The mission is clear. Get in. Get the general. Get out.

Commandos charged with freeing a U.S. general from an Alpine fortress should also be told to trust nothing – including the search-and-rescue orders just issued.

Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood go Where Eagles Dare in this twisty World War II thriller written by action master Alistair MacLean.

In a holocaustic future world, perpetually at war, where failure to conform is the ultimate crime, Winston Smith (John Hurt) rewrites history books and finds himself dreaming of escape from the all-seeing eyes of the Authorities. He embarks on a passionate (and illegal) affair with a young woman (Suzanna Hamilton) but they are soon caught and Smith undergoes a nightmarish brainwashing at the hands of the chief inquisitor O'Brien (Richard Burton).

Irresistibly magnetic on stage, mesmerizing in movies, seven times an Academy Award nominee, Richard Burton rose from humble beginnings in Wales to become Hollywood's most highly paid actor and one of England's most admired Shakespearean performers. His epic romance with Elizabeth Taylor, his legendary drinking and story-telling, his dazzling purchases (enormous diamonds, a jet, homes on several continents), and his enormous talent kept him constantly in the public eye. Yet the man behind the celebrity facade carried a surprising burden of insecurity and struggled with the peculiar challenges of a life lived largely in the spotlight.
This volume publishes Burton's extensive personal diaries in their entirety for the first time. His writings encompass many years--from 1939, when he was still a teenager, to 1983, the year before his death--and they reveal him in his most private moments, pondering his triumphs and demons, his loves and his heartbreaks. The diary entries appear in their original sequence, with annotations to clarify people, places, books, and events Burton mentions.
From these hand-written pages emerges a multi-dimensional man, no mere flashy celebrity. While Burton touched shoulders with shining lights--among them Olivia de Havilland, John Gielgud, Claire Bloom, Laurence Olivier, John Huston, Dylan Thomas, and Edward Albee--he also played the real-life roles of supportive family man, father, husband, and highly intelligent observer. His diaries offer a rare and fresh perspective on his own life and career, and on the glamorous decades of the mid-twentieth century.

During World War II, seven Allied agents are selected to rescue an American general from the impenetrable German fortress Schloss Adler. In charge of the team is British Major Smith (Richard Burton), with American Lieutenant Schaffer (Clint Eastwood) as second in command. Parachuting into the enemy territory in German uniforms, the squad discover one of their number dead on arrival, and Smith suspects that he may have a traitor amongst his unit. Alistair Maclean wrote the screenplay and the film is reported to be amongst director Quentin Tarantino's favourites.

Triple bill of classic WWII film dramas. In 'The Longest Day' (1962) an all-star international cast heads the tale of the Allied Landings in Normandy in 1944. Events are seen from various points of view, including the Germans', in an epic and spectacular style. Along with the 43 international stars, the film used 23,000 Allied troops and, despite costing over $10 million to make, it has now become one of the most successful films of its genre. John Wayne, Robert Mitchum and Henry Fonda head the cast. 'A Bridge Too Far' (1977) is Richard Attenborough's similarly star-studded account of the failed 1944 Arnheim assault. Dirk Bogarde, James Caan, Robert Redford and Sean Connery are among those battling against insurmountable odds - foul weather, bad luck, negligence on the part of intelligence officers - to secure one of the bridges essential to the Allied advance into Germany. Gene Hackman, Michael Caine and Anthony Hopkins also star. The life and times of America's most famous modern general, George Patton (George C. Scott), are recreated in 'Patton' (1970) which focuses on the general's controversial exploits during the Second World War, where he eventually gave up command of the Seventh Army after slapping a soldier and accusing him of being a coward.

Forget James Bond... and step into the real, dour and chilling world of spies and counterspies.

Oscar nominee Richard Burton is the burnt-out British agent who refuses to "come in from the cold" to take a desk job - but instead launches into the most dangerous assignment of his career, stalking a East German agent.

John Le Carre's best-selling novel provides the basis for this breathtaking thriller of espionage, intrigue, crosses and double-crosses.

