Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy (1759–1767) is one of literature’s great comic masterpieces — a novel that cheerfully refuses to follow any rules, digressing, backtracking, and playing with the reader at every turn. Tristram can barely get himself born before the book is half over, so busy is Sterne with wit, whimsy, and philosophical tangents.
Beloved by writers from Samuel Johnson to Virginia Woolf, it remains a thrillingly modern read: anarchic, warm-hearted, and endlessly funny. Download this free EPUB and discover why it has delighted readers for more than 250 years.