ELT & Literary Studies Books

4574 products


  • The Food Almanac: Volume Two

    HarperCollins Publishers The Food Almanac: Volume Two

    5 in stock

    Book SynopsisThe Food Almanac II is an annual, seasonal collection of recipes and stories celebrating the joy of food – a dazzling, diverse mix of memoir, history, short stories and poems alongside recipes, cooking tips, menus and reading lists. Following on from The Food Almanac, which was shortlisted for the Jane Grigson Trust Award and the Fortnum & Mason Food & Drink Awards and received a tranche of stunning reviews, the second in the series offers another fascinating collection of recipes and stories. Prepare to go on a seasonal and joyful journey of food and what it means to different people. This curation is a dynamic, diverse mix of history, memoir, stories and poems, alongside recipes, cooking tips and techniques, menus and reading lists – from Caroline Eden describing the dining car on the Siberian Express to Diana Henry honouring the softness of autumn, from Simon Hopkinson discussing the glory of puddings to Russell Norman celebrating bitterness in the beautiful form of chicory and its many Italian varieties. Each month includes a seasonal three-course menu from food writers such as Jeremy Lee, Tommi Miers, Emily Scott and Calum Franklin, plus additional recipes from the likes of Mary Berry, Asma Khan, Darina Allen and Gill Meller – there is an abundance of thought-provoking, hunger-making food writing for you to tuck into, whatever the season. This book is an inspirational companion in the kitchen and an enriching, comforting read for the armchair cook. Join Miranda York, editor of At The Table, as she guides you through the year, accompanied by legendary food writers, lauded chefs, up-and-coming poets and award-winning novelists.Trade Review‘Even more handsome and diverting than the first. A gorgeous mixture of menus, food writing and book lists for every month of the year. A book to read.’ - Diana Henry 'Beautifully illustrated, winningly written' – The Times 'Beautifully illustrated and produced, it’s a book to curl up with as we head towards the darker months.' – Telegraph Weekend 'What better gift for a foodie?' -The Bookseller 'The perfect book to tuck into for a long read during the cold days and nights of winter and then dip back into throughout the year.' – The Independent 'A literary pick-and-mix by your favourite food writers…suitable to enjoy snuggling under the duvet, with Love Actually on a loop.’ – The Oldie 'A lovely, convivial celebration of all that is good about food.' – The Simple Things 'This is one for the armchair cook who likes to dip in and out of a volume of good food writing. Simply lovely. – The Irish Sunday Times 'This is a book to keep both in the kitchen and on your bedside table. Reading it felt as soothing as podding broad beans. This collection of seasonal thoughts & recipes is packed full of delicious treats from wonderful food writers, from Claudia Roden to Diana Henry, from Itamar Srulovich to Meera Sodha.' – Bee Wilson "A joy for anyone who loves reading about food, The Food Almanac weaves poetry, recipes, essays and illustrations together to make a book that will carry you through the year. Rich, diverse and thoughtful." – Diana Henry "Not just a book for all seasons, but for all moods too – a timeless, eclectic, truly satisfying feast of great food writing." – Felicity Cloake "A brilliantly curated collection of work from the best, freshest and most thought provoking voices in food." – Tim Hayward "The Food Almanac is a tonic for the palate and the mind." – Fuchsia Dunlop

    5 in stock

    £19.80

  • Words That Burn

    Little, Brown Book Group Words That Burn

    7 in stock

    Book SynopsisFollowing the success of CATCHING LIFE BY THE THROAT, Josephine Hart compiles more poetry from the like of such poets as Milton, Byron, Keats, Shelley, Browning, Frost and Lowell. An audio CD accompanies.Trade Review** 'For all ages . . . [the poets'] work is enhanced by some of our greatest actors' FT MAGAZINE * ** 'The performances illuminate afresh’ *SUNDAY TIMES * ** 'How gratifying for once to find an audiobook that's a million times better than its print counterpart . . . Inspired’ *GUARDIAN * ** 'Live readings by good voices are a terrific idea. All the greats are here’ *BOOKSELLER

    7 in stock

    £7.49

  • The Daphne Du Maurier Companion

    Little, Brown Book Group The Daphne Du Maurier Companion

    5 in stock

    Book Synopsis'A marvellous celebration of du Maurier's life, work and cultural legacy' SARAH WATERS 'She wrote exciting plots, she was highly skilled at arousing suspense' GUARDIAN 'One of the last century's most original literary talents ' DAILY TELEGRAPH Daphne du Maurier is one of Britain's best-loved bestselling authors. Her writing captured the imagination in a way that few have been able to equal. Rebecca, her most famous novel was a huge success on first publication and brought du Maurier international fame. This enduring classic remains one of the nation's favourite books. In this celebration of Daphne du Maurier's life and achievements, today's leading writers, critics and academics discuss the novels, short stories and biographies that made her one of the most spellbinding and genre-defying authors of her generation. The film versions of her books are also explored, including Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca and The Birds and Nicholas Roeg's Don't Look Now. Featuring interviews with du Maurier's family and a long-lost short story by the author herself, this is the indispensable companion to her work.Contributors include Sarah Dunant, Sally Beauman, Margaret Forster, Antonia Fraser, Michael Holroyd, Lisa Jardine, Julie Myerson, Justine Picardie and Minette Walters.Trade ReviewShe wrote exciting plots, she was highly skilled at arousing suspense, and she was, too, a writer of fearless originality * Guardian *One of the last century's most original literary talents * Daily Telegraph *A marvellous celebration of du Maurier's life, work and cultural legacy; an indispensable guide to the writer and her art -- Sarah WatersA storyteller of cunning and genius -- Sally BeaumanNo other popular writer has so triumphantly defied classification . . . She satisfied all the questionable criteria of popular fiction, and yet satisfied the exacting requirements of "real literature", something very few novelists ever do -- Margaret ForsterA marvellous celebration of du Maurier's life, work and cultural legacy; an indispensable guide to the writer and her art * Sarah Waters *

    5 in stock

    £11.69

  • Afternoons with Harper Lee

    NewSouth, Incorporated Afternoons with Harper Lee

    1 in stock

    Book SynopsisImagine sitting with an esteemed writer on his or her front porch somewhere in the world and swapping life stories. Dr. Wayne Flynt got the opportunity to do just this with Nelle Harper Lee. In a friendship that blossomed over a dozen years starting when Lee relocated back to Alabama after having had a stroke, Flynt and his wife Dartie became regular visitors at the assisted living facility that was Lee’s new home. And there the conversation began. It began where it always begins with Southern storytellers, with an invitation to "Come in, sit down, and stay a while."The stories exchanged ranged widely over the topics of Alabama history, Alabama folklore, family genealogy, and American literature, of course. On the way from beginning to end there were many detours: talks about Huntingdon College; The University of Alabama; New York City; the United Kingdom; Garden City, Kansas; and Mobile, Alabama, to name just a few. Wayne and his wife were often joined by Alice Lee, the oldest Lee sister, a living encyclopedia on the subject of family genealogy, and middle sister Louise Lee Conner. The hours spent visiting, in intimate closeness, are still cherished by Wayne Flynt. They yielded revelations large and small, which have been shaped into Afternoons with Harper Lee. Part memoir, part biography, this book offers a unique window into the life and mind and preoccupations of one of America’s best-loved writers. Flynt and Harper Lee and her sisters learned a great deal from each other, and though this is not a history book, their shared interest in Alabama and its history made this extraordinary work possible.

    1 in stock

    £21.95

  • Medievalism: a Critical History

    Boydell & Brewer Ltd Medievalism: a Critical History

    1 in stock

    Book SynopsisAn accessibly-written survey of the origins and growth of the discipline of medievalism studies. The field known as "medievalism studies" concerns the life of the Middle Ages after the Middle Ages. Originating some thirty years ago, it examines reinventions and reworkings of the medieval from the Reformation to postmodernity,from Bale and Leland to HBO's Game of Thrones. But what exactly is it? An offshoot of medieval studies? A version of reception studies? Or a new form of cultural studies? Can such a diverse field claim coherence? Should it be housed in departments of English, or History, or should it always be interdisciplinary? In responding to such questions, the author traces the history of medievalism from its earliest appearances in the sixteenth century to the present day, across a range of examples drawn from the spheres of literature, art, architecture, music and more. He identifies two major modes, the grotesque and the romantic, and focuses on key phases of the development of medievalism in Europe: the Reformation, the late eighteenth century, and above all the period between 1815 and 1850, which, he argues, represents the zenith of medievalist cultural production. He also contends that the 1840s were medievalism's one moment of canonicity in several European cultures at once. After that, medievalism became a minority form, rarely marked with cultural prestige, though always pervasive and influential. Medievalism: a Critical History scrutinises several key categories - space, time, and selfhood - and traces the impact of medievalism on each. It will be the essential guide to a complex and still evolving field of inquiry. David Matthews is Professor of Medieval and Medievalism Studies at the University of Manchester.Trade ReviewA major new work on medievalism, it deserves to be studied by students or scholars interested in this latest period of a medieval revival. * PARERGON *This book is a highly informative, accessible, and occasionally humorous guide for anyone interested in learning about medievalism on a macro-scale. * TOEBI *Matthews' account of the history and contemporary status of medievalism is both highly readable (he is an elegant stylist) and frequently provocative. . . . [He] offers a fresh overview and compelling meta-commentary on the history and practice of medievalism, focusing on its uneasy relationship with medieval studies. * THE MEDIEVAL REVIEW *In his well-researched book, Medievalism: A Critical History, David Matthews provides a foundational study for the multidisciplinary field of medievalism studies. * MEDIEVALLY SPEAKING *Tracing the history of medievalism from the 16th century to today, the author closely examines significant phases in the development of medievalism studies, paying special attention to the period between 1815 and 1850, which he cogently argues was the apogee of medievalism in European popular culture, and provides the foundation for the relationship between medievalism and medieval studies. Recommended. * CHOICE *Table of ContentsIntroduction How Many Middle Ages? "Welcome to the Current Middle Ages": Asynchronous Medievalism This Way to the Middle Ages: The Spaces of Medievalism On Being Medieval: Medievalist Selves and Societies Wemmick's Castle: The Limits of Medievalism Realism in the Crypt: The Reach of Medievalism Conclusion: Against a Synthesis: Medievalism, Cultural Studies, and Antidisciplinarity Afterword Appendix I: The Survey of Reenactors Appendix II: Key Moments in Medievalism Bibliography

    1 in stock

    £19.99

  • Guidance for Women in Twelfth-Century Convents

    Boydell & Brewer Ltd Guidance for Women in Twelfth-Century Convents

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisCollection of letters and texts offering guidance for nuns, and including selections from Abelard's letters to Heloise. These translated letters and texts composed for younger and older women in twelfth-century convents illuminate the powerful medieval ideals of virginity and chastity. Abelard's history of women's roles in the church and his letteron women's education, both written for Heloise in her work as abbess, are seen here alongside previously untranslated letters and texts for abbesses and nuns in England and France. An interpretive essay explores the practical and spiritual engagement of women's convents with medieval commemorative and memorial practices, showing that the professional concern of women religious with death goes far beyond the stereotype of nuns as dead to the world, or enclosed in living death. VERA MORTON gained an MA in Medieval Studies at the University of Liverpool in 1994. JOCELYN WOGAN-BROWNE is Professor of English at Fordham University, NY.Trade ReviewA significant and lasting contribution to the field of medieval women's religious literature and culture. -- DIANE WATT, THE MEDIEVAL REVIEW

    15 in stock

    £19.99

  • The Closet

    Princeton University Press The Closet

    3 in stock

    Book SynopsisTrade Review"Finalist for the Mavis Gallant Award for Non-Fiction, Quebec Writers’ Federation""The Closet is a major accomplishment that promises to be the definitive word on its subject."---Beth Kowaleski Wallace, Eighteenth-Century Studies"Bobker’s study succeeds in illuminating a fascinating topic with a wealth of detail pulled from various disciplines. . . it also shows the way monographs may go beyond a reconstruction of the past to include examining what this version of the past means for the present."---Rachel Ramsey, Eighteenth-Century Fiction"Providing a careful look at 18th-century historical and fictional texts, Bobker expands contemporary and commonplace ideas of the closet, its early use, and how it was initially developed. . . . Recommended." * Choice Reviews *"[This book] is a kind of cabinet of curiosities in itself, a curated collection to delight, educate and intrigue the reader and including in its wide scope both architectural and social history, queer theory and classic English literature."---Sue Nicholson, pepysdiary.com"Smart, enjoyable, and ground-breaking."---Mary Peace, ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640-1830

