Literary studies: c 1900 to c 2000 Books

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Book Synopsis'York Notes Advanced' offer an accessible approach to English Literature. This series has been completely updated to meet the needs of today's A-level and undergraduate students. Written by established literature experts, York Notes Advanced introduce students to more sophisticated analysis, a range of critical perspectives and wider contexts.Table of Contents Part 1: Introduction Part 2: The poems Part 3: Critical approachs Part 4: Critical history Part 5: Background Further Reading Literacy Terms

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Book SynopsisSexual desire has long played a key role in Western judgments about the value of Arab civilization. This title reveals the history of how Arabs represented their own sexual desires. It assembles a compendium of Arabic writing to chart the changes in Arab sexual attitudes and their links to Arab notions of cultural heritage and civilization.Trade Review"A pioneering work on a very timely yet frustratingly neglected topic.... I know of no other study that can even begin to compare with the detail and scope of [this] work." - Khaled El-Rouayheb, Middle East Report "In Desiring Arabs, Edward Said's disciple Joseph A. Massad corroborates his mentor's thesis that orientalist writing was racist and dehumanizing.... Massad brilliantly goes on to trace the legacy of this racist, internalized, orientalist discourse up to the present." - Financial Times"

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Book SynopsisHe has an affinity with the violence, the balance, the ritual, the grace and the power. He is indestructible.Beautiful Burnout is about the soul-sapping three-minutes when men become gods and gods, mere men. It''s about the second when the guard drops, that moment when the eyes blink and miss the incoming hammer blow.Beautiful Burnout premiered at the Pleasance Forth as part of the Edinburgh International Festival in August 2010 before touring the UK in a co-production between Frantic Assembly and the National Theatre of Scotland.

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Book SynopsisA compelling portrait of a beloved poet from one of today''s most acclaimed novelistsIn this book, novelist Colm Tóibín offers a deeply personal introduction to the work and life of one of his most important literary influences—the American poet Elizabeth Bishop. Ranging across her poetry, prose, letters, and biography, Tóibín creates a vivid picture of Bishop while also revealing how her work has helped shape his sensibility as a novelist and how her experiences of loss and exile resonate with his own. What emerges is a compelling double portrait that will intrigue readers interested in both Bishop and Tóibín.For Tóibín, the secret of Bishop''s emotional power is in what she leaves unsaid. Exploring Bishop’s famous attention to detail, Tóibín describes how Bishop is able to convey great emotion indirectly, through precise descriptions of particular settings, objects, and events. He examines how Bishop’s attachment to the Nova Scotia of her childhood, despite her later life in Key West and Brazil, is related to her early loss of her parents—and how this connection finds echoes in Tóibín’s life as an Irish writer who has lived in Barcelona, New York, and elsewhere.Beautifully written and skillfully blending biography, literary appreciation, and descriptions of Tóibín’s travels to Bishop’s Nova Scotia, Key West, and Brazil, On Elizabeth Bishop provides a fresh and memorable look at a beloved poet even as it gives us a window into the mind of one of today’s most acclaimed novelists.Trade ReviewColm Toibin, Inducted into the New York State Writers Hall of Fame 2015 Nominee for the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism One of The Guardian's Best Books of 2015, selected by Nicci Gerrard One of The Guardian's Best Books of 2015, selected by Blake Morrison One of The Guardian's Readers' Books of 2015 One of the Irish Times 2015 Readers' Books of the Year One of The New Yorker's Twelve Books Related to Poems, 2015 "Toibin's close readings of Bishop's poems in this deft suite of essays are admirably acute, but what's truly special is that Toibin offers not an elegant study of Bishop's achievements as a poet, but also a shadow account of his own development as a writer, and thus an incidental treatise on the ways writers affect one another's process."--Joel Browner, New York Times Book Review "[The book's] pull on the reader is almost tidal ... it's still impossible for a reader to resist getting sucked into the orbit of Robert Lowell, the rapaciously brilliant and royally messed-up literary lion whom Bishop considered her closest friend. The cat-and-mouse dynamic of Bishop and Lowell's correspondence remains, in Mr. Toibin's telling, as riveting as a series on Netflix or HBO, and probably ought to become one."--Jeff Gordinier, New York Times "The Irish writer's valentine to the Canadian-American poet: a beautiful meditation on shyness, sex, art, and family."--Dan Chiasson, New Yorker "Toibin's little book on Bishop is a writer's exercise in rechristening himself, a second time through with Bishop as his chaperone. The narrative draws us back to moments when the discovery of Bishop, and later of Thom Gunn, drew Toibin forward. This is the kind of beautiful relay that great writers provide for each other, and it gives you hope that some young person somewhere who finds himself in a bind will pick this short book up and find in it not one, but two companions."--Dan Chiasson, New York Review of Books "On Elizabeth Bishop is an engaging introduction to her life and work, and also an essay on the importance of her work in his [Toibin's] life."--Matthew Bevis, London Review of Books "Novelist Toibin (Nora Webster) gives an intimate and engaging look at Elizabeth Bishop's poetry and its influence on his own work... Toibin is also present in the book, and his relationship to Bishop's work and admiration of her style gives the book much of its power. Whether one is familiar with Bishop's life and work or is looking to Toibin to learn more, this book will appeal to many readers."--Publishers Weekly starred review "An admiring critical portrait of a great American poet and a master of subtlety... An inspiring appreciation from one writer to another."--Kirkus Reviews "On Elizabeth Bishop, an unusual mixed-genre critical study/personal memoir by the celebrated Irish novelist Colm Toibin, himself something of a writer's writer, makes a particularly welcome addition to the Princeton University Press Writers on Writers series... Toibin's sense of identification with Bishop allows not only sympathy with her work but his real insight into it... [F]ew critics have dealt more revealingly than Toibin with Bishop's habitual illusion of 'spontaneous' self-correction, her process of thinking aloud on the page... [I]n some essential and large way, Toibin gets Bishop right, and even his quirkiest interpretations illuminate something about both Bishop and himself."--Lloyd Schwartz, Arts Fuse "How does a writer turn life into art? Novelist, poet and critic Colm Toibin's brilliant, compelling book On Elizabeth Bishop does not raise or answer this question directly, but it brings us very close to the moment of alchemy, both in Bishop's work and in his own, showing Princeton University Press' wisdom in establishing the series of writers on writers of which this is a part... Toibin's decision to set the poems in the context of Bishop's life, her friendships and love, and a circle of writers and painters like-minded enough to throw light on her achievement, is an impressive solution to a potentially difficult critical problem."--Elizabeth Greene, Times Higher Education "[I]n Colm Toibin's new book, the Irish novelist explores Bishop's remoteness in ways that both open her poems to the everyday reader and season scholars' broth about her eminence. John Ashbery once called Bishop a 'writer's writer's writer,' and Toibin reveals how this hypothesis has been, in his case, positively true. Though this book is not a biography, it has the uncanny effect of one: In close readings of Bishop's poems and their geographical moorings, Toibin takes us further inside the poet's (and his own) psyche than, perhaps, the archives ever will."--Heather Treseler, Weekly Standard "Bishop is a 20th-century U.S. master poet; Toibin is an Irish fiction writer of today. You might wonder at this pairing. Well, none could pair comfortably with the uneasy, furtive Bishop. Turns out the two have much in common... I just loved this: a writer so open about how his work and life touch another writer's... Little books like this make the world better, teaching us much and inviting more."--John Timpane, Philadelphia Inquirer "In this splendid and perceptive book, Colm Toibin the novelist, has probed the Bishop canon and biography and exquisitely described her work and vision."--Sam Coale, Providence Journal "Toibin's treatment is personal but never self-indulgent, and the book is much more than an appreciation of a poet with whom he has affinities. Beautifully written and deeply felt, this is a penetrating examination of Bishop's aesthetic of stylistic restraint and personal reticence."--Choice "[A] wonderful book."--Lavinia Greenlaw, The Telegraph "An entirely different kind of criticism [On Elizabeth Bishop] reads like a love letter from one writer to another."--Anthony Domestic, Commonweal "A deceptively little, sharp, brilliant book, in which Toibin's understanding and excellent analysis are profound, up close and personal."--Niall MacMonagle, Irish Times "It is not surprising to find, with Colm Toibin's exquisite meditation On Elizabeth Bishop that the masterful Irish novelist is also a critic of considerable acuity. Toibin's sensibility is superbly attuned to that of the formidable Bishop, a poet whose shadow over the crowded landscape of 20th-century American poetry grows longer with every passing year."--Michael Lindgren, Washington Post "I have always been drawn to Bishop's spare poetry, but it was reading Toibin's analysis, which manages to be both a personal reaction and an objective assessment, that helped me to appreciate her fully. Subject and critic can seldom have been as well-matched as they are here, and the insights go in both directions, illuminating Toibin's novels as well as Bishop's poems."--Catherine Peters, RacemeTable of ContentsNo Detail Too Small 1 One of Me 9 In the Village 15 The Art of Losing 30 Nature Greets Our Eyes 41 Order and Disorder in Key West 62 The Escape from History 77 Grief and Reason 96 The Little That We Get for Free 115 Art Isn't Worth That Much 135 The Bartok Bird 162 Efforts of Affection 174 North Atlantic Light 193 Acknowledgments 201 Bibliography 203

