Published diaries, letters and journals Books

Book SynopsisIn 1951, just days before her scheduled lobotomy after years in a mental hospital, New Zealand author Janet Frame's first collection of short stories unexpectedly won the Hubert Church Memorial Award, one of the country's most prestigious honors. The procedure was cancelled, and Frame would go on to become one of the seminal authors of contemporary New Zealand literature.During her time at the MacDowell artist's colony in New Hampshire, Frame met painter William Theophilus Brown, and their friendship resulted in a whimsical and artistic correspondence that lasted until Frame's death in 2004. In Brown, Frame found an ideal listener who inspired her to take the art of letter writing to new creative heights; over the course of their correspondence, Frame included character sketches, personal disclosures, invented tales, and over 300 of her own doodles and collages.This compilation of letters and original illustrations has been published nowhere else in the world, including Frame's home country of New Zealand. This moving and enlightening correspondence opens up the hopes, fears, joys, and inner machinations of one of New Zealand's most renowned authors, and offers a side of her dramatic personal history often ignored or misunderstood by the public. The closeness and intimacy of the two artists allows for unfettered wordplay, where Janet is merely Jay, Bill merely Bee, and granular, unprocessed creativity is allowed to flow freely; the result is a book that vividly captures the brilliantly unique wit that was Janet Frame.

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Book SynopsisThis volume presents full annotated text of five hundred documents from Andrew Jackson’s fifth presidential year. They include his private memoranda, intimate family letters, presidential message drafts, and correspondence with government and military officers, diplomats, Indian leaders, political friends and foes, and citizens throughout the country.The year 1833 began with a crisis in South Carolina, where a state convention had declared the federal tariff law null and void and pledged resistance by armed force if necessary. Jackson countered by rallying public opinion against the nullifiers, quietly positioning troops and warships, and procuring a “force bill” from Congress to compel collection of customs duties. The episode ended peaceably after South Carolina accepted a compromise tariff devised by Jackson’s arch-rival Henry Clay. But Clay’s surprise cooperation with South Carolina’s John C. Calhoun foretold a new opposition coalition against Jackson.With nullification checked, Jackson embarked in June on a triumphal tour to cement his newfound popularity in the North. Ecstatic crowds greeted him in Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, and Harvard awarded him a degree. But Jackson’s fragile health broke under the strain, forcing him to cut the tour short.Meanwhile Jackson pursued his campaign against the Bank of the United States, whose recharter he had vetoed in 1832. Charging the Bank with political meddling and corruption, Jackson determined to cripple it by removing federal deposits to state banks. But Treasury secretary William John Duane refused either to give the necessary order or resign. In September Jackson dismissed him and installed Roger Taney to implement the removal. Jackson’s bold assumption of authority energized supporters but outraged opponents, prompting Clay to introduce a Senate resolution of censure.The year closed with Jackson girding for further battle over the Bank, pursuing schemes to pry the province of Texas loose from Mexico, and trying to stem rampant land frauds that his own Indian removal policy had unleashed against Creek Indians in Alabama. Unfolding these stories and many more, this volume offers an incomparable window into Andrew Jackson, his presidency, and America itself in 1833.

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Book SynopsisBorn near Guntersville, Alabama, Catherine (Cassie) Fennell was nineteen when the Civil War began. Starting with her time at a female academy in Washington, DC, the diaries continue through the war’s end and discuss civilian experiences in Alabama and the Tennessee Valley. Fennell believed that by keeping a diary she made a small contribution to the war effort and history itself.Fennell was fairly well off and highly educated, moving easily in very elite social circles. Most of her relatives were staunch Confederates, and the war took its toll, with multiple members of her family killed or captured. As Fennell recounts the consequences of war—the downward spiral of the family fortune, the withering of hope at news from the battlefront, and the general uncertainty of civilian life in the South—her diaries constitute one of the few contemporaneous records of north Alabama, including the shelling and burning of Guntersville, which has been poorly documented in the historiography of the Civil War. While the first diary is written as a private reflection, the war journals are well researched and rely on extensive familiarity with local newspapers and seem like they are intended for the eyes of later generations.Ultimately, these diaries amount to a social history of the war years, in a specific region where scholars have recovered relatively few firsthand accounts, and editor Whitney Snow’s compilation adds to the now growing genre of women’s Civil War diaries. Insightful and engrossing, The Civil War Diaries of Cassie Fennell is a compelling portrait of a privileged young woman who suffered devastating losses for her ardent support of a Confederate nation.

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Book SynopsisThe final volume of the Correspondence of James K. Polk documents the end of a presidency and the end of a life. With the Mexican War over, Polk focused on integrating new lands into the country, resolving discord over slavery, and planning for a retirement that proved all too short. His letters of April 1848 to June 1849 reveal his and his contemporaries’ thoughts on a nation racing from an international conflict toward a civil war.Having won half of Mexico’s land, Polk wanted to create territorial or state governments for New Mexico and California. He chafed under Congress’s inability to agree on whether to permit slavery there. Clashes in New Mexico, Oregon, and YucatÁn, meanwhile, involved Americans in further violence. Like many Americans, Polk welcomed the republican revolutions that swept Europe. But he soon learned that conservative armies were reversing those gains. From here at home, he received petitions by Native Americans to remedy ill treatment by an administration intent on their removal.Though he refused to seek reelection, Polk closely followed the presidential campaign of 1848. Stung by the victory of Zachary Taylor, one of his chief generals and now a leading Whig, he still happily left the White House for his retirement in Nashville. In his new mansion he hoped to rest and socialize while continuing to profit from the labor of slaves on his Mississippi plantation.His voyage home, alas, took Polk through a US entry point of a worldwide cholera pandemic. He arrived in Tennessee ill and died only three months after leaving office. Others were left to mourn the fifty-three-year-old, to assess his legacy, and to deal with the consequences of his actions.Right to the end, Polk corresponded with diverse men and women. This volume includes letters by future presidents, to a past first lady, and by the newly installed Vicaire of the German Empire. It includes letters by pro-annexation Cubans, to India’s poet laureate, and by a planter who would become one of the earliest female physicians. Presented here with full annotation, they illuminate politics, diplomacy, economy, and culture.This volume concludes a six-decade-long project to render accessible key primary sources in US history. From slave escapes to presidential lies and from gas lighting to temperance reform, the letters herein expose controversy and change at the end of one of America’s most consequential presidencies.

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Book SynopsisBorn a German Jew in 1915, Rudy Baum was eighty-six years old when he sealed the garage door of his Dallas home, turned on the car ignition, and tried to end his life. After confronting her father's attempted suicide, Karen Baum Gordon, Rudy's daughter, began a sincere effort to understand the sequence of events that led her father to that dreadful day in 2002. What she found were hidden scars of generational struggles reaching back to the camps and ghettos of the Third Reich.In The Last Letter: A Father's Struggle, a Daughter's Quest, and the Long Shadow of the Holocaust, Gordon explores not only her father's life story, but also the stories and events that shaped the lives of her grandparents—two Holocaust victims that Rudy tried in vain to save in the late 1930s and early years of World War II. This investigation of her family's history is grounded in eighty-eight letters written mostly by Julie Baum, Rudy's mother and Karen's grandmother, to Rudy between November 1936 and October 1941. In five parts, Gordon examines pieces of these well-worn, handwritten letters and other archival documents in order to discover what her family experienced during the Nazi period and the psychological impact that reverberated from it in the generations that followed.Part of the Legacies of War series, The Last Letter is a captivating family memoir that spans events from the 1930s and Hitler's rise to power, through World War II and the Holocaust, to the present-day United States. In recreating the fatal journeys of her grandparents and tracing her father's efforts to save them an ocean away in America, Gordon discovers the forgotten fragments of her family's history and a vivid sense of her own Jewish identity. By inviting readers along on this journey, Gordon manages to honor victim and survivor alike and shows subsequent generations—now many years after the tragic events of World War II—what it means to remember.

