Search results for ""author ivan"

How and why have American labor unions grown in the century and a half since the industrial revolution? In this concise and illuminating history of the labor movement, Daniel Nelson traces the ebb and flow of union activity since the early nineteenth century. Rejecting an emphasis on individual leadership or the uniqueness of American “conditions,” he instead looks to three factors to explain labor’s record: the role of the autonomous worker, the threat of employer reprisals, and the influence of external forces such as government policy. His chief concern is to describe and document the historical experience, especially the erratically rising level of union membership from the close of the nineteenth century to the 1960s, and the reversal of that phenomenon in recent decades. Mr. Nelson devotes special attention to miners’ unions in the years up to the 1950s, to government policy in the New Deal years and after, and to the development of sophisticated anti-union employer strategies in recent years. The strength of Shifting Fortunes lies not only in the scope of its coverage but in its evenhanded portrayal of employer-worker relations.

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"For centuries," Daniel Horowitz writes, "Americans have worried about the consequences of comfort, affluence, and luxury. They have often greeted a rising standard of living with a mixture of pleasure and disquiet. Anxious about the impact of ease on the commitment to hard work, savings, and self-control, and ambivalent about the implications of increased wealth, many in the United States have expressed concern about new levels and kinds of consumption. This book traces the development of such misgivings." "Clear, judicious, thorough and unfailingly interesting; a solid work on a most significant topic."—Technology and Culture. "An illuminating study...intelligent and perceptive...full of interesting insights."—Reviews in American History. "Daniel Horowitz has made creative use of diverse sources in order to integrate several fascinating strands of American cultural history.... His findings have broad implications...."—American Historical Review. "An imaginative and carefully researched study.... The Morality of Spending accomplishes what it sets out to do: not a sociology of money but a history of ideas about money."—Journal of Social History.

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After an initial honeymoon with historians, in recent years John F. Kennedy has been more carefully scrutinized, resulting in a wide variety of assessments of his presidency and his life. Michael O'Brien, who knows as much about Kennedy as any historian now writing, has distilled the findings of his heavily detailed biography of a few years ago into a compact life that touches on all the important issues and incorporates the findings and judgments of major works since the president's death. He offers nuanced interpretations of the influence of Kennedy's parents, his early life, his struggles with health problems, his intellectual development, his heroism in World War II, his House and Senate career, and the paramount moments of his presidency, including the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and his stand on civil rights, tax policy, and other domestic matters.

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In an age when the American public relies more on television for its news than any other medium, Edward Jay Epstein's detailed, probing analysis of the decision-making process in network news organizations has achieved the status of a classic. Mr. Epstein shows how internal corporate policy and budget requirements shape the direction of television news coverage. What we see on the network evening news, he demonstrates, does not mirror reality because TV's essential aim is not to inform but to excite viewers enough to induce them to "stay tuned." "The best book ever written about any aspect of television."—Richard Schickel. "The book is burnished with insights on virtually every page. Epstein's analysis seems to me incontestable, and is offered with great cogency, elegance, and sophistication."—Stephen J. Whitfield, Brandeis University. "A complex, fascinating book....Mr. Epstein shows that no educated citizen should rely exclusively or principally on TV news, but also that none should fail to watch it."—Wall Street Journal.

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Rather than fitting the journalistic stereotype of a "New Woman" of the 1890s, this novel's heroine must earn her own living in a society whose power and values are rooted firmly in a patriarchal system. In struggling to make her way, she sees the need for solidarity among women. The Story of a Modern Woman lays bare the relationship between social expectations and women's capacity to achieve self–fulfillment.