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Book SynopsisRaymond Chandler, a dazzling stylist and portrayer of American life, holds a unique place in literary history, straddling both pulp fiction and modernism. With The Big Sleep, published in 1939, he left an indelible imprint on the detective novel. Fredric Jameson offers an interpretation of Chandler's work that reconstructs both the context in which it was written and the social world or totality it projects. Chandler's invariable setting, Los Angeles, appears both as a microcosm of the United States and a prefiguration of its future: a megalopolis uniquely distributed by an unpromising nature into a variety of distinct neighborhoods and private worlds. But this essentially urban and spatial work seems also to be drawn towards a vacuum, an absence that is nothing other than death. With Chandler, the thriller genre becomes metaphysical.Trade ReviewFredric Jameson is America's leading Marxist critic. A prodigiously energetic thinker whose writings sweep majestically from Sophocles to science fiction. -- Terry EagletonNot often in American writing since Henry James can there have been a mind displaying at once such tentativeness and force. The best of Jameson's work has felt mind-blowing in the way of LSD or mushrooms: here before you is the world you'd always known you were living in, but apprehended as if for the first time in the freshness of its beauty and horror. -- Benjamin Kunkel * London Review of Books *Probably the most important cultural critic writing in English today . it can truly be said that nothing cultural is alien to him. -- Colin MacCabeThe most muscular of writers. * Times Literary Supplement *Even the most anti-Marxian among us, [will] find ourselves compelled, if not to accept the book's intricate hypotheses, at least to accord them an ungrudged admiration for the brilliance of their formulation and the serene and quietly convinced tone in which they are advanced. -- John Banville * New York Review of Books *The small length of Jameson's book adds a tightness to its arguments and the style is often Chandler-esque: words are not wasted, literary observations are pin-sharp and there are some wry aperçu. Winningly, Jameson occasionally employs the genre's rhetoric, so his theorising becomes the pursuing of "lines of enquiry", a "procedure", etc. It's touches like this that make Jameson such a joy to read -- Cornelius Fitz * 3AM Magazine *

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Book SynopsisDerick Thomson Ruaraidh MacThòmais was one of the most prolific and influential Scottish Gaelic poets of the twentieth century. His work pushed forward the boundaries of Gaelic poetry, taking it from its traditional heartlands in the Highlands and Islands to Scotland''s Lowland cities, Glasgow in particular. He was the first poet to use free verse consistently in Gaelic, and his poems, both in terms of form and content, had a profound influence on following generations of Gaelic writers.Petra Johana Poncarová's SCOTNOTE examines Thomson's life and work, and his historical, political, cultural and personal influences. It is an ideal introduction for senior school pupils and students of all ages.

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Book SynopsisThis is the first full biography of Charles Williams (1886-1945), an extraordinary and controversial figure who was a central member of the Inklingsthe group of Oxford writers that included C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. Charles Williamsnovelist, poet, theologian, magician and guruwas the strangest, most multi-talented, and most controversial member of the group. He was a pioneering fantasy writer, who still has a cult following. C.S. Lewis thought his poems on King Arthur and the Holy Grail were among the best poetry of the twentieth century for ''the soaring and gorgeous novelty of their technique, and their profound wisdom''. But Williams was full of contradictions. An influential theologian, Williams was also deeply involved in the occult, experimenting extensively with magic, practising erotically-tinged rituals, and acquiring a following of devoted disciples. Membership of the Inklings, whom he joined at the outbreak of the Second World War, was only the final phase in a remarkabTrade ReviewIn Charles Williams: The Third Inkling, Grevel Lindop has written a page-turner. He proves himself a master of the biographical narrative. He knows how to end chapters and sections of chapters with cliffhangers. He liberally employs the ironic slant, and he has an eye for visuals. Lindop's preface, a model of balanced prose, sets the volume's tone. * Philip Irving Mitchell, Religion and the Arts *exemplary, and very thought-provoking * Philip Hensher, Books of the Year 2015, The Spectator *This solid and scholarly biography explores the byways of literary history with much verve and energy ... Lindop has provided a fascinating account * Philip Hensher, Spectator *Lindop has added significantly to our knowledge of the Third Man in the Inklings and deftly filled in some major blank areas in our standard map of literary modernism. * Kevin Jackson, Literary Review *excellent biography * London Review of Books *[a] fine, thoroughly researched book. * Tablet *thorough biography * Journey *fascinating reading ... meticulous study ... This biography puts Williams back in the picture * Andy Ffrench, Oxford Times *a fascinating, and even astonishing biography * Theology *Grevel Lindop's biography of Charles Williams is, in almost every way, all that one would want in such a study: comprehensive, judicious, sympathetic, but also properly surprised by its subject, for good and ill. * Rowan Williams, Journal of Inkling Studies *His prose style has benefitted from long years of listening to the musicality of language: his sentences are clear and competent, his narrative skill evident, his storytelling ability considerable. It is this last quality, in combination with his meticulous scholarship, that makes The Third Inkling masterful. * Sørina Higgins, Journal of Inkling Studies *Lindop's exhaustive research and clarity of presentation make this an indispensable volume for anyone who wishes to understand Williams and come to terms with his writing and influence. No future study of Williams will be adequate without drawing on this study; Lindop deserves much praise for bringing to completion such a massive endeavour. * Holly Ordway, Journal of Inkling Studies *Lindop's narrative, packed with incident and parcelled into satisfying arcs, is exemplary * Oxford Today *Grevel Lindop has written a ground-breaking life, at once scholarly and readable, which reveals Williams in all his fascination ... Lindop has done a real service in showing not only why his writing had such an appeal for Tolkein, Lewis, and Eliot, but how it can still jolt us into deeper reflection today. * The Rt Revd Lord Harries, Church Times *the definitive biography ... .a brilliant introduction to a brilliant, yet very troubled and troubling, man * Evangelical Times *an authoritative, and extremely readable, biography. * Sydney Morning Herald *The Third Inkling is a very readable book which wears its meticulous research lightly - and that's no mean feat. It raises some important and troubling questions. * A Writer's Life *well-written biography * Notre Dame magazine *wonderful biography * Network Review *As a work of biographical scholarship, then, The Third Inkling leaves nothing to be desired. * The Oddest Inkling *a thorough, profound, and sympathetic study * A.N Wilson, First Things *an excellent biography, taking its place as the premier resource on Williams * The Notion Club Papers *Table of ContentsPrologue Chapter One: From Holloway to Silvania Chapter Two: 'The Most Talkative Young Man' Chapter Three: The Silver Stair Chapter Four: 'Marriages are Made in Heaven' Chapter Five: The Initiate Chapter Six: 'The Satanist' Chapter Seven: 'Why the Devil Does Anyone Ever Get Married?' Chapter Eight: Romantic Theology Chapter Nine: Phyllis Chapter Ten: 'I Can't Do Without You - I Can't' Chapter Eleven: Substitution Chapter Twelve: Novels and the Poetic Mind Chapter Thirteen: 'They Saved My Life by Three Hours' Chapter Fourteen: 'I'm Becoming a Myth to Myself' Chapter Fifteen: 'The Staff Work of the Omnipotence' Chapter Sixteen: The Order of the Co-Inherence Chapter Seventeen: 'A Kind of Parody of London' Chapter Eighteen: 'Bitter Is the Brew of Exchange' Chapter Nineteen: A Pioneer for the Young Poets Chapter Twenty: 'It Is Not Yet Too Late' Chapter Twenty-One: 'Into the Province of Death' Epilogue