First-rate performances from the entire cast are matched by a tension-packed and brilliantly plotted screenplay, with masterful direction from Martin Ritt.

The mission is clear. Get in. Get the general. Get out.

Commandos charged with freeing a U.S. general from an Alpine fortress should also be told to trust nothing – including the search-and-rescue orders just issued.

Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood go Where Eagles Dare in this twisty World War II thriller written by action master Alistair MacLean.

John Morlar, a well-known novelist, is savagely attacked in his London flat. Barely alive, he is taken to hospital. Detective Brunei is assigned to the case. He comes across Morlar's journal, which leads him to a mysterious woman named Zonfeld who is Morlar's doctor.

Zonfeld discloses that her patient is obsessed. He feels he bears an awesome telekinetic power - the power to "will" destruction and death. He can make airplanes crash, buildings crumble, start raging fires and unleash mighty floods. He believes he possesses the gift of evil, and dangerously demonstrates his power. What at first seems preposterous, soon becomes sickeningly real.

Morlar is able to wreak havoc at will. Brunei desperately wants to stop the next tragedy, but can he kill this man? If released from his mortal confines, how far can the power of his mind roam..?

Directed by Jack Gold from a script by John Briley, The Medusa Touch is a highly-effective, fast paced thriller which ends in a spectacular and spine-chilling climax.

Michael Anderson directs this classic British drama following Peter McCabe (Robert Newton), a sailor who leaves his wife and three children to fend for themselves in a Liverpool slum during the Great Depression. Then, after an absence of 14 years, Peter returns, but not to a warm welcome...

Mike Nichols' directorial debut is an adaptation of Edward Albee's controversial stage play, starring husband-and-wife Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. George (Burton) is a foul-mouthed, drunken university professor married for two decades to the equally foul-mouthed, drunken Martha (Taylor), whose father is the president of George's college. When younger married couple Nick (George Segal) and Honey (Sandy Dennis) are invited round for a nightcap, they witness a marathon of bickering and verbal abuse. The film won five Oscars, including Best Actress for Elizabeth Taylor and Best Supporting Actress for Sandy Dennis.

The Wild Geese are a fifty-man military unit for hire, comprised of mercenaries and led by Colonel Faulkner (Richard Burton), Lieutenant Shawn Fynn (Roger Moore), Rafer Janders (Richard Harris) and Pieter Coetzee (Hardy Kruger). When they are hired by sinister businessman Sir Edward Matheson (Stewart Granger), the team depart for Africa, their mission to rescue an imprisoned political leader, seize the airport and return safely to England.

Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton star in this Academy Award-winning, epic retelling of the life and loves of the Egyptian queen. Desperate to hold onto her throne in the face of Roman expansion, Cleopatra (Taylor) employs all her charms in an attempt to secure an alliance with Julius Caesar (Rex Harrison). When Caesar is subsequently murdered, however, a vulnerable Cleopatra quickly turns her affections to popular Roman general Mark Antony (Burton). But although the relationship initially fares well, it's not long before the once proud general, now emasculated by the queen's charms, is reduced to a shadow of his former self that presages the doomed lovers' ultimate fate.

Double bill of action adventures set during World War Two, directed by Brian G. Hutton and starring Clint Eastwood. In 'Kelly's Heroes' (1970), a group of soldiers led by Kelly (Eastwood) capture a German general in occupied France. He reveals the location of a bank housing 14,000 bars of Nazi gold, which Kelly and his men set out to steal. The only problem is that the bank lies 30 miles behind enemy lines. In 'Where Eagles Dare' (1968) seven Allied agents are selected to rescue an American general from the impenetrable German fortress Schloss Adler. In charge of the team is British Major Smith (Richard Burton), with American Lieutenant Schaffer (Eastwood) as second in command. Parachuting into the enemy territory in German uniforms, the squad discover one of their number dead on arrival and Smith suspects that he may have a traitor amongst his unit.

