In presenting The Life and Teaching of the Masters of the Far East, I wish to state that I was one of a research party of 11 persons that visited the Far East in 1894. During our stay - three and a half years - we contacted the Great Masters of the Himalayas, who aided us in the translation of the records, which was of great assistance in our research work. They permitted us to enter into their lives intimately and we were thus able to see the actual working of the great Law as demonstrated by them.

The reception accorded to The Initiate has been at once gratifying, instructive, and curious. No less than three different people have claimed to be its author and confided this intelligence to one of my friends “in the know”, who, with considerable amusement, passed it on to me without, I may add, divulging their names; neither did he inform them of the identity of the real author. 

Marcel's suspicions regarding Albertine's lesbian desires lead to his keeping her a virtual prisoner in his Paris apartment. The Captive is a masterly portrayal of obessional jealousy.

What is the nature of our personal relationship with God? That's the core question of Fear and Trembling. If God asks us to do something we instinctively feel is unethical, must we obey and have faith that he knows best? Examining this question, Danish philosopher Kierkegaard considers the biblical story in which God commands Abraham to sacrifice his only son, Isaac. His unique reading of the story breaks new ground, focusing on our relationship with God at an individual level.

Accidentally witnessing an encounter between the Baron de Charlus and the tailor Jupien opens Marcel's eyes to a world hidden from him until now. Meanwhile his love for Albertine is poisoned by the suspicion that she is attracted to her own sex. Sodom and Gomorrah (Cities of the Plain), Part I, the fourth volume of Marcel Proust's monumental, seven volume Remembrance of Things Past, addresses the subject of homosexual love with insight and understanding.

Dion Fortune's classic, The Mystical Qabalah, explores all aspects of the Qabalah, including the esoteric sciences of astrology and tarot, which form the basis of the Western Mystery Traditions. It provides a key to the practical working of this mystical system for both novice and initiate alike. 

This extraordinary document represents a new form of historical research and straightens out many open questions and misinterpretations. It takes the form of direct dialogues between a modern researcher and a member of the Qumran Essene community. Alive around the time of Christ, this community has become the focus of ideas about the connection of Jesus' teachings to earlier traditions. 

In 1852, young Walt Whitman - a down-on-his-luck housebuilder in Brooklyn - was hard at work writing two books. One would become one of the most famous volumes of poetry in American history, a free-verse revelation beloved the world over, Leaves of Grass. The other, a novel, would be published under a pseudonym and serialized in a newspaper. A short, rollicking story of orphanhood, avarice, and adventure in New York City, Life and Adventures of Jack Engle appeared to little fanfare. Then it disappeared.

Known to the world as Papaji, Sri HWL Poonja introduced Satsang to the West. Eli Jaxon-Bear, who met Papaji before he was well known, set out on a mission of spreading Papaji's name and teachings to everyone. Wake Up and Roar: Satsang with Papaji is the profound result. It continues to thrive as a living teaching, awakening truth seekers with authentic and grounded wisdom from this great, beloved modern sage.

Lost in the blacked-out streets of Paris during the First World War, Marcel stumbles into a brothel and accidentally witnesses a shocking scene involving the Baron de Charlus. Later, at a reception given by the Prince de Guermantes, his meditations on the passage of time lead to his determination to embark on his life's work at last. Time Regained is the twelfth and final part of Marcel Proust's Remembrance of Things Past cycle.

When the young, beautiful Mademoiselle de Chartres comes to court, her primary objective is to find herself a husband. Upon her mother's recommendation, she accepts the advances of the Prince de Clèves, a rather average sort of a man. Unfortunately, soon after the wedding she finds herself to be in love with the dashing Duc de Nemours.... Against a backdrop of labyrinthine court politics, the naïve Madame de Clèves' pursuit of true love is a riveting and timelessly tragic tale.

A pairing of Tolstoy's most spiritual and existential works of fiction and nonfiction from the renowned translator of Turgenev and Chekhov. In the last two days of his own life, Peter Carson completed these new translations of The Death of Ivan Ilyich and Confession before he succumbed to cancer in January 2013. In Carson's shimmering prose, these two transcendent works are presented in their most faithful rendering in English.

For every fan who has wished Jane Austen herself might have enjoyed the romance and happy ending she so carefully crafted for all her heroines: The Persuasion of Miss Jane Austen, by Shannon Winslow. What if the tale Jane Austen told in her last, most poignant novel was inspired by momentous events in her own life? Did she in fact intend Persuasion to stand forever in homage to her one true love?

This modern English edition of Chaucer's classic begins on a spring day in April. Sometime in the waning years of the 14th century, 29 travelers set out for Canterbury on a pilgrimage to the shrine of Saint Thomas Beckett. Among them are a knight, a monk, a prioress, a plowman, a miller, a merchant, a clerk, and an oft-widowed wife from Bath. Travel is arduous and wearing; to maintain their spirits, this band of pilgrims entertain each other with a series of tall tales.

Published just months before his death in 1768, A Sentimental Journey is Sterne's lightly fictionalised account of his own European travels; and being Sterne, it is more about digressions, misunderstandings and risqué jokes than the places he visits. Narrated by the (apparently) innocent Parson Yorick, who appeared in Sterne's other masterpiece, Tristram Shandy, it is full of anecdote and incident, and is far more about the people than the landscapes on the road from Calais.