CLASSICS The Iliad and The Odyssey Homer Set during the Trojan War, The Iliad combines

battle scenes with a debate about heroism; Odysseus' thwarted attempts to return to Ithaca when the war ends form The Odyssey Its symbolic e!ocation of human life as an epic journey homewards has inspired e!erything from "ames "oyce's #lysses to the $oen brothers' film, O %rother Where &rt Thou' The Barchester Chronicles &nthony Trollope & story set in a fictional cathedral town about the s(uabbles and power struggles of the clergy' It doesn)t sound promising, but Trollope's spar*lingly satirical no!els are among the best+lo!ed boo*s of all time Pride and Prejudice "ane &usten Heroine meets hero and hates him Is charmed by a cad & family crisis , caused by the cad , is resol!ed by the hero The heroine sees him for what he really is and realises -after !isiting his enormous house. that she lo!es him The plot has been endlessly borrowed, but few authors ha!e written anything as witty or profound as /ride and /rejudice Gulliver's Travels "onathan Swift Swift's scathing satire shows humans at their worst0 whether diminished -in 1illiput. or grossly magnified -in %robdingnag. Our capacity for self+delusion , personified by the absurdly pompous 2ulli!er , ma*es this dar*est of no!els !ery funny Jane Eyre $harlotte %ront3 $ruelty, hypocrisy, dashed hopes0 "ane 4yre faces them all, yet her indi!iduality triumphs Her relationship with 5ochester has such emotional power that it's hard to belie!e these characters ne!er li!ed War and Peace Tolstoy Tolstoy's masterpiece is so enormous e!en the author said it couldn't be described as a no!el %ut the characters of &ndrei, /ierre and 6atasha , and the tragic and une7pected way their li!es intersect , grip you for all 8,9:: pages avid Co!!er"ield $harles ;ic*ens ;a!id's journey to adulthood is filled with difficult choices , and a huge cast of characters, from the treacherous Steerforth to the comical <r <icawber

#anity $air William <a*epeace Thac*eray '=I'm no &ngel,= answered <iss 5ebecca &nd to tell the truth, she was not ' Whether we should judge the cunning, amoral %ec*y Sharp , or the hypocritical society she inhabits , is the (uestion %ada&e Bovary 2usta!e >laubert >laubert's finely crafted no!el tells the story of 4mma, a bored pro!incial wife who comforts herself with shopping and affairs It doesn't end well %iddle&arch 2eorge 4liot ;orothea wastes her youth on a creepy, elderly scholar 1ydgate marries the beautiful but self+ absorbed 5osamund 2eorge 4liot's characters ma*e terrible mista*es, but we ne!er lose empathy with them POET'( Sonnets Sha*espeare Sha*espeare's sonnets contain some of poetry's most iconic lines , and a mysterious insight into his personal life ivine Co&edy ;ante ;ante &lighieri's epic tale of one man's journey into the afterlife is considered Italy's finest literary e7port Canter)ury Tales $haucer These humorous tales about fictional pilgrims made an important contribution to 4nglish literature at a time when court poetry was written in either &nglo+6orman or 1atin The Prelude William Wordsworth This posthumously published wor* is both an autobiographical journey and a fragment of history from the re!olutionary and post+re!olutionary years Odes "ohn ?eats 1ittered with sensuous descriptions of nature's beauty, ?eats's odes also pose profound philosophical (uestions The Waste Land T S 4liot 4liot's !ision of dystopia became a literary landmar*, and introduced new techni(ues to the modern poet He remains one of the defining figures of @:th+century poetry

