The world-class writers featured in this collection are adept at conjuring the depth of passion that surrounds all stories of love and loss. The short story form is perfect for capturing the uplift and dizzying heights that accompany a new object of affection, as well as the queasy unease and bottomless longing of lost loves.

Includes: "The Lady with the Dog" by Anton Chekhov; "Love Sonnets" by William Shakespeare; "Rappuccini's Daughter" by Nathaniel Hawthorne; "The Piazza" by Herman Melville; "Coming, Aphrodite!" by Willa Cather; and "The Dead" by James Joyce.

Various narrators.