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Book SynopsisAt the outbreak of the Civil War, Sarah Kennedy watched as her husband, D.N., left for Mississippi, leaving her alone to care for their six children and control their slaves in a large home in downtown Clarksville, Tennessee. D. N. Kennedy left to aid the Confederate Treasury Department. He had steadfastly supported secession and helped recruit local boys for the Confederate army. The Civil War Letters of Sarah Kennedy: Life under Occupation in the Upper South showcases the letters Sarah wrote to her husband during their time apart, offering readers an inside look at life on the home front during the Civil War through the eyes of a slave-owning, town-dwelling wife and mother.Featuring fifty-two of Sarah Kennedy’s letters to her husband from August 16, 1862, to February 20, 1865, this important collection chronicles Sarah Kennedy’s personal struggles during the Civil War years, from periods of illness to lack of consistent contact with her husband and everything in between. Her love and devotion to her family is apparent in each letter, contrasting deeply with her resentment and harsh treatment toward her enslaved people as Emancipation swept through Clarksville. A useful volume to Civil War historians and women’s history scholars alike, The Civil War Letters of Sarah Kennedy pulls back the curtain on upper-middle-class family life and social relations in a mid-sized Middle Tennessee town during the Civil War and reveals the slow demise of slavery during the Union occupation.

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Book SynopsisThis volume presents more than five hundred annotated original documents from Andrew Jackson’s sixth presidential year. They include his private memoranda, intimate family letters, official messages, and correspondence with government and military officers, diplomats, Indian leaders, political friends and foes, and plain citizens throughout the country.The year 1834 began with Jackson battling the United States Senate. Pursuing his campaign against the federally chartered Bank of the United States, Jackson in 1833 had installed Roger Taney as interim Treasury secretary to transfer the government’s deposits to selected state-chartered “pet” banks. The Bank retaliated by curtailing its business, setting off a commercial crisis and a political frenzy. In 1834 the Senate, controlled by the new opposition Whig Party led by Jackson’s old nemeses Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun, rejected a slew of Jackson’s nominees for office, including Taney, and adopted an unprecedented (and still unparalleled) resolution of censure against Jackson himself. Jackson returned a scathing protest, which the Senate rejected. Meanwhile the administration struggled to implement its “experiment” of conducting government finances through state banks.Throughout the year Jackson pursued his aim of compelling eastern Indians to remove west of the Mississippi. In May the Chickasaws signed a removal treaty. But brazen frauds complicated the administration’s scheme to induce individual Creeks to emigrate from Alabama, while the Cherokees, led by Principal Chief John Ross, stood fast in resistance. In June some unauthorized dissident Cherokees signed a removal treaty, but it died in the Senate.In 1834 Jackson continued his longstanding effort to pry the province of Texas loose from Mexico, while the U.S. hurtled toward confrontation with France over French failure to pay an indemnity due under an 1831 treaty. Other matters engaging Jackson included corruption scandals in the Post Office Department and at Mississippi land offices, fractious disputes over rank and seniority among Army and Navy officers, and a fire that gutted Jackson’s Hermitage home in Tennessee. Unfolding these stories and many more, this volume offers a revelatory window into Andrew Jackson, his presidency, and America itself in 1834.

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Book SynopsisWith a closeness perhaps unique to siblings orphaned young, Orlando and Artimisia “Missie” Palmer exchanged intimate letters throughout their lives. These letters (interspersed with additional letters from Oliver Kennedy, the Palmers’ first cousin) offer a clear and entertaining window into the life and times of a junior Confederate officer serving in the Western Theater of the Civil War. Though he initially felt Americans would see “the folly and the madness” of going to war, Orlando enlisted as a private in what would become Company H of the First (later Fifteenth) Arkansas Infantry, informing his sister that he had volunteered “not for position, not for a name, but from patriotic motivation.” However, he was ambitious enough to secure an appointment as Maj. Gen. William Joseph Hardee’s personal secretary; he then rose to become his regiment’s sergeant major, his company’s first lieutenant, and later captain and brigade adjutant. Soldier letters typically report only what can be observed at the company level, but Palmer’s high-ranking position offers a unique view of strategic rather than tactical operations. Palmer’s letters are not all related to his military experience, though, and the narrative is enhanced by his nuanced reflections on courtship customs and personal relationships. For instance, Palmer frequently attempts to entertain Missie with witticisms and tales of his active romantic life: “We have so much to do,” he quips, “that we have no time to do anything save to visit the women. I am in love with several dozen of them and am having a huge time generally.”The Folly and the Madness adds depth to the genre of Civil War correspondence and provides a window into the lives of ordinary southerners at an extraordinary time.

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Book SynopsisFeldpost: The Wartime Letters of Friedrich Reiner Niemann documents the life and front line experiences of a German soldier from the 6th Infantry Division from 1941-1945. Niemann, a well-educated youth from a Westphalia family, was sent to the Russian front four times. He wrote his final two letters home from Poland on January 12, 1945 before he disappeared during the Soviet Vistula-Oder Offensive. In his extensive correspondence, Niemann describes the fighting at Rzhev, Russia, 1942-1943, and his survival of the destruction of his division during the Soviet summer offensive in 1944. His is a rare view of battles that annihilated entire German divisions and armies. After World War Two, the Niemann family preserved Reiner's letters and photographs and shipped them to New Orleans when Reiner's sister, Liselotte Andersson, had emigrated. Neglected in an attic for over fifty years, the documents surfaced only after Hurricane Katrina flooded the family house. Andersson's daughter-in-law, author Whitney Stewart, discovered the letters in 2012, and contacted Denis Havel to translate them. Together, Havel and Stewart uncovered historical details that enabled them to follow Reiner's trail and tell his story.

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Book SynopsisLawrence Ferlinghetti—legendary poet and best-selling author—collects here his travel journals. Traversing the latter half of the twentieth century to the present, Writing Across the Landscape positions Ferlinghetti as a major voice whose personal writings are now added to the fabric of twentieth-century literary history. The volume gives glimpses of figures like William Burroughs in London, Ezra Pound in Italy and Fidel Castro at the dawn of the Revolution. Readers will journey to Mexico, Morocco, Paris and Rome, as well as to post-Stalinist Russia on a harrowing journey on the Trans-Siberian Express. Embedded with new poems and Ferlinghetti’s pyrotechnic prose, Writing Across the Landscape evokes the people, places and political movements that have shaped our time.Trade Review"Ferlinghetti move[s] through the decades...in the grip of managed melancholy; a detached and watchful sympathy for the world and its follies." -- Iain Sinclair - London Review of Books

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Book SynopsisArrested in 1962 as South Africa’s apartheid regime intensified its brutal campaign against political opponents, forty-four-year-old lawyer and African National Congress activist Nelson Mandela had no idea that he would spend the next twenty-seven years in jail. During his 10,052 days of incarceration, Mandela wrote hundreds of letters to unyielding prison authorities, fellow activists, government officials, and most memorably, to his wife Winnie and his five children. Now, 255 of these letters, the majority of which were previously unseen, provide the most intimate portrait of Mandela since Long Walk to Freedom. Painstakingly researched, authenticated and catalogued by the Nelson Mandela Foundation, the letters have been drawn from the Foundation’s archive as well as from public and private collections held by the Mandela family and South African government archives. Mandela’s letters are organised chronologically and divided by the four prisons in which he was incarcerated. Each section opens with a short introduction to provide a historical overview of each of these periods and the collection features a foreword by Zamaswazi Dlamini-Mandela. Whether writing about the death of his son Thembi after a request to attend the funeral was ignored, providing unwavering support to his also-imprisoned wife or outlining a human-rights philosophy that resonates today, The Prison Letters of Nelson Mandela reveals the heroism of a man who refused to compromise his moral values in the face of extraordinary human punishment. Ultimately, they confirm Mandela’s position among the most inspiring historical figures of the twentieth century.Trade Review"Madiba's words give us a compass in a sea of change. Firm ground amidst swirling currents." -- Barack Obama"A veritable treasure trove, they grant a forensic insight into his courage, superhuman fortitude and clarity of political judgment; into his agony at failing in his duties as a husband and father of two girls, toddlers when he was snatched away; and his torment at being refused permission to attend either his mother's or his son’s funeral. To me, even as a biographer of Mandela, it is a revelatory volume." -- Peter Hain - The Daily Telegraph"... this mesmerising book of prison letters... through these compelling letters the thinking, feeling, loving man he was comes back to us." -- Gillian Slovo - The Guardian"Venter has done an excellent job of sifting through the South African national archives, which alone contain 57 boxes of his prison letters and papers, and smaller collections that are scattered all over the place." -- Ivan Fallon - The Sunday Times"Nelson Mandela’s long, thoughtful letters, written during his 27 years in prison, display an unwavering certainty that change would prevail." -- Tim Adams, Book of the Day - The Guardian"... as a series of illuminating snapshots into one of the most important political icons of post-colonial Africa, the book will have a timeless value." -- The Irish Times"Remarkably, this collection only serves to enhance and consolidate Mandela’s reputation as a defining figure of the last century and the present one. The letters are in multiple languages, English, Afrikaans and isiXhosa, but they speak the language of humanity, which is the language of that fraught but loaded prison word: time." -- The Herald"To commemorate what would have been his 100th birthday, a book of 250 letters has just been published, providing a remarkable insight into the man, his tenacity and endurance and the struggle for his country's freedom." -- The Independent"A superbly edited collection of the ANC chief's prison letters paint a portrait of Mandela the family man, the political thinker and the inmate... As well as presenting 255 letters across 640 pages here, the South African journalist Sahm Venter does a fine job of putting them into historical context." -- The Irish Independent"So much rubbish has been written over the years by those who feared, revered or pretended to know Nelson Mandela that it is useful, finally, to be able to read about him and the privations of his prison years in his own contemporaneous, understated prose." -- The Spectator"The back cover of The Prison Letters Of Nelson Mandela is adorned with several quotes from the book, all expressing the kind of noble sentiments you might expect from one of the Great Men of History. In fact, though, this is a bit misleading — because, taken as a whole, the book itself gives us a far more rounded, interesting and, above all, human portrait of Mandela than that." -- The Daily Mail"Published in what would have been his centenary year, this fascinating collection of correspondence provides a revealing and deeply emotional glimpse into the mind of the 20th century's greatest leader." -- World of Cruising