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On October 12, 1994, Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg, and David Geffen—three of Hollywood's biggest players—announced they would form a new studio to produce feature films, television series, and pop music recordings. It didn't have a name, though Katzenberg's reference to his partners as the "Dream Team" eventually led to the company being dubbed DreamWorks. What the three men were attempting hadn't been done in more than sixty years: create a movie studio that could compete with the already existing major players. In The Dream Team, Daniel Kimmel tells the behind-the-scenes story of DreamWorks' rise—and the end of the dream eleven years later, when most of the company was sold off or shut down. Its plan for 1,087 acres of studio facilities that would include residences and retail operations came to naught. Its animation division was split off and went public. Its principals had already begun to go their own ways. Mr. Kimmel explores DreamWorks' successes: best-picture Oscars for American Beauty and Gladiator; a near miss (but box office success) for Saving Private Ryan; a smash animated hit Shrek winning the first Oscar ever for best animated feature and pointing the industry toward computer animation. But he also investigates why an enterprise with such promise failed to reach the heights. Was it the company's diffuse management style, or had the industry changed and consolidated so greatly that it was now impossible for new players to break into the ranks? Mr. Kimmel offers intriguing answers, showing how, more often than not, the guys tilting at windmills usually end up on the ground.

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While film genres go in and out of style, the romantic comedy endures—from year to year and generation to generation. Endlessly adaptable, the romantic comedy form has thrived since the invention of film as a medium of entertainment, touching on universal predicaments: meeting for the first time, the battle of the sexes, and the bumpy course of true love. These films celebrate lovers who play and improvise together, no matter how nutty or at what great odds they may appear. As Eugene Pallette mutters in My Man Godfrey (1936), "All you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people." Daniel Kimmel's book about romantic comedy is like watching a truly funny movie with a knowledgeable friend.

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Why do so many different people with widely dissimilar ideas and customs get along as Americans? In American Beliefs, John McElroy identifies and explains those essential ideas that keep a big country and a diverse people united, tracing them historically from their origins in the earliest experiences of the American colonists. A powerful antidote to decades of concentration on the differences among Americans. A magnificent and timely book. John McElroy picks up where de Tocqueville left off. —Charles Moskos.

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This play forms a bridge between the events in Oedipus the King and Antigone. It begins with the arrival of Oedipus in Colonus after years of wandering; it ends with Antigone setting off toward her own fate in Thebes.

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Written and first performed in 1599, The Shoemaker's Holiday was the most popular non-Shakespearean comedy of its day—a hearty brew of character and overflowing good humor, occasionally ribald, about the gentle craft of shoemaking. Bernard Sahlins's new adaptation streamlines the dialogue for contemporary audiences and makes it extremely playable.

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When Sylvia Lawry's brother was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in the late 1930s, she refused to accept the medical wisdom of the day that "nothing could be done." In 1945 Ms. Lawry took the unique step of running a classified ad searching for someone who had been "cured" of multiple sclerosis. When instead she found that respondents were as desperate as she, Ms. Lawry began making plans for what would become one of the nation's largest voluntary health agencies—the National Multiple Sclerosis (MS) Society. Courage is the story of one woman's unceasing devotion to her brother and how her dream to end the devastating effects of MS was transformed into one of the most powerful and effective national health organizations in the world, a passion she pursued for more than half a century. It is also the story of medical detective work that has enlisted dedicated scientists in the search for clues to one of the more baffling and stubborn medical mysteries of our time, and of people, especially volunteers, who have become the strength of the Society. Multiple sclerosis is one of the most common diseases of the central nervous system, affecting more than two and a half million people and their families throughout the world. Although the cause remains unknown and there is still no cure, research breakthroughs have now led to therapies that can help control and manage the disease, thanks in large part to work supported by the Society. Courage looks into the inner workings of the MS movement and counteracts the common misconception that health agencies are self-serving, seeking only to perpetuate themselves. We hear of countless stories of man's inhumanity to man; Courage celebrates the power of our humanity. With 12 black-and-white photographs.

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Here, adapted for the stage, is Budd Schulberg's classic story of the New York waterfront and the kid who coulda been a contender.

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Fast-moving and brisk, and filled with wit, humor, and gaiety, the Barber is assured of immortality because of its sheer fun. Mr. Sahlins’s deft adaptation of a superbly constructed plot, and his attention to language for present-day audiences, make this a beautifully playable farce. An appropriate companion to The Marriage of Figaro, also available in the series.