    3 in stock

    £25.50

  • Imagining India in Modern China

    Columbia University Press Imagining India in Modern China

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisGal Gvili examines how Chinese writers’ image of India shaped the making of a new literature and spurred efforts to achieve literary decolonization. She argues that multifaceted visions of Sino-Indian connections empowered Chinese literary figures to resist Western imperialism and its legacies through novel forms and genres.Trade ReviewGvili’s brilliant study unearths the archives of modern China’s India and their stakes for the present. Imagining India in Modern China showcases the importance of Indian literature to Chinese anticolonial thought. More startlingly, it has us revisit the British Empire’s role in India-China relations as a literary—and not just a historical—mediation. -- Tamara T. Chin, author of Savage Exchange: Han Imperialism, Chinese Literary Style, and the Economic ImaginationThis book frees us from the usual story of China and the West and points to new horizons for scholarship and teaching. Imagining India in Modern China will astonish readers with its rich array of sources and its stories of writers and thinkers who traveled—and read, wrote, and translated—across the Pacific and Indian Oceans. -- Michael Gibbs Hill, author of Lin Shu, Inc.: Translation and the Making of Modern Chinese CultureRich in historical detail, Imagining India in Modern China offers a fascinating look at the development of comparative anticolonial thinking and its imagination of a shared precolonial Asian past. Gvili shows how this attempt to get past the colonial world struggled with the dominance of its knowledge practices, especially those codified in English. An invaluable work for scholars of world literature and Global South literature and thought. -- Aamir R. Mufti, author of Forget English! Orientalisms and World LiteraturesImagining India in Modern China offers an outstanding and much-needed analysis of the Chinese engagement with Indian literature during the twentieth century. Through detailed case studies and by demonstrating the possibilities and limitations of the “south-south” paradigm, Gvili makes significant contributions to the fields of postcolonial studies, Asian literature, and China-India studies. -- Tansen Sen, author of India, China, and the World: A Connected HistoryGal Gvili's remarkable Imagining India in Modern China is a fascinating and pathbreaking exploration of the importance of India to modern Chinese literature and culture, and in particular the anticolonial dynamics of the Chinese Indian imagination. Contributing significantly to the decolonization of both comparative literature and Asian studies and reconfiguring China-India engagement, this book charts much-needed scholarly pathways. -- Karen Thornber, author of Global Healing: Literature, Advocacy, CareImagining India will offer provocative reading for all those working on China and the Global South, as well as on issues of realism and religion in modern Chinese literature. * Modern Chinese Literature and Culture Resource Center *Table of ContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: South-North-South1. Unsettling the Violence of Comparison2. What Is Rising There in the East?3. Folklore, (Il)literacy, and Cyclical Realism4. Śakuntalā in ChinaEpilogue: After 1962: The Ongoing Literary Work of MourningNotesBibliographyIndex

    15 in stock

    £21.25

  • Poststructuralism

    Oxford University Press Poststructuralism

    3 in stock

    Book SynopsisVery Short Introductions: Brilliant, Sharp, InspiringPoststructuralism challenges traditional ways of thinking about human beings and our relation to the world. Language, meaning, and culture are all reappraised, and with them assumptions about what it''s possible for us to know. More interested in posing sharply focused questions than in reassuring with certainties, its theorists tend to clarify the options, while leaving them open to debate. At once sceptical towards inherited authority and positive about future possibilities, poststructuralism asks above all that we reflect on its findings.In this Very Short Introduction, Catherine Belsey traces the key arguments that have led poststructuralists to challenge traditional theories of language and culture. In this new edition, such well-known figures as Barthes, Foucault, and Derrida are joined by less famous theorists, and examples are drawn from both high art and popular culture. Shakespeare features alongside advertising and Christmas cards, as well as Lewis Carroll, Marcel Duchamp, Toni Morrison, and the tantalizing lithographs of M. C. Escher.ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.Trade ReviewA wonderfully clear account * Guardian *Table of ContentsPreface by Neil Badmington 1: Creatures of difference 2: Difference and culture 3: The differed subject 4: Difference or truth? 5: Difference in the world 6: Dissent References Further reading Glossary Index

    3 in stock

    £9.49

  • Culture and Society: 1780–1950

    Vintage Publishing Culture and Society: 1780–1950

    2 in stock

    Book SynopsisAcknowledged as a masterpiece of materialist criticism, this book delves into the complex ways economic reality shapes the imagination. Surveying two hundred years of history and English literature – from George Eliot to George Orwell – Williams provides insights into the social and economic forces that have shaped British culture and society. Provocative and revolutionary in its day, this work overturned conventional thinking about the development of a common British mentality.Trade ReviewHe was the foremost political thinker of his generation in Britain who in his most formidable books, Culture And Society, The Long Revolution and The Country And The Town, redrew the map of our cultural history, and elsewhere made heroic interventions in the main political debates of his time * Guardian *For those who read English in the '60s, it was common to revere Williams as both a rock of integrity and a pathfinder for new ways of seeing culture, communication, class and democracy * Independent *Brave, intelligent, and disciplined...a most impressive work -- C. P. SnowPenetrating, lucid, objective, and also honestly engaged...the best reasoned plea that I have read for a common culture -- Angus WilsonBrilliantly intelligent...a good critic and also an original thinker -- Stuart Hampshire

    2 in stock

    £11.69

  • The Country and the City

    Vintage Publishing The Country and the City

    7 in stock

    Book SynopsisTaking inspiration from classic authors from Jane Austen to Thomas Hardy, Williams shines a light on our society’s changing views of the rural and industrial landscapes in which we work and live.Our collective notion of the city and country is irresistibly powerful. The city as the seat of enlightenment, sophistication, power and greed is in profound contrast with an innocent, peaceful, backward countryside. Examining literature since the sixteenth century, Williams traces the development of our conceptions of these two traditional poles of life. His groundbreaking study casts the country and city as central symbols for the social and economic changes associated with capitalist development.WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY TRISTRAM HUNTTrade ReviewWhile written with the energy of political engagement, it is a critically generous book... Even where you would read something differently, there is space to disagree -- John Mullan * Guardian *His complex character, indeed his whole life, was held together by two qualities - scholarship and political conviction - which made him a major influence on three decades of political thought * Independent *I went back to my own edition of The Country and the City... Certain books are held dear because they are also psychic landmarks revealing where and how they helped us come into consciousness. Inevitably, our perception of the world continues to be informed by such texts long after the precise details of their contents have been forgotten. -- Geoff Dyer * New Statesman *He was the foremost political thinker of his generation in Britain who in his most formidable books, Culture And Society, The Long Revolution and The Country and the City, redrew the map of our cultural history, and elsewhere made heroic interventions in the main political debates of his time * Guardian *The first thing that struck me about this book when I read it as an undergraduate was the personable charm of the narrator. Embarking on a topic which could hardly be broader or grander: the study of how literature has described the world; he starts with his own country, with his own city. His emotion about his birthplace his sense of belonging, is so powerful, that the book reads at times like an autobiography, like a love-letter to the country of his childhood -- Philippa Gregory * Independent *

    7 in stock

    £11.69

  • Cornelius Nepos, Life of Hannibal: Latin text, notes, maps, illustrations and vocabulary

    15 in stock

    £22.59

  • Raw,   Weirdo,  and Beyond: American Alternative

    McMullen Museum of Art, Boston College Raw, Weirdo, and Beyond: American Alternative

    1 in stock

    Book SynopsisAn extensively illustrated catalog for an exhibition of alternative comics, featuring essays that offer interdisciplinary perspectives. This catalog accompanies an exhibition of alternative comics from the 1980s and 1990s with a particular focus upon artists who contributed to the anthologies Raw (198091) and Weirdo (198194) and comics from venues such as alternative newspapers and independent presses. Following the popularity and eventual decline of underground comics in the 1960s and 1970s, this next generation of cartoonists explored more complex themes and forms and garnered eclectic readers in new markets. Featuring 180 color illustrations, this book comprehensively examines the world of these comics from interdisciplinary perspectives. Essayists from art historical, literary, and other fields focus on the role of influential editors and publishers as well as the strategies artists employed to encourage readers to take the art form seriously. Subjects include the aesthetics of Raw and Weirdo, the punk-influenced work of Gary Panter, and the genre-breaking work of the Hernandez Brothers.

    1 in stock

    £45.60

  • The Language of Languages

    Seagull Books London Ltd The Language of Languages

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisWith clear, conversational prose, this is the first book dedicated entirely to Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s writings on translation. Through his many critically acclaimed novels, stories, essays, plays, and memoirs, Kenyan writer Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o has been at the forefront of world literature for decades. He has also been, in his own words, “a language warrior,” fighting for indigenous African languages to find their rightful place in the literary world. Having begun his writing career in English, Ngũgĩ shifted to writing in his native language Gikũyũ in 1977, a stance both creatively and politically significant. For decades now, Ngũgĩ has been translating his Gikũyũ works into English himself, and he has used many platforms to champion the practice and cause of literary translations, which he calls “the language of languages.” This volume brings together for the first time Ngũgĩ’s essays and lectures about translation, written and delivered over the past two decades. Here we find Ngũgĩ discussing translation as a conversation between cultures; proposing that dialogue among African languages is the way to unify African peoples; reflecting on the complexities of auto-translation or translating one’s own work; exploring the essential task translation performed in the history of the propagation of thought; and pleading for the hierarchy of languages to be torn down. He also shares his many experiences of writing across languages, including his story The Upright Revolution, which has been translated into more than a hundred languages around the globe and is the most widely translated text written by an African author. At a time when dialogues between cultures and peoples are more essential than ever, The Language of Languages makes an outspoken case for the value of literature without borders. Table of Contents1.Translation: Towards a Global Conversation among Languages and Cultures2.Finding Our Way: Dialogue Among Our Languages is the Way to the Unity of African Peoples3.Translation, Restoration and a Global Culture4.Encounters with Translation: A Globalectic View5.Languages as Bridges6.Preface to Kurdish Translation of Decolonising the Mind7.Archipelago of Treasures8.Adventures in Translation9.The Politics of Translation: Notes Towards an African Language Policy

    15 in stock

    £13.29

  • American Trickster: Trauma, Tradition and Brer

    Rowman & Littlefield International American Trickster: Trauma, Tradition and Brer

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisOur fascination with the trickster figure, whose presence is global, stems from our desire to break free from the tightly regimented structures of our societies. Condemned to conform to laws and rules imposed by governments, communities, social groups and family bonds, we revel in the fantasy of the trickster whose energy and cunning knows no bounds and for whom nothing is sacred. One such trickster is Brer Rabbit, who was introduced to North America through the folktales of enslaved Africans. On the plantations, Brer Rabbit, like Anansi in the Caribbean, functioned as a resistance figure for the enslaved whose trickery was aimed at undermining and challenging the plantation regime. Yet as Brer Rabbit tales moved from the oral tradition to the printed page in the late nineteenth-century, the trickster was emptied of his potentially powerful symbolism by white American collectors, authors and folklorists in their attempt to create a nostalgic fantasy of the plantation past. American Trickster offers readers a unique insight into the cultural significance of the Brer Rabbit trickster figure, from his African roots and through to his influence on contemporary culture. Exploring the changing portrayals of the trickster figure through a wealth of cultural forms including folktales, advertising, fiction and films the book scrutinises the profound tensions between the perpetuation of damaging racial stereotypes and the need to keep African-American folk traditions alive. Emily Zobel Marshall argues that Brer Rabbit was eventually reclaimed by twentieth-century African-American novelists whose protagonists ‘trick’ their way out of limiting stereotypes, break down social and cultural boundaries and offer readers practical and psychological methods for challenging the traumatic legacies of slavery and racism.Trade ReviewAmerican Trickster: Trauma, Tradition and Brer Rabbit lays out all of the ironies embedded in the story of how this trickster tale came into its own as African American folklore, directly related to the lives of Blacks within plantation culture, only to be appropriated in the form of plantation fantasies by White collectors as an alibi for the system of slavery the tales worked to circumvent and subvert. Zobel-Marshall’s study foregrounds the rich and complex cultural history and impact of Brer Rabbit trickster tales within African American, American, and global culture, from cultural appropriation and alienation to the cultural reappropriation of the tales by African American authors to overcome the trauma of their past. -- Anne Duggan, Professor of French, Wayne State UniversityEmily Zobel Marshall traces the figure of Brer Rabbit across African American history and culture from the Plantations to the fiction of Toni Morrison. This book is a wonderfully subtle examination of why the story of Brer Rabbit is about resistance, survival and ambivalence. -- Susan Watkins, Professor, School of Cultural Studies & Humanities, Leeds Beckett UniversityThe origins and cultural specificity of the Brer Rabbit stories - fables of a trickster whose cunning overcomes adverse circumstances and adversaries - have been contested in fierce exchanges over decades. Writing in a clear and concise style in American Trickster, Emily Zobel Marshall teases apart and ably illuminates this complicated cultural phenomenon in a way which, though academically rigorous, will also enthral readers unfamiliar with Brer Rabbit's complexity. Drawing on a wealth of research, Zobel Marshall's close textural reading weaves together an impressive tapestry of ownership and remembrance. She is a skilled navigator charting Brer Rabbit's brisk and challenging journey, from the stories' African roots through to their sanitised renditions in support of a mythologised, idyllic ante-bellum South, before their eventual reclamation by African American storytellers. In doing so at this time of cultural crisis, with the kind of beguiling wit worthy of her subject, Zobel Marshall reminds us of the importance of keeping the past in the present. -- Colin Grant, Author, Historian, BBC Radio Producer and JournalistCountless millions of American and European children—including epic-oriented presidents (“Teddy” Roosevelt) and genteel UK writers (Beatrix Potter)—grew up on Uncle Remus & Brer Rabbit, Joel Chandler Harris’ whitewashed expropriation of African-American trickster-lore. Marshall, yoking Harris’ tales to European and American racial tastes, demonstrates that classic tricksters—Hermes, Anansi, Brer Rabbit—have long been in, and walked among, us. For those attuned to the cultural history and politics of trickster-lore and African-American literary responses, American Trickster is a welcome addition. -- Gregory E. Rutledge, author of The Epic Trickster in American Literature: From Sunjata to So(u)l (2013)With a far-weaving scholarly eye, Emily Zobel Marshall liberates Brer Rabbit from the cuddly context of children's bedtime stories into the subversive figure of the trans-forming trickster who provides a healing gateway out of the crippling cycle of trans-Atlantic trauma. In this work Zobel Marshall crucially explores Brer Rabbit within the wide spectrum of the trickster, not only as a timely reminder of the fluidity of identity, but as an empowering folk-muse whose presence resonates from the oral tradition to African-American novelist, Toni Morrison's literary landscape. -- John Agard, Poet, Performer, Playwright and AuthorTable of ContentsIntroduction List of Illustrations Chapter 1: African Trickster in the Americas Chapter 2: Anansi and Brer Rabbit: The Trickster and the Dynamics of Racial Representation Chapter 3: Harris, Jones Jr. and Fortier: The Paradox of the Collector’s Delight Chapter 4: From Bugs Bunny to Peter Rabbit: Problematising Popular Adaptations Chapter 5: Writing Back to Remus: Cheating the Cycle of Trauma in the Fiction of Ralph Ellison and Nella Larsen Chapter 6: Toni Morrison: Brer Rabbit Reclaimed Bibliography