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Book SynopsisHervé Guibert''s incandescent correspondence with Belgian poet Eugène Savitzkaya.In 1977, Hervé Guibert discovered the first novel written by Eugène Savitzkaya, Mentir, and sent him his La mort propagande, which had just been published. In the following years, they exchanged the books they had written, read each other, appreciated each other. They saw each other rarely, however: one lived in Liège, the other Paris.A turning point occurred in 1982, when Hervé published "Lettre à un frère d?écriture," in which he declared to Eugène, "I love you through your writing." The tone had changed; Hervé, obsessed with his correspondent, wrote him increasingly incandescent letters. 1984 would, however, see the sudden extinguishing of that passion. A deep friendship replaced it, which found itself with new areas to explore: the adventure of publishing L?Autre Journal and at the Villa Medicis, where they were both fellows. These nearly eighty letters, exchanged between 1977 and 1987, form a correspondence that is all the more unique for being the only one whose publication was authorized by Guibert. An intersection of life and writing, self and other, reality and fiction, their release is a renewal of Guibert?s oeuvre.

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Book SynopsisI was a guest of Adolf!This was how Ernest Focht responded when asked about his wartime experience.Ernest Virgil Focht was born and brought up in Tyrone, Pennsylvania. He was drafted into the Pennsylvania Army National Guard in April 1941 and assigned to the 105th Infantry Battalion (Anti-Tank). After training he participated in the Carolina Maneuvers. The National Guard unit was redesignated as the 805th Tank Destroyer Battalion, being deployed to North Africa in January 1943.Ernie was captured in his first action in February 1943, remaining a prisoner of war until May 1945 when the Russian Army liberated his camp. During these 27 months he was held in five different POW camps, and was forced to march between camps in the depths of the 194445 winter. Using his wartime diaries and letters home, this book offers an insight into the 805th Tank Destroyer Battalion, and the experiences of prisoners of war.

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Book SynopsisWest Coast-based Aunt K (the author) writes to niece DeeDee, ostensibly to bring her up to speed on family history and share anecdotes about their North Carolina relatives, past and present. The letters soon evolve into broader discussions of community, loss, love, ambition, leaving the South (in body, if not mind) and what it means to negotiate life as a female. Integral to the correspondence are books and writers (from Burroughs to Woolf), landscapes and cityscapes in North Carolina, California, New Mexico, New York, East Sussex and elsewhere. A persistent theme: the inter-weavings of person and place. It is also, in the sum of its parts, deeply concerned with the question of which elements (genetic and circumstantial) conspire to make us who we are.Trade Review"If you know Kat Meads's work, you'll recognize the author in these pages. If you don't know her, you're in for a treat. Taking the form of letters to her niece in 1996, Dear DeeDee consists of vignettes, which, when quilted together, describe an entire life. A cynical romantic, a clear-eyed myopic, and an honest fibber, Meads emerges in these pages not so much as a memoirist but as a chronicler of a time, place, family and way of life which is no more. The details of her Southern upbringing are precise, the humor acerbic, and the abiding love she has for her family, particularly for her beloved brother, affecting. You'll finish this evocative book wishing you had an aunt like Woolf-worshipping, keenly-aware, word-braiding Meads." Allison Amend, author of Enchanted Islands and A Nearly Perfect Copy"My first encounter with the writing of Kat Meads was her spellbinding genre-blurring story In the Guise of an Explanation of My Aunt's Life , a three-decades-ago precursor to this beguiling take on "Southern memoir". Always defiant of definition, Meads has mapped a unique family and a special region without chronology or longitude, and has rendered a particular life and a whole way of life in epistolary vignettes that bend the two ends of a linear genealogy together into a circle." Cris Mazza, author of Various Men Who Knew Us as Girls and Something Wrong With Her"The magic and joy of an intimate conversation is hard to renounce. We simply need to share our stories, and Kat Meads does just that in this charming and chatty epistolary memoir to a beloved, pretend niece. Family lore, life wisdom, and real affection abound in these letters. In our current zeitgeist of swift and glib communication, Meads swims upstream past 280 characters of a tweet, texts open to misinterpretation, deadening email chains, to remind us all of the delight in the art of letter writing. Dear DeeDee is an absolute pleasure to read." Natalie Serber, author of Shout Her Lovely Name and Community Chest"In these hilarious and heart-breaking letters, exiled Southerner Kat Meads remembers, regrets, and makes us 'bark-laugh." Norma Watkins, author of The Last Resort: Taking the Mississippi Cure and That Woman from Mississippi"Like a stone skipping across a pond, the book's structure touches on depths without wholly revealing them. ...As a reverie, Dear DeeDee is as carefully packed as an overnight suitcase, its final destination signaled as much by what's left in as what's left out." Letitia Montgomery-Rodgers, Foreword Reviews"The depth of field Meads painstakingly develops in Dear DeeDee creates a kind of Geertzian modality, a thick description of the valences of time, place, moodall of which make it a pleasure to read, full of local color, brimming with remembrances of a certain strain of American family life, with its quirks, snarky asides, and quiet tragedies." Diana Jones-Ellis, T he Lit Pub

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Book SynopsisThe letters between Dominican revolutionaries Minerva Mirabal Reyes and Manolo Tavárez Justo tell an intimate story of life and love under the brutal dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo, who held power in the nation from 1930 to 1961. Leaders in the 14th of June Movement, Minerva and Manolo were imprisoned multiple times. Minerva—one of three Mirabal sisters known by the code name “Las Mariposas” (The Butterflies)—was assassinated with her sisters in 1960; Manolo was killed in 1963. This translation and critical edition of their correspondence brings their stories to the English-language readers of the world.Paired with commentary from the couple’s daughter, political activist Minou Tavárez Mirabal, these 117 letters and telegrams span from the first notes Minerva and Manolo exchanged while courting in law school to the last message Manolo sent to 7-year-old Minou before his murder. Translator Heather Hennes introduces the collection with a history of the Trujillo regime and its opposition, and the book includes a foreword by Michelle Bachelet, United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Through this volume, readers will discover the human complexities of the iconic and much-mythologized “Butterfly,” Minerva, and will appreciate the importance of the couple’s legacy in the politics and democratic growth of the country today.Trade Review“Minerva Mirabal and Manolo Tavárez are martyrs of the Dominican struggle against tyranny and oppression, but they were also two human beings deeply in love with each other. Through this superb and careful translation of their letters and the powerful evocations of their daughter, Heather Hennes brings to the English-speaking public this very necessary book. A must read!”—Ramón Antonio Victoriano-Martínez, author of Rayanos y Dominicanyorks: La dominicanidad del siglo XXI“An original and significant addition to the history and literature of the Dominican Republic, as it translates a collection of historically significant letters exchanged between two major figures in the struggle to end the infamous, long-lasting, widely condemned Trujillo dictatorship.”—Elizabeth Horan, editor and translator of Gabriela Mistral’s Motivos: The Life of St. Francis“Beautiful, sad, revelatory, and inspiring, this book offers English-language readers the opportunity to glimpse into a revolutionary relationship, the beginnings of the radical movement that ended the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic, and leftist mobilization in Latin America. A timely and important contribution to Dominican historiography and the study of dictatorship, resistance, and revolution that also reminds us of the very real exigencies of memory and reconciliation.”—Elizabeth S. Manley, author of The Paradox of Paternalism: Women and the Politics of Authoritarianism in the Dominican Republic