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Franklin Roosevelt was the first great hero of American Jews. FDR's promise of economic and social justice was consonant with the mainstays of Jewish culture and with the ethos of the Old Testament and the prophets. And of course these themes were especially resonant during the desperate days of the Great Depression. The Jews who so deeply admired Roosevelt made up the richest, most influential Jewish community in the world, leaders in government, commerce, and the arts. Yet by the time Franklin Roosevelt died in office, six million European Jews had been murdered by the Nazis while neither FDR nor American Jews lifted much more than a finger to help them. How did the president, the nation he led, and American Jewry allow this to happen? There is no simple answer, but Robert Shogan seeks a partial explanation by examining the behavior of a handful of Jews, so close to Roosevelt and supposedly so influential that they could be considered "the president's Jews." Most prestigious was Supreme Court justice Louis D. Brandeis. Next was Felix Frankfurter, Harvard law professor and later Supreme Court justice. Sam Rosenman, FDR's chief speechwriter from the time he was governor of New York. Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau was an old Dutchess County neighbor of Roosevelt's. Benjamin V. Cohen crafted the major financial reforms of the early New Deal. Their actions, and often inaction, illuminate the strengths and limits of interest-group politics, the system invented by FDR that dominated American politics for the remainder of the century. Taken broadly, the response of the president's Jews to the Nazi threat illustrates with heartbreaking intensity the dilemma of politics—the conflict between conscience and self-interest, between principle and expediency. With 8 pages of black-and-white photographs.

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Widely acknowledged as the most authoritative art critic of his generation, Hilton Kramer advanced his comments and judgments largely in the form of essays and short pieces. Thus this first collection of his work to appear in twenty years is a signal event for the art world and for criticism generally. The Triumph of Modernism not only traces the vicissitudes of the art scene but diagnoses the state of modernism and its vital legacy in the postmodern world. Mr. Kramer bracingly updates his incisive critique of the artists, critics, institutions, and movements that have formed the basis for modern art. Appearing for the first time in greatly expanded form is his consideration of the foundations of modern abstract painting and the future of abstraction. The aesthetic intelligence that Mr. Kramer brings to bear on certain tired assumptions about modernism—many of them derived from methodologies and politics that have little to do with art—helps rescue the artwork itself and its appreciation from the very institutions, such as the art museum and the academy, that purport to foster it. Always clear-eyed and vastly illuminating, Hilton Kramer’s art criticism remains among the very finest written in the past hundred years. Readers of The Triumph of Modernism will be treated to an exhilarating experience.

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Building on his enormously successful series of Philosophers in 90 Minutes, Paul Strathern now applies his witty and incisive prose to brief biographical studies of the world's great writers. He brings their lives and ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the writer and his work, authoritative and clearly presented. Applause for Paul Strathern's Philosophers in 90 Minutes series: "Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one's friends to Western civilization."—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe "Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading."—Richard Bernstein, New York Times "Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise."—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal

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A bumptious narrative history of American newspapermen in Paris in the 1920s and 1930s, a time when serious journalism still went hand in hand with relative poverty, good times, and a carefree spirit cultivated by eccentric personalities. An absorbing and delightful book.

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More than most wars in American history, the long and contentious Vietnam War had a profound effect on the home front, during the war and especially after. In At the Water's Edge, Melvin Small delivers the first study of the war's domestic politics. Most of the military and diplomatic decisions made by Presidents Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon, Mr. Small shows, were heavily influenced by election cycles, relations with Congress, the state of the economy, and the polls. Although all three presidents and their advisers claimed that these decisions were taken exclusively for national security concerns, much evidence suggests otherwise. In turn, the war had a transforming impact on American society. Popular perceptions of the "war at home" produced a dramatic and longstanding realignment in political allegiances, an assault on the media that still colors political debate today, and an economic crisis that weakened the nation for a decade after the last U.S. troops left Vietnam. Domestic conflict over the war led to the abolition of the draft, the curtailment of the intelligence agencies' unconstitutional practices, formal congressional restraints upon the imperial presidency, and epochal Supreme Court rulings that preserved First Amendment rights. The war ultimately destroyed the presidency of Lyndon Johnson and indirectly forced the resignation of Richard Nixon. Those presidents who followed through the remainder of the twentieth century constructed their foreign policies mindful that they would not survive politically if they were to lead the nation into another protracted limited war in the Third World.

