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Book SynopsisThis illuminating book traces the development of Scottish women’s writing in English from its genesis in the late eighteenth century to its flowering in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Hindered initially by the hostility of the Presbyterian Church and the self-serving attitude of the male hierarchy which denied them a proper education, an astonishing number of women found opportunities, in the midst of domestic obligations, to write, and often publish – novels, poetry, diaries, journalism, letters, essays and reportage. Charlotte Waldie and Christina Keith visited, respectively, Waterloo and Flanders in the immediate aftermath of battle. Another intrepid writer, Emily Graves, wrote a memoir of her travels in Transylvania in The Light Beyond the Forest – from which Bram Stoker directly lifted the most blood-curdling elements of Dracula. Others remembered include literary multi-tasker and businesswoman Christian Isabel Johnstone; playwright Joanna Baillie; working-class poets Marion Bernstein and Janet Hamilton; novelist Susan Ferrier; memoirist Anne Grant of Laggan; and writer and scientist Mary Somerville, depicted on the cover, after whom Somerville College, Oxford is named. Trade Review'Any open-minded reader will learn a lot from this survey of Scottish women writers of the 19th and early 20th centuries.' Stuart Kelly in Scotland on SundayTable of ContentsBefore Fiction / Calvin’s Shadow / The Author of Marriage / Multitasking / A General Utility Woman / A Chelsea Interior / The Good Wife / Two Poets of the West / The Rainbow in the Cloud / The Highland Lady / The Immortal Joanna / Telling My Story / The Most Extraordinary Woman / Waterloo and Other Stories / Golden Lands / Turning the Century / My Own Country / Postscript

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Book SynopsisEver since Arthur Conan Doyle created the pipe-smoking, deer-stalkered character, Sherlock Holmes, he has become a part of popular culture for generations, and here every aspect of the legendary detective is investigated. Brief, accessible and entertaining pieces on a wide variety of subjects makes it the perfect book to dip in to. The amazing and extraordinary facts series presents interesting, surprising and little-known facts and stories about a wide-range of topics which are guaranteed to inform, absorb and entertain in equal measure.Table of ContentsIntroduction The Doyle Family - Background of the author Literary beginnings - Conan Doyle at school Dr Joseph Bell - Mentor and model for Holmes The doctor who wanted to write - Conan Doyle sets up practice in Southsea Who came before? - Other literary detectives A Study in Scarlet - How Sherlock Holmes was born A slow birth process - Beeton's Christmas Annual 1887 Holmes described - Appearance, character and background Watson described - Appearance, character and background Holmes' Baker Street - Numbers and complications So many choices - The search for 221B The Sign of (the) Four - The story of the follow-up novel Evocative of its time - Conan Doyle's London The Strand Magazine - Reading for the masses Sidney Paget - The first great Holmes illustrator The human side - Re-introduction of Holmes Central attraction - Why Holmes still works today Deduction - It's a science Mycroft Holmes - Sherlock's big brother Mrs Hudson - The long-suffering landlady Scotland Yarders - Lestrade and all the rest Professor Moriarty - The Napoleon of Crime Women and Holmes - What he really thought of them Holmes' literary tastes - What he reads and what he recommends Holmes' musical tastes - The detective takes time to relax A rare actor - Sherlock Holmes in disguise Town versus country - Holmes, the city-dweller Expert monographs - Holmes, the writer Great quotations - Holmes, the brilliant conversationalist The early plots - Short story breakdown, Part 1 Holmes is critical - Watson's writing analysed Increasing returns - Conan Doyle and his considerable earnings Reichenbach beckoned - The killing of Sherlock Holmes Start of something - The Holmes phenomenon First parodies - Sherlock Holmes becomes a copied man The footlights - Holmes takes to the stage Sherlock Holmes - The play that became Gillette's great success The Hound looms - The return of the detective It was inevitable - The story of the real return The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Short story breakdown, Part 2 The start of scholarship - Something new in detective fiction The bright Ronald Knox - 'Studies in the Literature of Sherlock Holmes' Baffled! - Holmes in the silent film era Output dwindles - The story of writing His Last Bow His Last Bow - Short story breakdown, Part 3 Post Gillette's masterpiece - More Holmes on stage, Part 1 Spiritualism dominates - Conan Doyle and his religious beliefs The final demise - Conan Doyle's last decade of writing The Case-book of Sherlock Holmes - Short story breakdown, Part 4 Mystery stories - And yet another three? The 'talkies' - The arrival of film with sound Rathbone arrives - A triumph before typecasting Rathbone runs away - The Rathbone-Bruce partnership ends Up to date - More Holmes on stage, Part 2 The birth of societies - With their roots firmly in scholarship An insatiable appetite - Holmes and modern media Enduring appeal - Holmes in the 21st century Epilogue - Remembering Conan Doyle Bibliography Index

