Madame Bovary, often ranked among the greatest novels of all time, is Flaubert’s first novel, and considered to be both his masterpiece and one of the most influential works in literary history, with authors from Henry James to Proust to Nabokov heaping it with praise. The novel tells the story of Emma Bovary, a commoner wife of a country doctor, and her attempts to escape the drudgery of day-to-day mediocrity by engaging in adulterous affairs and overspending on luxuries. She remains unsatisfied even though her husband adores her and they want for little, and her shallowness eventually leads to their ruin. The story was first serialized in Revue de Paris, where prosecutors tried to have it censored for obscenity, arguing that not only is the story immoral, but that realism as a literary style is an offence against art and decency. The trial only served to increase the story’s fame, and when it was published as a single novel it quickly became a bestseller. The novel is groundbreaking in its emphasis on the psychological and emotional lives of its characters. Literature up to then had mostly focusing on the external events that make characters react, instead of focusing on the internal thought processes of those characters. Madame Bovary changed that forever. It was also revolutionary in its criticism of the middle class, which at the time was a still-new social class vying for elbow room between the working poor and hereditary aristocracy. Flaubert critiqued the middle class as being ambitious, shallow, greedy, materialistic, and totally without culture; Emma’s burning desire to reach even higher social strata, contrasted against that satisfaction being fundamentally denied to her by her middle-class nature, is an early echo of Marx’s theory of alienation in industrial societies. Today Madame Bovary, with its careful but charming description of the banality of everyday life, is considered the first great example of literary realism in fiction novels. Eleanor Marx-Aveling’s translation, though over a hundred years old, is remarkably fresh and smooth, and is a pleasure even for modern readers.

Mary’s parents fall ill and die, forcing her to be transplanted from India to the English countryside. She arrives at a strange and foreign country manor, where she discovers a long-neglected garden and hears strange sobbing noises at night. Thus begins The Secret Garden, a children’s book with an unusually dense collection of themes, symbols, and motifs. Mary’s personal development mirrors her unraveling the secret of the hidden garden, and a subtle backdrop of magical realism adds a mysterious air to the proceedings. Contemporary reception left The Secret Garden largely unnoticed, eclipsed by Hodgson’s other work, Little Lord Fauntleroy. Since then, however, the book’s reputation has steadily grown, with modern critics considering it one of the finest children’s books of the 20th century.

Cogewea, a mischievous young rancher, lives with her older sister and brother-in-law on their homestead, the Horseshoe Bend Ranch, located in the Flathead Indian Reservation. A member of the Okanogan tribe, Cogewea is nevertheless stigmatized as a “breed”—a derogatory term historically applied to people of mixed Native American and European descent. Drama arrives at the Horseshoe Bend with the person of Alfred Densmore, a businessman who has set out from the Eastern states in search of adventure and money. After he breaks his arm by being thrown by a half-tame bronco, Densmore develops a romantic interest in Cogewea, sparking a rivalry with Cogewea’s friend Jim, who is the ranch’s foreman and a fellow breed. Cogewea must navigate the interwoven challenges of choosing a suitor and reckoning with her ethnic identity, with the aid of advice in the form of stories told by her grandmother, the Stemteemä. Cogewea was one of the first novels ever published by a Native American woman. It was the product of collaboration between Mourning Dove and her editor, Lucullus Virgil McWhorter, a Euro-American anthropologist and advocate of indigenous American cultures. Critics have debated the extent of McWhorter’s influence on the final product, but Mourning Dove’s own correspondence with McWhorter suggests that McWhorter revised her draft significantly and introduced his own voice into the novel. Cogewea continues to be studied as an early example of Native American literature.

At the height of the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror, a mysterious daredevil rescues French aristocrats from execution and smuggles them out of France. This secretive escape artist is known to the French authorities only by the drawings of a flower, the scarlet pimpernel, that he leaves as his calling card. Marguerite St. Just has avoided the worst of the revolutionary turmoil. Her recent marriage to the English baronet Sir Percy Blakeney has taken her away from the chaos in France to England, where she is quickly recognized as the most fashionable and clever lady in London. But even in England, she is unable to escape the effects of the Revolution, and she is soon blackmailed into a plot to unmask and capture the elusive Scarlet Pimpernel. With The Scarlet Pimpernel, Baroness Orczy introduced the world to a talented, adventurous hero hiding behind a dull and ineffectual secret identity. Countless imitators followed, until the “secret identity” became a common feature of adventure stories. In addition to the novel, Orczy wrote with her husband a stage play of the same name, which broke stage records and saw several revivals. Both the play and the novel received much critical and popular acclaim, and Orczy went on to write several sequels about the mysterious Pimpernel and his companions.