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Building on his enormously successful series of Philosophers in 90 Minutes, Paul Strathern now applies his witty and incisive prose to brief biographical studies of the world's great writers. He brings their lives and ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the writer and his work, authoritative and clearly presented. Mr. Strathern lives in London. Applause for Paul Strathern's Philosophers in 90 Minutes series: Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one's friends to Western civilization. —Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading. —Richard Bernstein, New York Times. Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise. —Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal

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Building on his enormously successful series of Philosophers in 90 Minutes, Paul Strathern now applies his witty and incisive prose to brief biographical studies of the world's great writers. He brings their lives and ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the writer and his work, authoritative and clearly presented. Applause for Paul Strathern's Philosophers in 90 Minutes series: "Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one's friends to Western civilization."—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe "Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading."—Richard Bernstein, New York Times "Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise."—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal

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A fascinating medical detective story about the unusual reception for a promising new drug by a skeptical medical community reluctant to abandon its age-old Hippocratic Oath of "Do No Harm." Stewart Justman explains how a pill called finasteride, proven to dramatically reduce the incidence of prostate cancer, was found to be also associated with a distinctly higher rate of aggressive cancer. As urologists and oncologists were presented with a strange mix of eurekas and cautionary notes, physicians adhered to their best principles and remained wary of massive application. For now, the drug is deemed too risky: the medical dictum of avoiding harm has inhibited its use on a grand scale, though statistically there is much in its favor. Do No Harm is engrossing reading about medical science and, finally, a reassuring tale of the triumph of tradition over novelty.

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In eighteen essays, Ms. Allen explores the lives and work of some of the last century's most brilliant and eccentric literary talents. Ms. Allen's appraisals, which combine extensive biographical information with new critical insights, richly illustrate the tenuous and often bizarre links between character and talent, between historical circumstances and individual vision. A New York Times Notable Book of the Year.

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Pictures of Home is based on photographs that were stored on a shelf in the bedroom closet where Douglas Bukowski grew up. The pictures are a source and a measure. They show a family on the South Side of Chicago, where the children of immigrants fought to keep out the descendants of slaves. They show a boy from Hardscrabble who forever lived in the shadow of Richard J. Daley. The one was born within a mile of the other; each received the baptismal name of Joseph; they both drew a city paycheck as firefighter or mayor; and they died on the same date in December. The pictures tell about a husband and wife, their children, and the inevitability of change. While the house they lived in remained much the same from 1939 to 2000, the surrounding neighborhood did not. The streets changed, the children grew up, and the man died a slow death to which two daughters and a son bore witness even as they sought to fight it. The mother stays in the house still, comforted by pictures of a life that slips from her memory a little more each day. The pictures and the history behind them are brought to life in stunning fashion in Mr. Bukowski's spare prose. Pictures of Home is the story of a family and a city, told affectionately and endearingly by one who is part of both.

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Building on his enormously successful series of Philosophers in 90 Minutes, Paul Strathern now applies his witty and incisive prose to brief biographical studies of the world's great writers. He brings their lives and ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the writer and his work, authoritative and clearly presented.

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Here returned to print, at a timely moment in history, is Elie Kedourie's classic study of the Middle East in modern times. In analyzing British failures in the region during the zenith of their power and influence, Mr. Kedourie attributes much of Britain's faulty and disastrous handling of Middle East problems to what he calls "the Chatham House version." It was a view of Middle Eastern history and politics propounded and propagated in the various publications of the Royal Institute of International Affairs (known popularly as Chatham House), written or edited by Arnold Toynbee. The episodes that Mr. Kedourie investigates show "successive and cumulative manifestations of illusion, misjudgment, maladroitness, and failure." Together they point up hard lessons for the Bush administration or any outside power that would intervene in Middle Eastern affairs. "No better guide...can be found to the pitfalls awaiting those who seek to control the Middle East to their own advantage."—Asian Affairs "These twelve studies in the modern history of the Middle East [form] the most learned book, the most demanding therefore of rethinking, that has come out on the Middle East for many years, and anyone who in the future writes on any Middle Eastern subject, from any point of view, without consulting it, will do so at his or her grave peril."—London Telegraph

