该书向普通读者介绍了32部重要的英译欧洲文学作品。从但丁的《神曲》到布莱希特的《三个便士的歌剧》,菲利普·盖斯凯尔以公认的文学经典为对象,结合作品产生时的历史和文学背景,对每一部作品进行了介绍。选文部分囊括了诗歌、散文和戏剧等主要文类,所选作家包括彼特拉克、维庸、龙沙、蒙田、塞万提斯、莫里哀、伏尔泰、卢梭、歌德、席勒、普希金、莱蒙托夫、巴尔扎克、福楼拜、波德莱尔、兰波、屠格涅夫、托尔斯泰、陀思妥耶夫斯基、易卜生、斯特林堡、汉姆生、契诃夫、高尔基、左拉、冯塔纳、普鲁斯特、曼、卡夫卡和皮兰德娄。
书中关于目前在版的和已经**的各种翻译文本的实用指南以及有关进一步阅读的**书目显示了作者作为批评家和书志学家的高超技艺。书后有四个附录,内容分别为:通过把同一文本的不同译本并列对举进行比较来讨论有关翻译的议题和问题;从各个作品的本族语原文中摘选了大量引文;对于俄国人名的形式和发音提供了指导;介绍了19世纪中叶至晚期货币的价值。
该书以希望自己探索欧洲文学的渎者为目标,是一本极富可读性和趣味性的入门书籍。

Preface
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Introduction
A European canon
Reading foreign literature in translation
The availability of translations
How this book is arranged
Ⅰ Dante and Petrarch
Italy in the early fourteenth century
Dante (1265-1321)
The Divine Comedy, 1307-21
Petrarch (1304-74)
Love Lyrics, 1327-58
Ⅱ Villon, Ronsard, and Montaigne
France from the late Middle Ages to the Renaissance
Metre and sound in French verse
Villon (1431--63+)
Poems, 1456-61
Ronsard (1524-85)
Poems, 1550-85
Montaigne (1533-92)
Essays, 1572, 1588, 1595
Ⅲ Cervantes and Moliiere
Spain and France in the seventeenth century
Cervantes (1547-1616)
Don Quixote, 1605-15
Moliere (1622-73)
Tartuffe, 1664, 1669
Ⅳ Voltaire and Rousseau
France before the Revolution
Voltaire (1694-1778),
Candide, 1759
Rousseau (1712-78),
Confessions, 1766--70
Ⅴ Goethe and Schiller
German-speaking countries in the eighteenth century
Goethe (1749-1832)
Faust, Part One, 1775-1808
Schiller (1759-1805)
Wallenstein, 1798-9
Ⅵ Pushkin and Lermontov
The Russian Empire in the nineteenth century
Pushkin (1799-1837)
Eugene Onegin, 1831
Lermontov (1814- 41)
A Hero of Our Time, 1840
Ⅶ Balzac and Flaubert
France: Restoration and the July Monarchy,1815-48
Balzac (1799-18S0)
Le Pere Goriot, 1834-5
Flaubert (1821-80)
Women and adultery in the nineteenth century
Madame Bovary, 1856--7
Ⅷ Baudelaire and Rimbaud
Ⅸ Turgenev, Tolst6y, and Dostoevsky
Ⅹ Ibsen, Strindberg, and Hamsun
Ⅺ Ch6khov and G6rky
Ⅻ Zola, Fontane, and Proust
ⅩⅢ Mann and Kafka
Appendix A: Translating Flaubert
Appendix B: Quotations from original texts and selected translations
Appendix C: The form and pronunciation of Russian names
Appendix D: The value of money in the mid- to late-nineteenth century
Copyright Acknowledgements
Index