During her brief career as a writer, Nella Larsen published two novels and three short stories. The most famous of her short works, the short story “Sanctuary” and the novella “Passing,” focus on the perspectives of African-American and mixed-race people in the United States, and handle themes of solidarity and prejudice based on both race and class. Though Larsen’s literary reputation rests mainly upon her treatment of these issues, her other stories, “The Wrong Man” and “Freedom,” concern infidelity and marriage. Larsen was born in Chicago to a mother and father who had immigrated to the United States from Denmark and the Danish West Indies respectively. She published her first stories in the 1920s, when she was living with her husband in Harlem and working as a librarian. During these years she became active in the literary community of the Harlem Renaissance, but her career was cut short after some accused her of plagiarizing “Sanctuary.” This alienated publishers despite Larsen’s denying any wrongdoing in print. Her short fiction draws on her experiences of not belonging and of the African-American middle class into which she had married. It is noted for the acuity of its psychological insight, its use of suspense and plot twists, and the simplicity and elegance of its prose. Larsen’s novella “Passing” concerns the possibility of moving between the highly race-conscious social groups of 1920s New York, and explicitly mocks the idea that ancestry is straightforwardly deducible from behavior. The concept of “passing” had already been featured in American fiction for several decades before, but “Passing” presented the issue in a new way, alongside questions of social class and morality. The novella was positively received by critics, including W. E. B. Du Bois, and was instrumental in Larsen’s receiving a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1930. “Sanctuary” is set along a desolate strip of the Southern coast. A desperate man named Jim Hammer seeks refuge at Annie Poole’s isolated cottage. When Jim reveals he’s shot a man—possibly white—Annie reluctantly agrees to hide him, not from kindness but because of her son Obadiah’s inexplicable fondness for this man she considers “no ’count trash.”

Four strangers, each enchanted by an advertisement addressed “To Those who Appreciate Wistaria and Sunshine,” impulsively pool their savings to lease a medieval Italian castle for the month of April. All are deeply dissatisfied with life and in need of escape: awkward Mrs. Wilkins, increasingly resentful of a husband who largely ignores her; proper Mrs. Arbuthnot, whose own marriage seems headed toward estrangement; beautiful and unmarried Lady Caroline Dester, tired of men constantly “grabbing” at her; and elderly Mrs. Fisher, widowed and walled off in memories of the past. As they come to know one another, each woman finds herself gradually transformed by the beauty of San Salvatore—a magical place where conflict just might turn to friendship, and even the most soured relationship has a chance of being salvaged. Later adapted into an Academy Award-nominated film, The Enchanted April was an instant bestseller upon its publication in 1922. It continues to enchant readers today as a lighthearted, often comedic exploration of friendship and romance that is steeped in vibrant, intoxicating descriptions of wisteria and sunshine.

L. M. Montgomery is perhaps best known as an author of youth fiction, especially her Anne of Green Gables series. But of her novels intended for adult readers, The Blue Castle is the most famous. In Valancy Stirling’s rural Ontario town, marriage is thought to be a young woman’s vital accomplishment. Yet Valancy, now in her late 20s, has never had a flicker of interest from any suitor. Add to this the oppressive home life she endures with her mother, and Valancy’s misery is complete. In order to find some relief, she builds a fantasy world in her imagination—her “Blue Castle”—full of love and beauty. Even this, however, fails to support her when her chest pains prove to be the sign of a terminal condition. This traumatic discovery combines with Valancy’s inspirational reading to prompt her to take back her life—much to her relatives’ consternation. Undeterred, Valancy finds new worth and freedom in relationships she could never have imagined before, which bring their own surprising twists and turns.

Anne of Green Gables established the career of Canadian writer Lucy Maude Montgomery. When Matthew Cuthbert sends away for an orphan boy to help on his farm, he is surprised to instead meet the captivatingly imaginative Anne Shirley. What ensues is one of the most enduringly popular coming-of-age stories, bringing the pastoral beauty of Prince Edward Island to the world.

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is the classic American children’s novel about the adventures of Dorothy, a young girl who along with her dog Toto is swept away by a cyclone to the magical Land of Oz. It was written by L. Frank Baum and published in May 1900. Dorothy lives with her Aunt Em, Uncle Henry, and Toto on a farm in the Kansas prairie. One day, Dorothy and Toto are caught up in a cyclone that deposits her farmhouse into Munchkin Country in the magical Land of Oz. The falling house has killed the Wicked Witch of the East, the evil ruler of the Munchkins. The Good Witch of the North arrives with three grateful Munchkins and gives Dorothy the magical Silver Shoes that once belonged to the Wicked Witch. The Good Witch tells Dorothy that the only way she can return home is to go to the Emerald City and ask the great and powerful Wizard of Oz to help her. The Library of Congress has declared it “America’s greatest and best-loved homegrown fairy-tale.” Its groundbreaking success and the success of the Broadway musical adaptation led Baum to write thirteen additional Oz books which serve as sequels to the first story. The 1939 film musical adaptation starring Judy Garland is considered by many to be one of the greatest films in cinema history.

Anne Elliot is the under-valued daughter of a vain and improvident English baronet, Sir Walter Elliot. Some years previously, at the urging of a family friend, Anne had rejected a marriage proposal from a young but impoverished naval captain. When she unexpectedly encounters him again, she is filled with regrets. Persuasion was published in 1817, six months after Jane Austen’s death, and is the last novel she completed in full. It was well-regarded on publication and has been turned into several television series and movies.