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Book Synopsis

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Book SynopsisSurrealist women’s writing: A critical exploration is the first sustained critical inquiry into the writing of women associated with surrealism. Featuring original essays by leading scholars of surrealism, the volume demonstrates the extent and the historical, linguistic, and culturally contextual breadth of this writing. It also highlights how the specifically surrealist poetics and politics of these writers’ work intersect with and contribute to contemporary debates on, for example, gender, sexuality, subjectivity, otherness, anthropocentrism, and the environment.Drawing on a variety of innovative theoretical approaches, the essays in the volume focus on the writing of numerous women surrealists, many of whom have hitherto mainly been known for their visual rather than their literary production. These include Claude Cahun, Leonora Carrington, Kay Sage, Colette Peignot, Suzanne Césaire, Unica Zürn, Ithell Colquhoun, Leonor Fini, Dorothea Tanning, and Rikki Ducornet.Trade Review'This book does not attempt to impose a harmonious, all-encompassing feminist perspective that would gloss over the complexities of being a ‘woman writer’ within the grand scheme of surrealism, but looks, rather, to highlight differences and ambivalences, enriching the discourse surrounding this literature. An enthralling and intensely intellectual investigation into surrealist women’s writing, this study is of critical importance for literary scholars and admirers of surrealism as it offers a profound reconsideration of these ten authors.'French Studies'The 11 essays in the collection look at the work of Claude Cahun, Lenora Carrington, Ithell Colquhoun, Colette Peignot, Kay Sage, and Unica Zürn, among others. Beyond examining the women’s literary work, the essays show how these writers’ work informs contemporary discussion of gender, sexuality, ecocriticism, the Other, and the Anthropocene. Wetz’s excellent introduction frames the questions and concerns surrealist women writers explored in their work.'CHOICE(Reprinted with permission from Choice Reviews. All rights reserved. Copyright by the American Library Association.)'This book has much to offer to animal studies, queer studies, and ecocritical and ecofeminist studies... and it will enrich scholarship on auto/biography and confessional writing... It will expand and enliven the category of women’s modernism. In spite of its focus on text, the collection will leave its readers with some startling images. But mostly, in ways both serious and playful, Surrealist Women’s Writing will show the imaginative gains to be made by breaking down barriers—of both gender and genre—and daring to stand out.'Modern Language Review -- .Table of ContentsIntroductionAnna Watz1 ‘The dung beetle’s snowball’: the philosophic narcissism of Claude Cahun’s essay-poetryFelicity Gee2 Identity convulsed: Leonora Carrington’s The House of Fear and The Oval LadyAnna Watz3 Recasting the human: Leonora Carrington’s dark exilic imaginationJeannette Baxter4 Colette Peignot: the purity of revoltMichael Richardson5 Suzanne Césaire’s surrealism: tightrope of hope Kara M. Rabbitt6 Kay Sage alive in the worldKatharine Conley7 Outside-in: translating Unica ZürnPatricia Allmer8 Ithell Colquhoun’s experimental poetry: surrealism, occultism, and postwar poetryMark S. Morrisson9 Leonor Fini’s abhuman familyJonathan P. Eburne10 ‘Open sesame’: Dorothea Tanning’s critical writingCatriona McAra11 Magic language, esoteric nature: Rikki Ducornet’s surrealist ecologyKristoffer NohedenBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisThis first book in a three-volume collection of Georges Bataille’s essays introduces English readers to his philosophical and critical writings. In the aftermath of the Second World War, French thinker and writer Georges Bataille forged a singular path through the moral and political impasses of his age. In 1946, animated by “a need to live events in an increasingly conscious way,” and to reject any compartmentalization of intellectual life, Bataille founded the journal Critique. Adopting the format of the review essay, he surveyed the post-war cultural landscape while advancing his reflections on excess, non-knowledge, and the general economy. Focusing on literature as a mode of sovereign uselessness, he tackled prominent and divisive figures such as Henry Miller and Albert Camus. In keeping with Critique’s mission to explore the totality of human knowledge, Bataille’s articles did not just focus on the literary but featured important reflections on the science of sexuality, the Chinese Revolution, and historical accounts of drunkenness, among other matters. Throughout, he was attuned to how humanity would deal with the excessive forces of production and destruction it had unleashed, his aim being a way of thinking and living that would inhabit that excess. This is the first of three volumes collecting Bataille’s post-war essays. Beginning with an article on Nietzsche and fascism written shortly after the liberation of Paris and running to the end of 1948, these texts make available for the first time in English the systematic diversity of Bataille’s post-war thought. Trade Review"In this erudite volume, scholars Toscano and Noys collect the critical works of French thinker and novelist Georges Bataille (1897–1962), touching on topics including philosophy, literature, religion, geopolitics, art, and psychoanalysis." * Publishers Weekly *"Sixty years after his death, Georges Bataille remains a vexing figure in French literature and philosophy. A creator or member of endless literary and philosophical movements, from the short-lived Acéphale to surrealism, he belonged fully to none of them, not even his own, and his apparent will to destruction often risks carrying over to those who enter into dialogue with him, even today. . . . These essays invite the reader in, in a way that many of Bataille’s works do not; they also give us a glimpse of a thinker working out his position. . ." * Times Literary Supplement *Table of Contents1.Is Nietzsche Fascist?2.Is Literature Useful?3.The Will to the Impossible4.Picasso’s Political Paintings5.Miller’s Morality6.Dionysos Redivivus7.Mystical Experience and Literature8.The Indictment of Henry Miller9.Notes: Gide – Baranger – Gillet10.The Last Moment11.Gide—Nietzsche—Claudel12.Take It or Leave It13.The War in China14.Cossery – Robert Aron15.Marcel Proust and the Profaned Mother16.Adamov17.The Friendship between Man and Beast18.Giraud – Pastoureau – Benda – Du Moulin de Laplante – Govy19.On the Relationship between the Divine and Evil20.Pierre Gordon21.What Is Sex?22.A New American Novelist23.Sartre24.A Morality based on Misfortune [Malheur]: The Plague25.Letter to Merleau-Ponty26.Is Lasting Peace Inevitable?27.Joseph Conrad28.Preface to the Gaston-Louis Roux Exhibition29.Goya30.Psychoanalysis31.Tavern Drunkenness and Religion32.Political Lying33.The Sexual Revolution and the Kinsey Report 34.Jean Paulhan – Marc Bloch35.On the Meaning of Moral Neutrality in the Russo-American War36.The Divinity of Isou37.The Mischievousness of Language38.Marcel Proust

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Book SynopsisThe Penguin Classics Marvel Collection presents the origin stories, seminal tales, and characters of the Marvel Universe to explore Marvel’s transformative and timeless influence on an entire genre of fantasy.   A Penguin Classics Marvel Collection Edition   Collects Fantastic Four #52-53 (1966); Jungle Action #6-21 (1973-1976). It is impossible to imagine American popular culture without Marvel Comics. For decades, Marvel has published groundbreaking visual narratives that sustain attention on multiple levels: as metaphors for the experience of difference and otherness; as meditations on the fluid nature of identity; and as high-water marks in the artistic tradition of American cartooning, to name a few.   The Black Panther is not just a super hero; as King T’Challa, he is also the monarch of the hidden African nation of Wakanda. Combining the strength and stealth of his namesake with a creative scientific Trade Review“A groundbreaking example of comics representation in literature.”—Publishers Weekly“Penguin provides introductory essays; superb analyses by the series editor, Ben Saunders; and extensive bibliographies.”—Michael Dirda, The Washington Post“Stories become classics when generations of readers sort through them, talk about them, imitate them, and recommend them. In this case, baby boomers read them when they débuted, Gen X-ers grew up with their sequels, and millennials encountered them through Marvel movies. Each generation of fans—initially fanboys, increasingly fangirls, and these days nonbinary fans, too—found new ways not just to read the comics but to use them. That’s how canons form. Amateurs and professionals, over decades, come to something like consensus about which books matter and why—or else they love to argue about it, and we get to follow the arguments. Canons rise and fall, gain works and lose others, when one generation of people with the power to publish, teach, and edit diverges from the one before ... A top-flight comic by Kirby—or his successor on “Captain America,” Jim Steranko—barely needed words. You could follow the story just by watching the characters act and react. Thankfully, Penguin volumes do justice to these images. They reproduce sixties comics in bright, flat, colorful inks on thick white paper—unlike the dot-based process used on old newsprint, but perhaps truer to their bold, thrill-chasing spirit.”—Stephanie Burt, The New Yorker

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Book SynopsisThis brilliant, incisive volume captures the high points of Myles' work in New York City during the 1980s.Listen, I have been educated. I have learned about Western Civilization. Do you know What the message of Western Civilization is? I am alone. This breakthrough volume, published in 1991 by the author of Cool For You and Chelsea Girls captures the high points of Myles' work in New York City during the 1980s. Poet, novelist, lesbian culture hero and one-time presidential candidate, Myles has influenced a whole generation of young queer girl writers and activists. She is one of the most brilliant, incisive, immediate writers living today.

