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  • Published: 1 December 2016
  • ISBN: 9780241282618
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 128
  • RRP: $27.99

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty



The very best of James Thurber's hilarious short stories, essays and cartoons

Walter Mitty is an ordinary man living an ordinary life. But he has dreams - vivid, extraordinary day dreams - in which the life he leads is one of excitement and even adventure, in which he - a weary, put upon middle-aged man - is the hero of his own story.

A man can dream, can't he?
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is just one of the brilliant humorous and witty stories written by James Thurber and collected here.

  • Published: 1 December 2016
  • ISBN: 9780241282618
  • Imprint: Penguin Classics
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 128
  • RRP: $27.99

About the author

James Thurber

James Thurber was born in 1894 in Ohio. After leaving college, he joined the then-struggling New Yorker magazine, helping to change its fortunes with the unique wit of his writings and cartoons. He was to remain a contributor for the rest of his life. Thurber's sophisticated humour saw him achieve worldwide fame and success, with almost thirty books of fiction, cartoons, children's stories and essays translated into dozens of languages, and his most famous work, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, was made into a film with Danny Kaye as the eponymous hero. James Thurber died in 1961.

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Praise for The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

One of the great humourists

Sunday Times