    Out of stock

    £93.60

  • American Trickster: Trauma, Tradition and Brer

    Rowman & Littlefield International American Trickster: Trauma, Tradition and Brer

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisOur fascination with the trickster figure, whose presence is global, stems from our desire to break free from the tightly regimented structures of our societies. Condemned to conform to laws and rules imposed by governments, communities, social groups and family bonds, we revel in the fantasy of the trickster whose energy and cunning knows no bounds and for whom nothing is sacred.One such trickster is Brer Rabbit, who was introduced to North America through the folktales of enslaved Africans. On the plantations, Brer Rabbit, like Anansi in the Caribbean, functioned as a resistance figure for the enslaved whose trickery was aimed at undermining and challenging the plantation regime. Yet as Brer Rabbit tales moved from the oral tradition to the printed page in the late nineteenth-century, the trickster was emptied of his potentially powerful symbolism by white American collectors, authors and folklorists in their attempt to create a nostalgic fantasy of the plantation past. American Trickster offers readers a unique insight into the cultural significance of the Brer Rabbit trickster figure, from his African roots and through to his influence on contemporary culture. Exploring the changing portrayals of the trickster figure through a wealth of cultural forms including folktales, advertising, fiction and films the book scrutinises the profound tensions between the perpetuation of damaging racial stereotypes and the need to keep African-American folk traditions alive. Emily Zobel Marshall argues that Brer Rabbit was eventually reclaimed by twentieth-century African-American novelists whose protagonists ‘trick’ their way out of limiting stereotypes, break down social and cultural boundaries and offer readers practical and psychological methods for challenging the traumatic legacies of slavery and racism.Trade ReviewAs a work of cultural anthropology that traces the origins, adaptations, distortions, and reclamations of the folkloric Brer Rabbit trickster figure in literary and cinematic forms, this is an exceptionally useful piece of scholarship. Marshall (cultural studies, Leeds Beckett Univ., UK) has previously published on the primarily Caribbean trickster Anansi (Anansi's Journey: A Story of Jamaican Cultural Resistance, 2012), and that work helps both ground and illuminate her analysis of the markedly different development of the Brer Rabbit story in the US and Great Britain. With their considerable research and skillful organization, the opening three chapters compellingly demonstrate that the appropriation of Brer Rabbit by white scholars and writers including Joel Chandler Harris, Alcée Fortier, Beartrix Potter, Enid Blyton, and Alan Lomax served to largely undermine the power of Brer Rabbit to subvert colonial power and offset some of its traumatic effects. Summing Up: Recommended. . . Upper-division undergraduates through faculty; general readers. * CHOICE *In her engaging and well-researched book American Trickster, Emily Zobel Marshall traces the history of Brer Rabbit and his representation in folklore, literature, and popular culture in the United States and beyond. Her compelling study demonstrates how Brer Rabbit tales have been used to further sometimes diametrically opposed political ends, from reinforcing racist caricatures such as the “happy plantation darkie” to celebrating the resilience of African Americans in the face of oppression… American Trickster is an illuminating study of Brer Rabbit’s journey across time and space... Marshall’s interdisciplinary book will appeal especially to readers interested in African American literature, oral tradition, and popular culture. * Papers on Language and Literature *American Trickster: Trauma, Tradition and Brer Rabbit lays out all of the ironies embedded in the story of how this trickster tale came into its own as African American folklore, directly related to the lives of Blacks within plantation culture, only to be appropriated in the form of plantation fantasies by White collectors as an alibi for the system of slavery the tales worked to circumvent and subvert. Zobel-Marshall’s study foregrounds the rich and complex cultural history and impact of Brer Rabbit trickster tales within African American, American, and global culture, from cultural appropriation and alienation to the cultural reappropriation of the tales by African American authors to overcome the trauma of their past. -- Anne Duggan, Professor of French, Wayne State UniversityEmily Zobel Marshall traces the figure of Brer Rabbit across African American history and culture from the Plantations to the fiction of Toni Morrison. This book is a wonderfully subtle examination of why the story of Brer Rabbit is about resistance, survival and ambivalence. -- Susan Watkins, Professor, School of Cultural Studies & Humanities, Leeds Beckett UniversityThe origins and cultural specificity of the Brer Rabbit stories - fables of a trickster whose cunning overcomes adverse circumstances and adversaries - have been contested in fierce exchanges over decades. Writing in a clear and concise style in American Trickster, Emily Zobel Marshall teases apart and ably illuminates this complicated cultural phenomenon in a way which, though academically rigorous, will also enthral readers unfamiliar with Brer Rabbit's complexity.Drawing on a wealth of research, Zobel Marshall's close textural reading weaves together an impressive tapestry of ownership and remembrance. She is a skilled navigator charting Brer Rabbit's brisk and challenging journey, from the stories' African roots through to their sanitised renditions in support of a mythologised, idyllic ante-bellum South, before their eventual reclamation by African American storytellers. In doing so at this time of cultural crisis, with the kind of beguiling wit worthy of her subject, Zobel Marshall reminds us of the importance of keeping the past in the present. -- Colin Grant, Author, Historian, BBC Radio Producer and JournalistCountless millions of American and European children—including epic-oriented presidents (“Teddy” Roosevelt) and genteel UK writers (Beatrix Potter)—grew up on Uncle Remus & Brer Rabbit, Joel Chandler Harris’ whitewashed expropriation of African-American trickster-lore. Marshall, yoking Harris’ tales to European and American racial tastes, demonstrates that classic tricksters—Hermes, Anansi, Brer Rabbit—have long been in, and walked among, us. For those attuned to the cultural history and politics of trickster-lore and African-American literary responses, American Trickster is a welcome addition. -- Gregory E. Rutledge, author of The Epic Trickster in American Literature: From Sunjata to So(u)l (2013)With a far-weaving scholarly eye, Emily Zobel Marshall liberates Brer Rabbit from the cuddly context of children's bedtime stories into the subversive figure of the trans-forming trickster who provides a healing gateway out of the crippling cycle of trans-Atlantic trauma. In this work Zobel Marshall crucially explores Brer Rabbit within the wide spectrum of the trickster, not only as a timely reminder of the fluidity of identity, but as an empowering folk-muse whose presence resonates from the oral tradition to African-American novelist, Toni Morrison's literary landscape. -- John Agard, Poet, Performer, Playwright and AuthorTable of ContentsIntroductionList of IllustrationsChapter 1: African Trickster in the Americas Chapter 2: Anansi and Brer Rabbit: The Trickster and the Dynamics of Racial RepresentationChapter 3: Harris, Jones Jr. and Fortier: The Paradox of the Collector’s DelightChapter 4: From Bugs Bunny to Peter Rabbit: Problematising Popular AdaptationsChapter 5: Writing Back to Remus: Cheating the Cycle of Trauma in the Fiction of Ralph Ellison and Nella LarsenChapter 6: Toni Morrison: Brer Rabbit ReclaimedBibliography

    Out of stock

    £31.50

  • Embracing Vocation: Cormac McCarthy's Writing

    University of South Carolina Press Embracing Vocation: Cormac McCarthy's Writing

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisRevelations on craft from a foundational scholar of Cormac McCarthyDevotees of Cormac McCarthy's novels are legion, and deservedly so. Embracing Vocation, which tells the tale of his journey to become one of America's greatest living writers, will be invaluable to scholars and literary critics—and to the many fans—interested in his work.Dianne C. Luce, a foundational scholar of McCarthy's writing, through extensive archival research, examines the first fifteen years of his career and his earliest novels. Novel by novel, Luce traces each book's evolution. In the process she unveils McCarthy's working processes as well as his personal, literary, and professional influences, highlighting his ferocious devotion to both his craft and burgeoning art. Luce invites us to see the fascinating evolution of an American author with a unique vision all his own. Until there is a full-on biography, this study, along with Luce's previous, Reading the World: Cormac McCarthy's Tennessee Period, is the finest available portrait of an American genius unfolding.

    Out of stock

    £81.00

  • Llên yr Uchelwyr: Hanes Beirniadol Llenyddiaeth

    University of Wales Press Llên yr Uchelwyr: Hanes Beirniadol Llenyddiaeth

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisBeirdd yr Uchelwyr' in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries are considered to be the pinnacle of the bardic tradition in Wales in the Middle Ages. This book gives a comprehensive look at the period's literature in all its aspects. Attention is given to masters of the cywydd, such as Dafydd ap Gwilym, Iolo Goch, Guto'r Glyn, Dafydd Nanmor and Lewys Glyn Cothi. New edition.Table of Contents1 Y Cefndir Hanesyddol 2 Y Gyfundrefn Farddol 3 Parhad Traddodiad yr Awdl a'r Englyn 4 Y Cywydd 5 Dafydd ap Gwilym 6 Canu Serch y Cywyddwyr Cynnar 7 Canu Mawl y Cywyddwyr Cynnar 8 Y Canu Crefyddol 9 Beirdd y Bymthegfed Ganrif 10 Genres a Chonfensiynau 1: Y Canu Mawl 11 Genres a Chonfensiynau 2: Canu Serch y Bymthegfed Ganrif 12 Proffwydoliaeth a Phropaganda 13 Dychan ac Ymryson 14 Cyfnod y Tuduriaid 15 Rhyddiaith

    Out of stock

    £26.99

  • Dylan Thomas

    University of Wales Press Dylan Thomas

    1 in stock

    Book SynopsisThis critical study covers the whole range of Dylan Thomas's writing, both poetry and prose, in an accessible appraisal of the work and achievement of a major and dynamic poet. It interrelates the man and his national-cultural background by defining in detail the Welshness of his poetic temperament and critical attitudes, as both man and poet. At the same time, it illustrates Thomas's wide knowledge of and impact on the long and varied tradition of poetry in English. In that connection, it delineates and delimits Thomas's relationship to surrealism, compares and contrasts his work with that of other poets of the 1930s and 1940s, and shows how its power survives his early death in 1953, in the decade of the 'Movement' poets and beyond. A major aspect of this book is the close textual analysis of the works quoted; it explores anew the recognition due to the man who wrote the work, and helps us to separate the intrinsic achievement of the work from the foisted perceptions of the 'legend'.Trade ReviewWalford Davies's sympathetic introduction to the character and writing of Dylan Thomas, one of the great twentieth-century poets, is illuminating for new or experienced readers. His appraisal and close readings are warmly personal, rooted in Welsh literary and social culture. - Prof. Barbara Hardy, Professor of English Literature Emeritus, University of London Walford Davies displays commendable but misplaced modesty in calling this extensively revised centenary edition of his celebrated study of Dylan Thomas an 'essay'. It is, rather, a sustained, even ecstatic meditation on the meaning of the life and the work of one of the great English language writers of the twentieth century. The book performs a miracle of compression in distilling a lifetime's learning and reflection into manageable space and offering elegant readings not only of Thomas's key writings in poetry, fiction and broadcast media but of his biographical and cultural contexts. The poet's debt to the Welsh-speaking, Non-Conformist milieu of his immediate ancestry is sensitively illuminated, and his place in the British poetry of his time and in the long history of verse in English from Chaucer to Heaney delineated with formidable skill and erudition. The volume is in the best sense a work of advocacy - and one as dapper, witty and unfanatical as it is impassioned. - Prof. Patrick Crotty, University of AberdeenTable of Contents1 'Begin at the beginning': introductory 2 'The sideboard fruit, the ferns': the poet in suburbia 3 'The loud hill of Wales': theWelshness of the work 4 'I'll put them all in a story by and by': aspects of the prose 5 'Now my saying shall be my undoing': the need to change 6 'Criss-cross rhythms': comparisons of earlier and later poems 77 7 'Ann's bard on a raised hearth': towards 'After the funeral (In Memory of Ann Jones)' 8 'Mostly bare I would lie down': a creative decade ends in war 9 'Arc-lamped thrown back upon the cutting flood'; 'This unbelievable lack of wires': wartime, film work, broadcasts 98 10 'We hid our fears in that murdering breath': the war elegies 11 'Parables of sun light': towards 'Poem in October', 'Fern Hill', 'Do not go gentle into that good night' and beyond