Michael Anderson directs this classic British drama following Peter McCabe (Robert Newton), a sailor who leaves his wife and three children to fend for themselves in a Liverpool slum during the Great Depression. Then, after an absence of 14 years, Peter returns, but not to a warm welcome...

HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics. `"For," said he, "there never was nor is there one chaste woman upon the face of earth."' A collection of Persian, Arabian and Indian tales dating from the 9th century, Sir Richard Burton's most well-known translation of Arabian Nights brings together ancient folklore and stories passed down from generation to generation. Featuring tales about love, history, tragedy and comedy as well as fables and fairy tales, this edition remains a well-loved collection of exotic and evocative stories. Fantastical and curious customs are bought to life by Burton's translation in stories such as `The Lovers of Bassorah', `The Concubine of Al-Maamun' and `The Hunchback's Tale'.

No library's complete without the classics! This new, enhanced leather-bound edition collects the beloved tales of Arabian Nights, translated by Sir Richard Burton. They are ancient stories, but they still enchant our imaginations today. Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. Sinbad the Sailor. Aladdin. These and the other Middle Eastern stories collected in Arabian Nights are delightful, fascinating, and fun for fans and first-time readers alike. This beautiful, leather-bound edition collects the classic tales of Arabian Nights in a new, redesigned format. Specially designed end papers, gilded edges, a ribbon bookmark, and other decorative elements enhance the reading experience, while an expert introduction provides new information and context for these well-known stories. Arabian Nights is a compelling look at a long-gone culture--and the perfect addition to any home library.

Basil Bunting, one of the greatest modernist poets, had an extraordinary life. Born in the mining village of Scotswood in Tyneside in 1900, after a largely Quaker education, during which at the age of 13 he met the love of his life, he left school in 1918 and went straight to prison as a conscientious objector. In Paris in the early 1920s after working as an artist's model and road mender he was rescued from another spell in prison by Ezra Pound and Ford Madox Ford and became Ford's assistant on the pioneering modernist magazine, the Transatlantic Review.

Excluded from France he found himself with Pound and W. B. Yeats in Rapallo on the Italian Riviera where he worked on sand boats and wrote the poems that formed the backbone of Pound's influential Active Anthology. Bunting spent the first part of the 1930s in the Canary Islands but fled to London with his young family at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. After his newly pregnant wife left him and took their two children to the US he lived on a boat on the south coast of England, trained as a seaman and captained yachts in America.

During the Second World War his knowledge of classical Persian earned him a job as a translator in Iraq, after which he served as a spy in the region culminating in his promotion to Vice Consul in Isfahan. Compelled to leave the embassy because of his remarriage to a local woman, he became Middle East correspondent for the Times until he was thrown out of Iran by Mossadeq in 1953. A barren period followed until his poetic masterpiece, Briggflatts, caught the literary world's attention in 1965.

Literary fame brought Bunting no relief from grinding poverty and he died at the age of 85, impoverished but with a lasting poetic legacy. Underneath this captivating tale of action, adventure and lasting friendships with some of the greatest writers of the 20th century (Yeats, Pound, T. S. Eliot, William Carlos Williams, Louis Zukofsky and many more) lies one of the greatest love stories of the twentieth century.

Richard Burton explores the extraordinary world of early to mid-twentieth century artistic gay Paris and in particular the links between Poulenc's sexuality, music and religious beliefs. This is the Paris of Cocteau and Radiguet, and of Dali and Bunuel, where the Catholic church was beginning to reassert its conservative morality as the influence of the French revolution and the Paris commune finally seemed to be on the wane -- a Paris where modernism and radicalism existed alongside reaction and religious faith. The disparate factors that came together in Paris during this period produced an artistic milieu quite unlike any other in Europe. And in the middle of all this was Poulenc, one of the greatest and most popular composers of the twentieth century.