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Book SynopsisWriting Home offers readers a firsthand account of the life of Emma Alderson, an otherwise unexceptional English immigrant on the Ohio frontier in mid-nineteenth-century America, who documented the five years preceding her death with astonishing detail and insight. Her convictions as a Quaker offer unique perspectives on racism, slavery, and abolition; the impending war with Mexico; presidential elections; various religious and utopian movements; and the practices of everyday life in a young country. Introductions and notes situate the letters in relation to their critical, biographical, literary, and historical contexts. Editor Donald Ulin discusses the relationship between Alderson’s letters and her sister Mary Howitt’s Our Cousins in Ohio (1849), a remarkable instance of transatlantic literary collaboration.Writing Home offers an unparalleled opportunity for studying immigrant correspondence due to Alderson’s unusually well-documented literary and religious affiliations. The notes and introductions provide background on nearly all the places, individuals, and events mentioned in the letters. Published by Bucknell University Press. Distributed worldwide by Rutgers University Press.Trade Review"Emma Botham Alderson, author of this important collection of letters, is an unusually articulate, observant, and skilled writer, who brings to life the courage and ingenuity of America’s nineteenth-century English settlers. Such records are of special significance in our own time, when many are sadly unappreciative of the hardships and heartbreak of the immigrant experience. Donald Ulin provides a wealth of well-researched material to help us better understand the text and its historical context." -- Paula Feldman * co-editor of The Collected Poetry of Mary Tighe *"Emma Botham Alderson, an English Quaker woman setting out on a new life in the United States, was an acute and sensitive observer of life in the Ohio Valley in the 1840s. Her letters to family back in England are filled with observations on everything from landscapes to politics to slavery and antislavery to Quaker peculiarities. We are fortunate that they have survived, and fortunate that they have found such a skilled and thorough editor in Donald Ulin." -- Tom Hamm * editor of Quaker Writings: An Anthology, 1650-1920 *"Bucknell University Press must be highly congratulated for fulfilling so successfully the role of an academic press (no surprise for Bucknell) and not shrinking this volume to a slender market piece. The book contains Ulin’s full scholarly apparatus of endnotes, an appendix of the physical and postal attributes of the letters, an appendix of names, a rich bibliography, and a detailed index. Ulin and Bucknell University Press have demonstrated the highest standard of academic publishing. This book is worth every penny and is something to write home about." * Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies *"The letters are a wonderful window into Alderson's experiences...The editorial sections are tremendously insightful and valuable. Ulin has completed a lot of research about all manner of aspects of Alderson's life and context." * Quaker Studies *Table of Contents Illustrations Abbreviations Preface Introduction Friends and Family Final Years in England Letters, Authorship, and Transnational Modernity Editorial Practices and Principles I. Leaving home: the Shenandoah, across the Alleghenies, the First Winter Six Weeks at Sea Across the Alleghenies American Friends The Botany of Home Letters (1842 to 1843) 1. To Unknown, July 8, 1942 2. To Ann Botham, August 17, 1842 3. To Ann Botham and Mary Howitt, September 1842 4. To Ann Botham and Anna Harrison, October 7, 1842 5. To Anna Harrison and Daniel Harrison, November 30, 1842 6. To Ann Botham, January 16, 1843 to February 24, 1843 7. To Mary Harrison and Margaret Ann Harrison, March 27, 1843 8. To Ann Botham, April 7, 1843 to April 16, 1843 9. To Ann Botham, May 16, 1843 to May 28, 1843 II. A Home of their Own: First Years at Cedar Lodge Pittsburgh to Cincinnati by Steamboat Landscapes: Beauty and More Botany Becoming (and Unbecoming) Americans Family and Friends Friends and the Great Separations Letters 1843 to 1845 10. To Anna Harrison and Daniel Harrison, June 1843 11. To Ann Botham, July 25, 1843 12. To Ann Botham, September 6, 1843 13. To Mary Howitt, October 3, 1843 14. To Ann Botham, October 29, 1843 to November 14, 1843 15. To Anna Harrison, November 20, 1843 to December 1, 1843 16. To Ann Botham, December 31, 1843 17. To Ann Botham, January 28, 1844 to March 9, 1844 18. To Ann Botham, April 22, 1844 to May 6, 1844 19. To Ann Botham, May 19, 1844 to June 14, 1844 20. To Ann Botham, June 2, 1844 to July 24, 1844 21. To Anna Harrison, September 2, 1844 to September 13, 1844 22. To Mary Howitt, October 13, 1844 23. To Ann Botham, October 24, 1844 24. To Ann Botham, December 1, 1844 to December 26, 1844 25. To Mary Howitt, January 20, 1845 26. To Ann Botham, March 7, 1845 to May 27, 1844 27. To Ann Botham, April 4, 1845 28. To Ann Botham, May 21, 1845 29. To Anna Mary Howitt, June 10, 1845 30. To Anna Harrison, July 19, 1845 31. To Ann Botham, September 13, 1845 32. To Ann Botham, October 1845 32. To Ann Botham, October 1845 33. To Ann Botham, October 25, 1845 34. To Anna Harrison, November 5, 1845 35. To Ann Botham, November 1845 to December 24, 1845 36. William Howitt, December 28, 1845 III. The Final Years Race and Racism in America Becoming an Author The End Letters 1846-1847 37. To Margaret and Herbert Howitt, January 1, 1846 to January 8, 1846 38. To Margaret and Herbert Howitt, January 9, 1846 to January 20, 1846 39. To Mary Howitt, February 15, 1846 to February 21, 1846 39. To Mary Howitt, February 15, 1846 to February 21, 1846 40. To Margaret and Herbert Howitt, January 28, 1846 to March 2, 1846 41. To Ann Botham, March 23, 1846 42. To Margaret and Herbert Howitt, March 2, 1846 to March 26, 1846 42. To Margaret and Herbert Howitt, March 2, 1846 to March 26, 1846 43. To Margaret and Herbert Howitt, April 1, 1846 to April 16, 1846 44. To Mary Howitt, April 18, 1846 to May 18, 1846 44. To Mary Howitt, May 1, 1846 to May 18, 1846 45. To Ann Botham, May 3, 1846 to May 18, 1846 46. To Mary Howitt, May 14, 1846 to June 14, 1846 46. To Mary Howitt, May 15, 1846 to June 14, 1846 47. To Mary Howitt, June 30, 1846 to July 11, 1846 48. To Anna Harrison, June 26, 1846 to July 15, 1846 49. To Ann Botham, July 12, 1846 50. To Mary Howitt, July 13, 1846 to June 27, 1846 51. To Mary Howitt, August 2, 1846 to August 15, 1846 52. To Mary Howitt, August 1846 to September 21, 1846 52. To Mary Howitt, August 1846 to September 21, 1846 53. To Ann Botham, September 21, 1846 54. To Ann Botham, September 1846 55. To Mary Howitt, September 27 1846 to October 20, 1846 56. To Mary Howitt, October 24, 1846 to November 20, 1846 56. To Mary Howitt, October 24, 1846 to November 20, 1846 57. To Anna Harrison, November 1846 58. To Ann Botham, November 24, 1846 59. To Ann Botham, December 20, 1846 60. To Mary Howitt, November 29, 1846 to December 25, 1846 61. To Mary Howitt, February 2, 1847 62. To Mary Howitt, February 21, 1847 to October 7, 1847 63. To Mary Harrison and Margaret Ann Harrison, March 20, 1847 64. To Ann Botham, March 1847 65. To Ann Botham, April 10, 1847 to April 20, 1847 66. To Ann Botham, May 23, 1847 67. To Ann Botham, June 1847 to July 1847 68. To Mary Howitt, July 23, 1847 69. To Mary Howitt and Ann Botham, July 24, 1847 70. To Anna Harrison, August 24, 1847 71. To Mary Howitt, October 1847 72. To Ann Botham, October 9, 1847 73. To Mary Howitt, November 23, 1847 74. To Mary Howitt and William Howitt, December 1847 75. To Ann Botham and William Howitt, December 18, 1847 Epilogue Cedar Lodge The Aldersons and their Descendants The Harrisons and their Descendants The Howitts and their Descendants Joseph Taylor and Family Appendix 1. Physical and Postal Attributes Appendix 2. Directory of Names Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe correspondence of Hannah Whitman Heyde (1823-1908), younger sister of poet Walt Whitman, provides a rare glimpse into the life of a nineteenth-century woman. Married to well-known Vermont landscape artist Charles Louis Heyde (1820-1892), Hannah documented in letters to her mother, Louisa Van Velsor Whitman (1795-1873), and other family members, her lived experience of ongoing physical and emotional abuse at the hands of her husband. Hannah has long been characterized in biographical and scholarly studies of Whitman’s family as a neurotic and a hypochondriac—a narrative promulgated by Heyde himself—but Walt Whitman carefully preserved his sister’s letters, telling his literary biographer that his intention was to document her plight. Hannah’s complete