    1 in stock

    £7.99

  • The Arthur of the North: The Arthurian Legend in

    University of Wales Press The Arthur of the North: The Arthurian Legend in

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisThe Arthur of the North is the first book-length study of the Arthurian literature that was translated from French and Latin into Old Norse-Icelandic in the thirteenth century, which has been preserved mostly in Icelandic manuscripts, and which in early modern times inspired the composition of narrative poems and chapbooks in Denmark, Iceland and Norway, chiefly of the Tristan legend. The importation of Arthurian literature in the North, primarily French romances and lais, is indebted largely to the efforts of King Hákon Hákonarson (r. 1217–63) of Norway, who commissioned the translation of Thomas de Bretagne’s Tristan in 1226, and subsequently several Arthurian romances by Chrétien de Troyes and a number of Breton lais. The translations are unique in that the French metrical narratives were rendered in prose, the traditional form of narrative in the North. The book concludes with a chapter on Arthurian literature in the Rus’ area, precisely East Slavic, with a focus on the Belarusian Trysčan. Contents 1. The Introduction of the Arthurian Legend in Scandinavia, Marianne E. Kalinke 2. Sources, Translations, Redactions, Manuscript Transmission, Marianne E. Kalinke 3. Breta sögur and Merlínússpá, Stefanie Gropper 4 The Tristan Legend, Geraldine Barnes 5. The Translated Lais, Carolyne Larrington 6 The Old Norse-Icelandic Transmission of Chrétien de Troyes’s Romances: Ívens saga, Erex saga, Parcevals saga with Valvens þáttr, Claudia Bornholdt 7. The Old Swedish Hærra Ivan Leons riddare, William Layher 8. Arthurian Echoes in Indigenous Icelandic Sagas, Marianne E. Kalinke 9. Arthurian Ballads, rímur, Chapbooks and Folktales, M. J. Driscoll 10. Arthurian Literature in East Slavic, Susana Torres PrietoTable of Contents1 The Introduction of the Arthurian Legend in Scandinavia Marianne E. Kalinke 2 Sources, Translations, Redactions, Manuscript Transmission Marianne E. Kalinke 3 Breta sögur and Merlínússpá Stefanie Gropper 4 The Tristan Legend Geraldine Barnes 5 The Translated Lais Carolyne Larrington 6 The Old Norse-Icelandic Transmission of Chrétien de Troyes’s Romances:Ívens saga, Erex saga, Parcevals saga with Valvens þáttr Claudia Bornholdt 7 The Old Swedish Hærra Ivan Leons riddare William Layher 8 Arthurian Echoes in Indigenous Icelandic Sagas Marianne E. Kalinke 9 Arthurian Ballads, rímur, Chapbooks and Folktales M. J. Driscoll 10 Arthurian Literature in East Slavic Susana Torres Prieto

    Out of stock

    £31.49

  • Patrick White Beyond the Grave

    Anthem Press Patrick White Beyond the Grave

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisPatrick White (1912–1990) won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1973 and remains one of Australia’s most celebrated writers. In 2006, White’s literary executor, Barbara Mobbs, released a highly significant collection of hitherto unpublished papers, reviving mainstream and scholarly interest in his work. 'Patrick White Beyond the Grave' considers White’s writing in light of the new findings, acknowledging his homosexuality in relation to the development of his literary style, examining the way he engages his readers, and contextualizing his life and oeuvre in relation to London and to London life. Thought-provoking, this collection of original essays represents the work of an outstanding list of White scholars from around the globe, and will no doubt inspire further work on White from a rising generation of scholars of twentieth-century literature beyond Australia.Trade Review‘Patrick White haunts us because he dared to speak the deliciously unsayable whether on sexuality, politics, the battle between personality and truth, or the impact of the Australian voice. This collection of essays documents and challenges the depth and internationalism of new critical reception. It is inspired, dealing with a quest for truth in White’s writings and the tensions between the belief and disbelief in a postcolonial global world of the sacred and the profane.’ —Ann McCulloch, Deakin University ‘A lively reminder that great writing continues to speak beyond its author’s death, this fine collection of essays by Patrick White scholars from around the world brings fresh perspectives from the archives and biography, and from modernist, postcolonial and queer studies, to the rich range of White’s work.’ —Susan Sheridan, Flinders University‘With standout essays by Gail Jones, Ivor Indyk and Ian Henderson, this book leaves the critical battles of yesteryear behind to advance Patrick White studies in new and timely directions.’ —Jennifer Rutherford, University of AdelaideTable of ContentsIntroduction (Ian Henderson); Part I. Resurrected Papers; 1. The Evidence of the Archive (Margaret Harris and Elizabeth Webby); 2. Leichhardt and ‘Voss’ Revisited (Angus Nicholls); Part II. Many in One; 3. White’s London (David Marr); 4. Elective Affinities: Manning Clark, Patrick White and Sidney Nolan (Mark McKenna); 5. ‘Dismantled and Reconstructed’: ‘Flaws in the Glass’ Re-Visioned (Georgina Loveridge); 6. Patrick White’s Late Style (Andrew McCann); Part III. The Performance of Reading; 7. Patrick White’s Expressionism (Ivor Indyk); 8. The Doubling of Reality in Patrick White’s ‘The Aunt’s Story’ and Paul Schreber’s ‘Memoirs of My Nervous Illness’ (Aruna Wittman); 9. Desperate, Marvellous Shuttling: White’s Ambivalent Modernism (Gail Jones); 10. ‘Time And Its Fellow Conspirator Space’: White’s ‘A Fringe of Leaves’ (Brigid Rooney); Part IV. Queer White; 11. Knockabout World: Patrick White, Kenneth Williams and the Queer Word (Ian Henderson); 12. Queering Sarsaparilla: Patrick White’s Deviant Modernism (Anouk Lang); Contributors; Index

    Out of stock

    £23.75

  • Guide to the Lakes

    Oxford University Press Guide to the Lakes

    2 in stock

    Book SynopsisWilliam Wordsworth''s Guide to the Lakes gives a first-hand account of his feelings about the unique countryside that was the source of his inspiration. He addresses concerns that are relevant today, such as how the growing number of visitors, and the money they might bring, would affect such a small and vulnerable landscape.It is now understood that Wordsworth''s notion of the Lake District as ''a sort of national property, in which every man has a right and interest who has an eye to perceive and a heart to enjoy'', expressed in his Guide, gave a rationale for the foundation of the National Trust in 1895 and the establishment of the Lake District National Park in 1951. Furthermore, the 2017 nomination document for the Lake District as a World Heritage site quotes this phrase in recognition of Wordsworth''s contribution to the idea that ''landscape has a value, and that everyone has a right to appreciate and enjoy it''. We can now see how Wordsworth''s Guide has had a far-reaching infTrade ReviewThis newly annotated edition of the Guide is a timely reminder of how Wordsworth helped shape later generations to view the Lake District as 'a sort of national property'. * Sheng Yao, British Association of Romantic Studies *Table of ContentsMap List of Illustrations Introduction Note on the Text Select Bibliography A Chronology of William Wordsworth A GUIDE THROUGH THE DISTRICT OF THE LAKES (1835) Explanatory Notes Glossary of Selected Persons and Places

    2 in stock

    £9.49

  • States of Disconnect

    Columbia University Press States of Disconnect

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisStates of Disconnect examines the breakdown of transnationalism through readings of literary texts that express aversion to pairing ideas of China and India. Adhira Mangalagiri proposes the concept of “disconnect”: a crisis of transnationalism perceptible in moments when a connection is severed, interrupted, or disavowed.Trade ReviewHow does one reckon with the conditions of comparison in the act of comparison? Reading twentieth-century Chinese and Hindi texts side by side or against each other, this book offers a fascinating account of literary relations between China and India with invaluable insights on rupture, repulsion, and crisis of understanding. A bold experiment in method. -- Lydia Liu, Columbia UniversityThis deeply inspiring and important book explores the gray zones of literary relations. States of Disconnect subjects the easy pair of India and China to stringent scrutiny and in the process offers a new vocabulary and critical tools for comparative literature in a world full of tension and strife. -- Francesca Orsini, SOAS, University of LondonStates of Disconnect offers a novel approach by exploring how conditions of war, diplomatic breakdown, and international friction factor non-comparability into cross-cultural interpretation and genres of transnational literacy. Mangalagiri puts the brakes on forms of borderless criticism that homogenize distinct knowledge worlds and globalize literary learning without sufficient attention to the politics of difference. -- Emily Apter, New York UniversityDaring to step into a territory where few humanist scholars of China-India relations have tread, Mangalagiri focuses on the ‘disconnect’ and negativity that characterizes a great deal of this relationship in the modern literary realm. She demonstrates persuasively that the first step in literature is to confront and understand the disconnect and imagine the ethical possibilities of the relationship from this fuller understanding. -- Prasenjit Duara, Duke UniversityIn States of Disconnect, Mangalagiri portrays how China and India encountered each other against the global background of war and peace, imperialism and nationalism, and, above all, transculturation and its disavowal. Working against the grain of conventional modernity studies, States of Disconnect probes the ways in which circulation falls short and connectivity stumbles, as well as the options of alternative modernities arising therefrom. -- David Der-wei Wang, Harvard UniversityStates of Disconnect is a pioneering work of scholarship. It shifts the gaze to cultural production and emphasizes the ways in which the acts of writing and reading in both countries, and the views each developed of the other in these cultural practices, did not necessarily follow the prevailing political vicissitudes of the transnational relationship. -- Laura Brueck, author of Writing Resistance: The Rhetorical Imagination of Hindi Dalit LiteratureStates of Disconnect aims at no less than reshaping the paradigm of comparison and supplying a critical vocabulary for a new ethics of transnational relation. * MCLC Resource Center *Deeply serious in its disciplinary-cum-ethical commitments and confident in the possibilities afforded by critical reading [. . .], States of Disconnect is ultimately as inspiring as it is generative. * Critical Inquiry *Table of ContentsNote on Transliteration and TranslationIntroduction1. Anatomy of Antagonism: The Indian Policeman in Chinese Literature2. Revolution Redux: Agyeya’s China Stories3. Dialogue and Its Discontents: 1950s Cultural Diplomacy Untold4. Word and World in Crisis: Hindi Texts of 19625. On Correspondence: Lu Xun and PremchandConclusion: A Comparatist’s Guide to DisconnectAcknowledgmentsNotesBibliographyIndex

    15 in stock

    £21.25

  • The Common Reader

    HarperCollins Publishers The Common Reader

    5 in stock

    Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.A good essay must have this permanent quality about it; it must draw its curtain round us, but it must be a curtain that shuts us in not out'In the first volume of her critical essays, Virginia Woolf discusses the greatest authors of the literary canon Jane Austen, George Eliot and Geoffrey Chaucer among others with the everyday, common reader' in mind. With wit and insight, Woolf also revisits classic novels and examines scholarly subjects, from the Greek language to the Modern Essay, to the Brontë's Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights.First published in 1925, The Common Reader is a stunning work from one of the most perceptive minds of the twentieth century, a collection which continues to nurture the joys of literature and reading to this day.

