imaginations of the nineteenth century were imprisoned.

First published by Faber & Faber in 1940, A Crook in the Furrow was described by the Manchester Evening News as 'like no other detective story. Mr Street's plots and stratagems, his devices are well up to the most exacting professional standards. As a background for it there is Mr Street's great love and knowledge of the English countryside'. Detective Inspector 'Coincidence' Charles Jenks has been investigating a hunch that Dr Larne of 223 Harley Street has been committing crimes. What these crimes are, however, he isn't sure, but Dr Larne's name has occurred too frequently in reference accounts of suspicious circumstances for 'Coincidence' Charles to think that he is perfectly innocent. As ever, 'Coincidence' Charles is right. Dr Larne has been supplying drugs using his Harley Street practice and two unknown accomplices, Peggy and Frank Young. Believing that 'Coincidence' Charles is onto their scheme, Larne persuades the couple to move to the country and set up as 'honest' farmers in order to continue their growing business away from the prying eyes of 'Coincidence' Charles. Can Charles discover what is really going on, or will the country straighten them out? After all, 'Wiltshire won't have crooks in her furrows'.

Ahoy, maties!I've had my share of adventures as the beloved pet hamster of Room 26. But when I heard about the sailing competition on Potter's Pond, I longed for a BIG-BIG-BIGGER adventure of my own. Believe me, I got it ...but it wasn't all smooth sailing. I helped out my classmates Gail, Richie and Kirk, took an unsqueakably dangerous (but thrilling) voyage of my own, and even came face-to-face with a pirate! To top it all off, I just had to tell you about all the extra adventures that happened along the way: I got to know even more of my friends from Longfellow School, and faced a BIG-BIG-BIGGER surprise than ever!Would I do it again? Aye-aye, you bet I would! It's all in a day's work for me!Your extra-adventurous pal,Humphrey

The East End as an idea is known to every Londoner, and to many others, though its boundaries are vague. Alan Palmer's historical overview of the area (first published in 1989 and revised in 2000) takes its extent to be the traditional limits of Hackney and Tower Hamlets, Hoxton and Shoreditch, the docklands and their overflow into West Ham and East Ham. And at the heart of the East End lies Spitalfields, home to a transient, often radical and hard-working population. Though it is often seen as London's centre of industry and poverty, in comparison to the well-to-do West End, the East End has always been a diverse place: in the seventeenth century, Hackney was a pleasant country retreat; Stepney and the docklands a bustling world of sailors and merchants. The book traces the development of the area from these roots, through the nineteenth century - when the East End became notorious as the home of radicals, exiled revolutionaries and the very poor, its crowded streets the scene of murder, riot and cholera -to the bombing of the first and second world war; and the subsequent decline and regeneration of the twentieth century.

As Alan Palmer himself writes in his preface, 'Alexander 1, ruler of Russia for the first quarter of the nineteenth century, is remembered today mainly on three counts: as the Tsar who refused to make peace with the French when Moscow fell in 1812; as the idealist who sought to bind Europe's sovereigns in a Holy Alliance in 1815; and as the Emperor who died - or gave the impression of having died - at the remote southern seaport of Taganrog in the winter of 1825. Recent interest has concentrated , perhaps excessively, on the third of these dramatic episodes akthough it is natural that the epic years of the struggle with Napoleon should continue to excite the historical imagination.'He has been dubbed 'The Enigmatic Tsar'. There are many contrasting opinions of him. Thomas Jefferson declared 'A more virtuous man, I believe, does no exist, nor one who is more enthusiastically devoted to better the condition of mankind. Castlereagh thought well of him, too, but both Metternich and Napoleon considered him inconsistent and untrustworthy. And Pushkin famously described him as 'a Sphinx who carried his riddle with him to the tomb.' an assessment even more piquant if it is true, as some maintain, his tomb in empty.With his customary blend of meticulous scholarship and agreeable writing, Alan Palmer provides the most balanced and engaging portrait imaginable.'A pleasure to read and unlikely to be replaced for many years' Philip Ziegler, The Times'Excellent . . . a major biographical achievement, a notable contribution to our understanding of this still enigmatic monarch' Robert Blake, Spectator

In the author's own words this is a book about 'chaps and maps'. More formally. The Chancelleries of Europe is a study of traditional diplomacy at its peak of influence in the nineteenth-century and the first years of the twentieth. At the Congress of Vienna in 1814-15 the five Great Powers - Austria, Britain, France, Prussia and Russia - established a system of international intercourse that safeguarded the world from major war for exactly a hundred years. The successive crises that challenged this supranational system - the unification of Italy and Germany, the scramble for colonies in Africa, and for trade concessions in Asia, the decline of the Ottoman Empire and the emergence of Japan - are well-known. Less attention has been given to the way the system functioned and to changes imposed on its character by the spread of speedier communications. It is these gaps in our understanding of the international politics of the century that the author seeks to fill.The book therefore studies the clashes of personality between crowned heads of the old empires and between rival statesmen and ambassadors seeking advancement. It compares the growth of personnel and specialist departments in the various foreign ministries, assesses the impact of domestic politics on external affairs, the power of the pressure groups like the (British) China Association and the (Russian) Far Eastern Committee, the proto-spin fed to favoured newspapers and, in contrast, the growing unease of press and public at 'hidden' negotiations and the concealment of diplomatic expedients and alliances. But the book also notes changes in the way diplomacy was conducted in the wake of technological inventions such as the semaphore towers of the early years and the electric telegraph and undersea cables of the second half of the century. Moments of high drama, skullduggery and bathos prove that the reading of diplomatic history is not the dull, dreary drudge many abhorred in their schooldays.

Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jane Smiley draws upon her first-hand knowledge to examine the horse on all levels - practical, theoretical and emotional. Drawing on the wisdom of trainers, vets, jockeys and a real-life horse whisperer, Smiley adds an element of drama and suspense as two of her own horses begin their careers at the racetrack. As the horses get closer to the winner's circle, we are enchanted, enthralled and informed about what it's really like to own, train and root for a racehorse.

Malcolm Lowry was the troubled author of Under the Volcano (1947), a brilliant novel about the last day of an alcoholic former British consul on the Mexican Day of the Dead, the manuscript of which Lowry rescued from the flames when his fisherman's shack burned down in 1944. Lowry's other books were not always so lucky: his first novel, Ultramarine (1930), was stolen after four years' composition and resurrected from a carbon copy; another manuscript, In Ballast to the White Sea, was destroyed in the 1944 fire. An early draft of In Ballast was discovered this century and published in 2014. Lowry's life, like his work, was often lost to chaos; Gordon Bowker's 1994 biography is a masterful account of a life spent adrift.

First published in English in 1980, this important early memoir of Gustav Mahler is by Natalie Bauer-Lechner (1858-1921), a viola player and close and devoted friend of Mahler until his marriage to Alma Schindler in 1902. She visited him in Hamburg and frequented his circle in Vienna, also accompanying him and his family on a number of the summer vacations during which the Second, Third and Fourth Symphonies came into being, together with many of the Wunderhorn songs. Compiled from Bauer-Lechner's private journal, these Recollections are a vital, invaluable record of Mahler's personal, professional and creative life during the last decade of the nineteenth century. A large part of the book recounts, at first hand, conversations with Mahler concerning his works and his ideas about performance (both in the opera-house and on the concert platform.)