Walt Whitman is perhaps America's most admired poet. His work, now praised for its themes of equality and democracy, was once shunned for its experimental verse and discussion of sexuality.
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Articles on Guide to the Classics
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George Orwell's dystopian classic can tell us a lot about contemporary politics and power, from Donald Trump to Facebook.
Tacitus' Annals is a powerful and darkly humorous examination of imperial Rome. Though his work was little read in the Roman world, it has influenced great thinkers such as Hobbes and Montesquieu.
Jean Rhys's prequel to Jane Eyre explores the monstrous figure of Rochester's mad wife Bertha, prompting readers to think about the racialised legacies of colonialism.
In The Water Margin, first put to paper in the 14th century, local injustice is the rule, and defence against cruel local authority is a matter of vengeance, stratagem, and violence
Juvenal wrote 16 satires, divided into five books, each with their own target from decadent aristocrats to Egyptian cannibals.
From about age seven, Spartan children learned to fight and practise obeying orders. They also staged pretend battles. Boys and girls were trained separately.
After Shakespeare and Laozi, Kahlil Gibran is the highest selling poet ever, largely thanks to The Prophet, a set of 26 prose poems.
Euripides’ dismissal by some as a misogynist sits uncomfortably alongside his complex and sympathetic female characters.
Across her long career, Dobson was celebrated as a poet who could take the reader beyond the immediate image to another insight.
A lack of respect for history, a population conditioned to consume goods at breakneck pace, and pacification of individuals via an entertainment culture: parts of Huxley's novel strikingly resemble our own world.
To Kill a Mockingbird is no sermon. Its lessons are presented in effortless style, tackling the complexity of race issues with startling clarity and a strong sense of reality.
This week is the 200th anniversary of Emily Bronte's birth. If reading Wuthering Heights - her only published novel - feels like a suspension in a state of waking nightmare, what a richly-hued vision of the fantastical it is.
Murasaki Shikibu, the author of The Tale of Genji, served in the Japanese imperial court. She transformed her experiences into an intricate narrative fusing fiction, history, and poetry.
William Faulkner began writing As I Lay Dying the day after the 1929 Wall Street crash. It documents, through the voices of 15 characters, the emergence of a poor white family into the modern world.
Completed by Cervantes when he was in prison, Don Quixote is the tale of a man so passionate about reading he leaves home to live the life of his fictional heroes.
In this age of the pseudo-factual, its more important than ever to acquaint ourselves with the foundations of the scientific tradition, such as Darwin's Origin of Species.
In our ongoing Guide to the Classics series, we look at Heart of Darkness: the product of dark historical energies that continue to shape our contemporary world.
In its abridged form, Gulliver's Travels has become a children's classic. But in full, it is a misanthropic satire, scathing of politicians.
Dream of the Red Chamber, by Cao Xueqin, follows the travails of a pubescent boy. Somehow, through the spats, crushes and rivalries of a handful of teenagers, the great questions of the human condition are broached.
Top contributors
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Professor, Department of Classics and Ancient History, University of Sydney
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Professor of Classics, La Trobe University
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Professor of Classics, University of Newcastle
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Senior Lecturer in Roman History, Macquarie University
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Lecturer in Chinese Studies, University of Sydney
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Honorary Associate, Classics and Ancient History, La Trobe University
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Senior Lecturer, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney
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Senior Lecturer in English and Writing (children's literature), University of New England
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Senior Lecturer in English, UNSW
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Judith Armstrong is a Friend of The Conversation.
Honorary Fellow of the School of Languages and Linguistics, University of Melbourne
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Lecturer in English, Monash University
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Associate Professor in Australian Literature, University of Sydney
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Assoc. Professor, School of Culture and Communication, University of Melbourne
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Professor, School of Culture and Communication, University of Melbourne
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Senior Lecturer, Chair, The Department of Writing Studies, University of Sydney