    5 in stock

    £5.68

  • Dark Scenes from Damaged Earth: The Gothic

    University of Minnesota Press Dark Scenes from Damaged Earth: The Gothic

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisAn urgent volume of essays engages the Gothic to advance important perspectives on our geological era What can the Gothic teach us about our current geological era? More than just spooky, moonlit castles and morbid graveyards, the Gothic represents a vibrant, emergent perspective on the Anthropocene. In this volume, more than a dozen scholars move beyond longstanding perspectives on the Anthropocene—such as science fiction and apocalyptic narratives—to show that the Gothic offers a unique (and dark) interpretation of events like climate change, diminished ecosystems, and mass extinction.Embracing pop cultural phenomena like True Detective, Jaws, and Twin Peaks, as well as topics from the New Weird and prehistoric shark fiction to ruin porn and the “monstroscene,” Dark Scenes from Damaged Earth demonstrates the continuing vitality of the Gothic while opening important new paths of inquiry. These essays map a genealogy of the Gothic while providing fresh perspectives on the ongoing climate chaos, the North/South divide, issues of racialization, dark ecology, questions surrounding environmental justice, and much more.Contributors: Fred Botting, Kingston U; Timothy Clark, U of Durham; Rebecca Duncan, Linnaeus U; Michael Fuchs, U of Oldenburg, Germany; Esthie Hugo, U of Warwick; Dawn Keetley, Lehigh U; Laura R. Kremmel, South Dakota School of Mines and Technology; Timothy Morton, Rice U; Barry Murnane, U of Oxford; Jennifer Schell, U of Alaska Fairbanks; Lisa M. Vetere, Monmouth U; Sara Wasson, Lancaster U; Jeffrey Andrew Weinstock, Central Michigan U.Trade Review"All of the essays connect the subjective potency of the texts under discussion — the affects and moods that they inspire in the reader or viewer — to the ways that such works also give us a deeper understanding of the ongoing ecological transactions that are putting our very existence at risk. Dark Scenes from Damaged Earth both reclaims the gothic as an urgently relevant mode of fiction-making and suggests that aesthetic approaches are able to bring us a kind of understanding that scientific studies on their own could not."—Los Angeles Review of Books"It is impossible for me to do complete justice to this book in a review, but I will say that the sixteen essays included in it are all illuminating, thoughtful, and interesting."—Gothic WandererTable of ContentsContentsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Gothic in the AnthropocenePart I. Anthropocene1. The AnthropoceneJeffrey Andrew Weinstock2. De-extinction: A Gothic Masternarrative for the AnthropoceneMichael Fuchs3. Lovecraft vs. VanderMeer: Posthuman Horror (and Hope?) in the Zone of ExceptionRune Graulund4. Monstrous Megalodons of the Anthropocene: Extinction and Adaptation in Prehistoric Shark Fiction, 1974–2018Jennifer Schell5. A Violence “Just below the Skin”: Atmospheric Terror and Racial Ecologies from the African AnthropoceneEsthie HugoPart II. Plantationocene6. Horrors of the Horticultural: Charles Brockden Brown’s Wieland and the Landscapes of the AnthropoceneLisa M. Vetere7. True Detective’s Folk GothicDawn Keetley8. Beyond the Slaughterhouse: Anthropocene, Animals, and GothicJustin D. EdwardsPart III. Capitalocene9. Gothic in the Capitalocene: World-Ecological Crisis, Decolonial Horror, and the South African PostcolonyRebecca Duncan10. Overpopulation: The Human as InhumanTimothy Clark11. Digging Up Dirt: Reading the Anthropocene through German RomanticismBarry Murnane12. Got a Light? The Dark Currents of Energy in Twin Peaks: The ReturnTimothy Morton and Rune GraulundPart IV. Chthulucene13. The Anthropocene Within: Love and Extinction in M. R. Carey’s The Girl with All the Gifts and The Boy on the BridgeJohan Höglund14. Rot and Recycle: Gothic Eco-burialLaura R. Kremmel15. Erotics and Annihilation: Caitlín R. Kiernan, Queering the Weird, and Challenges to the “Anthropocene”Sara Wasson16. MonstroceneFred BottingContributorsIndex

    15 in stock

    £23.39

  • The Outlandish Companion Volume 1

    Cornerstone The Outlandish Companion Volume 1

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisDiana Gabaldon has captivated millions of readers with her critically acclaimed Outlander novels. In this beautifully illustrated compendium, Diana Gabaldon opens a door through the standing stones and offers a guided tour of what lies within. Including:· Full synopses of Outlander, Dragonfly in Amber, Voyager and Drums of Autumn· A complete listing of the characters (fictional and historical) in the first four novels in the series, as well as family trees and genealogical notes· A comprehensive glossary and pronunciation guide to Gaelic terms and usage· The Gabaldon Theory of Time Travel, explained· Frequently asked questions to the author and her (sometimes surprising) answers· An annotated bibliography· Essays about medicine and magic in the eighteenth century, researching historical fiction, creating characters and more· Professionally cast horoscopes for Jamie and Claire· The making of the TV series: how we got there from here, and what happened next (including ‘My Brief Career as a TV Actor’)

    Out of stock

    £17.99

  • A Thing of Beauty

    Oneworld Publications A Thing of Beauty

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisA BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE YEAR LONGLISTED FOR THE ANGLO-HELLENIC LEAGUE RUNCIMAN AWARD 2022 ‘Peter Fiennes’s road trip around Greece [is] engagingly described’ Mary Beard, TLS ‘Fiennes is a brilliant and generous guide through Greece’ Observer ‘A wonderful… really profound meditation on what it means to hope… a gorgeous excursion into Greece and across the centuries on an environmental quest’ BBC Radio 4 Open Book Book of the Year choice by Anita Roy What do the Greek myths mean to us today? It’s now a golden age for these tales - they crop up in novels, films and popular culture. But what’s the modern relevance of Theseus, Hera and Pandora? Were these stories ever meant for children? And what’s to be seen now at the places where heroes fought and gods once quarrelled? Peter Fiennes travelTrade Review‘Peter Fiennes’s road trip around Greece – engagingly described in A Thing of Beauty – began with a visit to Lord Byron’s house… Fiennes’s tough talk and his down-to-earth refusal to put up with pretentious silliness contributes a lot to the pleasure of the book… [he] is well attuned to the ambivalence of hope.’ -- Mary Beard, Times Literary Supplement‘Fiennes is a brilliant and generous guide… a must-read.’ -- Alex Preston, Observer‘This book is a lament for a poisoned planet… He goes in search of the numinous but relishes the bathos of modernity… not so much a travelogue as an excursion into the psyche of Anthropocene man.’ * Literary Review *‘A wonderful book by a wonderful writer.’ -- Tom Holland‘A wonderful… really profound meditation on what it means to hope… a gorgeous excursion into Greece and across the centuries on an environmental quest’ * BBC Radio 4 Open Book BOOK OF THE YEAR choice by Anita Roy *‘A Thing of Beauty is an immensely pleasurable read. It takes you on an adventure around Greece and the myths that the ancients told there. But what really stayed with me were the reflections on storytelling, joy, and hope. Essential reading for our pandemic and pollution ravaged times.’ -- Helen Morales, author of Antigone Rising: The Subversive Power of the Ancient Myths‘Peter Fiennes has a way of making even the most serious of subjects enjoyable and riveting to the end, and A Thing of Beauty is certainly no exception, this is great travel writing that makes the reader a part of the adventure, and one of the most engaging and enjoyable books I’ve read this year.’ -- Pilgrim House‘A deeply humane travelogue, a beautifully written book of stories, A Thing of Beauty is a siren song for Greece and a generous and precious gift – a classical education for those of us who are bereft of one.’ -- Patrick Barkham, natural history writer and author of Wild Child‘Peter Fiennes… follows in the footsteps of Pausanias, Lord Byron and others to rediscover some of the most evocative landscapes and sites from classical myth.’ -- Argo‘Fiennes is a brilliant and generous guide through Greece. He weaves the ancient world and the modern together with intelligence and elegance… There’s a wry Sebaldian humour at work here … A Thing of Beauty is a must-read for anyone visiting Greece.’ -- Alex Preston, Observer‘A Thing of Beauty is an entertaining, erudite travelogue through Greece, both ancient and modern.’ * Foreword Reviews *‘An evocative and informative book… It’s for anyone interested in the Greek Gods and their myths, the Greek countryside and wildlife, Greek politics and history, climate change and sustainable living, whether there’s any hope in the world today… and just how many Greek salads can one man eat? If you’re interested in more than one of those topics, it’s definitely the book for you.’ * Greece Travel Secrets *‘Fiennes sets out to explore the birthplace of Western civilization, Greece, in search of Hope… It’s a highly personal travelogue…with the historical and modern-day detail that late British travel writer Jan Morris might bring to the task.’ -- Booklist, starred review‘Passionate and lyrical’ * Publishers Weekly *‘An enjoyable journey through Greek myths and modernity in [Fiennes’s] search for hope, beauty and new understanding of our world.’ * Choice Magazine *‘In A Thing of Beauty, myths are not presented as dust-covered artefacts but vibrant, living, often frightening things that, like Greek gods, still affect and manipulate our lives. The quest that Peter Fiennes undertakes is of urgent relevance in this time of environmental change. Startling, informative and often very funny.’ -- Nick Hunt, author of Outlandish‘Fiennes is a talent and an important voice. His search for hope in the stories of the past feels vital for these times.’ -- Rob Cowen, author of Common Ground‘A Thing of Beauty is such a joy. Peter Fiennes invites us to travel with him to visit the ancient Oracle at Delphi as he searches for hope while the pre-vaccine pandemic is at its height and the wild fires rage. Self-deprecating, funny, deeply knowledgeable about Greek mythology, yet simultaneously confronting the challenges that face our world head-on, Fiennes is a most delightful travelling companion.’ -- Katharine Norbury, author of The Fish Ladder and editor of Women on Nature

    15 in stock

    £10.44

  • Selected Stories

    Harvard University Press Selected Stories

    2 in stock

    Book Synopsis

    2 in stock

    £22.46

  • David and Bathsheba: George Peele

    Manchester University Press David and Bathsheba: George Peele

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisDavid and Bathsheba presents a modernised edition of George Peele’s explosive biblical drama about the tangled lives, deadly liaisons, and twisted histories of Ancient Israel’s royal family. Martin’s critical edition is the first modern single-volume edition of the play since 1912 and opens up this unduly neglected gem of English Renaissance drama to student and scholar alike. The introduction examines such topics as the play’s treatment of its biblical and poetic sources, its engagement with Elizabethan politics, and its forceful representations of religious fanaticism, genocide, and sexual violence. Its commentary notes clarify the text’s meaning and staging, guide the reader through the play’s dramatisation of the turbulent Davidic period of Ancient Israel’s history, and place the play in its broader cultural and artistic milieu. Martin’s edition aims to encourage new contemporary critical study of Peele’s powerful and disturbing drama.Table of ContentsINTRODUCTIONGeorge PeeleDavid and BathshebaDavid in medieval and Renaissance literature and culture David and Bathsheba, Elizabethan politics, and MarloweDavid and Bathsheba, Queen Elizabeth, and sexual violenceSourcesDavid and Bathsheba, biblical drama, and performance provenanceThe textConclusionDAVID AND BATHSHEBAINDEX

    Out of stock

    £19.00

  • Kinship in Old Norse Myth and Legend

    Boydell & Brewer Ltd Kinship in Old Norse Myth and Legend

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisThis wide-ranging study offers a new understanding of Old Norse kinship in which the individual self was expanded to encompass its kin. Family interactions in Old Norse myth and legend were often fraught, competitive, even violent as well as loving, protective and supportive. Focusing particularly on intergenerational relationships in the legendary sagas, the Poetic Edda and Snorra Edda, this book reveals not only why ambivalence was so characteristic of mythic-heroic kinship relations but how they were able to endure, even thrive, in spite of such pressures. Close attention is paid to the way gender inflects the dynamic between parents and their children and to the patronymic naming system which prevailed in Old Norse society, while outdated assumptions about the existence of a special relationship between a man and his sister's son inherited from earlier Germanic society are reassessed for the first time in decades. What emerges from this wide-ranging study is a new understanding of Old Norse kinship as a dynamic transpersonal process rather than a presocial fact, in which the individual self was expanded to encompass its kin. Taking the lead from recent anthropological research into kinship and with exciting implications for our understanding of Old Norse personhood, emotions, and the life course, this book challenges its readers to rethink many of the basic ontological assumptions which they bring to their interpretations of Old Norse myth and legend.Table of ContentsAcknowledgements A Note on Conventions List of Abbreviations Introduction 1. Fathers and Sons 2. Fathers and Daughters 3. Mothers and their Children 4. Uncles and Aunts 5. The Patronymic System 6. Kinship and Narrative Conclusion Bibliography Index

    15 in stock

    £76.00

  • The Roving Shadows

    Seagull Books The Roving Shadows

    1 in stock

    Book SynopsisA bold and adventurous work of literature that explores the relationship between reading, writing, sex, and death. The first book in Pascal Quignard's Last Kingdom series, The Roving Shadows can be read as a long meditation on reading and writing that strives to situate these otherwise innocuous activities in a profound relationship to sex and death. Writing and reading can in fact be linked to our animal natures and artistic strivings, to primal forces and culturally persistent fascinations. With dexterity and inventiveness, Quignard weaves together historical anecdotes, folktales from the East and West, fragments of myth, and speculative historical reconstructions. The whole, written in a musical style not far removed from that of Couperin, whose piano composition Les Ombres errantes lends the book its title, coheres into a work of literature that reverberates in the psyche long after one has laid it down. The Roving Shadows is a rare and wondrous tour de force that cements Quignar