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Book SynopsisA Book of the Year for The Times and the Sunday Times ‘The writer is the engineer of the human soul,’ claimed Stalin. Although one wonders how many found nourishment in Turkmenbashi’s Book of the Soul (once required reading for driving tests in Turkmenistan), not to mention Stalin’s own poetry. Certainly, to be considered great, a dictator must write, and write a lot. Mao had his Little Red Book, Mussolini and Saddam Hussein their romance novels, Kim Jong-il his treatise on the art of film, Hitler his hate-filled tracts. What do these texts reveal about their authors, the worst people imaginable? And how did they shape twentieth-century history? To find out, Daniel Kalder read them all – the badly written and the astonishingly badly written – so that you don’t have to. This is the untold history of books so terrible they should have been crimes.Trade Review‘Daniel Kalder has slogged his way through the 20th century’s “Krakatoa-like eruption of despotic verbiage” so you don’t have to… Kalder’s dispatches from “the transnational empire of ultra-boredom” are not only very funny, they also form a quirky, pacey guide to recent world history.’ * Sunday Times, Books of the Year *‘Full of…wonders, and startling individual facts… An overwhelmingly powerful reminder of 20th-century misrule, and of just how delusional human beings can be – especially if they’re literate.’ * Telegraph *‘This wonderfully entertaining book is a cautionary tale about how societies are easily wooed by foolish demagogues spouting gibberish.’ * The Times, Books of the Year *‘I enjoyed this book a great deal…it’s actually a rather snappy read.’ * Will Self, Guardian *‘Hugely compelling…Like coming across a planet-sized car crash, with hundreds of millions snarled up in the wreckage: you can’t look away. Kalder has really dug deep into the minds of these infernal texts’ creators, and thus delivers some truly enlightening insights.’ * Irish Independent *‘Daniel Kalder…deserves a medal…Dictator Literature is a great book... An insightful book, but also a funny one.' * The Times *‘Very funny… After reading Dictator Literature you will never look at books with such a benevolent eye again.’ * Spectator *‘A engaging, brisk, and morbidly humorous haul of the lives and literary pretensions of the murderous wingnuts who defined a century.’ * Irish Times *‘Kalder's book is an informative, lively and often hilarious account of some of the worst authors who ever lived, doubling as a history of the terrible ideologies that marred the last century. Some execrable books have come out of communism and fascism, but Dictator Literature is certainly not one of them.’ * Catholic Herald *‘A fascinating study…partly an enjoyable romp but mostly a sombre sidelong-glance history of 20th-century totalitarianism.’ * Sunday Telegraph *‘Brisk, and full of antic fun.’ * New Statesman *‘Highly readable.’ * Herald *‘A mesmerizing study of books by despots great and small, from the familiar to the largely unknown.’ * Washington Post *‘Kalder is our cheeky and irreverent guide to the (generally aggressively tedious) prose by history’s despots.’ * Tatler *‘This is about the most discomforting book I’ve read in the past year. Never mind Trump and never mind Twitter: Kalder demonstrates that words themselves, and the escapist spells we weave with them, are our riskiest civic gift.’ -- Simon Ings, author of Stalin and the Scientists‘A compelling examination of why bad minds create bad writing, and therefore a valuable read for anyone interested in literature – or the world, in fact. Kalder’s dry humour makes Dictator Literature a fun tour de force through the mad history of the 20th century and the present.’ -- Norman Ohler, author of Blitzed

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Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.She wished to find out about this hazardous business of passing, this breaking away from all that was familiar and friendly to take one's chance in another environment'The elegant Clare Kendry glides through New York's high-society circles with ease, until the day she is reacquainted with her childhood friend, Irene. Clare chooses to pass' as white, hiding her African American heritage from her bigoted husband, while Irene leads a life that embraces it. As both women observe the other, a relationship of mutual fascination, obsession and secrets begins, one that will end in devastating circumstances.Published in 1929, Nella Larsen's Passing lays bare the complexities of identity, race, class and gender. The novella established Larsen as one of the most important female authors in American literature and is considered a literary masterpiece of the Harlem Renaissance era.

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Book SynopsisWith superb skill and feeling, Graham Greene retraces the experiences and encounters of his extraordinary life. His restlessness is legendary; as if seeking out danger, Greene travelled to Haiti during the nightmare rule of Papa Doc, Vietnam in the last days of the French, Kenya during the Mau Mau rebellion. With ironic delight he recalls his time in the British Secret Service in Africa, and his brief involvement in Hollywood. He writes, as only he can, about people and places, about faith, doubt, fear and, not least, the trials and craft of writing.Trade ReviewInspiring...provides the best possible introduction to the novels but also the portrait of a dedicated artist * Observer *Ways of Escape is as good as the best of its kind...marvellously rich -- William Trevor * Guardian *Excellent reading...wonderfully good * Sunday Telegraph *The writing is suffused with melancholy regret, not for what he writes, one feels, but for what he has left out * Independent *Greene is unrivalled in his ability to evoke location and the human condition -- Carol Drinkwater * Daily Express *

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Book SynopsisPhilip Roth is the voice of our times.In a sequence of intimate conversations with some of the most influential and insightful writers of the twentieth century, Roth explores the importance of region, politics and history in their work and that of their predecessors.What qualities helped Primo Levi survive the demented laboratory of Auschwitz? What does Milan Kundera make of being denounced as a subversive writer in communist Czechoslovakia? What does Edna O''Brien think drove generations of Irish writers into exile?Between colleagues and friends there is a startling candour seldom found in formal interviews, a sense that the guard is dropped, the ideas unbounded, as the conversations crackle with an urgency of ideas. Shop Talk is a literary symposium of the highest calibre, profoundly revelatory and consistently enlightening.Trade ReviewRiveting * Sunday Times *Roth brings out something adamantine and irreducible about each of his interlocutors... Rings with what his readers will recognise as Rothian intelligence * New York Times *The questions are serious, respectful and intelligent, and the interviewees respond in kind * Times Literary Supplement *Roth manages to tease from his subjects the convictions that fuel their work and the vulnerabilities that make them human... Yet another example of [his] clarity of purpose and singular intelligence * New York Times Book Review *Fascinating glimpses of some of the deans of postwar literature [and] a working diagram of the very engine that makes Roth run * Los Angeles Times Book Review *

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Book SynopsisJohn Cheever was born in Quincy, Massachusetts, in 1912, and he went to school at Thayer Academy in South Braintree. He is the author of seven collections of stories and five novels. His first novel, The Wapshot Chronicle, won the 1958 National Book Award. In 1965 he received the Howells Medal for Fiction from the National Academy of Arts and Letters and in 1978 he won the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Pulitzer Prize. Shortly before his death in 1982 he was awarded the National Medal for Literature.Trade ReviewOne of the most compelling and intimate books you'll ever read * Independent *Beautifully written, lyrically spiritual, sexually candid memoirs * Mail on Sunday *Cheever's journals include the struggle for recognition, the problem-drinking and covert homosexuality of a public figure and, finally, cancer. His intelligence and honesty powerfully communicate the sense of life as an urgent predicament * Sunday Times *These diaries are so painfully personal...that they were not published until after his death. But they also concentrate the true essence of what made his short stories great * Sunday Express *John Cheever understood fallibility and that made for the greatness in his writing * The Times *

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Book SynopsisThis is the story of Christopher Isherwood's parents their meeting in 1895, marriage in 1903 after his father had returned from the Boer War, and his father's death in an assault on Ypres in 1915, which left his mother a widow until her own death in 1960. As well as a family memoir, it is a social history of a period of striking change, and a portrait of the world which shaped Isherwood and which he rejected.Trade ReviewShows a deeper understanding of much that he had once rebelled against * Guardian *A moving account of his parents' marriage based on their letters and diaries * Independent *A social history of the first half of the twentieth century and a study of artistic megalomania... Christopher writes about Christopher with fine, clear, cool precision * Spectator *There emerge from this book three remarkable characters, two highly edifying, one a writer of compelling talent * Catholic Herald *

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Book SynopsisTells the story of Ian Fleming at Goldeneye in Jamaica, where all his novels and stories on James Bond were written. This book includes interviews with Ian's family, his Jamaican lover Blanche Blackwell and many other islanders. It deals with Ian Fleming's life and work.Trade ReviewSupremely enjoyable... Matthew Parker has created a completely new picture of Ian, Bond and the role of Jamaica in the making of the legend -- John Pearson, author of THE LIFE OF IAN FLEMINGThe book that James Bond obsessives have been waiting for – a beautiful, brilliant history of Ian Fleming at home at Goldeneye, all of sun-drenched, gin-soaked, bed-hopping colonial Jamaica outside the window and 007 at the moment of his creation. This is the big bang of Bond books. -- Tony Parsons[Here are] the glowing sea, the teeming life beneath the waves, and the warm black nights, all of which made their way into the Bond novels... [But] Parker’s highly readable account of Fleming’s Jamaican life is less Thunderball and more Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea. Bond himself might have been a touch jealous. -- Sinclair McKay * Daily Telegraph *A superb account of Fleming’s Jamaica… well-researched, excellently written… Without Jamaica, it is safe to say, there would have been no Agent 007. * Financial Times *Matthew Parker's brilliant book Goldeneye is indispensable for anyone interested in the inner life of the enigmatic Ian Fleming and the whole James Bond phenomenon he created. -- Nicholas Rankin * author of Ian Fleming's Commandos *