letters, gathered here for the first time and painstakingly edited and annotated by Maire Mullins, provide an important counternarrative, allowing readers insight into the life of a real nineteenth-century woman, sister, and wife to famous men, who endured and eventually survived domestic violence.Trade Review"Hannah Whitman Heyde, sister of Walt Whitman and wife of landscape painter Charles Heyde, has been dismissed as 'neurotic' or 'psychotic' by unsympathetic scholars. Mullins' edition of her correspondence brings her into clarity as a victim of long-term intimate partner violence whose primary survival strategy was writing to her adored brother and mother." -- Kenneth Price * author of Whitman in Washington: Becoming the National Poet in the Federal City *"Hannah Whitman Heyde’s Complete Correspondence is a powerful addition to Walt Whitman family correspondence, one with which future biographers must reckon. Hannah was not a masochist, psychotic, or neurotic, though these are all ways that prominent Whitman biographers have described her. Instead, Maire Mullins’s complete collection of Hannah’s letters demonstrate that Whitman biographer consensus relies too much on the testimony of Hannah’s husband, the landscape artist Charles Louis Heyde, who is revealed in her letters as a venomous snake. Hannah’s lifelong struggle, with minimal family support, was against intimate partner psychological abuse and physical violence, and against the weight of public opinion that made the truth about her marriage unspeakable in her era. Like Virginia Woolf’s imaginary sister to Shakespeare, the great American poet Walt Whitman had a favorite sister, but much documentary evidence about Hannah’s life survives, and it tells a story with immediate relevance in the #metoo era." -- Wesley Raabe * editor of 'walter dear': The Letters from Louisa Van Velsor Whitman to Her Son Walt *"Maire Mullins' edition brings Walt Whitman's sister Hannah into well-deserved cultural visibility. Bravo to Mullins for this eye-opening contribution to Whitman studies and to feminist historiography. She argues persuasively that Hannah was an important member of the close-knit Whitman family." -- Vivian Pollak * author of Our Emily Dickinsons: American Women Poets and the Intimacies of Difference *“Much of the most revealing recent scholarship on Walt Whitman has been dedicated to opening up and fully humanizing the fascinating group of people who surrounded the poet throughout his life, including his wildly diverse siblings. Maire Mullins’ inspired collection of Whitman’s younger sister Hannah’s letters—along with Mullins’ chilling introductory essay about how Hannah’s life illuminates nineteenth-century intimate partner violence—bring Hannah fully and achingly to life, and, in so doing, highlight anew the deep empathy of her brother Walt, who cared for her when no one else did. The Hannah that emerges in Mullins’ eye-opening book undoes the whining one-dimensional figure that has inhabited Whitman biographies for the past century.” -- Ed Folsom * coauthor of Re-Scripting Walt Whitman: An Introduction to his Life and Work *"Hannah Whitman Heyde, sister of Walt Whitman and wife of landscape painter Charles Heyde, has been dismissed as 'neurotic' or 'psychotic' by unsympathetic scholars. Mullins' edition of her correspondence brings her into clarity as a victim of long-term intimate partner violence whose primary survival strategy was writing to her adored brother and mother." -- Kenneth Price * author of Whitman in Washington: Becoming the National Poet in the Federal City *"Hannah Whitman Heyde’s Complete Correspondence is a powerful addition to Walt Whitman family correspondence, one with which future biographers must reckon. Hannah was not a masochist, psychotic, or neurotic, though these are all ways that prominent Whitman biographers have described her. Instead, Maire Mullins’s complete collection of Hannah’s letters demonstrate that Whitman biographer consensus relies too much on the testimony of Hannah’s husband, the landscape artist Charles Louis Heyde, who is revealed in her letters as a venomous snake. Hannah’s lifelong struggle, with minimal family support, was against intimate partner psychological abuse and physical violence, and against the weight of public opinion that made the truth about her marriage unspeakable in her era. Like Virginia Woolf’s imaginary sister to Shakespeare, the great American poet Walt Whitman had a favorite sister, but much documentary evidence about Hannah’s life survives, and it tells a story with immediate relevance in the #metoo era." -- Wesley Raabe * editor of 'walter dear': The Letters from Louisa Van Velsor Whitman to Her Son Walt *"Maire Mullins' edition brings Walt Whitman's sister Hannah into well-deserved cultural visibility. Bravo to Mullins for this eye-opening contribution to Whitman studies and to feminist historiography. She argues persuasively that Hannah was an important member of the close-knit Whitman family." -- Vivian Pollak * author of Our Emily Dickinsons: American Women Poets and the Intimacies of Difference *“Much of the most revealing recent scholarship on Walt Whitman has been dedicated to opening up and fully humanizing the fascinating group of people who surrounded the poet throughout his life, including his wildly diverse siblings. Maire Mullins’ inspired collection of Whitman’s younger sister Hannah’s letters—along with Mullins’ chilling introductory essay about how Hannah’s life illuminates nineteenth-century intimate partner violence—bring Hannah fully and achingly to life, and, in so doing, highlight anew the deep empathy of her brother Walt, who cared for her when no one else did. The Hannah that emerges in Mullins’ eye-opening book undoes the whining one-dimensional figure that has inhabited Whitman biographies for the past century.” -- Ed Folsom * coauthor of Re-Scripting Walt Whitman: An Introduction to his Life and Work *Table of ContentsIllustrations Preface and Acknowledgments Abbreviations Whitman Family Genealogy IntroductionThe Complete Correspondence 1 1852–1853: Letters 1–3 “I am afraid you will be plagued to read this. . . .” 2 1855: Letters 4–9 “I have more to regret than any of you. . . .” 3 1856: Letters 10–19 “I hope I shall not die in a hotel. . . .” 4 1858–1861: Letters 20–27 “I am afraid I have done wrong in telling you. . . .” 5 1862–1865: Letters 28–37 “Have you heard from George” 6 1866–1868: Letters 38–42 “. . . this is only a line. . . .” 7 1872–1873: Letters 43–51 “. . . try to not greive. . . .” 8 1879–1892: Letters 52–62 “. . . I only wish I could do something for you. . . .” 9 1905: Letter 63 “the birth place of my brother Walt Whitman” Appendix A: Biographical Sketches of the Whitman Family Appendix B: Obituary of Hannah Whitman Heyde Appendix C: List of Letters from Hannah Whitman Heyde: Dates, Recipients, and Manuscript Sources Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisWhen Charles Frederick Ball was killed at Gallipoli in 1915 The Irish Times called him ‘one of the best known botanists and horticulturists in Ireland’. Fred Ball (to friends and family) trained in horticulture at Kew Gardens in the UK, moved to Dublin in 1906, became Assistant Keeper at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Glasnevin, and was editor of the journal Irish Gardening. A skilled plant breeder, he could have expected, in time, to succeed Sir Frederick Moore as Keeper of the Botanic Gardens. Instead, he responded to the call to serve king and country, enlisting in the famous 7th Battalion, Royal Dublin Fusiliers. This book describes Fred Ball’s life and achievements up to his tragic death at Suvla Bay in September 1915, shedding new light on his contribution to Irish horticulture as well as his time as a soldier. It is also the story of Fred Ball’s relationship with Alice Lane, the youngest daughter of a well to do Anglo-Irish family, who was the love of his life. They were married in Dublin in December 1914, just after Fred had joined up. The author, Alice’s grandson, discovered among his mother’s papers a small metal box containing over 100 letters that Fred wrote to Alice between 1911 and 1914. These letters, combined with further research in libraries and archives in Ireland and England, provide a captivating account of Fred Ball’s life in the Victorian and Edwardian worlds of which he was a part. Richly illustrated with historical photographs, Charles Frederick Ball offers a moving testament to a life tragically cut short. “A fascinating story, beautifully told. And what a wonderful collection of photographs.” – Jeff Kildea, author of Anzacs and Ireland “Excellent ... [a] really valuable reference … It is a sad though exciting story.” – Seamus O’Brien, Head Gardener, National Botanic Gardens, Kilmacurragh