    1 in stock

    £14.24

  • The Critical Writings of Oscar Wilde

    Harvard University Press The Critical Writings of Oscar Wilde

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisThough best known for his drama and fiction, Oscar Wilde was also a pioneering critic. He introduced the idea that criticism was an act of creation, not just appraisal. Wilde transformed the genre by extending its ambit beyond art to include society itself, all while injecting it with his trademark wit and style.Trade ReviewNo, it’s not poetry, but it’s the next best thing: prose that floats along on rhyme and rhythm…Rejoice in a book made up of what one essay calls ‘passages…[of]…pure and perfect beauty.’ * The Tablet *A remarkable collection…Students and scholars of literature will relish these witty, acerbic outings. * Publishers Weekly (starred review) *This is an absorbing volume for which all Wilde fans should be grateful. -- D. J. Taylor * Washington Examiner *A lucid guide to the dissident thought of Oscar Wilde, who attacked the genteel gender norms and philanthropic pieties of imperial Britain. At this moment of cultural crisis in the dwindling humanities, Wilde's eloquent defense of individualism, as well as his celebration of the beauty and power of art, could not be more timely. -- Camille Paglia, author of Sexual PersonaeWilde was a first-rate critic and an essayist and a thoughtful provocateur years before he became a successful playwright, a scandalous novelist, or a queer icon: he’s still a terrific critic today, with a range wider than almost anyone knows. Here are essays you’ve read if you care about Wilde already (‘The Decay of Lying’) and essays even scholars may not have seen. Here is the impossible socialist, anti-populist radical, anti-Platonic creator of Platonic dialogues, infinitely insatiable individualist, and, of course, ‘The Critic as Artist.’ If you’re like me, you owe it to yourself to return to him and check him out. We shall not see his like again. -- Stephanie Burt, author of Don’t Read PoetryIt is refreshing to see Wilde the critic take center stage. This is an astute selection showing the full range of the essays, dialogues, and reviews that helped make Oscar's name, brought together expertly by Nicholas Frankel, whose characteristically insightful introduction is essential reading. -- Kate Hext, author of Walter Pater

    15 in stock

    £22.46

  • Chekhov Becomes Chekhov: The Emergence of a

    Pegasus Books Chekhov Becomes Chekhov: The Emergence of a

    1 in stock

    Book SynopsisA revelatory portrait of Chekhov during the most extraordinary artistic surge of his life.In 1886, a twenty-six-year-old Anton Chekhov was publishing short stories, humor pieces, and articles at an astonishing rate, and was still a practicing physician. Yet as he honed his craft and continued to draw inspiration from the vivid characters in his own life, he found himself—to his surprise and occasional embarrassment—admired by a growing legion of fans, including Tolstoy himself. He had not yet succumbed to the ravages of tuberculosis. He was a lively, frank, and funny correspondent and a dedicated mentor. And as Bob Blaisdell discovers, his vivid articles, stories, and plays from this period—when read in conjunction with his correspondence—become a psychological and emotional secret diary. When Chekhov struggled with his increasingly fraught engagement, young couples are continually making their raucous way in and out of relationships on the page. When he was overtaxed by his medical duties, his doctor characters explode or implode. Chekhov’s talented but drunken older brothers and Chekhov’s domineering father became transmuted into characters, yet their emergence from their family's serfdom is roiling beneath the surface. Chekhov could crystalize the human foibles of the people he knew into some of the most memorable figures in literature and drama. In Chekhov Becomes Chekhov, Blaisdell astutely examines the psychological portraits of Chekhov's distinct, carefully observed characters and how they reflect back on their creator during a period when there seemed to be nothing between his imagination and the paper he was writing upon. Trade Review"[Chekhov Becomes Chekhov] captures the turn in Chekhov’s life. Blaisdell’s entertaining book traces this change in Chekhov’s self-perception and allows us to trace the emergence of a literary genius." * The New York Review of Books *"Absorbing, pleasurable, and as unaffected as its subject. [Blaisdell] doesn’t simply (as the title promises) explain how Chekhov came to be Chekhov but rather how impossible it was for him to become anybody else. It’s the sort of book that dedicated readers rarely find, one that doesn’t presume to teach us about Chekhov so much as simply enjoy him. It is like reading along with a fellow lover of Chekhov, attentive to the nuances of the life behind the work." -- Scott Bradfield * The New Republic *“A celebration of the enduring power of literary creativity. The mystery of Chekhov’s genius is thrown into even sharper relief, a rare accomplishment in a genre that’s often the playground of know-it-alls. Blaisdell’s reading reaps handsome rewards. The author’s overflowing enthusiasm never distracts from the main performance––Anton Chekhov’s miraculous transformation from paid humorist to profound commentator on the human condition. As we turn the pages of Chekhov Becomes Chekhov, the author’s delight is ours, too.” * The Wall Street Journal *"A work of love...Blaisdell’s incredibly researched work is a treasure trove of insight and information for scholars and fans of Russian literature. For generations to come, it will be a staple for Chekhov studies." * Library Journal, starred review *“Two years in the life and work of the Russian master, where Blaisdell draws from Chekhov’s personal correspondence and references several previous biographies in conjunction with close readings of his numerous stories. Blaisdell offers meaningful insights into Chekhov’s life and writing.” * Kirkus Reviews *"A penetrating take on Anton Chekhov's development as a writer. Blaisdell seamlessly blends biography and critical analysis to offer a bracing look at a formative period in the life of a literary legend. The result is a stirring portrait of an artist coming into his own." * Publishers Weekly *Praise for Creating Anna Karenina: "That Creating Anna Karenina is a major contribution to Tolstoy scholarship makes it no less of a delight to read. Blaisdell's passion for the subject, and his always-surprising discoveries about the great man and his creation, kept me turning the pages unstoppably. This is a wonderful book." -- Ian Frazier, author of Travels in Siberia, staff writer at The New Yorker“Captivating. How did Anna Karenina evolve from a trivial high-society adulteress, whom Tolstoy despised, into one of the deepest, most sensitive tragic heroines in all of literature? What happened inside Tolstoy to condition this metamorphosis? Creating Anna Karenina is a worthy companion to the novel." -- Janet Fitch * Los Angeles Review of Books *"In its study of the comings and goings of the Tolstoy household at the time of the novel’s composition, Creating Anna Karenina asks if one of the world’s greatest novels was in fact just as much a product of everyday minutia—like who stops by for a visit with what kind of gossip to tell—as it was the culmination of long-simmering ideas about morality and desire." * The New Republic *"A fuller understanding of any work—and especially of its creation—requires the resurrection of its creator and his milieu. Blaisdell manages to do precisely that." -- Boris Dralyuk, Executive Editor, Los Angeles Review of Books, from the Foreword

    1 in stock

    £19.80

  • Reading the Odyssey

    Princeton University Press Reading the Odyssey

    15 in stock

    Book Synopsis

    15 in stock

    £25.50

  • Earth Room

    Hat & Beard Earth Room

    5 in stock

    Book Synopsis

    5 in stock

    £14.25

  • The American Sonnet: An Anthology of Poems and

    University of Iowa Press The American Sonnet: An Anthology of Poems and

    4 in stock

    Book SynopsisPoet and scholar team Dora Malech and Laura T. Smith collect and foreground an impressive range of sonnets, including formal and formally subversive sonnets by established and emerging poets, highlighting connections across literary moments and movements. Poets include Phillis Wheatley, Fredrick Goddard Tuckerman, Emma Lazarus, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Gertrude Stein, Fradel Shtok, Claude McKay, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Ruth Muskrat Bronson, Langston Hughes, Muriel Rukeyser, Gwendolyn Brooks, Dunstan Thompson, Rhina P. Espaillat, Lucille Clifton, Marilyn Hacker, Wanda Coleman, Patricia Smith, Jericho Brown, and Diane Seuss. The sonnets are accompanied by critical essays that likewise draw together diverse voices, methodologies, and historical and theoretical perspectives that represent the burgeoning field of American sonnet studies.Trade Review“With keen observation and rigorous inquiry, The American Sonnet documents and celebrates American poets’ vital contributions to an ancient, global verse form. The poems and essays collected here situate the ‘American sonnet’ within a centuries-long conversation about how poetry happens on the page and in the mind. By centering diverse, living American poets for whom the sonnet is a way to think deeply about social and political questions, this work offers a timely snapshot of our urgent literary moment. The American Sonnet is a feast of discovery for all readers.”—Kiki Petrosino, author, White Blood: A Lyric of Virginia “The American Sonnet will be embraced by all who’ve noted the lack of diverse scholarship on the sonnet, particularly regarding historically underrepresented sonneteers. Malech and Smith have deepened and expanded the range of our thinking on this form. I can’t wait to teach this book—and be taught by it.”—Beth Ann Fennelly, author, Heating & Cooling: 52 Micro-Memoirs “I can’t imagine a group of people with whom I would be more excited to talk with about the sonnet than the essayists herein, nor talk more illuminating than their essays. And the sonnets themselves cover whatever the essays don’t (more Dunstan Thompson in anthologies, please). This is an ideal anthology.”—Shane McCrae, author, Cain Named the Animal “’We shall not always plant while others reap,’ promised Countee Cullen; the robust tradition of sonnets he represented is just one of several in this memorable, thoughtful, useful, and sometimes stellar collection’s deeply American braid, reflecting both a panoply of sonnets from U.S.-based writers (and translators!) and a splendid variety of contemporary writings on the form, a modern—but not too modern—pattern designed to make ‘the soul swing open’ (as Mona Van Duyn puts it) ‘on its hinges.’ Sonnets themselves train up to the present day and then introduce up-to-date reflections on the form, from major critics’ takes to up-and-coming poets’ thoughts: Jahan Ramazani on this ‘tightly wound global form,’ Meg Day's ‘Deaf and disabled existence,’ Timo Muller on Harlem Renaissance translation, arguments about neuroqueerness and autism in (wait for it) Robert Frost, and about where on Earth this form is going beyond the pentameter, beyond—or is it back to?—the past. ‘A sonnet is a mother,’ as the great Diane Seuss writes: here are its children.”—Stephanie Burt

    4 in stock

    £30.56

  • Khosrow & Shirin: Nezami Ganjavi

    Mage Publishers Khosrow & Shirin: Nezami Ganjavi

    5 in stock

    Book Synopsis

    5 in stock

    £44.19

  • State University of New York Press Doubly Erased

    Out of stock

    Book SynopsisA wide-ranging overview of contemporary literary works by LGBTQ Appalachians with a focus on LGBTQ themes and characters.The first book of its kind, Doubly Erased is a comprehensive study of the rich tradition of LGBTQ themes and characters in Appalachian novels, memoirs, poetry, drama, and film. Appalachia has long been seen as homogenous and tradition-bound. Allison E. Carey helps to remedy this misunderstanding, arguing that it has led to LGBTQ Appalachian authors being doubly erased-routinely overlooked both within United States literature because they are Appalachian and within the Appalachian literary tradition because they are queer. In exploring motifs of visibility, silence, storytelling, home, food, and more, Carey brings the full significance and range of LGBTQ Appalachian literature into relief. Dorothy Allison''s Bastard Out of Carolina and Alison Bechdel''s Fun Home are considered alongside works by Maggie Anderson, doris davenport, Jeff Mann, Lisa Alther, Julia Watts, Fenton Johnson, and Silas House, as well as filmmaker Beth Stephens. While primarily focused on 1976 to 2020, Doubly Erased also looks back to the region''s literary "elders," thoughtfully mapping the place of sexuality in the lives and works of George Scarbrough, Byron Herbert Reece, and James Still.