Paradise Lost "ohn <ilton Since its publication in 8AAB, <ilton)s 8@+boo* 4nglish epic , in which he sets out to 'justify the ways of 2od to men' , has been considered a classic Son*s o" Innocence and E+!erience William %la*e %la*e's short poems are simple in rhythm and rhyme, but sophisticated in meaning Written during a time of political turmoil, they embody his radical sympathies and anti+dualist ideas Collected Poe&s W % Ceats $onsidered a dri!ing force in the re!i!al of Irish literature, Ceats fruitfully engages the topics of youth, lo!e, nature, art and war Collected Poe&s Ted Hughes &lthough Hughes was a colossal presence among the 4nglish literary landscape , his wor* often draws upon the forbidding Cor*shire countryside of his youth , his personal life had a tendency to o!ershadow his talent LITE'A'( $ICTIO, The Portrait o" a Lady Henry "ames "ames's mastery of psychology has ne!er been more elegantly e7pressed nor more gripping than in his tale of Isabel &rcher, a young &merican in search of her destiny, and 2ilbert Osmond, the ultimate cold fish and one of literature's most repellent !illains A la recherche du te&!s !erdu /roust & no!el whose e!ery sentence can be a struggle to finish may sound forbidding, but this masterpiece of modernity, ta*ing us into e!ery noo* and cranny of the narrator's fascinating mind, is worth all the effort -lysses "ames "oyce %anned in %ritain and &merica for its depiction of female masturbation, "oyce's #lysses ta*es its scatological stand at the pinnacle of modernist literature 1yrical and witty, its stream+of+ consciousness narration deters many, but ma*es enraptured enthusiasts of others $or Who& the Bell Tolls 4rnest Hemingway & sparse, masculine, world+weary meditation on death, ideology and the sa!agery of war in general, and the Spanish ci!il war in particular

S.ord o" /onour trilo*y 4!elyn Waugh & poignant, ironic study of the disintegration of aristocratic !alues in the face of blan* bureaucracy and Second World War butchery, <en at &rms, Officers and 2entlemen and #nconditional Surrender are Waugh's crowning achie!ements The Ballad o" Pec0ha& 'ye <uriel Spar* $omic, satirical and ineffably odd, Spar*'s fifth no!el introduces ;ougal ;ouglas, ghost+writer, researcher, mysterious figure of Satanic magnetism and mayhem, to the upper wor*ing+classD lower middle+class milieu of /ec*ham 'a))it series "ohn #pdi*e We first meet Harry '5abbit' &ngstrom in 5abbit, 5un, as a boorish, unhappy former bas*etball joc* who runs from -and to. his pregnant wife The no!els that follow co!er E: years and ma*e up the great study of &merican manhood One /undred (ears o" Solitude 2abriel 2arcFa <Gr(ueH The greatest moment in magical realist fiction, 2arcFa <Gr(ueH's passionate, humorous history of <acondo and its founding family, the %uendFas, has the seducti!e power of myth Beloved Toni <orrison <orrison brought to life a !ersion of the sla!e narrati!e that has become a classic Her tour de force of guilt, abandonment and re!enge plays out against the bac*ground of pre+emancipation &merican life The /u&an Stain /hilip 5oth 5oth's brilliant, angry dissection of race, disgrace and hypocrisy in $linton+1ewins*y era &merica brings to a close his grand and meticulous &merican trilogy -&merican /astoral, I <arried a $ommunist. 'O%A,TIC $ICTIO, 'e)ecca ;aphne du <aurier $ornish estate owner <a7imilian de Winter's second wife , also the nameless narrator , is haunted by the house*eeper's oppressi!e worship of her predecessor, 5ebecca & masterful tale of suspense Le %orte 'Arthur Thomas <alory <alory's yarn e7plores the possibility that chi!alry is best re!ealed by a *night's loyalty to his fellow *nights, and not simply his de!otion to a woman

Les Liaisons

an*ereuses

$hoderlos de 1aclos /aris in the 8Ith century0 the <ar(uise de <erteuil and the Jicomte de Jalmont concoct a scheme of seduction to entrap members of the aristocracy Their roguish machinations lead to their climactic undoing I1 Claudius 5obert 2ra!es &n in!ented autobiographical account of $laudius, the fourth emperor of ancient 5ome 2ra!es draws upon the historical te7ts of Tacitus and Suetonius to write $laudius's story after claiming a !isitation from the ancient ruler in his dreams Ale+ander Trilo*y <ary 5enault 5enault transports readers to &ncient 2reece in a historical trilogy that presents the life and legacy of &le7ander the 2reat in a humanising fictional portrait %aster and Co&&ander /atric* O'%rian Set during the 6apoleonic Wars, O'%rian's boo*s journey the seas with $ommander &ubrey and his crew aboard H<S Sophie The no!el follows &ubrey's con!incing and comple7 friendship with <aturin, the ship's surgeon, as they fight enemies and storms Gone .ith the Wind <argaret <itchell Scarlett O'Hara manipulates her way through the &merican ci!il war This selfish, but gutsy heroine idealises the unattainable &shley before realising her lo!e for her third husband, 5hett, who dismisses her with, '<y dear, I don't gi!e a damn ' r 2hiva*o %oris /asterna* Curi Khi!ago lo!es two women, his wife, Tonya, and the capti!ating 1ara /asterna* ju7taposes romance with the star* brutality of the 5ussian ci!il war in this e7traordinary historical epic Tess o" the '-r)ervilles Thomas Hardy ;isgraced by an illegitimate child, Tess is tainted with shame and guilt, which destroys her marriage to &ngel $lare She emerges as a tragic heroine, incapable of escaping the hypocrisy of Jictorian society The Planta*enet Sa*a "ean /laidy & collection of no!els inspired by the /lantagenet dynasty "ean /laidy is one of the many noms de plume of 4leanor &lice %urford Hibbert, the celebrated historical fiction writer, who died in 8LLE