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Book SynopsisTom ‘Diver’ Derrick VC DCM was Australia’s most famous fighting soldier of World War II. Derrick fought in five campaigns, won the highest medals for bravery, and died of wounds sustained while leading his men in the war’s last stages. His career reached its climax on the jungle-clad heights of Sattelberg in New Guinea, where he won the Victoria Cross by spearheading the capture of seemingly impregnable Japanese defences. The diaries Derrick kept throughout his campaigns, from Tobruk to Tarakan, are among the most important writings by any Australian soldier. Those diaries and all his other known wartime correspondence and interviews are published here for the first time in their entirety. ‘Diver’ had only a rudimentary education, but his intelligence, humour, ambition and fighting outlook shine through his words. Edited and annotated by Mark Johnston, one of Australia’s leading authorities on World War II, this book provides unprecedented insights into the mind and the remarkable career of one of Australia’s most decorated and renowned servicemen.

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Book Synopsis'I am sir [sure] you will act as human bean', wrote one distressed pensioner to Prime Minister Robert Menzies in 1953, pleading for assistance.Robert Menzies received 22,000 letters during his 1949-1966 record-breaking second term as Australian Prime Minister. From war veterans, widows and political leaders to school students and homespun philosophers. Ordinary citizens sent their congratulations and grievances and commented on speeches they had heard on radio. They lectured him, quoted Shakespeare and the Bible at him and sent advice on how to eliminate the rabbit problem. In Dear Prime Minister, Menzies' fabled 'Forgotten People' write back.Revealed here for the first time, the letters respond to the royal visit of 1954, Communism, Australia's British connection and the dire poverty of aged pensioners. For many writers, these were not post-war boom years, but a time of anxiety and conflict, punctuated by fears of war, another Great Depression, or a nuclear Armageddon. Dear Prime Minister is a fascinating insight into the concerns, assumptions and political beliefs of 1950s and 1960s Australians.

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Book SynopsisDuring the Second World War, hundreds of children were sent from the UK to stay with family and friends in Canada as ""war guests."" This book collects the letters of one such war guest, young Alec Douglas, who wrote from his wartime home in Toronto to his mother back home in London. Alec wrote home every week, although sometimes he forgot to post his letters, and they were delayed, and some letters did not get through. Occasionally his godmother and host, Mavis Fry, would add comments and write her own more detailed letters. Also included are letters from Lillian Kingston, who brought Alec to North America in 1940.This is a story of exposure, at an impressionable age, to ocean passage in wartime, the sights and sounds of New York, the totally new and unfamiliar world of Canada, the wonderful excitement of passage home in a Woolworth Aircraft Carrier as a ""Guest of the Admiralty,"" and his eventful return to a world he had left behind three years before.Table of Contents Preface, by Cynthia Comacchio Introduction: The Careers of W.A.B. Douglas: Sailor and Historian, by Roger Sarty A War Guest in Canada, 1940–1943 1. Introduction 2. August 1940: Arrival in Toronto 3. September–October 1940: School! 4. October–December 1940: Canadian Thanksgiving and Halloween 5. December 1940–March 1941: First Canadian Christmas and Winter 6. April–August 1941 7. September–December 1941 8. January–September 1942: The Farm, Summer Camp, and New Experiences 9. October–December 1942 10. January–July 1943: Last Months in Canada 11. July–August 1943: Return to England 12. 1943–1947: Transition from a War Guest to a Canadian

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Book SynopsisThe diary of David Watson, who rose through the officer ranks to command one of the four divisions in the Great War, is an exceptional document that details with candid insight the responsibilities of senior command and shows the talent required to rise through the CEF to divisional command.The only published diary of a Canadian who held this rank in the last two (critical) years of the war, it focuses on the evolution of military leadership and associated challenges that Watson (and his peers) faced during the Great War. It recounts how he navigated not only the military battlefield in France and Belgium but also the political battlefield of the Canadian Expeditionary Force and larger British Expeditionary Force. The divisional commanders played a central role in the Corps’ transformation into a first-rate professional army, a transformation that coincided with Watson’s tenure at the 4th Division. Major-General David Watson’s personal accounts offer valuable insights into the innermost workings of the Canadian Corps at various stages during the war and in particular its emergence as an elite fighting force and the pride of a nation.Table of Contents Note on Text Introduction Chapter One: Leaving For France Chapter Two: Initial Shock Chapter Three: Promotions Chapter Four: Divisional Commander Chapter Five: At Vimy Chapter Six: Lens Chapter Seven: Passchendaele Chapter Eight: Preparing for the End Chapter Nine: The Hundred Days Chapter Ten: Belgium and Home

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Book SynopsisSocrates looked expectantly to the afterlife, when he would be able to converse with the wisest of the honored dead. Jüri Talvet has elected not to wait, but instead to begin his conversations with the wise in this life. In these ten letters, Talvet has entered into conversation with one of those wise predecessors, Michel de Montaigne. Talvet?s ruminations place contemporary issues into a long historical perspective, and a rich literary context. These letters offer an uncompromising critique of current global tendencies, but Talvet?s critique is matched by ? or perhaps it is ? a vision of hope.

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Book SynopsisSoon after his death, Vincent van Gogh’s reputation grew and developed through the remarkably symbiotic relationship evident between his paintings and letters. However, the sheer bulk and complexity of Van Gogh’s complete surviving correspondence presents a formidable challenge to those who wish to read and analyze the whole text as a literary work.Reading Vincent van Gogh is at once an interpretive guide to Van Gogh’s letters and a distillation of the key themes that reoccur throughout his collected letters – foremost among them the motifs of suffering, love, imagination, and the ineffable. In this indispensable, synoptic view of the letters, Patrick Grant makes the main lines of Vincent van Gogh’s thinking accessible and displays the arresting vividness of the well-known artist’s writing.Table of ContentsIntroduction: Privacy and the Public Record - Biography and Beyond1 Shaping Commitments2 Enduring Adversity3 What Holds at the Centre4 The Power of Words5 Matter and SpiritAppendix 1: Some Facts About the LettersAppendix 2: Suggestions for Further Reading

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Book SynopsisLeave it to a dog to put the “human” back in “humanities” In September 2020, Rod Michalko wrote to friend and colleague Dan Goodley, congratulating him on the release of his latest book, Disability and Other Human Questions. Joking that his late guide dog, Smokie, had taken offense to the suggestion that disability was purely a human question, Michalko shared a few thoughts on behalf of his dog. When Goodley wrote back—to Smokie—so began an epistolic exchange that would continue for the next seven months. As the COVID-19 pandemic swept across the world and the realities of lockdown-imposed isolation set in, the Smokie letters provided the friends a space in which to come together in a lively exploration of human-animal relationships and to interrogate disability as disruption, disturbance, and art. Just as he did in life, Smokie guides. In these pages, he offers wisdom about the world, love, friendship, and even The Beatles. His canine observations of human experience provide an avenue into some of the ways blindness might be reconceptualized and “befriended.” Uninhibited by the trappings of traditional academic inquiry, Michalko and Goodley are unleashed, free to wander, to wonder, and to provoke within the bonds of trust and respect. Funny and thoughtful, the result is a refreshing exploration and re-evaluation of learned cultural misunderstandings of disability.Table of Contents An Introduction from the Authors The Letters Afterword Acknowledgements Bibliography Notes

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Book SynopsisIn December 1820, at twenty-one years old, Edward Geoffrey Stanley, the future 14th earl of Derby and three-times prime minister, began an extensive tour of continental Europe. By the time of his return to England twenty months later, he had visited many of the foremost centres for art and culture in Europe, and mostly in Italy. In his travel diaries he recorded his intensive social life, his visits to historical sites, his viewings of art collections, his comments on architecture, his admiration of landscapes and his impressions of foreign societies. He was energetic, enthusiastic and discerning: the bridge of Augustus in Umbria gave him 'a stupendous idea of Roman grandeur'; the charm of the towns crowning the Tuscan hills struck him with the same delight that he felt when gazing at one of Poussin's paintings; the waterfall at Terni, which dropped 370 feet into an abyss of spray, was 'awfully magnificent'; while the ceremonies of the Italian Catholic Church he judged to be a blend of mummery, superstition and bigotry. Sights and experiences like these influenced him for the rest of his life. This precious collection of diaries, found only recently and published here for the first time, reveal Edward Stanley to have been a young man of diligence, courage and decisiveness: a future leader with a conspicuous and burgeoning sense of political and social justice. It was these characteristics, seen in early development within these pages, that shaped the man and the extraordinary career to come.Table of ContentsPreface; Introduction; Stanley's Itinerary; Florence-Rome: 16 December 1820 to 9 March 1821; Rome-Naples: 10 March to 27 May 1821; Naples-Venice-Tyrol-Switzerland: 27 May to 17 September 1821; Milan-Naples: 22 September 1821 to 7 April 1822; Bologna-England: 5 May to 8 July 1822; 'Venice'; Index.