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Book Synopsis An amazing guide to some of the most beloved, original, inspiring, hysterical, heart-warming, compelling, rude and downright scary books that have enchanted children the world over. In 100 Children's Books That Inspired Our World, author Colin Salter surveys an exceptional collection of truly groundbreaking children's books – from Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer to the graphic novels of Dr. Seuss. All the classic children's authors are represented with one stand-out book, plus mentions for their best-known works. Ordered chronologically, the book showcases favourite children's books ranging from Victorian classics to modern day bestsellers. Books featured include: Alice in Wonderland, Treasure Island, Charlotte's Web, A Series of Unfortunate Events, Matilda, Watership Down, Tales of Hans Christian Anderson, Grimms Fairy Tales, Peter Pan, A Bear Called Paddington, The Snowman, The Secret Garden, How to Train Your Dragon, Anne of Green Gables, Harry Potter, James and the Giant Peach, The Gruffalo, Mr Men, Coraline, Herge's Adventures of TinTin, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, Finn Family Moomintroll, Swiss Family Robinson, Heidi, The Hobbit, The Red Balloon, The Jungle Book, Mary Poppins, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, His Dark Materials, The Railway Children, Noddy, The House at Pooh Corner, The Sheep Pig, Stig of the Dump, Fungus the Bogeyman, Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, Secret Seven, Famous Five, Black Beauty, The Diary of a Young Girl, The Boy in Striped Pyjamas, Artemis Fowl and many more who lived happily ever after.Trade Review'Reveals how children’s literature has changed over time, from earnest instruction to playful adventure... includes bright covers and lively descriptions of beloved children’s books from 1697 to 2011.' -- Alexandra Wolfe, * The Wall Street Journal *'The is the most fantastic book - inspiring, interesting, reflective, nostalgic, informative and attractive.' * Juno magazine *'This is a lovely keepsake for book lovers who can look back on the stories that shaped their childhoods (and adulthood!). It is also a nice gift for children who can discover some “new” books, or learn about the authors who wrote some of their favourites.' * Picture Book Perfect blog *'Great for suggestions of books and extracts which would be worth using in the classroom; I want children in my class to see how brilliant some older texts can also be… This is an ideal book for any lover of children’s books and literature.' * Teacher Bookworm blog *'A beautiful selection of old and new books ... A real keepsake book' -- The Green Parent magazine'This is a lovely keepsake for book lovers who can look back on the stories that shaped their childhoods (and adulthood!). It is also a nice gift for children who can discover some “new” books, or learn about the authors who wrote some of their favourites.' * Picture Book Perfect blog *

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Book SynopsisAN ECONOMIST BOOK OF THE YEAR 2024'A masterclass in masterpieces' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH'Epic, personal, smart, wise, witty' JOSHUA COHEN'Sizzles with passion' TOM McCARTHYFor more than two decades, Edwin Frank has introduced readers to forgotten or overlooked texts as director of the acclaimed publisher New York Review Books. In Stranger than Fiction, he offers a legendary editor's survey of the key works that defined the twentieth-century novel. Starting with Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, Frank shows how its twitchy, self-undermining narrator established a voice that would echo through the coming century. He illuminates Gertrude Stein and Ernest Hemingway's reinvention of the American sentence; Colette and André Gide's subversions of traditional gender roles; and the monumental ambitions of works such as Mrs Dalloway, The Magic Mountain and The Man Without Qualities to encompass their times. Also included are Japan's Natsume Soseki and Nigeria's Chinua Achebe, as well as Vasily Grossman, Hans Erich Nossack and Elsa Morante. Later chapters range from Ralph Ellison and Marguerite Yourcenar to Gabriel García Márquez and WG Sebald. Frank makes sense of the century by mixing biographical portraiture, cultural history and close encounters with great works of art. In so doing he renews our appreciation of the paradigmatic art form of our times.

