The Oxford Book of Adventure Stories - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0192142143 ISBN 13: 9780192142146

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1995

Synopsis

When we think of adventure we envision feats of derring-do, perilous journeys into the remote wilderness, swashbuckling deeds on the high seas, and survival in the face of impossible odds. Now, in a collection that challenges our very notion of adventure, Joseph Bristow brings together twenty-three riveting tales, penned by such masters as Rudyard Kipling, Robert Louis Stevenson, Bram Stoker, and Zane Gray, but with notable contributions from such unexpected sources as Margaret Atwood, Tim O'Brien, and Daphne Du Maurier.
Here readers will find bravery and boldness in settings that range from desert islands to the Java Sea, from war-torn Europe to deepest Africa, and from India to the Canadian wastes. Bristow offers many classic works of adventure, such as Edgar Allan Poe's MS Found in a Bottle, Mark Twain's The Private History of a Campaign that Failed, and Joseph Conrad's The Lagoon. Along side these, he also includes Margaret Atwood's offbeat Death by Landscape and Tim O'Brien's On the Rainy River (where the adventure lies in dodging the draft as opposed to going to war).
An exhilarating collection of classic and contemporary tales, The Oxford Book of Adventure Stories is sure to amuse, intrigue, captivate, and challenge every lover of fiction.

About this title

About the Author

Joseph Bristow is Senior Lecturer in English at the University of York. His previous books include Empire Boys: Adventure Stories in a Man's World.

From the Back Cover

'The love of adventure, and of mystery, and of a good fight lingers in the minds of men and women.' Thus wrote Andrew Lang in 1887, and the enduring popularity of a genre that was in its heyday at the turn of the century shows no sign of waning. This anthology brings together 23 of the best adventure stories from the zenith of empire to our present fragmented post-colonial world. Pitched against the unknown, against the forces of nature and against man's own treachery, the protaganists' courage and heroism are put to the test. In settings that range from desert islands to the Java Sea, from war-torn Europe to deepest Africa, and from India to the Canadian wastes, heroes battle not only for self-preservation but in defence of country and culture. As the old certainties faded with the loss of empire, so moral complexity and literary sophistication grew, and the very notion of 'adventure' is challenged in fine stories by Paul Bowles, Tim O'Brien, and Margaret Atwood. As well as being an exhilarating collection of classic tales by such masters as Rudyard Kipling, Jack London, John Buchan, and Zane Grey, and featuring the intrepid 'Biggles', The Oxford Book of Adventure Stories offers an historical survey of a literature that holds up a mirror to the modern age.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0192142143
• ISBN 13: 9780192142146
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 436
• Editor: Bristow Joseph