C/IL 'E,'S BOO3S S.allo.s and A&a4ons &rthur 5ansome >our children sail to Wildcat Island, where they encounter a ri!al camping party then join forces to hunt treasure 5obinson $rusoe meets The >amous >i!e in a tale of sailing and ginger beer The Lion1 the Witch and the Wardro)e $ S 1ewis /eter, Susan, 4dmund and 1ucy disco!er the land of 6arnia and the male!olent White Witch The no!el uses $hristian iconography in &slan's dramatic sacrifice and resurrection 4dmund's transition from self+interested schoolboy to heroic young man is also resonantly spiritual The Lord o" the 'in*s " 5 5 Tol*ien >rodo and friends journey to <ordor to destroy the ring, ma*ing the young Hobbit one of the greatest fictional heroes of all time <ore than 8::million copies ha!e been sold of the trilogy that brought fantasy to a mainstream literary audience /is ar0 %aterials /hilip /ullman Will is a boy from O7ford 1yra is a girl from O7ford in a parallel world Together they ha!e an epic ad!enture spanning parallel uni!erses The trilogy has inspired criticism for being heretical , /ullman himself declared the boo*s were about '*illing 2od' Ba)ar "ean de %runhoff %abar brings clothes and cars -and <adame. from /aris to his &frican *ingdom With his family and the wise $ornelius by his side, %abar protects his land from the 5hino ?ing 5ata7es The big, beautiful boo*s are enriched by %runhoff's wonderful illustrations The 'ail.ay Children 4 6esbit 6esbit)s classic, made famous by the 8LB: film, tells of how %obby, /hyllis and /ete, missing their belo!ed father, adapt to a po!erty+stric*en life in the country, helped by <r /er*s, the Old 2entleman, and by wa!ing to the train Winnie5the5Pooh & & <ilne The Silly Old %ear, with his friends in Hundred &cre Wood, is more than a %ritish institution & & <ilne created a life philosophy with the trials, triumphs and tiddley+poms of the honey+lo!ing, always *ind+hearted /ooh /arry Potter " ? 5owling The boy wiHard's dealings with the forces of adolescence and e!il ha!e sold more than EM:million boo*s in AM languages The Harry /otter phenomenon has its detractors, but the success of special 'grown+up' co!ers, allowing commuters to read 5owling without shame, tells its own tale

The Wind in the Willo.s ?enneth 2rahame 1onely and miserable trying to clean his hole, <ole !entures outside He meets 5atty, Toad and %adger, and embar*s on a new life defending Toad Hall from the weasels, protecting Toad from himself and messing about in boats Treasure Island 5obert 1ouis Ste!enson The piratical coming of age of "im Haw*ins, who disco!ers a map of Treasure Island among an old sea captain's possessions , and then follows it /arrots, 'pieces of eight' and the lo!able, but morally ambiguous 1ong "ohn Sil!er SCI5$I $ran0enstein <ary Shelley The great genius of Shelley's no!el has often been o!erwhelmed by images of schloc*y bolt+ nec*ed '>ran*ensteins' %rought to life by ;r Jictor >ran*enstein, Shelley)s creature is part gothic monster, part 5omantic hero T.enty Thousand Lea*ues -nder the Sea "ules Jerne &mong the deep+sea !olcanoes, shoals of swirling fish, giant s(uid and shar*s, $aptain 6emo steers the 6autilus 6emo is the renegade scientist par e7cellence, a man madly in!enti!e in his (uest for re!enge The Ti&e %achine H 2 Wells & seminal wor* of dystopian fiction, Wells's tale of the !oyages of the Time Tra!eller in the distant future -&;I:@,B:8. is also a crac*ing ad!enture story Brave ,e. World &ldous Hu7ley Ignorance is far from bliss in Hu7ley)s terrible !ision of a future of rampant consumerism, worthless free lo!e, routine drug use and cultural passi!ity 6789 2eorge Orwell So persuasi!e and chilling was the world summoned up here that 'Orwellian' has entered the language as shorthand for go!ernment control $hilling, wry and romantic, it is abo!e all a passionate cry for freedom The ay o" the Tri""ids "ohn Wyndham Shifty So!iets and the clipped !ernacular ma*e this a >ifties horror story %ut as humans cope with disasters -mass blinding by meteor shower; ruthless wal*ing, flesh+eating plants. the tale becomes taut, terrifying, and far from ridiculous