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Book SynopsisTo celebrate Aurora Metro's 30th anniversary as an independent publisher, 20% of profits will to go to the Virginia Woolf statue campaign in the UK. This is a revised edition of the publisher's inaugural publication in 1990, which won the Pandora Award from Women-in-Publishing. Inspirational in its original format, this new edition features poems, stories, essays and interviews with over 30 women writers, both emerging authors and luminaries of contemporary literature such as: A.S. BYATT, KIT DE WAAL, CAROL ANN DUFFY, PHILIPPA GREGORY, JACKIE KAY, MADELINE THIEN, CLARE TOMALIN, SARAH WATERS, and the great-niece of Virginia Woolf herself, EMMA WOOLF. Together with the original writing workshops plus black and white illustrations from women illustrators. Guest editor Ann Sandham has compiled the new collection.Trade Review...a gem of a book: everything a woman writer might need in one slim volume. "...plenty of practical advice and information including detailed suggestions for a series of sessions." - Everywoman Magazine; “…I found The Women Writers’ Handbook intriguing, and it should encourage other women to develop confidence in creativity.” - The Listener; …plenty of practical advice and information including detailed suggestions for a series of sessions.” - Writers’ News.

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Book SynopsisFifty Forgotten Books is a very special sort of book about books, by a great bookman and for book-people of all ages and levels of experience. Not quite literary criticism, not quite an autobiography, it is at once a guided tour through the dusty backrooms of long vanished used bookstores, a love letter to bookshops and bookselling, and a browser's dream wish list of often overlooked and unloved novels, short story collections, poetry collections and works of nonfiction. In these pages, R. B. Russell, publisher of Tartarus Press, doesn't only discuss the books of his life, but explains what they have meant to him over time, charting his progress as a writer and publisher for over thirty years . . . and a bibliophile for many more. Here is living proof of how literature, books, and book collecting can be an intrinsic part of one's personal, professional and imaginative life, and as not only a solitary act, but a social one, resulting in treasured friendships, experiences, and loves one might never, otherwise, have enjoyed. Filled with a lively nostalgia for the era when finding strange new books meant pounding the pavement and not just filling in search engines, Fifty Forgotten Books is for anyone who wishes they could still browse the dusty bookshelves of their youth, and who can't wait to get back out into the world in quest of the next text liable to change their life.Trade Review‘A groovy and delicious and intimate jigsaw of memories and passions and books, and schisms and oddities and books – Ray Russell is a bibliomaniac that it is a delight to spend time with. Falling in love with books voraciously, whilst growing up ferociously, has never been so beautifully described – a memoir that is as accurate and enthralling as it is dreamlike – just like the books about which he writes with such love!’ David Tibet ---- ‘R. B. Russell’s beautifully told part-memoir gives us the story of a life lived alongside books, and the joyous way in which those dusty first editions often reverberate throughout our lives.’ Ed Parnell ---- ‘A compelling celebration of reading, writing, publishing and the unexpected treasures to be found in second hand bookshops. Ray Russell writes so eloquently about his deep love of books as things in themselves but also his joy of discovering the new, the strange – those books that act as life’s waymarkers.’ Andrew Michael Hurley ---- ‘This is a book to send you scurrying to the dusty mote-filled light of the secondhand book shop, to the chilliness of the jumble sale, to late nights at the blue screen of the laptop, seeking out the books you don’t know and can’t wait to know, and to renew old acquaintances. A memoir and commonplace book as delicate, suggestive and enchanting as the books themselves.’ Stuart Maconie ---- ‘Absolutely wonderful. A unique and enchanting memoir like no other. A book lover’s paean to the volumes that made him, which also opens a window on his soul. Charming, vivid and singularly evocative.’ Jeremy Dyson ---- ‘Decadents, bohemians, cult musicians, the odd (very odd) spy, shady publishers, backstreet booksellers, writers of the weird and wayward, they’re all here. R. B. Russell’s memoir gives us literature on the edge, in all its wonderful strangeness.’ Mark Valentine ---- ‘Whether Russell is remembering his discovery of Arthur Machen, chronicling his sometimes comic negotiations with the crafty bookdealer George Locke, or reflecting on his own personal library of tatty paperbacks, signed firsts and rare association copies, he makes clear that a bookish life can be an enviably rewarding one, replete with the quiet satisfactions of the study, the rowdy pleasures of the literary conference, and warm friendships with the learned, the widely read and, not least, the winningly eccentric.’ Michael Dirda

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Book Synopsis100 Objects of Dr Who is a celebration of everyone''s favourite sci-fi show. Perfect for fans, no matter your mileage. It is ingeniously structured as a choose your own adventure - style tour around a Doctor Who museum floating in outer space. Irreverent yet exhaustive, this is a reference book with a twist!