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Book SynopsisThe final volume of the definitive authorised biography of one of the greatest American writers.A moving testament to one of the last century's greatest writers' Sunday TimesAt forty-nine, Saul Bellow was at the pinnacle of American letters he was rich, famous and critically acclaimed, with the best yet to come: Mr Sammler's Planet, Humboldt's Gift, all his best stories. He went on to win two more National Book Awards, a Pulitzer Prize, and the Nobel Prize. However, away from his desk, Bellow''s life was set to become embroiled in controversy: over foreign affairs, race, religion, education, social policy, the state of culture, the fate of the novel. From the women he pursued and his turbulent family relations, to his struggles with cultural relativism and the perceived excesses of civil rights movements, this second and final volume of Zachary Leader''s monumental Life of Saul Bellow charts Bellow''s heroic energy and will throughout his life, right to the end - where his immense achievements and their costs, to himself and others, became ever more apparent.''Brilliant'' Spectator''Compelling'' Times Literary Supplement''Riveting'' New Statesman''Superb'' New York TimesTrade ReviewLeader is our hyper-sensitive ammeter, charting the myriad effects of all this fame on his difficult, brilliant subject. A great feat of scholarship and, at the end, a moving testament to one of the last century’s greatest writers. -- Claire Lowdon * Sunday Times, **Literary Book of the Year** *This will stand as the definitive account. Leader talked to the surviving three wives and drew on the memories of Bellow’s three sons, as well as more than 100 friends (and one or two enemies) and devout literary progeny including Martin Amis and the critic James Wood. -- Tim Adams * Observer *This second volume of biography perfectly captures the spirit of a complex genius… Bellow calls for a sensitive balance between censure and understanding, to avoid overshadowing his genius, and it is hard to imagine anyone doing it better [than Zachary Leader]. -- George Walden * Evening Standard *Book of the Week* *Zachary Leader’s monumental biography of Saul Bellow…[is] minutely researched and clear-eyed… Leader is wholly steeped in Bellow’s oeuvre and able to find all the fictional equivalents of the real people who filled his life. -- John Mullan * Guardian *Leader’s portrait manages to be both subtle and even-handed… Leader’s two-volume biography is an astonishingly detailed and thoughtful record of an important life. -- Benjamin Markovits * Spectator *

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Book SynopsisIn July 1914, Franz Kafka''s fiancée Felice broke off their engagement in a humiliating public tribunal, surrounded by her friends and family, and the other woman with whom Kafka had recently fallen in love. Broken and bereft, Kafka - at the height of his writing powers - turned the experience into his masterpiece, The Trial, where his lovers became the faceless prosecutors of Josef K. In Kafka''s Other Trial, Canetti explores each letter that Kafka wrote to his fiancée, from their first tender moments together to his final letter and his refusal to reconcile. In this affecting book, he offers moving insights into the creativity of Franz Kafka and the torment he suffered as a man, a lover, and a writer.Trade ReviewPerhaps the most revealing essay on Kafka ever published. At last Kafka is matched in thought and prose * Times Literary Supplement *

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Book SynopsisThe extraordinary letters of Italo Calvino, one of the great writers of the twentieth century, translated into English for the first time by Martin McLaughlin, with an introduction by Michael Wood.Italo Calvino, novelist, literary critic and editor, was also a masterful letter writer whose correspondents included Umberto Eco, Primo Levi, Gore Vidal and Pier Paolo Pasolini. This collection of his extraordinary letters, the first in English, gives an illuminating insight into his work and life. They include correspondence with fellow authors, generous encouragement to young writers, responses to critics, thoughts on literary criticism and literature in general, as well as giving glimpses of Calvino''s role in the antifascist Resistance, his disenchantment with Communism and his travels to America and Cuba. Together they reveal the searching intellect, clarity and passionate commitment of a great writer at work.''This literally marvelous collection of letters

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Book Synopsis''If you''re someone who dreams of penning a bestseller, read this book'' The Week''What if the success of E.L.James and Dan Brown was not so random? What if there were an algorithm that could pick out the bestseller DNA concealed within these books before they''re published? This is the audacious claim made by Jodie Archer and Matthew Jockers ... Smart, savvy and full of ideas'' Fiona Wilson, The TimesGirl on the Train. Fifty Shades. The Goldfinch. Why do some books capture the whole world''s attention? In The Bestseller Code, Archer and Jockers boldly claim that not only can mega-hits be explained and identified - but they''ve built the algorithm to prove it. Using cutting-edge text mining techniques, they have developed a model that analyses theme, plot, style and character to explain why some books resonate more than others with readers. Provocative, entertaining, and ground-breaking, The Bestseller Code explo

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Book Synopsis''When Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from troubled dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a monstrous insect ...'' So begins Franz Kafka''s most famous story Metamorphosis.Franz Kafka (1883-1924) is among the most intriguing and influential writers of the twentieth century. During his lifetime he worked as a civil servant and published only a handful of short stories, the best known being The Transformation. All three of his novels, The Trial, The Castle, and The Man Who Disappeared [America], were published after his death and helped to found Kafka''s reputation as a uniquely perceptive interpreter of the twentieth century.Kafka''s fiction vividly evokes bizarre situations: a commercial traveller is turned into an insect, a banker is arrested by a mysterious court, a fasting artist starves to death in the name of art, a singing mouse becomes the heroine of her nation. Attending both to Kafka''s crisis-ridden life and to the subtleties of his art, Ritchie Robertson shows how his work explores such characteristically modern themes as the place of the body in culture, the power of institutions over people, and the possibility of religion after Nietzsche had proclaimed ''the death of God''. The result is an up-to-date and accessible portrait of a fascinating author which shows us ways to read and make sense of his perplexing and absorbing work.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.Table of Contents1. Life and Myth ; 2. Reading Kafka ; 3. Bodies ; 4. Institutions ; 5. The Last Things ; References and Further Reading

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Book SynopsisAn exciting and accessible study of the genre of fantasy.One of the dominant modes of storytelling in the twenty-first century, fantasy can mirror contemporary experiences and convey our anxieties and longings better than any representation of the merely real. It is the lie that speaks truth. This book addresses two central questions about fantastic storytelling: first, how can it be meaningful if it doesn''t claim to represent things as they are, and second, what kind of change can it make in the world? How can a form of storytelling that alters physical laws and denies facts about the past be at the same time a source of insight into human nature and the workings of the world? What kind of social, political, cultural, intellectual work does fantasy perform in the world--the world of the reader, that is, not that of the characters? Focusing on various aspects of fantastic world-building and story creation in classic and contemporary fantasy, from the use of symbolic structures to the way new stories incorporate bits of significance from earlier texts, this book shows how fantasy allows writers such as Michael Cunningham, Hans Christian Anderson, Helene Wecker, C. S. Lewis, Ursula K. Le Guin, Nnedi Okorafor, Nalo Hopkinson, George MacDonald, Aliette deBodard, and Patricia Wrightson to test new modes of understanding and interaction and thus to rethink political institutions, social practices, and models of reality.Trade ReviewReadable and authoritative, rich in example without losing us in abstract theory... For many-academics and general readers alike-the value of this volume will be in the way it places the fantasy we have grown up with in the context of a range of other voices. * Andy Sawyer, Strange Horizons *[Fantasy] proceeds from the deep, sincere, unselfconscious heart of fandom. It follows the zigzagging logic of love... can I recommend this book? The answer is yes. * Sandra Newman, Times Literary Supplement *Attebery writes personably and with grace... Fantasy: How it Works is the beginning of lots of good discussions. * Gary K. Wolfe , Locus *Internationally, fans, students, established and new, and academics will all find a great deal of accessibly written and thoroughly researched, useful, entertaining work in this lovely book. * Gina Wisker, Dissections *a short and friendly book that eschews jargon and is very firmly based on Attebery's phenomenonally wide reading within the genre... If you haven't read much fantasy fiction, this book is a wonderful introduction. If you have, you will still come away with a to-read list as long as your arm, a new appreciation of the novels you love, and plenty of food for thought. * Helen Parry, Shiny New Books *[a] lively and informative tour of a wonderful genre. * George Kelley *Fantasy literature is often defined as "literature of the impossible" and dismissed as escapism and sometimes even as irrelevant. In this brief but powerful book, Attebery (Idaho State Univ.) argues against these views. Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates through faculty; professionals; general readers. * Choice *The great strength of Fantasy: How It Works lies in the way it draws on and showcases a lifetime of careful reading of and thinking about the fantastic, marking another invaluable addition to fantasy studies... There is no book quite like it, and it is best approached as just what Attebery intended, a conversation starter about how fantasy means and what it does, the important work it performs in the world. * Timothy S. Miller, Los Angeles Review of Books *Table of ContentsIntroduction: Speaking of Fantasy 1: How Fantasy Means: The Shape of Truth 2: Realism and the Structures of Fantasy: The Family Story 3: Neighbors, Myths, and Fantasy 4: If not Conflict, then What? Metaphors for Narrative Interest 5: A Mitochondrial Theory of Literature: Fantasy and Intertextuality 6: Young Adult Dystopias and Yin Adult Utopias 7: Gender and Fantasy: Employing Fairy Tales 8: The Politics of Fantasy 9: Timor mortis conturbat me: Fear and Fantasy Conclusion: How Fantasy Means and What It Does: Some Propositions Works Cited