$oundation Isaac &simo! '2reat 2ala7yN' It is not for literary brilliance that one approaches the first in the >oundation series, but rather for the sweeping grandeur of &simo!)s epic uni!erse+wide tale of the decline and fall of empires Once you'!e finished this, 89 no!els and countless more short stories await :;;6< A S!ace Odyssey &rthur $ $lar*e The first in $lar*e's (uartet was written as a no!el and, in collaboration with Stanley ?ubric*, as a film script &s the ;isco!ery One mission drifts towards Saturn, $lar*e creates the embodiment of the perils of computer technology, H&1L::: o Androids rea& o" Electric Shee!= /hilip ? ;ic* ;ic*'s masterpiece (uestions what it is that distinguishes us as human, as we follow 5ic* ;ec*ard on his mission to 'retire' recalcitrant androids Spawned 5idley Scott's %lade 5unner ,euro&ancer William 2ibson & !iolent slab of cyberpun* sci+fi, in which techie acti!ities -artificial intelligence, hac*ing, !irtual reality. are married with a grimy, anarchic, slangy sensibility, and a cast of hustlers, hac*ers and jun*ies trying to ma*e sense of a world ruled by corporations C'I%E The Talented %r 'i!ley /atricia Highsmith Tom 5ipley is one of @:th+century literature's most disturbingly fascinating characters0 a sua!e, charming serial *iller, who's utterly amoral in his pursuit of la dolce !ita The %altese $alcon ;ashiell Hammett & tale of greed and deceit that's also the archetypal wor* of @:th+century detecti!e fiction0 complete with flawed hero -Sam Spade., femme fatale and a con!oluted plot that unra!els grippingly The Co&!lete Sherloc0 /ol&es Sir &rthur $onan ;oyle It's one of literature's most wonderful ironies that $onan ;oyle himself became a spiritualist so soon after creating the most famously rational character in all literature The Bi* Slee! 5aymond $handler His oeu!re may be small, but with the help of long+time protagonist /I /hilip <arlowe , who appears here for the first time , $handler helped define the genres of detecti!e fiction and, later, film noir

Tin0er1 Tailor1 Soldier1 S!y "ohn le $arrO 1e $arrO, master of the $old War no!el, follows %ritish spymaster 2eorge Smiley as he tries to unco!er a <oscow mole, and faces his ?2% nemesis, ?arla 'ed ra*on Thomas Harris Hannibal 1ecter's second literary appearance sees him called upon by old >%I chum -and near+ !ictim. Will 2raham, to help sol!e the case of the serially morbid 'Tooth >airy' %urder on the Orient E+!ress &gatha $hristie >rom Istanbul to 1ondon, Hercule /oirot's little grey cells rattle away to improbable effect as he untangles the mystery of the life and !iolent death of a sinister passenger The %urders in the 'ue %or*ue 4dgar &llan /oe /oe's blac*ly ingenious tale of brutal murder in 8Lth+century /aris establishes $ &uguste ;upin, a man of 'peculiar analytic ability', as the model for pretty much e!ery intellectual detecti!e to come The Wo&an in White Wil*ie $ollins & sensational 8Lth+century epistolary tale of women in peril adds one of the most charismatic, refined and straightforwardly fat !illains to the pantheon 3illshot 4lmore 1eonard 1eonard is *nown for his pithy dialogue and frea*y characters Here he manages to create a sweatily suspenseful thriller, with a married couple as the une7pected heroes BOO3S T/AT C/A,GE as 3a!ital ?arl <ar7 His thin*ing may not be as popular as it was in the Si7ties and Se!enties, but it's as rele!ant The cardinal criti(ue of the capitalist system The 'i*hts o" %an Tom /aine Written during the heady days of the >rench 5e!olution, /aine's pamphlet + by introducing the concept of human rights + remains one of modern democracy's fundamental te7ts The Social Contract "ean+"ac(ues 5ousseau '<an is born free; and e!erywhere he is in chains ' How are we to reconcile our indi!idual rights and freedoms with li!ing in a society' T/E WO'L