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Book SynopsisLine Break is the major work on poetry as social practice and a must-read for anyone interested in contemporary criticism or poetry. For many years, James Scully, along with others, quietly radicalized American poetry—in theory and in practice, in how it is lived as well as in how it is written. In eight provocative essays, James Scully argues provocatively for artistic and cultural practice that actively opposes structures of power too often reinforced by intellectual activities.Trade Review"James Scully's essays, like his poems, refuse to soothe or simplify, to shortchange either poetry or the imperative for social revolution. His fiercely demystifying intelligence is grounded in hope and realism for poetry in itself along with other forms of dissident engagement."—Adrienne Rich|"Scully's brilliance is mesmerizing, radicalizing, a power plant producing synapses in the 'mind politic' that may well allow Americans, finally, to write and discourse with our kind around the globe. If American poets have a role to play in preserving free speech in the 21st century, this book belongs in our every backpack."—Linda McCarriston|"Line Break is a powerful and internally consistent argument that literature, that poetry in particular, can and must fulfill its ancient duty to register and judge the conduct of human beings. Line Break extrapolates and updates Plato: a poem that does not examine life critically is not worth writing."—Robert BaggTable of ContentsForeword by Adrienne RichPrefactory NotesRemarks on Political PoetryIn Defense of IdeologyDemagogy in the MuséeThe Dream of an Apolitical PoetryScratching SurfacesReviewPoetic Freedom and "Cuba"Line Break

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Book SynopsisScattered in a variety of academic journals here and abroad, these importnat essays have been brought together in a single volume for the first time. Included as an introduction is a lecture prepared by Dino Bigongiari, for over five decades the most eminent scholar at Columbia University and one of the great Dantist of the century.An internationally-known comparist, founder of Council on National Literatures and for over three decades Editor of its prestigious series, Review of National Literatures, Dr. Anne Paolucci brings her wide reading and training to bear in such essays as "Dante's Satan and Milton's 'Bryonic Hero'," "Dante and Machiavelli: Political 'Idealism' and Political 'Realism';" and "Women in the Political Love-Ethic of the Divine Comedy and the Faerie Queens." She sheds new light on a familiar subject in "Dante, Hegel, and the Marian Inspiration of the Commedia," showing Hegel to be a rich source for critical study in this area. "Exile Among the Exiles: Dante's Party of One" focuses on Dante's bitter life-long exile from his beloved Florence. "The Strident Voices of Hell" provides an insightful introduction to the Inferno. A brief but substantive picture of the Middle Ages is provided in "The Cosmopolitan Age of Dante and His Dream of Restored Imperial Rule."Professor Bigongiari's essya, probably written to be delivered as a lecture in Florence on the occasion of the 700th anniversary of Dante's birth, is a welcome Introduction to the volume. In his terse, informative and authoritative voice, the author raises two important questions: "Is Dante a popular poet?" and "Is Dante a classic poet?" In the course of answering these questions, Professor Bigongiari provides brilliant insights into the preservation and transmission of the precious manuscripts and codices that passed through his hands in Florence, where he had been invited to help prepare for the anniversary celebrations.

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Book SynopsisThis volume explores the influences of Catholicism and Protestantism in a trio of Shakespeare's tragedies: Julius Caesar , Macbeth , and Hamlet . Bypassing the discussion of Shakespeare's personal religious beliefs, Batson instead focuses on distinct footprints left by Catholic and Protestant traditions that underlie and inform Shakespeare's artistic genius.Trade Review"These essays, which seek to demonstrate how powerfully Shakespeare's artistry is informed by Christian tradition and culture, are admirably free of narrow doctrinal or exegetical restriction. As we make our way through these essays, here observing Shakespeare's Catholic sensibility and there his Protestant one, we see the playwright's infinite variety in a light both familiar and critically new. - JOSEPH CANDIDO, University of Arkansas This stimulating collection of smart essays demonstrates not only that Shakespeare was theologically informed but also that Christian language and concepts were integral to the design of his major tragedies. The formidable contributors enable us to hear lost echoes of Scripture and sermon, polemic and Prayer Book that reverberate in nearly every scene. - PETER LEITHART, New St. Andrews College"Table of ContentsPreface -- Beatrice Batson 1. Meta-drama in Hamlet and Macbeth -- Peter Milward, SJ 2. Explorers of the Revelation: Spenser and Shakespeare -- David Daniell 3. The Problem of Self-Love in Shakespeare's Tragedies and in Renaissance and Reformation Theology -- Robert Lanier Reid 4. "I Could Not Say âAmen'": Prayer and Providence in Macbeth -- Robert S. Miola 5. Hamlet and Protestant Aural Theater -- Grace Tiffany 6. Providence in Julius Caesar -- John W. Mahon 7. Cobbling Souls in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar -- Maurice Hunt Contributors