    Out of stock

    £22.96

  • Golden Age Whodunits

    Penzler Publishers Golden Age Whodunits

    15 in stock

    Book Synopsis

    15 in stock

    £10.42

  • Freedom Only Freedom

    Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Freedom Only Freedom

    5 in stock

    Book SynopsisBehrouz Boochani is a Kurdish-Iranian writer, journalist, scholar, cultural advocate and filmmaker. Boochani was a writer and editor for the Kurdish language magazine Werya in Iran. He is a Visiting Professor, Birkbeck Law School; Associate Professor in Social Sciences at UNSW; non-resident Visiting Scholar at the Sydney Asia Pacific Migration Centre (SAPMiC), University of Sydney; Honorary Member of PEN International; and winner of an Amnesty International Australia 2017 Media Award, the Diaspora Symposium Social Justice Award, the Liberty Victoria 2018 Empty Chair Award, and the Anna Politkovskaya award for journalism. He publishes regularly with The Guardian, and his writing also features in The Saturday Paper, Huffington Post, New Matilda, The Financial Times and The Sydney Morning Herald. Boochani is also co-director (with Arash Kamali Sarvestani) of the 2017 feature-length film Chauka, Please Tell Us The Time; and collaborator on Nazanin Sahamizadeh's play Manus. His book, No Friend But The Mountains: Writing From Manus Prison won the 2019 Victorian Prize for Literature in addition to the Nonfiction category. He has also won the Special Award at the NSW Premier's Literary Awards, the Australian Book Industry Award for Nonfiction Book of the Year, and the National Biography Prize. Omid Tofighian is Adjunct Lecturer in the School of the Arts and Media, University of New South Wales; and Honorary Research Fellow at Birkbeck Law, University of London. He is an award-winning lecturer, researcher and community advocate, combining philosophy with interests in citizen media, popular culture, displacement and discrimination. He is the translator of Behrouz Boochani's multi-award winning book No Friend but the Mountains: Writing From Manus Prison (2018).Moones Mansoubi is a community, arts and cultural development worker based in Sydney. Her work is dedicated mainly to supporting and collaborating with migrants and people seeking asylum in Australia. She has managed numerous community and cultural projects and the first translator of Behrouz Boochani's work when he began writing from Manus Island. She was translation consultant for Boochani's book No Friend but the Mountains: Writing from Manus Prison (Picador Australia 2018). Her translation of the article An Island Off Manus (Saturday Paper 6 May, 2017) was included in Boochani's winning nomination for the Amnesty Media Award in 2017. Moones has a Masters Degree in International Relations and is passionate about social justice and social cohesion. She is currently coordinator of the Community Refugee Welcome Centre in Inner West Sydney and a content producer for SBS Radio, Persian program.Trade ReviewBehrouz Boochani’s prison writings transcend journalism to become both a cry for justice, and an anatomy of a brutal prison system designed to strip its inmates of their identity, their aspirations, their agency, and crush their spirit. His writings are urgent, eloquent, and desperately poetic. Writing from within his Manus Prison, Boochani exposes the horror and inhumanity of Australia’s offshore detention system, yet he also captures the uniqueness, comradeship, and intimate acts of resistance of his fellow inmates, and affirms their full humanity. He fulfils his mission, his “duty to history”, and ensures that this dark chapter in Australian history, and those who suffered its consequences are not forgotten. A tour de force in bearing witness. * Arnold Zable, author of The Fig Tree *International law entitled people fleeing persecution to claim asylum. But those who seek refuge in Australia are subjected to indefinite offshore detention – a form of torture designed to sap their spirit and traumatise their minds. Behrouz Boochani survives to tell the truth about the cruelty of this policy, in a book which should open the eyes of Australians to a cruelty for which they are politically and morally responsible. These are writings of literary power and first-hand authenticity, with a message of urgent importance at a time when the siren slogan of “offshore detention” is appealing to governments in the UK and elsewhere. When will we recognise that it is both unprincipled and inhumane to punish the innocent? * Geoffrey Robertson AO QC *No Friend But the Mountains was a classic of Australian literature; Freedom, Only Freedom is something better. It is the definitive statement on freedom from a diverse group of writers working together on familiar themes. * ArtsHub *Behrouz Boochani’s newspaper articles about the “Manus Prison” have lost none of their original immediacy. This book also showcases some of the rich conversations prompted by his writings. A must-read for anybody wondering about what might happen when governments opt for an Australian “solution” and shirk their responsibilities towards refugees. * Klaus Neumann, author of Across the Seas (2015) *Behrouz Boochani’s work matters not merely because it bears journalistic witness to the brutality of mandatory refugee detentions but also because it distils that experience into a sophisticated theory of power and resistance. This book offers a deep engagement with a truly original writer. * Jeff Sparrow, author of Crimes Against Nature, (2021) *No writer wants to be a prison writer, no exile dreams of displacement without end. But nothing illuminates totalitarian thinking better than the power of creative imagination. We are fortunate that Behrouz Boochani and his friends summoned the courage to push the experience of Australia’s refugee regime into words. This stunning collection chronicles Boochani’s determination not to vanish. Freedom, Only Freedom is absolutely necessary reading for all those who want to understand what moral responsibility, political courage, and the anti-totalitarian imagination mean today. * Lyndsey Stonebridge, Professor of Humanities and Human Rights, University of Birmingham, UK, and author of Placeless People *Focused on - but not limited to - his individual journey into exile, Behrouz Bouchani’s Freedom Only Freedom offers a provocative and vivid criticism of politics of incarceration, alienation, and subjugation of displaced refugees across the world with specific reference to the case Australia. He has created a new lexicon to reckon with the traumas of border-crossing, displacement, and alienation. * Fatemeh Shams, author of A Revolution in Rhyme: Poetic Co-Option Under the Islamic Republic *A necessary book in the era of border fetishism. Boochani shows us that the current punitive migration measures are rooted in a racist colonial history. Through linking the struggle of the indigenous people of Kurdistan to the struggle of migrants incarcerated by the Australian state in Manus Prison Boochani unfolds how a progressive political subjectivity emerges from the ruins of the nation-states system. Freedom, Only Freedom is a collection of critical and thoughtful contributions to scholarship on contemporary bordering practices. * Shahram Khosravi, Stockholm University, Sweden *Manus is a polite form of torture, designed to deny us the privilege of people like Behrouz. It is often forgotten that the trial judgment in the Tampa case was delivered just 8 hours before the terrible 9/11 attack on America. Our government ramped up calling boat people like Behrouz “illegals”. It’s a lie: Behrouz points out that he broke no law, committed no crime, and had no trial, but was jailed for years. * Julian Burnside, AO, KC *This collected volume of Boochani's prison writings - supported and contextualised by essays from experts in migration, refugee rights, politics and literature - is profound and necessary reading for anyone interested in literature and human rights. Boochani's prison writings, though produced under horrendous conditions, are poetic, sharp in observation and generous in ambit. His body of work documenting firsthand the atrocities inflicted on refugees by the Australian government and their mandatory detention policies has allowed the world to bear witness to human rights violations which might otherwise have remained in the dark. * Maxine Clarke, Author of The Hate Race *The poetic and essayistic pieces in Freedom, Only Freedom: The Prison Writings of Behrouz Boochani exemplify the intersection of his prodigious literary and artistic creativity with his formidable political-geographical, political-scientific and journalistic expertise. Boochani and his collaborators undo familiar frames of reference with respect to the political space of incarcerated seekers of sanctuary and share intimate imaginaries of environmentally conceived pathways to healing and justice. * Rita Sakr, Maynooth University, Ireland *Table of ContentsList of Figures Foreword by Tara June Winch Writing in Languages of Freedom by Omid Tofighian Map Part One 2013-2015 - ‘Fighting to Take Back My Identity’: Creating a New Language in Collaboration “Becoming MEG45” by Behrouz Boochani “Unpublished Reports: Untitled and Two Souls, One Body” by Behrouz Boochani “Translating Manus and Nauru: Refugee Writing” by Moones Mansoubi “Collaborating with Behrouz Boochani: Journalists Against a System” by Ben Doherty Part Two 2016 (Feb-April) - A New Theory: Examining the Prison, Exposing the System “This is Manus Island. My Prison. My Torture. My Humiliation” by Behrouz Boochani “Life on Manus: Island of Damned” by Behrouz Boochani “Australia, Exceptional in its Brutality” by Behrouz Boochani “Testifying to History” by Jordana Silverstein Part Three 2016 (June-Dec) - Journalism as Minor Epics: Confrontation, Survival and Death “What it's Like in Solitary Confinement on Manus Island” by Behrouz Boochani “For Refugees Kidnapped and Exiled to the Manus Prison, Hope is Our Secret Weapon” by Behrouz Boochani “Untitled” by Behrouz Boochani “The Day My Friend Hamid Khazaei Died” by Behrouz Boochani “Faysal Ishak Ahmed’s Life was Full of Pain. Australia Had a Duty to Protect Him” by Behrouz Boochani “Time and Borders, Policy and Lived Experience: A Posthumanist Critique” by Sajad Kabgani “Kurdish Identity and Journalism: Reporting to Record History” by Roza Germian Part Four 2017 (Mar-Sept) - Introducing the Kyriarchal System: Knowing Manus Prison “A Kyriarchal System: New Colonial Experiments/New Decolonial Resistance” by Behrouz Boochani “Unpublished Report: Untitled” by Behrouz Boochani “An Island off Manus” by Behrouz Boochani “The Tortuous Demise of Hamed Shamshiripour, Who Didn’t Deserve to Die on Manus Island” by Behrouz Boochani “‘The Man Who Loves Ducks’: The Refugee Saving Animals on Manus” by Behrouz Boochani “Epistemic Violence, Aesthetic Breaks, and the Man Who Loves Ducks” by Anne McNevin “Exposing ‘Incalculable Cruelty’: Writings on Border Harms and Atrocity as Resistance” by Victoria Canning Part Five 2017 (Oct-Dec) - The Siege on Manus Prison: 23 Days of Collective Resistance “Days Before the Forced Closure of Manus We Have No Safe Place to Go” by Behrouz Boochani “Diary of Disaster” by Behrouz Boochani “The Refugees Are in a State of Terror on Manus”bu Behrouz Boochani “A Merciless Fear Provoked by Last Night's Events has Gripped the Manus Island Camp” by Behrouz Boochani “Manus is a Landscape of Surreal Horror” by Behrouz Boochani “The Breath of Death on Manus Island: Starvation and Sickness” by Behrouz Boochani “All We Want is Freedom – Not Another Prison Camp” by Behrouz Boochani “I Write from Manus as a Duty to History.” By Behrouz Boochani “A Letter from Manus Island” by Behrouz Boochani “23 Days of Resistance Alongside Behrouz Boochani” by Shaminda Kanapathi “Words That Escaped from Prison” by Erik Jensen Part Six 2018 (Feb-June) - A Duty to History: Dignity, Time and Identity “Four Years After Reza Barati’s Death, We Still Have No Justice” by Behrouz Boochani “Policy of Exile” by Behrouz Boochani “Mohamed’s Life Story is a Tragedy. But it’s Typical for Father’s Held on Manus” by Behrouz Boochani “The Gay, Transgender and Biosexual men on Manus are Forced into Silence” by Behrouz Boochani “Salim Fled Genocide to Find Safety. He Lost his Life in the Most Tragic Way” by Behrouz Boochani “Manus Island Poem” by Behrouz Boochani “Journalism, Borders and Oppression: The Nauru Context” by Elahe Zivardar and Mehran Ghadiri “On Mothers, Nature and the Body” by Fatima Measham Part Seven 2018 (Aug)-2019 (Apr) - Manus Prison Theory: Creating a Body of Knowledge “Manus Prison Theory” by Behrouz Boochani “Australia Needs a Moral Revolution” by Behrouz Boochani “Five Years in Manus Purgatory” by Behrouz Boochani “’Sam Could Have Been Saved’: Where Does the Money for Healthcare Go on Manus?” by Behrouz Boochani “The Paladin Scandal is Only a Drop in the Ocean of Corruption on Manus and Nauru” by Behrouz Boochani “The 'Papua New Guinea Solution' in Australia's Public Discourse and Human Rights Activism” by Mahnaz Alimardanian “Australian Corruption and the Pacific: Dollars, Displacement and Death” by Helen Davidson Part Eight 2019 (May-Oct) - Writing to Keep Hope Alive/New Dimensions to Systematic Torture “This Election is an Opportunity to Vote for Humanity and Freedom” by Behrouz Boochani “’The Boats are Coming’ is One of the Greatest Lies Told to the Australian People” by Behrouz Boochani “The truth about self-harm in offshore detention” by Behrouz Boochani “Purification by Love” by Behrouz Boochani “Emotion, Responsibility and Hope for Different Futures” by Claudia Tazreiter “Prison Notebooks and the Oceanic-Kurdish Connection: Boochani’s Political Reflectivity” by Steven Ratuva Part Nine 2020 (May-June) – New Narratives and Knowledge: New Writing and Collaboration “As I learn to live in freedom, Australia is still tormenting refugees” by Behrouz Boochani “’A Human Being Feels They Are On a Precipice’: COVID-19’s Threshold Moment” by Behrouz Boochani and Omid Tofighian “Boochani’s ‘Political Poetics’: Subverting and Reimagining the Fiction of Politics” by Anne Surma “Journalism as Dialogue: Creating Collective Activism Through the Prison Writings of Behrouz Boochani” by Lida Amiri Part Ten 2020 (Sept) – Neocolonial experiments/Creative resistance “For the refugees Australia Imprisons Music is Liberation, Life and Defiance” by Behrouz Boochani “’White Australia’ Policy Lives On in Immigration Detention” by Behrouz Boochani “On Documentation, Language, and Social Media” by Arianna Grasso “Carceral Coloniality as a History of the Present” by Helena Zeweri List of Contributors

    5 in stock

    £18.00

  • Muriel Sparks Early Fiction

    Edinburgh University Press Muriel Sparks Early Fiction

    2 in stock

    Book SynopsisThis book presents a detailed critical analysis of a period of significant formal and thematic innovation in Muriel Spark's literary career.Trade Review"Muriel Spark's Early Fiction is a magnificent achievement, bursting with revealing and original insights into Spark's fiction and the enduring preoccupations and working methods of this most singular author. The result is a welcome addition to the process Spark scholars have embarked upon in recent years: extricating (or 'desegregating') the author from the various literary-critical categories that once confined her. Bailey's approach is flexible and multi-faceted by contrast, and draws on an impressively extensive use of previously unexamined archival material. The reader is provided with illuminating explorations of 'instances of narrative daring' during the first two decades of Spark's career which range from under-examined early short stories to key texts such as The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie and The Driver's Seat, and place the emphasis on her enduring commitment to highlight the ways women become inscribed in oppressive cultural narratives. It is a rich and readable monograph which lives up to its ambition to establish a more complex and appropriate framework to discuss Spark in our current critical era, and will therefore be essential reading for those embarking on future studies of one of the most brilliant and unusual writers of the second half of the Twentieth Century." -Bran Nicol, University of Surrey

