Rousseau's Discourse sets out to explore the origin of inequality among people, a journey that sees him trace the evolution of humans from the savage man to the foundations of civil society. With verve and passion, the philosopher argues that the birth of private property was the 'beginning of evil'. Throughout the book we are lead to consider the development of language, reason, self-preservation, benevolence, pity and law - all through the lens of perhaps the most original thinker of the 18th c. Neville Jason trained at RADA, where he was awarded the diction prize by Sir John Gielgud. He has been a member of the BBC Radio Drama Company three times, and may be heard in radio plays, documentaries and arts programs. For Naxos AudioBooks his readings include War and Peace, The Once and Future King, Evgenii Onegin and Remembrance of Things Past, both unabridged and abridged.

The Story of My Life is the explosive and exhilarating autobiography by the infamous libertine Giacomo Casanova. Intense and scandalous, Casanova's extraordinary adventures take the listener on an incredible voyage across 18th-century Europe - from France to Russia, Poland to Spain and Turkey to Germany, with Venice at their heart. He falls madly in love, has wild flings and delirious orgies, and encounters some of the most brilliant figures of his time, including Catherine the Great, Louis XV and Benjamin Franklin. He holds a verbal duel with Voltaire, a pistol duel with a Polish noble, and finds himself hauled before the court multiple times, including in London, where the judge in question turns out to be none other than Henry Fielding. His appetite for life is voracious; for him, a life lived close to the precipice is the only life worth living. The book is divided into six sections. Volume 2 contains the third and fourth sections: '3: The Eternal Quest' and '4: Adventures in the South'.

Oliver Twist (Unabridged)

The Scarlet Letter is one of the great classics of American literature. One of the first, and most popular stories from 19th-century American literature, the book has been the subject of numerous film, television, and stage adaptations and is commonly found on school and university syllabi across the world. Set in the harsh Puritan environment of 17th-century Boston, it describes the plight of Hester Prynne, an independent-minded woman who stands alone against society. Having given birth to a child after an illicit affair, she refuses to name the father and is forced to wear the letter 'A' for Adulteress, embroidered on her dress. Adam Sims, experienced in radio, television and theatre performances, captures the elegance of Hawthorne's rich and lyrical language.

In The Aspern Papers, a cold and ruthless literary biographer travels to Venice on the trail of personal letters belonging to the deceased American poet Jeffrey Aspern. His journey takes him to a dilapidated, rambling house belonging to an elderly woman, named Juliana Bordereau, and her lonely niece, Miss Tina. Just how far will he go to get what he wants? Will morality confront his personal ambition and literary curiosity?

Underneath the patina of civilized society lies the Sadean demimonde: a bundle of lustful appetites fueled by momentary impulse and a desire for unfettered indulgence. And the target of this savagery: Justine de Bertole, a pious and virginal heroine. While her amoral sister Juliette gets all the wonders in the world, virtuous and faithful Justine is subjected to punishment after punishment at the hands of sadistic and abusive deviants. Grotesque, inhumane and compelling, Sade's novel overturns Rousseau's views of the social contract, and the common trope that punishment only visits sinners, to deliver a passionate treatise on good and evil, virtue and sin. Justine is infamous for it's controversial content and themes. There continues to be much fascination with Sade among scholars and writers, and many film adaptations have been made of his work, including Pasolini's 1975 film 'Salo.' This is the first unabridged recording. John Phillips' accessible new translation has been exclusively licensed to Naxos AudioBooks by Oxford University Press.

Set in the court of Urbino in 1507, Castiglione's The Book of the Courtier presents an invaluable look at court life and culture during the Renaissance. Over four nights of dialogue, the book explores the key question, 'What should a courtier be like?' and presents a deep and timeless discussion that is reminiscent of Plato's Symposium and Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, and invites comparisons with Machiavelli's The Prince. It is absorbing and enlightening, and encompasses a wide range of topics that include dancing, fencing, war, religion, culture, courtly and corporeal love and gender relations, with a surprisingly modern defense of women and equal rights. Nicholas Boulton is an exemplary narrator. He leads us through Castiglione's fascinating courtesy book with great fluency.

For a period of seven years, Wilfred Thesiger canoed through the marshes at the confluence of Iraq's Tigris and Euphrates rivers, living among the native Madan tribes and their islands made of reeds. Now extinct, their ancient way of life is speculated to have existed for 5,000 years, going back to the days of ancient Sumer, and possessed a unique culture found nowhere else in the Middle East. Thesiger documents the tribes' conflicts, traditions, cuisine, relationships, justice systems and art, and reveals how they built their unique water-borne society, with it's beautiful canoes (taradas) and stately guest houses (mudhifs) - it is a remarkable familiarity gained through Thesiger's innate understanding of tribal ritual and etiquette, and the trust he earned through the use of a basic medical supply kit that he brought along with him. Poetic and immersing, The Marsh Arabs brings alive the sights, sounds and smells of the marshes, and a culture that has now vanished forever.