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Book SynopsisThis work includes twenty-four essays including a preface, introduction, afterword, and sections containing seminal methodological pieces by such giants as Edward Said and Michel Foucault, as well as contemporary applications to Beowulf and other Old English and Germanic texts focusing on historicism, psychoanalysis, gender, textuality, and post-colonialism.

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Book SynopsisWorks prior to this book focused on Bede as not only a European, but also as an English scholar, historian, scientist, or a biographer of saints, and have used a traditional approach towards his explanation of the Bible. Bede's interpretation of his work, its continuous progress, and the reasons behind his hurried appointment to an authority almost as high as the Church Fathers are all topics examined within the text. Essays are by Roger Ray, Faith Wallis, Calvin B. Kendall, George Hardin Brown, Scott DeGregorio, Arthur G. Holder, Lawrence T. Martin, Walter Goffart, and Joyce Hill.

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Book SynopsisHeliand, the Old Saxon poem based on the life of Christ in the Gospels, has become more available to students of Anglo-Saxon culture as its influence has reached into a wider range of fields from history to linguistics, literature, and religion. In Perspectives on the Old Saxon Heliand, Valentine Pakis brings together recent scholarship that both addresses new turns in the field and engages with the relevant arguments of the past three decades. Furthering the ongoing critical discussion of both text and culture, this volume also reflects on the current state of the field and demonstrates how it has evolved since the 1970s.

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Book SynopsisCross and Cruciform in the Anglo-Saxon World: Studies to Honor the Memory of Timothy Reuter is edited by Sarah Larratt Keefer, Karen Louise Jolly, and Catherine E. Karkov and is the third and final volume of an ambitious research initiative begun in 1999 concerned with the image of the cross, showing how its very material form cuts across both the culture of a society and the boundaries of academic disciplines - history, archaeology, art history, literature, philosophy, and religion - providing vital insights into how symbols function within society. The flexibility, portability, and adaptability of the Anglo-Saxon understanding of the cross suggest that, in pre-Conquest England, at least, the linking of word, image, and performance joined the physical and spiritual, the temporal and eternal, and the earthly and heavenly in the Anglo-Saxon imaginative landscape.This volume is divided into three sections. The first section of the collection focuses on representations of ""The Cross: Image and Emblem,"" with contributions by Michelle P. Brown, David A. E. Pelteret, and Catherine E. Karkov. The second section, ""The Cross: Meaning and Word,"" deals in semantics and semeology with essays by Helen Damico, Rolf Bremmer, and Ursula Lenker. The third section of the book, ""The Cross: Gesture and Structure,"" employs methodologies drawn from archaeology, new media, and theories of rulership to develop new insights into subjects as varied as cereal production, the little-known Nunburnholme Cross, and early medieval concepts of political power.Cross and Cruciform in the Anglo-Saxon World: Studies to Honor the Memory of Timothy Reuter is a major collection of new research, completing the publication series of the Sancta Crux/Halig Rod project. Cross and Culture in Anglo-Saxon England: Studies in Honor of George Hardin Brown.