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Book Synopsis"What this charming, moving and fascinating collection proves is that the [letter] form itself - a scribbled note, a declaration of love, an outpouring of passion, a bitter word - has always been with us." - Mark GatissA good love letter can speak across centuries, and reassure us that the agony and the ecstasy one might feel today have been shared by lovers long gone. In The Love That Dares, queer love speaks its name through a wonderful selection of surviving letters between lovers and friends, confidants and companions. Alongside the more famous names coexist beautifully written letters by lesser-known lovers. Together, they weave a narrative of queer love through the centuries, through the romantic, often funny, and always poignant words of those who lived it.Including letters written by:John CageAudre Lorde Benjamin BrittenLorraine Hansberry Walt WhitmanVita Sackville-WestRadclyffe HallAllen Ginsberg

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Book SynopsisThe first full edition of the correspondence, between three artists Joanna Boyce, her brother George P. Boyce and Henry Wells, who she eventually married. It dates from the period 1845 to 1861, and covers artistic life in both Paris and London, including the Pre-Raphaelites. This correspondence, between three artists Joanna Boyce, her brother George P. Boyce and Henry Wells, whom she eventually married, dates from the period 1845 to 1861. They were all friends of Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelite circle, but in addition Henry and Joanna both studied in Paris, and Joanna wrote extensively about her time there, training with Thomas Couture. She wrote for The Saturday Review as well as painting a small number of very interesting and much admired pictures. Her brother George established himself as a successful watercolourist and member of the Old Watercolour Society, having been encouraged both by David Cox on his Welsh sketching expeditions,and by Ruskin, whose letters advising him what to paint in Venice are included here. Henry Wells was primarily a portrait painter. At first he specialised in miniatures, and was commissioned to paint Mary, princess of Cambridge byQueen Victoria. There are vivid accounts of visits to country houses to carry out commissions from their owners. The three wrote constantly about techniques of painting and about the new colours that became available at this period, and about their visits to exhibitions both in Paris and London. They all contributed to the Royal Academy and other exhibitions. In addition, there is the extraordinary story of Joanna's and Henry's courtship and marriage, at first encouraged and then viciously opposed by Joanna's recently widowed mother. The correspondence survives only in an unpublished transcript made in the 1940s, as the originals were all destroyed in a bombing raid on Bath during the second world war. Excerpts from George P. Boyce's diaries were published in the 1930s, but the present edition contains a considerable amount of new material.Trade ReviewIt is finally hearing the voice of Joanna Boyce Wells which is truly remarkable and makes this publication one of the most important of the last decade...The writing of the artists and editors alike is enjoyable and readable...[It] is a wonderful achievement that will greatly aid historians, and equally delight those with a keen interest in the period. * PRE-RAPHAELITE SOCIETY REVIEW *Table of ContentsGeneral Introduction Memoir by Alice Street, including diaries and letters to 1855 Letters and diaries 1855 Letters and diaries 1856 Letters and diaries 1857 Letters and diaries 1858 Letters and diaries 1859 Letters and diaries 1860 Letters and diaries 1861 Epilogue: 1862 onwards Essays by Alice Street Reviews G. P. Boyce's Diaries, 1848-1875 Appendix I: The Short Memoir Appendix 2: Table of entries not in the printed edition of The Diaries of George Price Boyce Abbreviations Bibliography

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Book SynopsisNew study and edition of the remarkable letter collection of Margaret of Anjou, bringing all her correspondence together in one volume for the first time. 2020 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Award Winner Margaret of Anjou remains a figure of controversy. As wife to the weak King Henry VI, she was on the losing side in the first phase of the Wars of the Roses. Yorkist propaganda vilifying Margaret was consolidated by Shakespeare: his portrait of a warlike and vengeful queen - "a tiger's heart wrapped in a woman's hide" - became the widely-accepted view, which up until recently had been little questioned. However, Margaret's letters, collected here in full for the first time, have their own story to tell - and present a rather different picture. In her words and the words of her contemporaries, both friend and foe, they reveal a woman who lived according to the noble standards of her time. She enjoyed the hunt, she practised her faith, and she tried to help or protect those who called upon her for assistance, as was expected of a queen and "good lady". Henry's mental breakdown, the birth of their son and growing tensions among the lords of the land forced her to step outside the life she would have expected to live. This study of Margaret's letters establishes the scope of a late medieval queen's concerns, while providing a unique account of this extraordinary woman. HELEN MAURER and B.M. CRON are both independent scholars; their work has focussed on Margaret of Anjou for many years.Trade ReviewThe very commendable volume demonstrates highly skilled and meticulous in-depthresearch...[it]proves a rich and invaluable source, complex in its substantial details, at times highly entertaining, to thoseworking with fifteenth century Anglo-Frenchnetworks, politics, and power. * H-SOZ-KULT *This meticulous compilation of the 15th-century English queen's letters is much more than just a collection of texts. . . . The extensive research makes this a valuable resource for understanding the people and institutions of medieval England at a time of civil disturbance. Highly recommended. * CHOICE *Helen Maurer and Boni Cron are to be congratulated on such a scholarly and complete edition of this hitherto scattered material which will provide a useful resource for all future studies of Margaret of Anjou. * THE RICARDIAN *It is difficult to think of two more qualified historians to provide a much-needed new edition of letters to, from, and about Margaret. . . . [T] letters in this critical edition are not new, but the new editors' detailed and knowledgeable commentary on each are alone a strong recommendation for this edition. -- Peter Russell * JOURNAL OF BRITISH STUDIES *[...]this volume will be useful primarily to scholars focused on research related to Margaret of Anjou, queenship, and epistolary writing. -- Michele Seah * PARERGON *[This book] will become the standard reference work for Margaret's letters. . . . The editors have succeeded in their aim of providing a counterpoint in the normalcy of Margaret's activities as queen, certainly before Henry VI's collapse in 1453, to her more-studied role as a leading player in the struggle for the English throne between 1455 and 1471. -- James Ross, University of Winchester * SPECULUM *Table of ContentsIntroduction Matchmaker Holy Orders Position Wanted Business Interests Protector and Peacemaker Money Matters Belief and Benevolence The Queen's Disport En Famille Queen Consort Lancastrian Queen Queen Beyond the Sea Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe Livre Charny (Charny's Book), by the 14th century French knight Geoffroi de Charny, translated here by Nigel Bryant with an introduction by Ian Wilson. The poem known as the Livre Charny (Charny's Book), by the fourteenth-century French knight Geoffroi de Charny, has never been published, Nigel Bryant's brilliant new translation of this long-neglected poem, based on a hitherto overlooked original Charny manuscript housed in Oxford, vividly conveys Charny's self-deprecating and extraordinarily down-to-earth attitudes towards the knightly career. Charny is surprisingly blunt in his descriptions of the mishaps and mortal dangers to be expected, from losing in a tournament, to homesickness on crusade, to being concussed whilst attempting to scale an enemy tower. Nothing else quite like it is to be found in medieval literature. Ian Wilson's introduction provides a markedly revised understanding of Charny's career as tournament performer, serving soldier, crusader, councillor, and finally royal standard-bearer: he was killed at Poitiers in 1356. Bryant and Wilson also argue that Charny's Book is so different in style from the Book of Chivalry, also attributed to him, that the latter is unlikely to be by the same author. Using the evidence of a hitherto unnoticed manuscript in Madrid, they show that the latter is likely to be a work of the 1380s composed by Charny's son of the same name, possibly as a kind of memorial to his heroic father.Trade ReviewWilson shows that the works of Charny constituted a substantial codicological project that caught a moment at the French royal court. . . . What can be said about the excellent translation except that it is excellent? Bryant's contribution may well attract readers with diverse interests and give them a lively text with which to examine the concept and practice of chivalry. * The Medieval Review *A delight...The translation is clear and concise and beautifully delivered in an unpretentious but informative style that allows the original author to speak to us from across the centuries. * INTERNATIONAL TIMES *This is a truly excellent book and an essential addition to any book collection based on the Shroud. * BRITISH SOCIETY FOR THE TURIN SHROUD *There is no question that the Livre Charny will prove a useful addition to the growing list of chivalric guides/biographies. -- David Green * Nottingham Medieval Studies *Table of ContentsIntroduction Charny's Career and Writings - the Current Understanding The Charny Manuscripts The Livre Charny - Editorial Introduction The Livre Charny: an edtion of the Oxford text (with translation) Charny's Career and Writings - a Revised Understanding Appendix: The Oxford manuscript: chart of its lost and misplaced folios Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisNew study and edition of the remarkable letter collection of Margaret of Anjou, bringing all her correspondence together in one volume for the first time. 2020 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Award Winner Margaret of Anjou remains a figure of controversy. As wife to the weak King Henry VI, she was on the losing side in the first phase of the Wars of the Roses. Yorkist propaganda vilifying Margaret was consolidated by Shakespeare: his portrait of a warlike and vengeful queen - "a tiger's heart wrapped in a woman's hide" - became the widely-accepted view, which up until recently had been little questioned. However, Margaret's letters, collected here in full for the first time, have their own story to tell - and present a rather different picture. In her words and the words of her contemporaries, both friend and foe, they reveal a woman who lived according to the noble standards of her time. She enjoyed the hunt, she practised her faith, and she tried to help or protect those who called upon her for assistance, as was expected of a queen and "good lady". Henry's mental breakdown, the birth of their son and growing tensions among the lords of the land forced her to step outside the life she would have expected to live. This study of Margaret's letters establishes the scope of a late medieval queen's concerns, while providing a unique account of this extraordinary woman. HELEN MAURER and B.M. CRON are both independent scholars; their work has focussed on Margaret of Anjou for many years.Trade ReviewThe very commendable volume demonstrates highly skilled and meticulous in-depthresearch...[it]proves a rich and invaluable source, complex in its substantial details, at times highly entertaining, to thoseworking with fifteenth century Anglo-Frenchnetworks, politics, and power. * H-SOZ-KULT *This meticulous compilation of the 15th-century English queen's letters is much more than just a collection of texts. . . . The extensive research makes this a valuable resource for understanding the people and institutions of medieval England at a time of civil disturbance. Highly recommended. * CHOICE *Helen Maurer and Boni Cron are to be congratulated on such a scholarly and complete edition of this hitherto scattered material which will provide a useful resource for all future studies of Margaret of Anjou. * THE RICARDIAN *It is difficult to think of two more qualified historians to provide a much-needed new edition of letters to, from, and about Margaret. . . . [T] letters in this critical edition are not new, but the new editors' detailed and knowledgeable commentary on each are alone a strong recommendation for this edition. -- Peter Russell * Journal of British Studies *Will be useful primarily to scholars focused on research related to Margaret of Anjou, queenship, and epistolary writing. -- Michele Seah * Parergon *[This book] will become the standard reference work for Margaret's letters. . . . The editors have succeeded in their aim of providing a counterpoint in the normalcy of Margaret's activities as queen, certainly before Henry VI's collapse in 1453, to her more-studied role as a leading player in the struggle for the English throne between 1455 and 1471. -- James Ross, University of Winchester * Speculum *Table of ContentsIntroduction Matchmaker Holy Orders Position Wanted Business Interests Protector and Peacemaker Money Matters Belief and Benevolence The Queen's Disport En Famille Queen Consort Lancastrian Queen Queen Beyond the Sea Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe latest edition of PN Review, one of the outstanding literary journals of our timeTable of ContentsEmily Grosholz: Encounters with BashoClaire Crowther on syllabic poetry Peter McDonald: The PN Review LecturePoems fromSinead Morrissey, Elaine Feinstein, Thomas A. Clark, C.K. Stead, Vahni Capildeo, Carol Mavor, Andrew Wynn Owen, Richard Scott, Thomas Kinsella & others