The Letters of Abelard and Heloise is one of the most extraordinary correspondences in European history. Written in the 12th century, the letters document the love affair between Peter Abelard, a revolutionary philosopher and biblical scholar, and his beautiful and precocious student, Heloise. Eviscerated by his religious opponents and castrated by Heloise's family, Abelard is haunted by ill fortune, and the star-crossed lovers are forced into separate lives, as monk and nun respectively, with letters being their only form of communication. What unfolds is tragic and heartbreaking, but also fascinating. The letters gave rise to compelling philosophical, theological and sociological discussions, and they provide a window into the medieval mind as the everyday lives of the two lovers are laid bare through their passionate discourse.

Nana Coupeau is a beautiful woman, able to attract men of enormous wealth with the crook of her finger. Part-time prostitute, part-time actress, she makes her debut in a mediocre operetta The Blonde Venus at the bustling Paris World's Fair of 1867. She can't sing, act or dance, yet she is stunning. Nana soon rockets through elite Parisian society, and, blinded by desire, men crawl to her feet, yielding to her every demand. Affections are manipulated, hearts are broken; fortunes are gutted and inheritances squandered. The poverty and violence of Nana's upbringing have led her to a cold and profligate life - a metaphoric indictment of the excesses of France's Second Empire, and a striking example of Zola's Naturalism.

Intended to be a defense of the Christian religion, Pensees is a penetrating collection of thoughts on faith, reason, and theology. Unfinished at the time of Pascal's death, the book consists of philosophical fragments on the 'wretchedness' of man and the controversial schisms of the church at the time. It includes the philosopher's infamous wager encouraging belief over agnosticism, as well as his thoughts on numerous other topics, including the great essayist Montaigne and the Stoic teacher Epictetus. Endlessly quotable, Pensees overflows with pearls of wisdom, with each elusive sentence pregnant with a universe of thought. Peter Wickham's elegant and personable reading makes Pascal's work immediately approachable and accessible.

Assembled from notes and jottings left unpublished at the time of the author's death, The Book of Disquiet is a collection of aphoristic prose-poetry musings on dreams, solitude, time and memory. Credited to Pessoa's alter ego, Bernardo Soares, who chronicles his contemplations in this so-called 'factless' autobiography, the work is a journey of one man's soul and, by extension, of all human souls that allow their minds and hearts to roam far and free. Though his outward life as an assistant bookkeeper in downtown Lisbon is a humdrum affair, Soares lives a rich and varied existence within the contours of his own mind, where he can be and do anything. Soares has no ambition, nor has he any friends; he is plagued with disquiet, and only imagination and dreams can conquer it. Compiled by the translator Richard Zenith, Fernando Pessoa's The Book of Disquiet is a fulgent tribute to the imagination of man.

Phineas Finn, a handsome young man of 23, comes to England to make his fortune in parliamentary politics. But despite all his aspirations, Finn is haunted by ethical questions as his personal convictions conflict with his duty towards his party. Loyalty versus honour, love versus money, and privacy versus prominence: our eponymous hero faces a variety of dilemmas as he navigates his way through the House of Commons. The second installment of Trollope’s celebrated Palliser series, Phineas Finn is a delightful and humorous look at the complexity of human relationships and the politics surrounding the Second Reform Bill of the 1860s.

A milestone in the history of the novel, Samuel Richardson's epistolary and elaborate Clarissa follows the life of a chaste young woman desperate to protect her virtue. When beautiful Clarissa Harlowe is forced to marry the rich but repulsive Mr. Solmes, she refuses, much to her family's chagrin. She escapes their persecution with the help of Mr. Lovelace, a dashing and seductive rake, but soon finds herself in a far worse dilemma. Lovelace is a devil in disguise: he promptly imprisons Clarissa, and is determined to break her will. Terrifying and enlightening, Clarissa weaves a tapestry of narrative experimentation into a gripping morality tale of good triumphing over evil. The recording is divided into three volumes, the present release being the first. Clarissa is one of the longest novels in the English canon; many critics agree that it is one of the greatest and most influential in English. For this first ever unabridged recording, a carefully selected cast of readers bring to life Richardson's intricate narrative.

Thomas Hardy’s first published novel, Desperate Remedies is a thrilling blend of Gothic mystery and love-triangle romance. After the untimely death of their parents, Cytheria and Owen Graye must go out into the world and fend for themselves. Cytheria’s journey leads her to the dark and mysterious household of Miss Aldclyffe, a capricious and eccentric woman, who steers Cytheria into a love affair with her charismatic steward Aeneous Manston. All is not what it seems, and Cytheria finds herself entangled in a violent web of lust, murder, deception and blackmail. With its beautiful and evocative scenes, along with themes of fate and class, the novel contains many traces of Hardy’s signature style, and is a unique take on the Victorian ‘sensation’ novel.