Books like Literature--Third Compact Edition by X. J. Kennedy

The Fourth Edition of Literature: The Human Experience offers a rich collec- tion of fiction, poetry, and drama. Its 33 short stories, 4 novellas, 190 poems, and 13 plays are arranged in four thematic sections and, within each section, by genre, chronologically. Selections range from the classics of antiquity and the Renaissance to works published during the past five years, and they represent a careful balance of American, British, and non-English- language authors. Among the new features in the Fourth Edition: • expanded drama sections, offering 5 new plays, by Molière, August Strindberg, Sean O'Casey, Arthur Miller, and Arthur Kopit • 8 new works of fiction, including stories by Grace Paley, Ursula Le Guin, Arna Bontemps, Alice Walker, Alice Munro, and Bobbie Ann Mason • 18 new poems, including selections by Anne Sexton, Muriel Rukeyser, Denise Levertov, David Kirby, Carolyn Forché, Kathleen Cushman, and Mary Gordon • increased opportunities throughout the anthology for students to write about literature --back cover

An interactive introductory literature textbook that expands Kennedy and Gioia’s anthology with a multimedia CD‑ROM featuring film, audio, critical articles, and student papers, enhancing study of fiction, history, and literary criticism.

Read great fiction and discover what it takes to write it. This book is a treasury of short fiction by the best writers of the past and present. Their stories will transport you to other times and places, where you will be inspired to laugh, to question, and to think. Along with the stories are writers' own commentaries on their craft and the traditions of short fiction, offering you insight, inspiration, and plenty of opportunities for discussion and writing.