Richard Burton stars in one of his earliest roles, as a shopkeeper trying to stop a water company from flooding his picturesque Welsh village. After promoting a scheme to build a huge dam above the North Wales village of Dolwyn to supply water to Liverpool, Lord Lancashire (Allan Aynesworth) finds his plans in turmoil when construction has to stop due to geological problems. Hoping to rescue his plan by opting for a cheaper scheme involving flooding the village, he dispatches Rob (Emlyn Williams), a former villager with a score to settle, to buy up the remaining land. But the discovery of old deeds by village shopkeeper Gareth (Burton) soon turns the tables on Rob's plans, provoking a tragic response.

The Wild Geese are a fifty-man military unit for hire, comprised of mercenaries and led by Colonel Faulkner (Richard Burton), Lieutenant Shawn Fynn (Roger Moore), Rafer Janders (Richard Harris) and Pieter Coetzee (Hardy Kruger). When they are hired by sinister businessman Sir Edward Matheson (Stewart Granger), the team depart for Africa, their mission to rescue an imprisoned political leader, seize the airport and return safely to England.

Based on James Barlow's novel, 'Burden of Proof',; Cathleen Burnett plays the long suffering mother who attempts to keep her wayward and viscious son in line. Richard Burton plays the confused, angry young man who cannot get to grips with his homosexuality.

Novelist John Morlar (Richard Burton) is haunted by the belief that he can, through the power of telekenesis, cause fatal disasters to occur. This obsession is reinforced when, after Morlar is assaulted, a moon mission crisis and jet crash occur in short order. The police turn to Morlar's mysterious therapist, Zonfeld (Lee Remick), to try to get to the bottom of the case.

Collection of four classic film dramas starring Elizabeth Taylor. In 'Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?' (1966), adapted from Edward Albee's controversial stage play, George (Richard Burton) is a foul-mouthed, drunken university professor married for two decades to the equally foul-mouthed, drunken Martha (Taylor), whose father is the president of George's college. When younger married couple Nick (George Segal) and Honey (Sandy Dennis) are invited round for a nightcap, they witness a marathon of bickering and verbal abuse. The film won five Oscars, including Best Actress for Elizabeth Taylor and Best Supporting Actress for Sandy Dennis. 'Cat On a Hot Tin Roof' (1958), based on the Tennesse Williams play, follows the events which transpire one long, hot Southern evening when the family of plantation patriarch Big Daddy (Burl Ives) gathers to celebrate his birthday. Both of the big man's sons are there for the party, but only one of them - Gooper (Jack Carson) - is keen to inherit the family fortune; the other, Brick (Paul Newman), a former high school athlete who now drinks constantly and refuses to sleep with his wife, Maggie (Taylor), couldn't care less. Nevertheless, Maggie would like to see some of the money, believing that it might offer some recompense for the coldness of her marriage, and Big Mama (Judith Anderson), the boys' mother, has always favoured Brick out of the two. As the night wears on, the temperature rises, skeletons emerge from closets, and the family tensions get closer and closer to breaking point. 'Giant' (1956) follows Bick Benedict (Rock Hudson), a Texas cattle baron who takes a non-Texan wife, Leslie (Taylor). The story traces two generations of his family, alongside the life of disreputable ranch-hand Jett Rink (James Dean), who strikes it rich on an oil well and falls in love with Leslie. Director George Stevens won an Oscar for his work, and the film garnered nine more nominations, including one for James Dean, who was killed in a car crash soon after filming. In 'Lassie Come Home' (1943) the Carraclough family are struggling financially and have no choice but to sell their pet collie, Lassie. Her new owner's granddaughter, Priscilla (Taylor), realises how unhappy Lassie is away from her family and helps her to escape so she can begin her long journey home.

Marcellus Gallio (Richard Burton) is a Roman centurion who wins the robe of the crucified Christ while gambling at the foot of the cross. At first insensitive to the beliefs of the new Christian church, Marcellus' possession of the robe soon begins to have a profound effect upon both him and his childhood sweetheart Diana (Jean Simmons). Meanwhile, Demetrius (Victor Mature), Marcellus' slave, is planning to leave and serve a higher master. Henry Koster's classic Biblical epic was the first film to be made using CinemaScope, the original widescreen process.