e&ocracy in A&erica &le7is de Toc(ue!ille This treatise loo*ed to the new country's flourishing democracy in the early 8Lth century and the progressi!e model it offered Pold) 4urope On War $arl !on $lausewitH The first, and probably still foremost, treatise on the art of modern warfare The /russian general loo*ed beyond the battlefield to war's place in the broader political conte7t The Prince 6iccolo <achia!elli Written during his e7ile from the >lorentine 5epublic, <achia!elli's bible of realpoliti* offers the ultimate mandate for those -still+too+many. politicians who !alue *eeping power abo!e dispensing justice Leviathan Thomas Hobbes Hobbes's call for rule by an absolute so!ereign may not sound too progressi!e, but it was based on the then+groundbrea*ing belief that all men are naturally e(ual On the Inter!retation o" rea&s Sigmund >reud ;rawing on his own dreams, plus those of his patients, >reud asserted that dreams , by tapping into our unconscious , held the *ey to understanding what ma*es us tic* On the Ori*in o" S!ecies $harles ;arwin 6o other boo* has so transformed how we loo* at the natural world and man*ind's origins L'Encyclo!>die ;iderot, et al Subtitled '& Systematic ;ictionary of the Sciences, &rts, and $rafts', with contributions by Joltaire, <ontes(uieu, ;iderot and others, the EM+!olume encyclopedia was the ultimate document of 4nlightenment thought BOO3S T/AT C/A,GE (O-' WO'L

2en and the Art o" %otorcycle %aintenance 5obert < /irsig /irsig's feel+good memoir about a father+son motorcycle trip across &merica became the biggest+selling philosophy boo* of all time Jonathan Livin*ston Sea*ull 5ichard %ach %ach's fable about a dreamy seagull called "onathan, who see*s to soar abo!e the ideology of his floc*, became a 6ew &ge classic, and is dedicated to the 'real seagull in all of us'

The /itchhi0er's Guide to the Gala+y ;ouglas &dams Originally broadcast on 5adio 9, this (uotable comedy about a hapless 4nglishman and his alien friend pro!ed that sci+fi could be cle!er and funny The Ti!!in* Point <alcolm 2ladwell 2ladwell uses e!erything from teenage smo*ing to Sesame Street to show how one person's small idea, or way of thin*ing, can spar* a social epidemic The Beauty %yth 6aomi Wolf Wolf, the contro!ersial &merican feminist -and teenage !ictim of anore7ia., argues that women's insecurities stem from society's demands on them either to be beautiful or face judgment /o. to Coo0 ;elia Smith The coo*ery (ueen's series is credited with teaching culinary delin(uents how to prepare good wholesome food from scratch Her latest boo*, How to $heat at $oo*ing, does the opposite A (ear in Provence /eter <ayle >or those who'!e dreamt of lea!ing it all to li!e in the South of >rance, e7pat /eter <ayle's diary offers a dose of reality, from une7pected snowfalls to an algae+coated swimming pool A Child Called 'It' ;a!e /elHer /elHer's graphic account of his abusi!e childhood topped the bestseller lists worldwide Since then, he's had to fight off accusations of embellishment and fantasy from family members Eats1 Shoots and Leaves 1ynne Truss In an attempt to stamp out poor punctuation, Truss compiled a li!ely and useful account for all those in doubt about how to use an apostrophe Schott's Ori*inal %iscellany %en Schott ;ip into Schott's compendium of tri!ia and impress your friends with such (uestions as, ';o you *now who ma*es the Queen's por* sausages'' The answer0 <us*s of 6ewmar*et /ISTO'( The ecline and $all o" the 'o&an E&!ire 4dward 2ibbon $ompressing 8E turbulent centuries into one epic narrati!e, this is often labelled the first 'modern' history boo* 2ibbon fell bac* on sociology, rather than superstition, to e7plain 5ome's demise