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In eighteen enlightening essays, the critic Brooke Allen explores the lives and work of some of the last century's most brilliant and eccentric literary talents. It was a century that apotheosized ideology and frequently demanded evidence of political engagement from its artists and intellectuals. Some of the writers considered in Twentieth-Century Attitudes found a spiritual home in the left (George Bernard Shaw, Christopher Isherwood, Sylvia Townsend Warner); others, like Evelyn Waugh, in the right; still others maneuvered the shifting ideological sands with a more measured skepticism. It was also a century during which the dictates of fashion, both social and intellectual, changed with unprecedented rapidity. A few of the writers Ms. Allen considers, like James Baldwin and Saul Bellow, struggled honorably but not always with success to reconcile their artistic intentions with intellectual fashion; others, like Colette and H. G. Wells, took an avid role in the drama of their historical moment and triumphantly communicated that sense of drama to their descendants. Really good writers, as Ms. Allen shows, do not write well in spite of the foibles, prejudices, and fallacies of their times; instead they crystallize these oddities into something universal. The writers in Twentieth-Century Attitudes embody in their very different ways the various attitudes of their contentious century and the success or failure of attempts to transcend these attitudes. Ms. Allen's essays, which combine extensive biographical information with new critical insights, richly illustrate the tenuous and often bizarre links between character and talent, between historical circumstances and individual vision.

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Observing our contemporary culture, the distinguished critic Roger Kimball sees that the avant-garde assault on tradition has long since degenerated into a sclerotic orthodoxy. He finds that the "cutting edge," as defined by the established tastemakers, turns out time and again to be a stale remainder of past impotence. And he locates a pretense that the traditional is the enemy rather than a springboard to originality. In Art's Prospect, Mr. Kimball observes that most of the really invigorating action in the art world today is a quiet affair. It takes place not at the Tate Modern in London or at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, not in the Chelsea or TriBeCa galleries but off to one side, out of the limelight. It usually involves not the latest thing but permanent things—they can be new or old, but their relevance is measured not by the buzz they create but by silences they inspire. With reviews and essays composed over the last twenty years and revised for this book, Art's Prospect illuminates some of the chief spiritual itineraries of modern art. It provides, in Mr. Kimball's words, "a collage whose elements, when seen from one perspective, add up to a diagnosis of a malady, and, when seen from another perspective, offer hints of where effective remedies can be found."

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In J.S. Mill in 90 Minutes, Paul Strathern offers a concise, expert account of Mill's life and ideas, and explains their influence on man's struggle to understand his existence in the world. The book also includes selections from Mill's work; a brief list of suggested reading for those who wish to push further; and chronologies that place Mill within his own age and in the broader scheme of philosophy.

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An abundant collection of stories from the pages of the New York Times that transcend what we know as sportswriting. Mr. Berkow has a clear understanding of the games he reports, but he also has a sharp eye for the lives of the players, an appreciation of the larger social context, and—not least—an affinity for the well-turned phrase. Ira Berkow is among the best—a Sondheim of the sports page. —George F. Will. I follow Ira Berkow in the Times with unfailing interest. —Saul Bellow. If there's anyone doing sports who is even close, I haven't read him. —Mike Royko.

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These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensible and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented. Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character. I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one's friends to Western civilization. —Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about theme. I find them hard to stop reading. —Richard Bernstein, New York Times. Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise. —Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal

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These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensible and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented. Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and characterE. I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one's friends to Western civilization. —Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about themE. I find them hard to stop reading. —Richard Bernstein, New York Times. Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise. —Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal

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"Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one’s friends to Western civilization."—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. "Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading."—Richard Bernstein, New York Times. "Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise."—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal. These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensive and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented.

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"Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one’s friends to Western civilization."—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. "Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading."—Richard Bernstein, New York Times. "Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise."—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal. These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensive and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented.

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“Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one’s friends to Western civilization.”—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. “Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading.”—Richard Bernstein, New York Times. “Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise.”—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal. These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensive and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented.