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Book SynopsisIn 1952, Faulkner noted the exceptional nature of the South when he characterized it as ""the only really authentic region in the United States, because a deep indestructible bond still exists between man and his environment."" The essays collected in Faulkner and the Ecology of the South explore Faulkner's environmental imagination, seeking what Ann Fisher-Wirth calls the ""ecological counter-melody"" of his texts. ""Ecology"" was not a term in common use outside the sciences in Faulkner's time. However, the word ""environment"" seems to have held deep meaning for Faulkner. Often he repeated his abiding interest in ""man in conflict with himself, with his fellow man, or with his time and place, his environment."" Eco-criticism has led to a renewed interest among literary scholars for what in this volume Cecelia Tichi calls, ""humanness within congeries of habitats and en-vironments."" Philip Weinstein draws on Pierre Bourdieu's notion of habitus. Eric Anderson argues that Faulkner's fiction has much to do with ecology in the sense that his work often examines the ways in which human communities interact with the natural world, and François Pitavy sees Faulkner's wilderness as unnatural in the ways it represents reflections of man's longings and frustrations. Throughout these essays, scholars illuminate in fresh ways the precarious ecosystem of Yoknapatawpha County. Joseph R. Urgo, Oxford, Mississippi, is chair of the English department at the University of Mississippi. His books include Faulkner's Apocrypha, Novel Frames: Literature as Guide to Race, Sex, and History in American Culture, and In the Age of Distraction, all published by University Press of Mississippi. Ann J. Abadie, Oxford, is associate director of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture at the University of Mississippi. She has coedited Faulkner and His Contemporaries, Faulkner and War, Faulkner and Postmodernism, and Faulkner at 100: Retrospect and Prospect, among other Faulkner volumes, all published by University Press of Mississippi.

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Book SynopsisThis is the third book in the critically acclaimed Two Guys series by Steve Chandler and Terrence Hill. This time the two guys take on their biggest challenge yet-Jane Austen. Follow their wild and often hilarious exchanges as they fly through Pride and Prejudice and the darker, more complex Mansfield Park. Often veering off into the worlds of music, sports, and history, both of these accomplished writers draw upon their lifelong friendships and shared childhood memories to give dimension to their deeply personal responses to Jane Austen's writing. These same zany digressions and non sequiturs were widely hailed in their first two books in this series, Two Guys Read Moby-Dick and Two Guys Read the Obituaries. Terrence Hill and Steve Chandler share their humorous and touching commentaries and debates with their readers in a way unlike any other, a testimony to their 53-year friendship.

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Book SynopsisAlan Sondheim's Writing Under explores and examines what happens to writing as it takes place on and through the networked computer. Sondheim began experimenting with artistic and philosophical writing using computers in the early 1970s. Since 1994, he has explored the possibilities of writing on the Internet, whether using blogs, web pages, emails, virtual worlds, or other tools. The sum total of Sondheim's writing online is entitled ""The Internet Text."" Writing Under selects from this work to provide insight into how writing takes place today and into the unique practices of a writer. The selections range from philosophical musings, to technical explorations of writing practice, to poetic meditations on the writer online. This work expands our understanding of writing today and charts a path for writing's future.Trade Review“Alan Sondheim is one of the precious few who joyfully-and in abject misery-risks these terrors of writing for us, for our pleasure and our undoing. What happens? Language disposes of us. As if that were not all that is required of any writer, Alan Sondheim is also the poet, the artist, the maker who has most profoundly immersed himself and his work in the life-changing code-forms-of networked computation-that have the world and its ‘genesis redux’ in their grip.”John Cayley, Literary Arts, Brown University

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Book SynopsisLos Angeles Review of Books is a nonprofit organization dedicated to promoting and disseminating rigorous, incisive, and engaging writing on every aspect of literature, culture, and the arts. Since its founding in 2011, LARB has quickly established itself as a thriving institution for writers and readers. TheLARB Quarterly Journal, a signature print edition, reflects the best that this institution brings to a national and international readership. The print magazine cultivates a stable of regular and ongoing contributors, both eminent and emerging, to cover all topics and genres, from politics to fiction, film to poetry, and much more.LARB specializes in a looser and more eclectic approach than other journals: grounded in literature but open to all varieties of cultural experience. Headquartered in Los Angeles, but home to writers and artists from all over the world, theLARB Quarterly Journal brings the pioneering spirit of the online magazine into print and and remains committed to covering and representing today’s diverse literary and cultural landscape.

