O. Henry (1862-1910), Born William Sydney Porter, on September 11,1862, in Greensboro, North Carolina, he was the famous American short-story writer, who wrote under the pseudonym O. Henry,pioneered in picturing the lives of lower-class and middle-class New Yorkers. Porter attended school for a short time, then clerked in an uncle's drugstore. At the age of 20 he went to Texas, working first on a ranch and later as a bank teller. In 1887 he married and began to write freelance sketches. A few years later he founded a humorous weekly, the Rolling Stone . When this failed, he became a reporter and columnist on the Houston Post . He was indicted in 1896 for embezzling bank funds(actually a result of technical mismanagement),and was imprisoned in Columbus, Ohio. During his three-year incarceration, he wrote adventure stories set in Texas and Central America that quickly became popular and were collected in Cabbages and Kings .Released from prison in 1902, Porter went to New York City, his home and the setting of most of his fiction for the remainder of his life, writing prodigiously under the pen name O. Henry. His popular collections of stories included The Four Million; Heart of the West and The Trimmed Lamp; The Gentle Grafter and The Voice of the City; Options; and Whirligigs and Strictly Business. 欧·亨利,20世纪初美国著名短篇小说家,美国现代短篇小说创始人。与法国的莫泊桑、俄国的契诃夫并称为“世界三大短篇小说巨匠”。 他少年时曾一心想当画家,婚后在妻子的鼓励下开始写作。后因在银行供职时的账目问题而入狱,服刑期间开始认真写作,并以“欧·亨利”为笔名发表了大量短篇小说,引起读者广泛关注。 欧·亨利是一位高产的作家,一生共留下了一部长篇小说和三百多篇短篇小说。他的短篇小说构思精巧,风格独特,与当时其他作家着重表现纽约等大城市的上层社会不同,欧·亨利一直着力于表现繁华都会以及西部乡村里普普通通的“小人物”,描写了美国民众的日常生活以及他们对浪漫和冒险生活的追求。其以语言幽默、结局出人意料(即“欧·亨利式结尾”)而闻名于世。代表作有短篇小说《爱的牺牲》(A Service of Love)、《警察与赞美诗》(The Cop and the Anthem)、《带家具出租的房间》(The Furnished Room)、《麦琪的礼物》(The Gift of the Magi)、《最后的常春藤叶》(The Last Leaf)等。 本书为英文原版,汇集了65篇欧·亨利经典作品,同时配以原版朗读供读者免费下载,让读者边听边读,更好地提升英语水平。
01 An Adjustment of Nature 02 The Admiral 03 After 20 Years 04 Between Rounds 05 The Brief Début of Tildy 06 The Buyer From Cactus City 07 By Courier 08 The Caliph, Cupid and the Clock 09 A Call Loan 10 Caught 11 The Chair of Philanthromathematics 12 A Chaparral Christmas Gift 13 A Comedy in Rubber 14 The Coming-out of Maggie 15 Conscience in Art 16 The Cop and the Anthem 17 A Cosmopolite in a Café 18 Cupid’s Exile Number Two 19 Dickey 20 The Exact Science of Matrimony 21 The Flag Paramount 22 “Fox-in-the-Morning” 23 From the Cabby’s Seat 24 The Furnished Room 25 The Gift of the Magi 26 The Green Door 27 The Hand that Riles the World 28 Hearts and Hands 29 Hygeia at the Solito 30 Innocents of Broadway 31 Jeff Peters as a Personal Magnet 32 The Last Leaf 33 A Lickpenny Lover 34 Lost on Dress Parade 35 The Love-philter of Ikey Schoenstein 36 The Making of a New Yorker 37 Mammon and the Archer 38 Man About Town 39 Memoirs of a Yellow Dog 40 A Midsummer Masquerade 41 The Missing Chord 42 Modern Rural Sports 43 The Octopus Marooned 44 The Pimienta Pancakes 45 The Princess and the Puma 46 The Proem By the Carpenter 47 The Ransom of Mack 48 The Romance of a Busy Broker 49 Rouge et Noir 50 A Service of Love 51 Shearing the Wolf 52 Ships 53 Shoes 54 Sisters of the Golden Circle 55 The Skylight Room 56 Smith 57 Springtime à La Carte 58 Squaring the Circle 59 A Strange Story 60 Telemachus, Friend 61 Tobin’s Palm 62 An Unfinished Story 63 The Vitagraphoscope 64 The Voice of The City 65 Witches’ Loaves
以下为对购买帮助不大的评价