This collection brings together six of the greatest English romance novels of all time, all published in the early nineteenth century—and all by women. Jane Austen’s novels are comedies of morals as well as manners. They show members of the upper English gentry caught between romance, marriage, love, inheritance, and respectability—all intertwined, just as they are in life. Her works feature strong, independent women such as Pride and Prejudice’s Elizabeth Bennet and Emma Woodhouse of Emma, who struggle between their own headstrong natures and the rigid social strictures of early nineteenth-century England. The Brontë sisters, Charlotte and Emily, continue the romantic interests of Austen’s works but add a unique Gothic intensity. In Charlotte’s Jane Eyre, the impoverished Jane takes a position as governess for the wealthy but aloof Mr. Rochester. Love blossoms between them, yet they are kept apart by some mysterious obstacle that blocks their happiness. Wuthering Heights is one of the greatest English novels of all time. The only novel by Emily Brontë, it is set in the stark moors of Yorkshire. It tells the tale of two intertwined families, the Earnshaws and the Lintons. Mr. Earnshaw brings a foundling into the family and names him Heathcliff. Abused and mistreated by Earnshaw’s son, Hindley, Heathcliff vows revenge. At the same time, he is passionately in love with Hindley’s sister Catherine. Eventually Heathcliff runs away and comes back years later as a wealthy gentleman. In the meantime, Catherine has married neighbor Edgar Linton. The ill-fated love between Heathcliff and Catherine forms the center point of a tragic and heartbreaking story spanning two generations. George Eliot is the pen name of Mary Ann Evans, who stands with Austen and the Brontës in the top rank of English novelists. Wrongly accused of theft and exiled from a religious community, the embittered weaver Silas Marner lives alone, living only for work and his precious hoard of money. When an orphaned child, Eppie, finds her way into his house, Silas is given the chance to transform his life. Silas Marner combines humor, symbolism, and social criticism to create an unsentimental but affectionate portrait of rural life.