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Book Synopsis''What do we seek through millions of pages? Still hopefully turning the pages -- oh, here is Jacob''s room.''Who is Jacob Flanders? Virginia Woolf''s third novel, published in 1922 alongside James Joyce''s Ulysses and T.S. Eliot''s The Waste Land, follows this elusive title character from a sunlit childhood on the Cornwall coast to adventures in Cambridge, London, and Athens. Women fall in love with Jacob; young men desire his company and conversation. But Woolf keeps her scornful, charming protagonist at a distance, enveloping Jacob in mystery as he enters adulthood and the Great War thunders across Europe. A daring work that reimagines every element of the traditional novel, Jacob''s Room tells a new story for a new century.In 1922, Lytton Strachey pronounced Jacob''s Room ''a most wonderful achievementmore like poetry, it seems to me, than anything else, and as such I prophesy immortal.'' One hundred years after its publication, Woolf''s first full-length work of experimental fiction pulls us into the inexhaustible mysteries of intimacy and mortality.Table of ContentsIntroduction Note on the Text Select Bibliography A Chronology of Virginia Woolf Maps Jacob's Room Explanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisConsiders three centuries of writers and creatives of mostly Scots-Irish and post-Famine Irish descent whose work examines moments of entwined racial, social, and political transformation for those of that identity in America.Trade Reviewthis is an innovative, thought-provoking book that employs rich historical framings for its literary analysis. The book's uncovering of what might be called a "disguised Irish experience" in the work of a number of well-known American writers not generally thought of as "Irish" is intellectually stimulating and will, we predict, be a building block for further work. * James Donnelly, Chair of McGowan Prize (IACI) *Burke confronts the racial dynamics ever-present—but acknowledged to varying degrees—in works by authors whose ancestors may have been considered "off white" or ethnic others themselves. Burke presents her readers with ew ways of considering the Irishness of canonical American authors such as Henry James, William Faulkner, and Edgar Allan Poe, while also introducing a wider audience to less studied authors such as Frank Yerby, who was of mixed African and Irish descent. In so doing she establishes a new sub-genre, the Scots-Irish gothic. This book will be of value to scholars of Irish Studies and American literature, as it makes important new claims in these overlapping fields. * Matthew Reznicek, Lawrence J. McCaffrey Prize (ACIS) *Race, Politics, and Irish America is of value because it refuses and exposes the homogeneous treatment of the Irish (as all descended from Famine refugees) in Irish American literary criticism. The book acts as a corrective for three prominent areas of scholarship...It provides a narrative in its own right that complements whiteness studies by bringing in a literary approach and an impressively nuanced view of the history of various groups in Ireland and America. * Beth O'Leary Anish, Community College of Rhode Island, Irish University Review *Burke's book is an exciting, necessary contribution to both Irish Studies and American literary studies. She impressively distills complicated histories on both sides of the Atlantic into comprehensible chunks, and then deftly applies that history to a range of texts, most with previously ignored Irish elements at the base of their protagonists' race and class anxieties. * Beth O'Leary Anish, Community College of Rhode Island, Irish University Review *Race, Politics, and Irish America makes a compelling argument for seeing ethnic identity as every bit as key to understanding Fitzgerald as his self-doubts over his class status and literary standing. * Kirk Curnutt, F. Scott Fitzgerald Review *For those of us who struggle with the contradiction of being Irish-American - how our ancestors, who were near the bottom of every racial hierarchy, came to side with their oppressors - Mary Burke's book is essential reading. Viewed through a Gothic lens with a focus on political, literary and artistic figures, Professor Burke's book connects the dots across five centuries of Irish history in the Americas. * Tim Quinn, BiblioCommons *Mary M. Burke has written a book that the field of Irish Studies in the United States will find hard to ignore or dismiss. * Peter McDermott, Irish Echo *A "luminous new study...[that] explores centuries of competing narratives about the Irish in America." * Cahir O'Doherty, Irish Central *This generic breadth helps Burke create a rich, nuanced, and complex picture of what it means to be Irish...Compellingly, Burke includes performers, "public women," and queer and multiracial authors in her analyses and thus rejects the traditional focus on straight, white, male authors. She promises, and delivers, a rich, rewarding, and challenging read...this powerful and timely examination of race and politics in Irish America challenges many stereotypes and frames well-known authors, celebrities, and politicians in a way that brings new understanding to them and their Irish identities. Burke is to be congratulated for producing such a fine, wide-ranging, and broadly appealing study. * Christine Kinealy, Eugene O'Neill Review *Burke's deeply researched and wide-ranging book provides a roadmap for future scholars to examine with far greater nuance than was previously the case the complexity of Irish identities in the United States. * Sinéad Moynihan, Irish Studies Review *The text is most enlightening when read as a linear whole, to understand the messy evolution of 'white' Irishness in a racially divided America. * Ciara Smart, Australasian Journal of Irish studies *Table of ContentsIntroduction: The Past is a Foreign Country 1: Towards Scots-Irish Gothic 2: Closeted Irish: Henry James 3: How the Irish Became Red: O'Neill and Fitzgerald 4: Complicit Irishness: Plantation novels by Yerby, Mitchell, and Faulkner 5: White Wedding: Grace Kelly, spectacle, and Irish assimilation Epilogue: Kennedy Gothic

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Book SynopsisConsiders George Orwell's writing about the East, and the presence of the East in his writing and argues that in thinking of Orwell as an 'Anglo-Indian writer', not just in upbringing and experience, but in many of his views, perceptions, and reactions, a different Orwell emerges.Trade ReviewKerr's insights on Orwell and Rudyard Kipling are particularly perceptive. No other writer was more important to Orwell: his whole life "was a conversation, or quarrel, with Kipling", quoting him frequently throughout his writings. While it is tempting to see the two writers as opposites, Kerr is keen to identify their similarities: "Both of them were patriots though highly critical of their fellow-countrymen and frequently of their government. Both were public intellectuals who used their writing to raise political consciousness. Both loved animals and wrote books about them and both had a strong feeling for the English countryside". * Richard Lance Keeble, English Studies *eminently readable, and a fascinating new look at Orwell's work * , Shiny New Books *Thoughtful and methodical, Orwell and Empire is a good guide to [Orwell's] complex and not always consistent imperial attitudes. * Professor Krishan Kumar, The Times Literary Supplement *[T]his is among the most enjoyable books on the subject of Orwell that I have discovered in a long time, and without doubt the finest work on Orwell's connection to empire and the east that it has been my privilege to read. * Ron Bateman, The Orwell Society *Table of Contents1: Introduction: Anglo-India 2: Animals 3: Environment: Burmese Days 4: Class 5: Empire 6: Geography 7: Women 8: Race 9: Police 10: The Law 11: Literature Notes Bibliography

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Book SynopsisA close reading of James Baldwin''s short story Sonny''s Blues that provides insight into his life and ideas about art.Tom Jenks''s reading of James Baldwin''s Sonny''s Blues follows a scene-by-scene, sometimes line-by-line, discussion of the pattern by which Baldwin indelibly writes Sonny''s Blues into the consciousness of readers. It provides ongoing observations of the aesthetics underlying the particulars of the story, with references to Edward P. Jones (whose magnificent story All Aunt Hagar''s Children bears a knowing relationship to Sonny''s Blues,) to Charlie Parker''s music, and to Billie Holiday''s Am I Blue? and John Coltrane''s A Love Supreme as part of the musical progression Baldwin creates, and with attention to Baldwin''s oratorical gifts and the biblical references in the story, to its time structure, characterizations, dramatic action, and, most of all, its totality of effect. Drawing on Baldwin''s book-length essay The Fire Next Time, which Baldwin published a decade

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Book SynopsisIn East of the Wardrobe, Warwick Ball explores hitherto unrecognised and unexpected Eastern aspects in and influences on C. S. Lewis' The Chronicles of Narnia.Trade Review"a complex, wide-ranging investigation" -- Mark Vernon, Church TimesBall's work highlights the breadth of intellectual and cultural traditions that were available to writers of his generation. * Greece & Rome *The book's personal, digressive, and allusive qualities make it a page turner and often sheer fun to read. * Philip Irving Mitchell, Dallas Baptist University, TX , Mythopoeic Society *A highly enjoyable and eye-opening account of the myriad ways Lewis was influenced by Eastern art, literature, and philosophy - and, indeed, religion. * Oliver Tearle, Interesting Literature *A highly enjoyable and eye-opening account of the myriad ways Lewis was influenced by Eastern art, literature, and philosophy -and, indeed, religion. * Interesting Literature *The book's personal, digressive, and allusive qualities make it a page turner and often sheer fun to read... Even those readers who are simply interested in comparative literature can enjoy the numerous possibilities on display. I think East of the Wardrobe will be mined for all of these for some years to come. * Philip Irving Mitchell, Mythlore *East of the Wardrobe is as enjoyable as it is important...Laced with Ball's humour and humanity, this book has something for every reader. * Frazer MacDiarmid, The Stimulus *East of the Wardrobe is as enjoyable as it is important. Ball betrays intimate familiarity with the Chronicles, undertaking close-reading (even exegesis) of the texts that will delight Narnia fans. Theologians will be fascinated by the variety of Eastern concepts evident in books whose secrets were thought to be long revealed... Even the endnotes were amusing and intriguing, with many meriting footnote status. C. S. Lewis emerges as a more complex and sympathetic author than commonly understood, whose bibliophilia sparked a love of beautiful stories, regardless of provenance. Laced with Ball's humour and humanity, this book has something for every reader. * The Stimulus *Table of ContentsList of Illustrations Introduction: Confessions of a Reluctant Narniaphile 1. Endless Books: Herodotus to Robert Byron 2. 'It All [Perhaps] Began with a Picture': Narnia, Persian Painting, and Pauline Baynes 3. East of the Wardrobe: The Manners and Customs of the Modern Calormen 4. On Board the Dawn Treader: Epic Quests and Fabulous Voyages to the East 5. Of This and Other Worlds: Portals and Alternative Time, from the Wardrobe to the Qu'ran 6. Mere Christianity? Mere Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, and Sufism as Well in Narnia 7. Farther Up and Farther In. Messages within, beyond, and east of Narnia Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisGet to grips with set texts and be fully prepared for the AS/A Level exam with the Modern Languages Oxford Literature Companions. The Companions are written by experienced lecturers, teachers and examiners and provide comprehensive coverage of characters, themes, plot, language and context with activities in Spanish to consolidate your knowledge of the text. There are also extensive sections on exam preparation and response planning, with a bank of annotated sample answers and practice questions. This guide covers Como agua para chocolate by Laura Esquivel. Modern Languages Oxford Literature Companions are also available for selected French and German set texts.