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The United States could have won the war in Vietnam if only President Lyndon Johnson had let his air generals do what they wanted...if only we had intervened massively...if only we had pursued our campaign against the Viet Cong infrastructure. These propositions and others, advanced by apologists for the American defeat in Vietnam (many of them the very generals and officials responsible for prosecuting the war), are fast becoming conventional wisdom. In The Hidden History of the Vietnam War, John Prados meets them head on. His straightforward narrative does not aim to be a comprehensive history; instead he focuses on key strategies, events, and personalities in the struggle. Mr. Prados's book draws from a broad range of evidence, including archival documents and official military government reports. By avoiding the atomized individual accounts that have characterized much of the nonfiction on Vietnam, and selecting crucial issues and battle actions, he succeeds in illuminating the high points of the Vietnam experience and puncturing the popular mythologies of the war.

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“Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one’s friends to Western civilization.”—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. “Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading.”—Richard Bernstein, New York Times. “Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise.”—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal. These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensive and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented.

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How and why have American labor unions grown in the century and a half since the industrial revolution? In this concise and illuminating history of the labor movement, Daniel Nelson traces the ebb and flow of union activity since the early nineteenth century. Rejecting an emphasis on individual leadership or the uniqueness of American “conditions,” he instead looks to three factors to explain labor’s record: the role of the autonomous worker, the threat of employer reprisals, and the influence of external forces such as government policy. His chief concern is to describe and document the historical experience, especially the erratically rising level of union membership from the close of the nineteenth century to the 1960s, and the reversal of that phenomenon in recent decades. Mr. Nelson devotes special attention to miners’ unions in the years up to the 1950s, to government policy in the New Deal years and after, and to the development of sophisticated anti-union employer strategies in recent years. The strength of Shifting Fortunes lies not only in the scope of its coverage but in its evenhanded portrayal of employer-worker relations.

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“Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one’s friends to Western civilization.”—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. “Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading.”—Richard Bernstein, New York Times. “Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise.”—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal. These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensive and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented.

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“Each of these little books is witty and dramatic and creates a sense of time, place, and character....I cannot think of a better way to introduce oneself and one’s friends to Western civilization.”—Katherine A. Powers, Boston Globe. “Well-written, clear and informed, they have a breezy wit about them....I find them hard to stop reading.”—Richard Bernstein, New York Times. “Witty, illuminating, and blessedly concise.”—Jim Holt, Wall Street Journal. These brief and enlightening explorations of our greatest thinkers bring their ideas to life in entertaining and accessible fashion. Philosophical thought is deciphered and made comprehensive and interesting to almost everyone. Far from being a novelty, each book is a highly refined appraisal of the philosopher and his work, authoritative and clearly presented.

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The first book to sum up the consequences of the cold war for Americans. A searching account of the costs of the cold war Ovictory' that we are celebrating—not only the material price but the blight on our ideas, ideals, and institutions. —James MacGregor Burns

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No one today writes more telling criticism of the American theatre than Robert Brustein. In this ground-breaking work he argues that the American stage is enjoying an unacknowledged renaissance. Despite obstacles that now confront various art forms in this country, Mr. Brustein finds that the theatre has been quietly reinventing the nature of its art. He celebrates this renewal in these wide-ranging, witty, and discerning essays and reviews, examining individual playwrights, directors, and other artists; defending the quality of American theatre in the face of the British invasion; and analyzing the uneasy relationship between politics and art in contemporary America. Mr. Brustein's great critical sense, and his ability to draw from an expanse of sources, make Reimagining American Theatre an entertaining adventure. "A refreshing and seminal work. Brustein provides the most insightful guidance through contemporary production in theatre and, what is so rare today, he is also a critic who defends high standards in performance."—Jan Kott. "Robert Brustein's directness clears the air. His intelligence shines."—Pauline Kael.

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The intimacy of the one-ring circus produced the classic clown routines that flourished until the mid-twentieth century and then disappeared with the rise of the grand circus. They have been lost until now. By seeking out the little band of surviving clowns who worked in the old tradition and setting down their scenes, Tristan Rémy, the eminent circus historian, has rescued a theatrical treasure. Thanks to Rémy’s persistence, the forty-eight scenes presented here contain not only the spoken words but the manner of line delivery and the physical turns. So they remain superbly suitable for performance. Most of them are written for just three actors—the white-faced clown, August the stooge, and the supercilious ringmaster. Sets are unnecessary. And their combination of the verbal with the physical has timeless appeal. Bernard Sahlins’s translation is masterfully attuned to present-day audiences. In his foreword, Mr. Sahlins notes that these scenes have been continually remounted in Europe, attesting to their fundamental vitality and universality. “Clearly there is a debt, witting and unwitting, owed to the clown of the ring by the great comedians of our century. With this book these scenes and the clowns who invented and played them now take their honored place in our theatrical legacy.”