    2 in stock

    £19.94

  • Shakespeare's Mad Men: A Crisis of Authority

    Stanford University Press Shakespeare's Mad Men: A Crisis of Authority

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisThis book is about a mad king and a mad duke. With original and iconoclastic readings, Richard van Oort pioneers the reading of Shakespeare as an ethical thinker of the "originary scene," the scene in which humans became conscious of themselves as symbol-using moral and narrative beings. Taking King Lear and Measure for Measure as case studies, van Oort shows how the minimal concept of an anthropological scene of origin—the "originary hypothesis"—provides the basis for a new understanding of every aspect of the plays, from the psychology of the characters to the ethical and dialogical conflicts upon which the drama is based. The result is a gripping commentary on the plays. Why does Lear abdicate and go mad? Why does Edgar torture his father with non-recognition? Why does Lucio accuse the Duke in Measure for Measure of madness and lechery, and why does Isabella remain silent at the end? In approaching these and other questions from the perspective of the originary hypothesis, van Oort helps us to see the ethical predicament of the plays, and, in the process, makes Shakespeare new again.Trade Review"This is criticism of the highest order, whose long, careful readings of King Lear and Measure for Measure are in dialogue with the finest readers of Shakespeare for the past century." —Blair Hoxby, Stanford University"A rigorous yet highly readable attempt to understand Shakespeare and neoclassical drama in general in new terms, Shakespeare's Mad Men demonstrates in admirable detail the analytical power of generative anthropology wielded by a powerful intelligence."—Eric Gans, University of California, Los Angeles"Attentive to both the ruses of bad faith and the truths disclosed by Shakespeare's language, van Oort addresses our human predicament as symbol-making creatures whose search for love is troubled by the ceaseless drive for mastery."—Julia Reinhard Lupton, University of California, Irvine"van Oort's reading is nothing less than a stunning provocation."—Amir Khan, Shakespeare Quarterly"[R]eaders... will find value and pleasure in van Oort's compelling readings, and his clear style makes complex concepts pleasingly accessible."—Molly G. Yarp, Times Literary Supplement"Eminently readable, Shakespeare's Man Men attempts to engage and explain the larger questions the plays raise, particularly why characters behave the way they do and make the choices they do. The readings are original and offer exciting ways to engage with the plays. Highly recommended."—K. J. Wetmore Jr., CHOICETable of ContentsIntroduction 1. The King's Last Potlatch 2. The Judge, the Duke, His Wife, and Her Lover Conclusion

    15 in stock

    £23.39

  • Brepols N.V. Ecocriticism and Old Norse Studies: Nature and

    Out of stock

    Book Synopsis

    Out of stock

    £72.68

  • Of Gods and Men: 100 Stories from Ancient Greece

    Bloomsbury Publishing PLC Of Gods and Men: 100 Stories from Ancient Greece

    15 in stock

    Book SynopsisA rigorously and imaginatively researched anthology of classical literature, bringing together one hundred stories from the rich diversity of the literary canon of ancient Greece and Rome. Striking a balance between the 'classic classic' (such as Dryden's translation of the Aeneid) and the less familiar or expected, Of Gods and Men ranges from the epic poetry of Homer to the histories of Arrian and Diodorus Siculus and the sprawling Theogony of Hesiod; from the tragedies of Aeschylus and Euripides to the biographies of Suetonius and Plutarch and the pen portraits of Theophrastus; and from the comedies of Plautus to the fictions of Petronius and Apuleius. Of Gods and Men is embellished by translations from writers as diverse as Queen Elizabeth I (Boethius), Percy Bysshe Shelley (Plato), Walter Pater (Apuleius's Golden Ass), Lawrence of Arabia (Homer's Odyssey), Louis MacNeice (Aeschylus's Agamemnon) and Ted Hughes (Ovid's Pygmalion), as well as a number of accomplished translations by Daisy Dunn herself.Trade ReviewThis book is a big and wonderful read for anyone who loves classical literature... Each story is a truly fascinating tale of wars, endless fighting, heroes, deaths, beautiful women – Helen features, of course – gods and goddesses, cruelty, pain and love * Pennant Magazine *This is an excellent collection. Everyone needs to know the Classics, and this volume is a good place not just to start but also to continue and depend one's love for the Ancients * Catholic Herald *The book is perfect gift material but really, you should treat yourself to it first * Minerva *This anthology is hard to beat for big names * BBC History Magazine *

    15 in stock

    £18.00

  • Materiality and Aesthetics in Archaic and

    Edinburgh University Press Materiality and Aesthetics in Archaic and

    1 in stock

    Book SynopsisCombining New Materialist and cognitive methodologies, Amy Lather shows the different ways in which matter interacted with mind in ancient Greek thought.Trade Review"Materiality and Aesthetics in Archaic and Classical Greek Poetry is a timely intervention in the field of Greek poetics that engages with current theoretical trends with admirable clarity and insight. It is a book that is both vital and full of vitality a joy to read!" -Verity Platt, Professor of Greek and Roman Art History, Cornell University

    1 in stock

    £19.94

  • Numinous Seditions: Interiority and Climate

    University of Alberta Press Numinous Seditions: Interiority and Climate

    3 in stock

    Book SynopsisWith Numinous Seditions, celebrated poet and essayist Tim Lilburn investigates inner dispositions that might help us bear the new sorrows of the climate crisis. The book draws from the West’s almost forgotten contemplative tradition in its Platonic, Islamic, Christian, and Zoharic forms. It also explores ideas from modern philosophers Jan Zwicky, Gillian Rose, Dorothy Day, and Simone Weil, and from contemporary poets Don Domanski, Philip Kevin Paul, Anne Szumigalski, and Roberto Harrison. Lilburn suggests that listening, noticing, reading, and stretching our imaginations are all part of an interior stance that can assist with the difficult tasks of forming deep relationships with the land, with Indigenous peoples, and with pedagogy itself. Numinous Seditions is for scholars and readers interested in poetry, environmental philosophy, and in the possibility of a contemplative politics.Trade Review"Numinous Seditions proposes to expand the human imagination with a call to renewed vision. It invites the reader into active, thoughtful engagement with arguably the most crucial question of our time: what can I make of myself, in the world we have made for ourselves?" H. L. Hix, University of Wyoming"Among the book’s ample gifts are its refusal of confected hope and its hosting of a larger conversation. Here Ibn ‘Arabī brushes foreheads with Anne Szumigalski, Andrew Ahenakew’s polar bear shares the sky with the angel of pseudo-Dionysius. In contemplating shards of ancient wisdom, Lilburn seeks the grace needed to grieve the conflagration of the world." Warren Heiti, author of Attending: An Ethical Art“The lucent essays gathered in Tim Liburn’s new book offer what they adumbrate: a ‘refugium for attentiveness,’ opening lines of earthbound thought, enriching our lexicon, and retrieving forgotten practices in order to cultivate a contemplative, compassionate, and creative modus vivendi in the midst of the unspeakable sorrow of ecological unravelling, climatic disruption, and the continuing legacies of imperialist violence. Amongst them is a meditation on lectio divina that might be taken as a guide for reading these essays themselves, many of them tending towards the fragmentary, punctuated with pauses, and all of them replete with invitations to see, feel, and imagine otherwise.” Kate Rigby, author of Meditations on Creation in an Era of ExtinctionTable of ContentsPreface New Sadness Interiority and Climate Change Contemplative Practices, Contemplative Pedagogies Hoping for Something to Appear | The Poetry of Don Domanski Poetry’s Practice of Philosophy | Anne Szumigalski Reading William Chittick Reading Ibn ‘Arabi Happy Incompetencies, the Self’s Other Routes Poverty and the Doom of Acedia Ontological Loneliness and the Balm of Metaphor Two Readings on Snow, Two Readings on Sorrow In the Time of Extreme Heat, In the Time of the Discovery of Unmarked Graves at the Site of Residential Schools Numinous Seditions Dream Coda Glossary Reading Index

    3 in stock

    £21.59

  • The Spice Must Flow

    Penguin Putnam Inc The Spice Must Flow

    10 in stock

    Book SynopsisGeek-culture expert Ryan Britt takes us behind the pages and scenes of the science-fiction phenomenon Dune, charting the series' life from cult sci-fi novels to some of the most visionary movies of all time.   Using original, deep-access reporting, extensive research, and insightful commentary, The Spice Must Flow brings the true popularity of Dune out into the light for the very first time. With original interviews with the beloved actors and directors behind the films—including Timothée Chalamet, Kyle Maclachlan, Denis Villeneuve, Patrick Stewart, Rebecca Ferguson, Alec Newman, and many more— The Spice Must Flow also examines the far-reaching influence of Dune on art, music, politics, and, most notably, its status as the first ecological science-fiction story specifically concerned with climate change.   Britt skillfully and entertainingly guides readers through the history of how the Dune

    10 in stock

    £14.40

  • Asimov's Foundation and Philosophy

    Carus Books Asimov's Foundation and Philosophy

    1 in stock

    Book Synopsis Isaac Asimov’s Foundation is the most influential science-fiction epic of all time. Published as a series of books and short stories from the 1940s to the 1980s, the series has impacted most subsequent science fiction, and influenced sciences like sociology, statistics, and psychology. The story has now been made into a highly acclaimed TV serial (Foundation), on Apple TV, the second season now shooting in Prague. The story begins 45,000 years in the future, and spans centuries in which a vast and successful interstellar human empire is unknowingly headed for total collapse. Using an advanced mathematical technique called psycho-history, a brilliant scientist, Hari Seldon, predicts the collapse and establishes a “foundation” to bring about the resurrection of human civilization many generations in the future.Asimov’s Foundation and Philosophy is a collection of twenty-four chapter by philosophers exploring the philosophical issues and puzzles raised by this epic story. Topics include whether one individual can make a big difference in history, the ethics of manipulating large populations of people to bring about a desirable future result, the Dao of non-action, the impact of education on future generations, whether human affairs are governed by predictable cycles, whether attempts to plan for the future must be thwarted by free will, the futility of empire-building, the ethics of cloning human beings, and the use of logic in analyzing human behavior.Joshua Heter teaches philosophy at Jefferson College, Missouri, and is co-editor of Better Call Saul and Philosophy: I Think Therefore I Scam (2022).Josef Thomas Simpson is an academic coach and part-time lecturer. He contributed chapters to Westworld and Philosophy: Mind Equals Blown (2019) and Orphan Black and Philosophy: Grand Theft DNA (2016).Trade ReviewIsaac Asimov (January 2, 1920 - April 6, 1992) was an American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University. During his lifetime, Asimov was considered one of the "Big Three" science fiction writers, along with Robert A. Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke. A prolific writer, he wrote or edited more than 500 books. He also wrote an estimated 90,000 letters and postcards. Best known for his hard science fiction, Asimov also wrote mysteries and fantasy, as well as much non-fiction. (Wikipedia) Simply stated, novelist Isaac Asimov's Foundation trilogy is arguably the most influential science-fiction epic of all time. Published as a series of books and short stories from the 1940s to the 1980s, the series has impacted most subsequent science fiction, and influenced sciences like sociology, statistics, and psychology. The story has now been made into a highly acclaimed TV serial (Foundation), on Apple TV, the second season now shooting in Prague. The story begins 45,000 years in the future, and spans centuries in which a vast and successful interstellar human empire is unknowingly headed for total collapse. Using an advanced mathematical technique called psycho-history, a brilliant scientist, Hari Seldon, predicts the collapse and establishes a "foundation" to bring about the resurrection of human civilization many generations in the future. Asimov's Foundation and Philosophy is a collection of twenty-four chapter by philosophers exploring the philosophical issues and puzzles raised by this epic story. Topics include whether one individual can make a big difference in history, the ethics of manipulating large populations of people to bring about a desirable future result, the Dao of non-action, the impact of education on future generations, whether human affairs are governed by predictable cycles, whether attempts to plan for the future must be thwarted by free will, the futility of empire-building, the ethics of cloning human beings, and the use of logic in analyzing human behavior. Critique: Of special appeal to the legions of Isaac Asimov fans, and deftly co-edited by the team of Joshua Heter and Josef Thomas Simpson, "Asimov's Foundation and Philosophy" is a compendium of twenty-three erudite and inherently interesting articles on the impact of the Foundation series on popular culture, introducing the concept of 'psychohistory'. Enhanced for the reader with the inclusion of an eight page Bibliography, a four page listing of the contributors and their credentials (The Encyclopedists), and a three page Index, "Asimov's Foundation and Philosophy" is a significant and unreservedly recommended addition to personal, community, and academic library Popular Culture & Philosophy collections and supplemental curriculum studies lists. It should be noted that "Asimov's Foundation and Philosophy" is also readily available in a digital book format (Kindle, $8.99). Editorial Note #1: Joshua Heter (https://philpeople.org/profiles/joshua-heter) teaches philosophy at Jefferson College, Missouri, and is co-editor of Better Call Saul and Philosophy: I Think Therefore I Scam (2022). Editorial Note #2: Josef Thomas Simpson (https://philpeople.org/profiles/josef-thomas-simpson) is an academic coach and part-time lecturer. He contributed chapters to Westworld and Philosophy: Mind Equals Blown (2019) and Orphan Black and Philosophy: Grand Theft DNA (2016).

    1 in stock

    £17.09

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