Tom's Learning Notes

Robinson Crusoe is a 1719 novel by Daniel Defoe. Like several of Defoe's works, it purported to be a genuine autobiography, in this case that of an English seaman, shipwrecked for many years on a desert island off the coast of South America, who nevertheless manages to maintain a civilised existence with the help of a native servant, Friday.

The novel proved immediately and enduringly popular, inspiring a genre of castaway stories, sometimes known as Robinsonades. Modern critics have often interpreted Crusoe as representing an emergent economic individualism. 

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Free online texts
Gutenberg: The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT format.
Internet Archive: Robinson Crusoe. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXT formats.
University of Adelaide: The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Robinson Crusoe. HTML and other formats.

The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders is a 1722 novel by Daniel Defoe.

The eponymous heroine recounts a picaresque life story that was presented as a genuine autobiography on first publication. The title page records that Flanders was 'born in Newgate, and during a life of continu'd variety for threescore years, besides her childhood, was twelve years a whore, five times a wife (whereof once to her own brother) twelve years a thief, eight years a transported felon in Virginia, at last grew rich, liv'd honest, and died a penitent.'

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Gutenberg: The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT format.
Internet Archive: Moll Flanders. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXT formats.
University of Adelaide: The Fortunes & Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Moll Flanders. HTML and other formats.

Clarissa, or The History of a Young Lady, is a 1748 novel by Samuel Richardson. Composed as a series of letters, it portrays the young heroine's attempt to maintain her virtue and independence in the face of a domineering family, and of the villainous attentions of the libertine Robert Lovelace.

Clarissa at online book stores
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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Clarissa - Preface, Hints of Prefaces, and Postscript | Vol. 1 | Vol. 2 | Vol. 3 | Vol. 4 | Vol. 5 | Vol. 6 | Vol. 7 | Vol. 8 | Vol. 9. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT format. 

Internet Archive: Clarissa Harlowe, from the Complete Novels of Samuel Richardson: Vol. I | Vol. II | Vol. III | Vol. IV | Vol. V | Vol. VI | Vol. VII | Vol VIII. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXT formats.

University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): Clarissa Harlowe. EPUB, HTML and MOBI format.

Other Resources

The Guardian: The 100 best novels - No 4 – Clarissa by Samuel Richardson (1748), by Robert McCrum, 14 October 2013.

Librivox: Clarissa Harlowe, or the History of a Young Lady by Samuel Richardson, in 9 Volumes. Public domain audiobook.

Wikipedia: Samuel Richardson - Clarissa

The Great Conversation: Further reading at Tom's Learning Notes

Samuel Richardson: Pamela.

Rousseau: Julie, ou la Nouvelle Heloise

Bloom's Western Canon: Clarissa is listed.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood is the last novel by Charles Dickens, left unfinished at his death in 1870, after six of a planned twelve parts had been published in serialization.

The story is set in Cloisterham, a thinly-veiled version of the Kent cathedral town of Rochester, the setting for a murder to which the title refers. A number of adaptations have attempted to provide a resolution to the story.

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Free online texts
Gutenberg: The Mystery of Edwin Drood. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT formats.  
Internet Archive: The Mystery of Edwin Drood, with an introduction by Cecil Day-Lewis and an essay by Edmund Wilson. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXT formatsd.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): The Mystery of Edwin Drood. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: The Mystery of Edwin Drood. HTML and other formats.

Our Mutual Friend is Charles Dickens' last completed novel, originally serialized in 1864-5.  It's complex plot centres on a legacy left to John Harmon, on condition that he marry Bella Wilfer, a woman, he has never met.

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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Our Mutual Friend. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT formats. 
Internet Archive: Our Mutual Friend, with introduction by G.K. Chesterton.. EPUB, MOBI, TXT and PDf formats.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): Our Mutual Friend. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Our Mutual Friend. HTML and other formats.

Little Dorrit is a novel by Charles Dickens, originally serialized from 1855 to 1857. The title character, Amy Dorrit, begins the novel in Marshalsea Prison where her father is held as a debtor, as Dickens' own father had been in the 1820s. 

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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Little Dorrit. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT formats.  
Internet Archive: Little Dorrit. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXT formats.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): Little Dorrit. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Little Dorrit. HTML and other formats.

Martin Chuzzlewit is a novel by Charles Dickens, originally serialized from 1842 to 1844. In outline the plot is typically Dickensian, with a young protagonist's progress in the face of miserly and hypocritical villains, though in practice, Mr Pecksniff is one of the best-realised of the latter. Poor sales prompted a diversion of the story, introducing Martin's attempt to settle in America. The satirical portrayal of the United States, based on Dickens' 1842 visit, embroiled Dickens in a notorious transatlantic literary spat.

Martin Chuzzlewit at online book stores
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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Martin Chuzzlewit.  EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT formats.  
Internet Archive: Martin Chuzzlewit. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXt formats.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): Martin Chuzzlewit. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Martin Chuzzlewit. HTML and other formats.

Great Expectations is a novel by Charles Dickens, originally serialised from 1860 to 1861, when it was published in two volumes. In this tale of a young man's unexpected fortune, Dickens returns to some of the autobiographical themes of his earlier work, but employs them in the service of a famously suspenseful plot, producing perhaps the best-loved of his later novels.

Great Expectations at online book stores
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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Great Expectations. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT formats.  
Internet Archive: Great Expectations. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXT formats.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): Great Expectations. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Great Expectations. HTML and other formats.

The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby is the third novel by Charles Dickens, originally serialised in 1838-9.

The story of a young man's progress in the face of hypocritical antagonists set the pattern for Dickens' mature novels, while retaining elements of broad comedy which have earned more popular success than critical praise.

Nicholas Nickleby at online book stores
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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Nicholas Nickleby.  EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT formats.  
Internet Archive: The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby, Everyman's Library edition, with an introduction by G.K. Chesterton. EPUB, MOBI, PDF and TXT formats.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): Nicholas Nickleby. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Nicholas Nickleby. HTML and other formats.

Hard Times is an 1852 novel by Charles Dickens. Set in the fictional Coketown in the North of England, it is Dickens' most sustained engagement with the world created by the industrial revolution. His portrayals of the characters of Thomas Gradgrind and Stephen Bounderby are a forceful satire of utilitarian ideas.

Hard Times at at online book stores
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Free online texts
Gutenberg: Hard Times. EPUB, HTML, MOBI and TXT formats.  
Internet Archive: Hard Times. Everyman's Library edition, introduced by G.K. Chesterton. EPUB, MOBI, TXT and PDF formats.
University of Adelaide (Internet Archive): Hard Times. EPUB, HTML and MOBI formats.
Wikisource: Hard Times. HTML and other formats.