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Book SynopsisWhat constitutes an environment in American literature is an issue that has undergone much debate across environmental humanities in the last decade. In the field, some have argued that environments are markedly natural or wild sites while others contend literary spaces can be both wild and urban, or even cultural. Yet, few of the works produced to date have addressed the pronounced influence the author of a text has on a literary environment. Despite exciting work on materiality and culture in conceptions of environments, critics have not yet fully examined the contributions of poetry’s language, form, and self-awareness in rethinking what constitutes an environment. By approaching environments in a new way, Nolan closes this gap and recognizes how contemporary poets employ self-reflexive commentary and formal experimentation in order to create new natural/cultural environments on the page. She proposes a radical new direction for ecopoetics and deploys it in relation to four major American poets. Working from literal to textual spaces through the contemporary poetry of A.R. Ammons’s Garbage, Lyn Hejinian’s My Life, Susan Howe’s The Midnight, and Kenneth Goldsmith’s Seven American Deaths and Disasters, the book presents applications of unnatural ecopoetics in poetic environments, ones that do not engage with traditional ideas of nature and would otherwise remain outside the scope of ecocritical and ecopoetic studies. Nolan proposes a new practical approach for reading poetic language. Ecocriticism is a very fluid and evolving discipline, and Nolan’s pioneering new book pushes the boundaries of second-wave ecopoetics—the fundamental issue being what is nature/natural, and how does poetic language, particularly self-conscious contemporary poetic agency, contribute to and complicate that question.Trade ReviewNolan’s book develops out of new materialist innovations transcending traditional ecopoetical interpretations of poetry. Her dazzling close readings are exciting to behold. They create a web of convincing matter that shore up her masterful take and development of this exciting field."" - Susan Morrison, Professor of English, Texas State University, San Marcos""A product of the built environments of greater Los Angeles whose ecopoetic ideas have been tempered by years of living in the Great Basin Desert on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Nolan thoroughly understands the natureculture continuum, while also recognizing and valuing the meaning of natural forces that exceed and constrain the human. She offers an ecumenical view of what an ‘environment’ is and how ‘this new era of ecopoetical theory’ enables readers to appreciate the materiality of texts and the textuality of the physical world."" - From the Foreword by Scott Slovic

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Book SynopsisThis original collection of essays by experts in the field weave together the first comprehensive examination of Nevada-born Willy Vlautin’s novels and songs, as well as featuring 11 works of art that accompany his albums and books.Brutally honest, raw, gritty, down to earth, compassionate and affecting, Willy Vlautin’s writing evokes a power in not only theme, but in methodology. Vlautin’s novels, The Motel Life, Northline, Lean on Pete and The Free (2006-2014) chart the dispossessed lives of young people struggling to survive in difficult economic times and in regions of the U.S. West and Pacific Northwest traditionally viewed as affluent and abundant. Yet as his work shows, are actually highly stratified and deprived.Likewise, Vlauntin’s songs, penned as lead singer of the Americana band Richmond Fontaine chart a related territory of blue-collar landscapes of the American West and Northwest with a strong emphasis on narrative and affective soundscapes evocative of the similar worlds defined in his novels.Featuring an interview with Vlautin himself, this edited collection aims to develop the first serious, critical consideration of the important novels and songs of Willy Vlautin by exploring relations between region, music, and writing through the lens of critical regionality and other interdisciplinary, cultural, and theoretical methodologies. In so doing, it will situate his work within its regional frame of the American New West, and particularly the city of Reno, Nevada and the Pacific Northwest, whilst showing how he addresses wider cultural and global issues such as economic change, immigration shifts, gender inequality, and the loss of traditional mythic identities.The essays take different positions in relation to considerations of both novels and music, looking for links and relations across genres, always mindful of their specificity. Under the Western Sky shows how although apparently rooted in place, Vlautin’s work traces diverse lines of contemporary cultural enquiry, engaging in an effective and troubling examination of regional haunting.Trade ReviewBringing a sophisticated set of contemporary lenses to bear upon the musical and novel-writing career of Willy Vlautin, Under the Western Sky makes a strong case for Vlautin as a resonant voice in a new kind of West a considerable distance from earlier regional mythologies. In fact, Vlautin emerges as not only a representative, but a central figure whose fictions and songs evoke a series of landscapes - urban, rural, desert - characterized by marginalization, failure, and transience in many forms. Vlautin emerges as a literary son of Raymond Carver, but one who writes in his own voice and for whom music forms a profound and intimate complement to the fiction."" - Alan Weltzien, University of Montana Western

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Book SynopsisEste libro es el primero en rendirle un homenaje al gran critico chileno, Jaime Concha. Reune reflexiones personales de unos amigos academicos; ensayos sobre su docencia en Concepcion y su obra en general; estudios inspirados en los libros de Concha sobre Huidobro, Mistral y Neruda; capitulos dedicados al deber de la critica y la narrativa sobre la dictadura chilena; estudios incisivos de ex estudiantes de la Universidad de California en San Diego quienes son ahora son academicos; y la conferencia magistral que Concha diera en un simposio-homenaje en Santiago de Chile en 2015. La obra critica de Concha, entonces, sirve de pretexto para meditaciones, puente con estudios relacionados a su obra, y punto de arranque para estudios innovadores e independientes.