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Book SynopsisThis volume is devoted to life-writing in English from 1945 to the present day, a period in which life-writing became an increasingly popular and accessible form.Table of ContentsIntroduction 1: Aftermath: Confronting the Inhuman 2: Biographies of the Unconscious 3: Self-Knowledge as a Question 4: Coming Out 5: Feminism's Lyric Selves 6: Autoethnography 7: Intimate Memoirs 8: Memory Culture 9: Posthuman Monsters 10: Literary Biography and Theory 11: Celebrity and its Literary Consequences 12: Prospect: Human 2.0? Bibliography

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Book SynopsisJames Joyce's only surviving play has divided Joyceans for a century. Illuminating the themes of performance that are so prominent throughout Joyce's fiction, Exiles sees Joyce staking his claim definitively within the European theatrical tradition.Trade ReviewThe book is complete with Walsh's useful notes and a well-established text and can safely be recommended to students. * Valérie Bénéjam, James Joyce Quarterly *Table of ContentsIntroduction Composition and Publication History Select Bibliography A Chronology of James Joyce EXILES Appendix A: 'Ibsen's New Drama' Appendix B: 'The Day of the Rabblement' Explanatory Notes

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Book SynopsisThe Ordnance Survey and Modern Irish Literature offers a fresh new look at the origins of literary modernism in Ireland, tracing a history of Irish writing through James Clarence Mangan, J.M. Synge, W.B. Yeats, James Joyce, and Samuel Beckett. Beginning with the archives of the Ordnance Survey, which mapped Ireland between 1824 and 1846, the book argues that one of the sources of Irish modernism lies in the attempt by the Survey to produce a comprehensive archive of a land emerging rapidly into modernity. The Ordnance Survey instituted a practice of depicting the country as modern, fragmented, alienated, and troubled, both diagnosing and representing a landscape burdened with the paradoxes of colonial modernity. Subsequent literature returns in varying ways, both imitative and combative, to the complex representational challenge that the Survey confronts and seeks to surmount. From a colonial mapping project to an engine of nationalist imagining, and finally a framework by which to evade the claims of the postcolonial nation, the Ordnance Survey was a central imaginative source of what makes Irish modernist writing both formally innovative and politically challenging. Drawing on literary theory, studies of space, the history of cartography, postcolonial theory, archive theory, and the field Irish Studies, The Ordnance Survey and Modern Irish Literature paints a picture of Irish writing deeply engaged in the representation of a multi-layered landscape.Trade Reviewan important new study ... startlingly original schema * Sinéad Sturgeon, Times Literary Supplement *... convincingly describes a uniquely Irish modernist aesthetic which is grounded in one of the islands most intense moments of cultural and material cartography, and should prove useful for a wide range of scholars interested in the intersections of history, geography, and literature. * Sinéad Sturgeon, Stephen O'Neill, Irish Studies Review *The Ordnance Survey and Modern Irish Literature opens fertile new ground and will surely encourage scholars with nicely polished looking glasses to further scrutinize the relationship between the British Empire's cartographic project and Ireland's modernist literary projects. * Vivian Valvano Lynch, Léirmheasanna: Reviews *The Survey, for Parsons, is one of the "many possible and actual starting points of a history of Irish modernity and modernism," and what emerges in the book is a brilliant and fresh analysis of the ways in which James Clarence Mangan, John Millington Synge, James Joyce, and Samuel Beckett engage with such a cartographical heritage and postcolonial imperative. * Malcolm Sen, Breac: A Digital Journal of Irish Studies *Table of ContentsIntroduction: Maps, Modernity, Modernism I. Archives 1: Archive: The Ordnance Survey Letters 2: Anarchive: James Clarence Mangan among the Ruins II. Scales 3: The Scales of Modernity I: The Aran Islands 4: The Scales of Modernity II: Ulysses' Encyclopedic Narrative Epilogue 5: "Accursed Progenitor!": Beckett's Abstract Landscapes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe forty-two chapters in this book consider Yeats''s early toil, his practical and esoteric concerns as his career developed, his friends and enemies, and how he was and is understood. This Handbook brings together critics and writers who have considered what Yeats wrote and how he wrote, moving between texts and their contexts in ways that will lead the reader through Yeats''s multiple selves as poet, playwright, public figure, and mystic. It assembles a variety of views and adds to a sense of dialogue, the antinomian or deliberately-divided way of thinking that Yeats relished and encouraged. This volume puts that sense of a living dialogue in tune both with the history of criticism on Yeats and also with contemporary critical and ethical debates, not shirking the complexities of Yeats''s more uncomfortable political positions or personal life. It provides one basis from which future Yeats scholarship can continue to participate in the fascination of all the contributors here in the satisfying difficulty of this great writer.Table of ContentsPreface Part 1. Such Friends: Predecessors and Collaborators 1: Claire Lynch: Self-Making 2: Seán Hewitt: Fairy and Folk Tales of Bedford Park 3: Peter McDonald: 'Never to leave that valley': Sligo 4: Francis O'Gorman: Among the Victorians 5: Nicholas Grene: Lady Gregory: Patronage, Collaboration, Mythopoeia 6: Joseph Hassett: John Quinn and the Literary Marketplace 7: Margaret Mills Harper: George Yeats 8: Nicholas Allen: The Writings of Jack Yeats Part 2. In and Through History 9: Geraldine Parsons: Ancient Ireland 10: R.F. Foster: The Ghost of Parnell 11: Edna Longley: Renaissance Italy: 'courtly images' 12: Hugh Haughton: Tradition and Phantasmagoria: Dante and Shakespeare 13: Geraldine Higgins: Talking back to history: From 'September 1913' to 'Easter, 1916' 14: Fran Brearton: 'Knights of the Air': Flight and Modernity 15: David Dwan: Revolution and Counter-Revolution 16: Lauren Arrington: Fascist Italy 17: Alan Gillis: The Thirties: 'The day brings round the night' 18: Adam Hanna: The Senate and the Stage 19: Adam Piette: 'Cast a cold eye': Death in Wartime Part 3. From the Global to the Interplanetary 20: Justin Quinn: Tagore, Pound and World English 21: Nathan Suhr-Sytsma: Africa 22: Jahan Ramazani: Asias 23: Katherine Ebury: 'The Scientific Revolution' 24: Cóilín Parsons: Planets 25: Neil Mann: Visionary Poetics Part 4. Genres and Medias 26: Charles Armstrong: Romanticism and Aestheticism 27: Claire Nally: Rites and Rhymes 28: Tom Walker: The most characteristic poet of modern Europe': Modernist Accommodations 29: Jack Quin: Illustrating 30: Elizabeth Bergmann Loizeaux: Family Business at Dun Emer and Cuala: Collaboration, Contention, and Creativity 31: Emilie Morin: In the Media Part 5. Playing Yeats 32: Susan Cannon Harris: Yeats's Early Plays: Gender, Genre, and Queer Collaboration 33: Akiko Manabe: 'A Country Over Wave': Japan, Noh, Kiogen 34: Zsuzsanna Balázs: Reading the Late Plays: Sexual Unorthodoxies 35: Patrick Lonergan: Playing in Ireland 36: Susan Jones: Dance Part 6. Reading Yeats 37: Stephanie Burt: Imperfect Forms 38: Matthew Campbell: Visionary Comedy 39: Lucy McDiarmid: Masculinities 40: Wayne K. Chapman: Late Style: Art v. Life 41: Warwick Gould: Editing Postscript 42: Vona Groarke: Yeats and Contemporary Poetry: Twelve Speculative Takes

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Book SynopsisList of Illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction Siting Testimony Testimony and the Voice of Species Iconophilia Archiving Beckett Information and the Inhuman Conclusion: Beyond the archive? IndexTrade Review'An extremely well-written and cogently argued work on an area that has remained underexplored in Beckett studies.' - Shane Weller, University of Kent, UK 'The book adds substantially to Beckett's status in considerations of testimony, providing an eloquent engagement that will prove an important reference-point for future scholarship.' - Peter Fifield, St. John's College, Oxford, Modern Language ReviewTable of ContentsList of Illustrations Acknowledgements Introduction Siting Testimony Testimony and the Voice of Species Iconophilia Archiving Beckett Information and the Inhuman Conclusion: Beyond the archive? Index