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In absorbing essays on books about film, the distinguished critic Richard Schickel offers more insights into moviemaking on every page than a reader will find in an entire shelf of film encyclopedias. His trenchant observations about films, actors, directors, producers, and the machinations of an always fascinating industry are consistently authoritative and entertaining. Here are charming but clear-eyed appraisals of Hollywood's major players, its low comedy and high self-regard, its bedrock of bourgeois values, its strange and convoluted affair with sex, and its relentless drive to give the customers what they want, regardless of critical failings. Film on Paper promises to be one of the most enjoyable movie books of the year.

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Manhattanites have always had a disdain for the rearview mirror. That's where trends begin, and the citizens of Gotham are concerned with the here and now rather than the then and there. Yet Manhattan's history is rich, filled with personalities who helped create the modern theater and made Broadway the center of show business-a distinction it still holds. The Voodoo That They Did So Well takes an endearing look at some of these giants. Stefan Kanfer writes about Irving Berlin, George and Ira Gershwin, Cole Porter, Richard Rodgers, and Stephen Sondheim, and considers the shining stars of New York's vibrant Yiddish theater, the colorful personalities who starred in two-a-day vaudeville, and the astonishing life of Lorenzo Da Ponte, a Renaissance man if ever there was one (Mozart's most brilliant collaborator landed in Manhattan after dazzling Europe, and wound up selling groceries and teaching Italian at Columbia University). Richard Rodgers's first song hit was "Manhattan," with lyrics by Lorenz Hart. The chorus read: "The great big city's a wondrous toy / Just made for a girl and boy / We'll turn Manhattan / Into an isle of joy." Manhattan remains an isle of joy in large part because of the men and women who led the way, and whose lives and art animate every page of this delightful gavotte.

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The contributors to this important new collection offer a vision of contemporary feminism that runs counter to and goes beyond the dominant attitudes of the feminist orthodoxy. Basing their arguments on individual rights and personal responsibility, the contributors offer surprising views on a wide range of issues that confront modern woman. Published in association with The Independent Institute.

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The race for the White House in 1968 was a watershed event in American politics. In this brilliantly succinct narrative analysis, Lewis L. Gould shows how the events of that tumultuous year changed the way Americans felt about politics and their national leaders; how Republicans used the skills they brought to Richard Nixon's campaign to create a generation-long ascendancy in presidential politics; and how Democrats, divided and torn after 1968, emerged as only crippled challengers for the White House throughout most of the years until the early twenty-first century. Bitterness over racial issues and the Vietnam War that marked the 1968 election continued to shape national affairs and to rile American society for years afterward. And the election accelerated an erosion of confidence in American institutions that has not yet reached a conclusion. In his lucid account, now revised and updated, Mr. Gould emphasizes the importance of race as the campaign's key issue and examines the now infamous "October surprises" of Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon as he describes the extraordinary events of what Eugene McCarthy later called the "Hard Year."

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The seventh winner of the annual New Criterion Poetry Prize is J. Allyn Rosser's Foiled Again. Ms. Rosser's third poetry collection contains poems of startling range and depth, with formal poems-traditional, hybrid, and nonce-and just as many shaped by the loopy trajectory of their associative momentum. At the heart of Rosser's work is a kind of crazed optimism-a quixotic, wryly cheerful pilgrimage through the maze of bafflement, loneliness, and love that constitutes our experience.

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In the years before the Curse of the Bambino descended on New England, the Boston Red Sox rode major league baseball like a colossus, capturing four World Series titles in seven seasons. Blessed with legendary players like Babe Ruth, Tris Speaker, Harry Hooper, and Smokey Joe Wood, and a brand new, thoroughly modern stadium, the Red Sox reigned as kings of the Deadball Era. Just in time for the centenary of baseball's hallowed Fenway Park and the dawn of the Red Sox dynasty, Thomas J. Whalen gracefully recounts the rise and fall of one of baseball's greatest teams.

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