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Book SynopsisFrom ancient Greek and Egyptian mythology to modern times, water has symbolized life, wisdom, fertility, purity, and death. Water also sustains and nourishes, irrigates our crops, keeps us clean and healthy, and contributes to our energy needs. Increased energy demands, coupled with the effects of climate change, have put a strain on our fresh water supply and water resources. Individuals and communities around the globe increasingly face droughts, floods, water pollution, water scarcity, and even water wars. We tend to address and solve these concerns through scientific and technological innovations, but social and cultural analyses and solutions are needed as well.In this edited collection, contributors tackle current water issues in the era of climate change using a wide variety of recent literature and film. At its core, this collection demonstrates that water is an immense reservoir of artistic potential and an agent of historical and cultural exchange. Creating familiar and relatable contexts for their water dilemmas, authors and directors of contemporary literary texts and films present compelling stories of our relationships to water, water health, ecosystems, and conservation. They also explore how global water problems affect local communities around the world and intersect with social and cultural aspects such as health, citizenship, class, gender, race, and ethnicity.This transformative work highlights the cultural significance of water—the source of life and a powerful symbol in numerous cultures. It also raises awareness about global water debates and crises.Trade ReviewThis edited book underscores how water is a creatively transformative symbol through which we synthesize environmental concerns and a source of cultural and political tensions exacerbated by climate change." - Chris Travis, Professor of Spanish and Latin American Literature, Elmhurst College"The collection is highly accessible. It gives a view of the representation of water from a variety of perspectives and introduces readers to likely unfamiliar texts—the Stanza Stones art/poetry installation or the Niger Delta poets—while providing unique new interpretations and/or insight into more familiar texts such as Chinatown or The Milagro Beanfield War." - Scott DeVries, author of Creature DiscomfortTable of Contents Introduction Part 1: Water Natures: Culture, Identity, and Creativity Chapter 1. Liquidity Incorporated: Economic Tides and Fluid Data in Hito Steyerl's Liquidity, Inc. Christina Gerhardt and Jaimey Hamilton Faris Chapter 2. Material States of Poetry: The Stanza Stones Emma Trott Chapter 3. Preying on Water: Hunting Spiritual and Environmental Rebirth on the Kentucky River in Selected Essays from Wendell Berry's The Long-Legged House Andrew S. Andermatt Chapter 4. "Let everything that binds fall": The Significance of Water in David Vann's Fiction Sofia Ahlberg Chapter 5. Water-blind: Erosion and (Re)Generation in Colm Tóibín's The Heather Blazing Julienne H. Empric Part 2: Water Cultures: Nations, Borders, and Water Wars Chapter 6. A Clash of Water Cultures in John Nichols' The Milagro Beanfield War Susan J. Tyburski Chapter 7. Watershed Ethics and Dam Politics: Mapping Biopolitics, Race, and Resistance in Sleep Dealer and Watershed Tracey Daniels-Lerberg Chapter 8. Thomas King Tells a Different Story: Dams, Rivers, and Indigenous Literary Hydromythology Rebecca Lynne Fullan Chapter 9. Shifting Tides: A Literary Exploration of the Colorado River Delta Paul Formisano Chapter 10. Poetry and Revolution on the Brink of Ecological Disaster: Ernesto Cardenal and the Interoceanic Canal in Nicaragua Jeremy G. Larochelle Chapter 11. "Bad for the glass": Chinatown's Skewed Rendition of the California Water Wars Robert Niemi Chapter 12. The Cinematic Portrayal of Water Wars in Bolivia and Ecuador Laura Hatry Part 3: Arid and Awash: High Pollution, High Energy Demands, and High Waters Chapter 13. Troubled Waters: Unveiling Industrial Negligence in Three Deepwater Horizon Films Ila Tyagi Chapter 14. The River as Character in Niger Delta Poetry Idom T. Inyabri Chapter 15. Water and Mental Health in Three British Climate Fiction Novels Giulia Miller Chapter 16. There Will Be Blood: Water Futures in Paolo Bacigalupi's The Water Knife and Claire Vaye Watkins' Gold Fame Citrus Paula Anca Farca Concluding Remarks About the Contributors

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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Book Synopsis

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