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José Protasio Rizal Mercado y Alonso Realonda (June 19, 1861 - December 30, 1896) was a Filipino nationalist, writer and polymath active at the end of the Spanish colonial period of the Philippines. He is considered the national hero (pambansang bayani) of the Philippines. An ophthalmologist by profession, Rizal became a writer and a key member of the Filipino Propaganda Movement, which advocated political reforms for the colony under Spain.He was executed by the Spanish colonial government for the crime of rebellion after the Philippine Revolution broke out; it was inspired by his writings. Though he was not actively involved in its planning or conduct, he ultimately approved of its goals which eventually resulted in Philippine independence.Rizal is widely considered one of the greatest heroes of the Philippines and has been recommended to be so honored by an officially empaneled National Heroes Committee. However, no law, executive order or proclamation has been enacted or issued officially proclaiming any Filipino historical figure as a national hero. He wrote the novels Noli Me Tángere (1887) and El filibusterismo (1891), which together are taken as a national epic, in addition to numerous poems and essays. (wikipedia.org)

El filibusterismo (transl. The filibusterism; The Subversive or The Subversion, as in the Locsín English translation, are also possible translations), also known by its alternative English title The Reign of Greed, is the second novel written by Philippine national hero José Rizal. It is the sequel to Noli Me Tángere and, like the first book, was written in Spanish. It was first published in 1891 in Ghent.The novel centers on the Noli-El fili duology's main character Crisóstomo Ibarra, now returning for vengeance as "Simoun". The novel's dark theme departs dramatically from the previous novel's hopeful and romantic atmosphere, signifying Ibarra's resort to solving his country's issues through violent means, after his previous attempt in reforming the country's system made no effect and seemed impossible with the corrupt attitude of the Spaniards toward the Filipinos.The novel, along with its predecessor, was banned in some parts of the Philippines as a result of their portrayals of the Spanish government's abuses and corruption. These novels, along with Rizal's involvement in organizations that aimed to address and reform the Spanish system and its issues, led to Rizal's exile to Dapitan and eventual execution. Both the novel and its predecessor, along with Rizal's last poem, are now considered Rizal's literary masterpieces.Both of Rizal's novels had a profound effect on Philippine society in terms of views about national identity, the Catholic faith and its influence on the Filipino's choice, and the government's issues in corruption, abuse of power, and discrimination, and on a larger scale, the issues related to the effect of colonization on people's lives and the cause for independence. These novels later on indirectly became the inspiration to start the Philippine Revolution.Throughout the Philippines, the reading of both the novel and its predecessor is now mandatory for high school students throughout the archipelago, although it is now read using English, Filipino, and the Philippines' regional languages. (wikipedia.org)

King Coal is a 1917 novel by Upton Sinclair that describes the poor working conditions in the coal mining industry in the western United States during the 1910s, from the perspective of a single protagonist, Hal Warner. As in his earlier work, The Jungle, Sinclair uses the novel to express his socialist viewpoint. The book is based on the 1913-1914 Colorado coal strikes and written just after the Ludlow massacre. The sequel to King Coal was posthumously published under the title, The Coal War. Hal Warner, a rich young fellow determined to find the truth for himself about conditions in the mines, runs away from home and adopts the alias "Joe Smith." After being turned away by one coal mine for fear of Hal being a union organizer, he gets a job in another coal mine operated by the General Fuel Company, or GFC. In the mines he befriends many of the workers, and realizes their misery and exploitation at the hands of the bosses.He befriends Mary Burke, who is a passionate fighter for the workers' rights. Her father is a mine worker who spends his days drinking and leaving her to take care of her siblings. She and Hal grow close, which tears at Hal's loyalty to his fiancée back home.After dedicating himself to the workers' cause, he tells them that he will appeal to the bosses to become a check weigh man who measures the amount of coal, but the GFC, wanting to cheat the workers out of their pay, appoints a company check weigh man. Hal is eventually put into the jail by the marshal, who is teased by Hal over conditions of the mines and accused by Hal of being corrupted and unfair to the workers.After an explosion in the mines, Hal seeks out Percy Harrigan, an old friend whose father, Peter Harrigan, owns the General Fuel Company. The workers organize a strike and union to demand their rights from the bosses, but the rescue effort goes longer than expected. The bosses are more intent on the tools and equipment than the miners. "Damn the man! save the Mules!" says a boss.Hal appeals to the United Mine Workers to back the strike, but they refuse, telling him that the strike is primitive and unexpected and that to support it when its just started to participate in action would waste the union's resources. Hal is told to wait a few more years for the other unions to strike, and only with a massive course of action could the unions win. Hal is left to tell the workers the grievous news but the workers nevertheless cheer out his name (some calling out Joe Smith and others Hal) for standing up for them.After a confrontation with his brother Edward, Hal resolves to return home and dedicate his life to the workers' cause. Hal leaves and concludes that he is in love with Mary Burke. (wikipedia.org)