A /istory o" the En*lish5S!ea0in* Peo!les Winston $hurchill Ta*ing us from $aesar's MM%$ in!asion to the %oer War's end in 8L:@, $hurchill)s four+!olume saga ma*es the proud, but now+unfashionable, connection between spea*ing 4nglish and bearing 'the torch of >reedom' A /istory o" the Crusades Ste!en 5unciman Still the landmar* account of the $rusades, %yHantine scholar 5unciman's wor* bro*e with centuries of Western tradition, claiming the crusading in!aders were guilty of a 'long act of intolerance in the name of 2od' The /istories Herodotus Ostensibly about 2reece's defeat of the in!ading /ersians in the Mth century %$, it blends fact, hearsay, legend and myth to tell tales of life in and around &ncient 2reece The /istory o" the Pelo!onnesian War Thucydides >amously fastidious o!er the reliability of his data and sources, Thucydides , with this detailed study of the @M+year struggle between &thens and Sparta , set the template for e!ery historian after him Seven Pillars o" Wisdo& T 4 1awrence 1awrence of &rabia's fascinating, self+mythologising account of how he united a string of &rab tribes and successfully led them to rebellion against their Ottoman o!erlords The An*lo5Sa+on Chronicle $ompiled at ?ing &lfred's behest in the &;IL:s, this is the earliest+*nown history of 4ngland written in old 4nglish It's also the oldest history of any 4uropean country in a !ernacular language A Peo!le's Tra*edy Orlando >iges >iges charts the 5ussian 5e!olution in star* detail, telling the tale of 'ordinary people' and boldly concluding that they 'weren't the !ictims of the 5e!olution but protagonists in its tragedy' Citi4ens< A Chronicle o" the $rench 'evolution Simon Schama %efore he was on tele!ision, /rof Schama offered L9I pages of proof that there was more to the >rench 5e!olution than fraternity, e(uality and eating ca*e The Ori*ins o" the Second World War & " / Taylor Was Hitler all that bad' Wasn't he just an opportunist who too* ad!antage of &nglo+>rench dithering and appeasement' The label 'iconoclastic' applies to few historians so well as it does to Taylor

LI#ES Con"essions St &ugustine In probably the first autobiography in Western literature, the $hurch >ather recounts his life+ journey from sinner to saint, from the boy who stole pears from a neighbour's tree to the articulator of *ey $hristian doctrines Lives o" the Caesars Suetonius $harting the li!es of "ulius $aesar, &ugustus and the 8: subse(uent 5oman emperors, with scandalous tales of imperial decadence, !ice and lunacy Lives o" the Artists Jasari The history of Italian 5enaissance art, as told through the biographies of its hea!yweight practitioners I" This is a %an /rimo 1e!i His bac*ground as an industrial chemist from Turin may not sound remar*able, but 1e!i's poised account of his hell+on+earth e7periences as a prisoner at &uschwitH undoubtedly is %e&oirs o" a $o+5/untin* %an Siegfried Sassoon He's best *nown for his anti+war poems, but Sassoon was also once popular for his semi+ autobiographical trilogy of no!els, of which this was the first E&inent #ictorians 1ytton Strachey Strachey didn't do hagiography His unflattering biographical essays on major Jictorian figures debun*ed the myth of Jictorian pre+eminence A Li"e o" Charlotte Bront? 4liHabeth 2as*ell & biography of the intriguing "ane 4yre author, by her friend and fellow+no!elist, 2as*ell One of the definiti!e 'tortured genius' biographies Good)ye to All That 5obert 2ra!es & friend of Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, 2ra!es was another 4nglishman to write unsparingly about the horrors of trench warfare The Li"e o" r Johnson %oswell He's one of 4nglish literature's all+time hea!yweights, but most of what we *now about Samuel "ohnson, the man, comes from his friend %oswell)s hearty anecdotal biog iaries &lan $lar* The late Tory </ was not one to get bogged down in matters of policy His indiscreet memoirs detailed countless e7tra+marital affairs and character assassinations of colleagues