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Book SynopsisThis scrupulously edited volume is the first edition of letters specifically related to the important British journal the Quarterly Review. Included are letters by notable literary and political figures such as Sir Walter Scott, George Canning, William Gifford, John Gibson Lockhart, and John Wilson Croker. The product of rigorous scholarship and careful attention to researchers’ requirements, the edition will interest students across all academic levels. The selection is comprehensive enough to provide valuable insights into Romantic and early Victorian literary and political history, but selective enough to be pertinent to a specialised readership interested in periodical journalism and publishing history. Informed by up-to-date scholarship and fresh research, the volume’s substantive introduction discusses the sources and dimensions of the Quarterly Review’s commercial success and cultural authority. It also provides a compelling account of tensions between the publisher’s commercial and his editors’ political and literary motivations. Students of reading and reception history will be interested in the discussion of press responses and the sociological make-up of the journal’s readership. The authoritative notes to the volume provide supporting information on the cultural and historical context.Trade ReviewReviews 'This volume is a great service to the field of nineteenth-century periodical studies. Cutmore’s punctilious and thoughtful editing has given us what will be an important resource and reference for scholars of the Quarterly Review, the Murray firm, and epistolary cultures of the early nineteenth century.' Ruth M. McAdams, Victorian Periodicals ReviewTable of ContentsPrefaceIntroductionChronologyLettersI Events of 1807II Founding the Quarterly Review: 1808-1809III Contest for Editorial Control: 1810-1815IV The Quarterly Review Ascendant: 1816-1823V The Transition to Lockhart: 1824-1825VI Lockhart’s Early Tenure: 1826-1831VII Croker under Contract: 1832-1843

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Book SynopsisThe collected BBC radio productions of the major works of Oscar Wilde, plus bonus play by Neil BartlettLoved for his flamboyant personality, sparkling wit and brilliant epigrams, Oscar Wilde was a comic genius and a literary icon.This collection reflects the many facets of his dazzling talent. Here are dramatisations of his only novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, a Gothic tale of a gilded aristocrat who makes a dangerous pact, as well as four scintillating social comedies – Lady Windermere’s Fan, A Woman of No Importance, The Importance of Being Earnest and An Ideal Husband. Among the distinguished casts are Ian MacDiarmid, Joely Richardson, Edward Fox, Diana Rigg, Martin Clunes, Michael Hordern and Judi Dench.Moving examples of his correspondence are revealed in The Letters of Oscar Wilde and De Profundis, read by Simon Callow and Simon Russell Beale respectively, and his most famous poem, The Ballad of Reading Gaol, is performed live by stars including Ian McKellen, Neil Tennant and Stephen Fry.In addition, a bonus drama, In Extremis by Neil Bartlett, starring Corin Redgrave and Sheila Hancock, reimagines Oscar Wilde's hastily arranged sitting with a society palm reader, a week before the trial that would cost him so dearly.

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Book SynopsisThis scrupulously edited volume is the first edition of letters specifically related to the important British journal the Quarterly Review. Included are letters by notable literary and political figures such as Sir Walter Scott, George Canning, William Gifford, John Gibson Lockhart, and John Wilson Croker. The product of rigorous scholarship and careful attention to researchers’ requirements, the edition will interest students across all academic levels. The selection is comprehensive enough to provide valuable insights into Romantic and early Victorian literary and political history, but selective enough to be pertinent to a specialised readership interested in periodical journalism and publishing history. Informed by up-to-date scholarship and fresh research, the volume’s substantive introduction discusses the sources and dimensions of the Quarterly Review’s commercial success and cultural authority. It also provides a compelling account of tensions between the publisher’s commercial and his editors’ political and literary motivations. Students of reading and reception history will be interested in the discussion of press responses and the sociological make-up of the journal’s readership. The authoritative notes to the volume provide supporting information on the cultural and historical context.Trade ReviewReviews 'This volume is a great service to the field of nineteenth-century periodical studies. Cutmore’s punctilious and thoughtful editing has given us what will be an important resource and reference for scholars of the Quarterly Review, the Murray firm, and epistolary cultures of the early nineteenth century.' Ruth M. McAdams, Victorian Periodicals ReviewTable of ContentsPrefaceIntroductionChronologyLettersI Events of 1807II Founding the Quarterly Review: 1808-1809III Contest for Editorial Control: 1810-1815IV The Quarterly Review Ascendant: 1816-1823V The Transition to Lockhart: 1824-1825VI Lockhart’s Early Tenure: 1826-1831VII Croker under Contract: 1832-1843

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