A Farewell to Arms is a novel by American writer Ernest Hemingway, set during the Italian campaign of World War I. First published in 1929, it is a first-person account of an American, Frederic Henry, serving as a lieutenant ("tenente") in the ambulance corps of the Italian Army. The title is taken from a poem by the 16th-century English dramatist George Peele.The novel, set against the backdrop of World War I, describes a love affair between the expatriate Henry and an English nurse, Catherine Barkley. Its publication ensured Hemingway's place as a modern American writer of considerable stature. The book became his first best-seller, and has been called "the premier American war novel from that debacle World War I."The novel has been adapted a number of times, initially for the stage in 1930; as a film in 1932 and again in 1957, and as a three-part television miniseries in 1966. The 1996 film In Love and War, directed by Richard Attenborough and starring Chris O'Donnell and Sandra Bullock, depicts Hemingway's life in Italy as an ambulance driver in the events prior to his writing of A Farewell to Arms. (wikipedia.org)

The Secret of Chimneys is a work of detective fiction by British writer Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by The Bodley Head in June 1925 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year. It introduces the characters of Superintendent Battle and Lady Eileen "Bundle" Brent. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence (7/6) and the US edition at $2.00.At the request of George Lomax, Lord Caterham reluctantly agrees to host a weekend party at his home, Chimneys. A murder occurs in the house, beginning a week of fast-paced events with police among the guests.The novel was well received at first publication, described as more than a murder mystery, as it is a treasure hunt. Later reviews found it a first-class romp and one of the author's best early thrillers. The most recent review says the novel requires a hefty suspension of disbelief. The later reviewers note that descriptions of characters use the terminology of the times in which it was written, and might be considered racist decades later. (wikipedia.org)

The Trumpet-Major is a novel by Thomas Hardy published in 1880, and his only historical novel, and Hardy included it with his "romances and fantasies". It concerns the heroine, Anne Garland, being pursued by three suitors: John Loveday, the eponymous trumpet major in a British regiment, honest and loyal; his brother Bob, a flighty sailor; and Festus Derriman, the cowardly nephew of the local squire. Unusually for a Hardy novel, the ending is not entirely tragic; however, there remains an ominous element in the probable fate of one of the main characters.The novel is set in Weymouth during the Napoleonic wars; the town was then anxious about the possibility of invasion by Napoleon. Of the two brothers, John fights with Wellington in the Peninsular War, and Bob serves with Nelson at Trafalgar. The Napoleonic Wars was a setting that Hardy would use again in his play, The Dynasts, and it borrows from the same source material.Edward Neill has called the novel an attempt to repeat the success of his earlier work Far from the Madding Crowd (1874), after the limited success of his intervening works. The novel originally appeared in 1880 in the Evangelical serial Good Words (January-December) with 33 illustrations by John Collier. The three-volume first edition was published in October 1880. (wikipedia.org)

Two on a Tower: A Romance (1882) is a novel by English author Thomas Hardy, classified by him as a romance and fantasy it is one of his minor works. The book is one of Hardy's Wessex novels, set in late Victorian Dorset. Because the book defied the social norms of the day, upon release the book was called shocking, repulsive, and one critic called it Hardy's "worst yet." Hardy's biographer, Claire Tomalin, says Hardy was "writing for serialization, which drove him to pack in far too much plot," and he wrote too fast "without time to think or reconsider."Hardy wrote in a letter to Edmund Gosse on 10 Dec 1882, "I get most extraordinary criticisms of T. on a T. Eminent critics write & tell me in private that it is the most original thing I have done...while other eminent critics (I wonder if they are the same) print the most cutting rebukes you can conceive-show me (to my amazement) that I am quite an immoral person..." (wikipedia.org)