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Book SynopsisThe essential companion for lovers of the contemporary novelTrade Review“Altogether, a stimulating and useful enterprise.”—Kevin Power, Irish Times“It is very possible that Peter Kemp is the best-read man in Britain.” —Ian Sansom, The Spectator“Peter Kemp has held the torch for fiction over many years—scrupulous, devoted to his favourite authors, and insightful about emerging talent.”—Edna O’Brien“An exhilarating gallop across the landscape of recent English-language fiction. You may not share all of Peter Kemp’s trans-genre enthusiasms, but you will certainly be awed by his omnivorous appetite and will come away with at least a dozen books you are now itching to read.”—Sebastian Faulks“Readable and enjoyable as well as informative. The sort of book that keen novel readers should buy and praise.”—Lindsay Duguid“No one knows more about fiction over the last 50 years than Peter Kemp. He has been a fearless and fiercely knowledgeable and entertaining critic for decades, and in this fascinating book he offers a completely original take on the modern novel—one that will completely change how we think about what we all have been reading.”—Andrew Holgate“A rich, vivid, and endlessly informative book, with an awe-inspiring command of detail.”—Leo Robson

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Book SynopsisThe electrifying diaries that are essential reading for anyone moved and fascinated by the life and work of one of America''s most acclaimed poets. Sylvia Plath began keeping a diary as a young child. By the time she was at Smith College, when this book begins, she had settled into a nearly daily routine with her journal, which was also a sourcebook for her writing. Plath once called her journal her “Sargasso,” her repository of imagination, “a litany of dreams, directives, and imperatives,” and in fact these pages contain the germs of most of her work. Plath’s ambitions as a writer were urgent and ultimately all-consuming, requiring of her a heat, a fantastic chaos, even a violence that burned straight through her. The intensity of this struggle is rendered in her journal with an unsparing clarity, revealing both the frequent desperation of her situation and the bravery with which she faced down her demons.

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Book SynopsisA panoramic literary anthology that explores the inner story of China in the twentieth century.Trade Review"Huang is previously the author of a witty and stylish book about Charlie Chan which drew on a variety of artforms – from doggerel verses to B-movies – to reflect on the representation of China in the West. The Big Red Book, which benefits from translations by a Who’s Who of talent, is similarly wide-ranging. And while Huang’s prose choices are relatively conventional, his selections of poems and sketches of their authors are engagingly idiosyncratic." -- The Times Literary Supplement"[A] worthwhile anthology... that manages to combine the established canon with less-well-known selections... [Its] breadth and variety…will, one hopes, encourage new readers to explore more Chinese literature in full translations." -- The New York Times Book Review

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Book SynopsisIn its centennial year, Marcel Proust’s masterpiece of literary imagination is available in a Norton Critical Edition.

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Book SynopsisSince 1966 readers new to James Joyce have depended upon this essential guide to Ulysses. Harry Blamires helps readers to negotiate their way through this formidable, remarkable novel and gain an understanding of it which, without help, it might have taken several readings to achieve.The New Bloomsday Book is a crystal clear, page-by-page, line-by-line running commentary on the plot of Ulysses which illuminates symbolic themes and structures along the way. It is a highly accessible, indispensible guide for anyone reading Joyce''s masterpiece for the first time.To ensure that Blamires'' classic work will remain useful to new readers, this third edition contains the page numbering and references to three commonly read editions of Ulysses: the Oxford University Press ''World Classics'' (1993), the Penguin ''Twentieth-Century Classics'' (1992), and the Gabler ''Corrected Text'' (1986) editions.

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Book SynopsisFor the past four decades Frank Kermode, critic and writer, has steadily established himself as one of the most brilliant minds of his generation. Questioning the public''s harsh perception of ''the artist'', Kermode at the same time gently pokes fun at artists'' own, often inflated, self-image. He identifies what has become one of the defining characteristics of the Romantic tradition - the artist in isolation and the emerging power of the imagination. Back in print after an absence of over a decade, The Romantic Image is quintessential Kermode. Enlightenment has seldom been so enjoyable!Trade Review'In this extremely important book of speculative and scholarly criticism, Mr Kermode is setting out to re-define the notion of the Romantic tradition, especially in relation to English poetry and criticism.' - Times Literary Supplement'Kermode's effortless learning, lucid intelligence and wry, self-deprecating style prove that, at its best, literary criticism itself is a lively art.' - Al AlvarezTable of ContentsPreface -- A Note on the Frontispiece -- Part I Dancer and -- The Artist in Isolation 3 -- ‘In Memory of Major Robert Gregory’ 37 -- The Image 52 -- The Dancer 59 -- The Tree111 -- Part II The Twentieth -- Arthur Symons 127 -- T. E. Hulme141 -- ‘Dissociation of Sensibility’ 164 -- Conclusion192 -- Epilogue -- Index

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Book SynopsisPostmodernism is an important part of the cultural landscape which continues to evolve, yet the ideas and theories surrounding the subject can be diverse and difficult to understand. Fifty Postmodern Thinkers critically examines the work of fifty of the most important theorists within the postmodern movement who have defined and shaped the field, bringing together their key ideas in an accessible format. Drawing on figures from a wide range of subject areas including literature, cultural theory, philosophy, sociology and architecture those covered include: John Barth Umberto Eco Slavoj Zizek Cindy Sherman John Cage Jean-Francois Lyotard Charles Jencks Jacques Derrida Homi K. Bhabha Quentin Tarantino Each entry examines the thinkers' career, key contributions Trade ReviewA joy to read, Sim's cross-referenced critical commentary enables readers to perceive transdisciplinary conceptual constellations, chart major and minor theoretical trajectories, and orient postmodernism in relation to current real-world debates about surveillance, neoliberalism, fundamentalism, and the global financial crisis. Intelligently designed, this informative book will not induce information overload. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers. -- E. D. Rasmussen, University of Stavanger in CHOICETable of ContentsIntroduction A-Z Key Thinkers Chronology Bibliography

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Book SynopsisAn anthology of translated Japanese literature about men behaving lovingly, erotically, and intimately with other men. Covering more than 125 years of modern and contemporary Japanese history, this book introduces a diverse array of authors to an English-speaking audience and provide further context for their works.Table of Contents Introduction Chapter 1: “A Portrait of Young Sangorō” [Shōnen sugata] by Yamada Bimyō (1886) - translated by Nick Albertson Chapter 2: “The Little Historian” [Shō rekishika] by Nishimura Suimu (1907) - translated by Kristin Sivak and Chelsea Bernard Chapter 3: “Is This Love?” [Ai ka] by Yi Kwangsu (1909) - translated by Janet Poole Chapter 4: “Whistle” [Kuchibue], by Orikuchi Shinobu (1914) - translated by Joseph Boxman Chapter 5: Three Stories by Inagaki Taruho - translated by Jeffrey Angles "Karl and the White Lamp" [Kāru to shiroi dentō] [1924, revised 1954] "Pince-Nez Glasses" [Hana megane] [1924, revised 1969] "The False Mustache" [Tsukihige] [1924, revised 1969] Chapter 6: Two essays by Hamao Shirō (1930) - translated by Steve Dodd “Thoughts on Homosexuality” [Dōseiai kō] “More Thoughts on Homosexuality” [Futatabi dōseiai ni tsuite] Chapter 7: “Squalid Alleyways” [Rōkō] by Kataoka Teppei (1934) - translated by Mio Akasako and Amanda Seaman Chapter 8: Selected Tanka from Haku'u and Tomo no sho by Kasugai Ken (1960) - translated by Scott Mehl Chapter 9: “Worse for Love” [Ai no shōkei], by “Sakakiyama Tamotsu” (Mishima Yukio) (1960) - translated by Sam Bett Chapter 10: “I Am Not Going on Sunday” [Nichiyōbi ni wa boku wa ikanai] by Mori Mari (1961) - translated by Bob Tierney Chapter 11: “Sacred Headland” from Sacred Triangle (Seisan kakukei) by Takahashi Mutsuo (1972) - translated by Paul McCarthy Chapter 12: “Red Palm Leaves” [Ai no yashi no ha], by Medoruma Shun (1992) - translated by Davinder Bhowmik Chapter 13: Selections from Gay Poems [Gei poemuzu] by Tanaka Atsusuke (2014) - translated by Jeffrey Angles Chapter 14: “The Story of a Strange Belly” [Kifukutan] by Fukushima Jirō (2005) - translated by Bruce Suttmeier Chapter 15: “Time Differences” [Jisa] by Tawada Yōko (2006) - translated by Jeffrey Angles Chapter 16: “The Playroom” [Mikkusu rūmu], by Morii Ryō (2014) - translated by Stephen D. Miller Acknowledgements List of Contributors

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