The Return of the Native is Thomas Hardy's sixth published novel. It first appeared in the magazine Belgravia, a publication known for its sensationalism, and was presented in twelve monthly installments from January to December 1878. Because of the novel's controversial themes, Hardy had some difficulty finding a publisher; reviews, however, though somewhat mixed, were generally positive. In the twentieth century, The Return of the Native became one of Hardy's most popular and highly regarded novels. With its deeply flawed heroine and its (for the time) open acknowledgement of illicit sexual relationships, The Return of the Native raised some eyebrows when it first appeared as a serial in Victorian Britain. Although he intended to structure the novel into five books, thus mirroring the classical tragic format, Hardy submitted to the tastes of the serial-reading public sufficiently to tack on a happy ending for Diggory Venn and Thomasin in a sixth book, Aftercourses. In Hardy's original conception, Venn retains his weird reddleman's character, while Thomasin lives out her days as a widow.Hardy's choice of themes-sexual politics, thwarted desire, and the conflicting demands of nature and society-makes this a truly modern novel. Underlying these modern themes, however, is a classical sense of tragedy: Hardy scrupulously observes the three unities of time, place, and action and suggests that the struggles of those trying to escape their destinies will only hasten their destruction. To emphasise this main part he uses as setting an ancient heath steeped in pre-Christian history and supplies a Chorus consisting of Grandfer Cantle, Timothy Fairway, and the rest of the heathfolk. Eustacia, who manipulates fate in hopes of leaving Egdon Heath for a larger existence in Paris, instead becomes an eternal resident when she drowns in Shadwater Weir; Wildeve shares not only Eustacia's dream of escape, but also her fate; and Clym, the would-be educational reformer, survives the Weir but lives on as a lonely, remorseful man.Some critics-notably D. H. Lawrence-see the novel as a study of the way communities control their misfits. In Egdon Heath, most people (particularly the women) look askance at the proud, unconventional Eustacia. Mrs. Yeobright considers her too odd and unreliable to be a suitable bride for her son, and Susan Nunsuch, who frankly believes her to be a witch, tries to protect her children from Eustacia's supposedly baleful influence by stabbing her with a stocking pin and later burning her in effigy. Clym at first laughs at such superstitions, but later embraces the majority opinion when he rejects his wife as a murderer and adulteress. In this view, Eustacia dies because she has internalised the community's values to the extent that, unable to escape Egdon without confirming her status as a fallen woman, she chooses suicide. She thereby ends her sorrows while at the same time-by drowning in the weir like any woman instead of floating, witchlike-she proves her essential innocence to the community. (wikipedia.org)

The Mayor of Casterbridge: The Life and Death of a Man of Character is an 1886 novel by the English author Thomas Hardy. One of Hardy's Wessex novels, it is set in a fictional rural England with Casterbridge standing in for Dorchester in Dorset where the author spent his youth. It was first published as a weekly serialisation from January 1886.The novel is considered to be one of Hardy's masterpieces, although it has been criticised for incorporating too many incidents, a consequence of the author trying to include something in every weekly published instalment. (wikipedia.org)

The Hand of Ethelberta: A Comedy in Chapters is a novel by Thomas Hardy, published in 1876. It was written, in serial form, for The Cornhill Magazine, which was edited by Leslie Stephen, a friend and mentor of Hardy's. Unlike the majority of Hardy's fiction, the novel is a comedy, with both humour and a happy ending for the major characters and no suicides or tragic deaths. The late nineteenth century novelist George Gissing, who knew Hardy, considered it "surely old Hardy's poorest book". It was adapted for BBC Radio 4 by Katherine Jakeways. The one-hour play was released just before International Women's Day 2021, as part of a series on Hardy's women. (wikipedia.org)