Search results for ""Author Merchant"
Granta Books The Language of Thieves: The Story of Rotwelsch and One Family’s Secret History
You might have heard the saying 'you're in a pickle' meaning you're in a difficult situation. This is just one example of Rotwelsch, an ancient language of the road influenced by Yiddish and written in rudimentary signs, and spoken by vagrants and refugees, merchants and thieves since the European Middle Ages. Martin Puchner grew up knowing that Rotwelsch was of unusual interest to his family. When he inherited a family achive, it led him on a journey not only into the history of this extraordinary language but also into his family's connections to the Nazi Party, for whom Rotwelsch held a particular significance. The Language of Thieves is a compelling story of the mindset and milieu of Central Europe and of the way language can be used to evade oppression. It is also a deeply moving reckoning with a family's buried past.
£15.05
Thames & Hudson Ltd Shakespeare's London on 5 Groats a Day
This entertaining and fact-packed guide provides all the information you’ll need to travel back in time to Elizabethan London – a booming city of courtiers, cutthroats, merchants, beggars, lawyers, dramatists, apprentices and adventurers. Find out the best way to the capital and where to stay. Saunter over London Bridge, with its hundreds of shops and houses. Glimpse Her Majesty at Whitehall, Europe’s largest palace. Watch the finest plays and players at the Rose Theatre, and marvel at the bustle of business in the Royal Exchange. Go down to Greenwich to stand on the deck of the Golden Hind, the ship that Sir Francis Drake sailed around the world. This intriguingly addictive guide provides all you need to know to sightsee, shop and meet the famous in the capital of a nation stirring to greatness.
£9.49
HarperCollins Publishers Castle in the Air
A magical Arabian Nights tale from the captivating creator of fantasy, Diana Wynne Jones. The dazzling sequel to Howl’s Moving Castle. Far to the south in the Land of Ingary, lives a young carpet merchant called Abdullah. In his dreams, he is the long-lost son of a great prince. This dream is a complete castle in the air… or is it? Abdullah’s day-dreams suddenly start to come true when he meets the exquisite Flower-in-the-Night, daughter of the ferocious Sultan of Zanzib. Fate has destined them for each other, but a bad-tempered genie, a hideous djinn, and various villanous bandits have their own ideas. When Flower-in-the-Night is carried off, Abdullah is determined to rescue her – if he can find her.
£8.55
Cornell University Press The Medieval Economy of Salvation: Charity, Commerce, and the Rise of the Hospital
In The Medieval Economy of Salvation, Adam J. Davis shows how the burgeoning commercial economy of western Europe in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, alongside an emerging culture of Christian charity, led to the establishment of hundreds of hospitals and leper houses. Focusing on the county of Champagne, he looks at the ways in which charitable organizations and individuals—townspeople, merchants, aristocrats, and ecclesiastics—saw in these new institutions a means of infusing charitable giving and service with new social significance and heightened expectations of spiritual rewards. In tracing the rise of the medieval hospital during a period of intense urbanization and the transition from a gift economy to a commercial one, Davis makes clear how embedded this charitable institution was in the wider social, cultural, religious, and economic fabric of medieval life.
£36.03
Princeton University Press The Plum in the Golden Vase or, Chin P'ing Mei, Volume Four: The Climax
This is the fourth and penultimate volume in David Roy's celebrated translation of one of the most famous and important novels in Chinese literature. The Plum in the Golden Vase or, Chin P'ing Mei is an anonymous sixteenth-century work that focuses on the domestic life of Hsi-men Ch'ing, a corrupt, upwardly mobile merchant in a provincial town, who maintains a harem of six wives and concubines. The novel, known primarily for its erotic realism, is also a landmark in the development of the narrative art form--not only from a specifically Chinese perspective but in a world-historical context. This complete and annotated translation aims to faithfully represent and elucidate all the rhetorical features of the original in its most authentic form and thereby enable the Western reader to appreciate this Chinese masterpiece at its true worth.
£43.05
Princeton University Press The Plum in the Golden Vase or, Chin P'ing Mei, Volume Four: The Climax
This is the fourth and penultimate volume in David Roy's celebrated translation of one of the most famous and important novels in Chinese literature. The Plum in the Golden Vase or, Chin P'ing Mei is an anonymous sixteenth-century work that focuses on the domestic life of Hsi-men Ch'ing, a corrupt, upwardly mobile merchant in a provincial town, who maintains a harem of six wives and concubines. The novel, known primarily for its erotic realism, is also a landmark in the development of the narrative art form--not only from a specifically Chinese perspective but in a world-historical context. This complete and annotated translation aims to faithfully represent and elucidate all the rhetorical features of the original in its most authentic form and thereby enable the Western reader to appreciate this Chinese masterpiece at its true worth.
£30.68
Ebury Publishing The Mystery of Edwin Drood
Charles Dickens died half way through writing The Mystery of Edwin Drood, and ever since speculation has been rife as to how the tale might have unfolded. For this intriguing two-part adaptation for BBC2, for prime-time January 2012, acclaimed screenwriter Gwyneth Hughes (Five Days, Miss Austen Regrets) scoured the text for clues indicating how the great author might have finished this masterpiece, and has drawn from those leads a seamless, compelling and surprisingly modern story of obsessive love, betrayal and murder. This tie-in edition of Dickens's unfinished text will also include an Afterword by Gwyneth Hughes, offering her own conclusion, and revealing how she knitted the strands from the original plot and her own work together to bring the book to a satisfying close.Key cast list: Matthew Rhys (Brothers & Sisters) as John Jasper; Rory Kinnear (Hamlet, Women In Love, Lennon Naked) as Reverend Septimus Crisparkle; Freddie Fox (Worried About The Boy, The Shadow Line) as Edwin Drood; Tamzin Merchant (Jane Eyre, Miranda, The Tudors) plays Rosa Bud; Alun Armstrong (New Tricks, Garrow's Law) as Hiram Grewgious, Rosa's guardian; Julia McKenzie (Cranford, Miss Marple) plays the Reverend's mother, Mrs Crisparkle; David Dawson (Luther, The Road To Coronation Street) as Bazzard; Ron Cook (Little Dorrit) as Durdles; Sacha Dhawan (Five Days 2) as Neville Landless; Amber Rose Revah (House Of Saddam) plays Helena Landless, Neville's twin sister; Ian McNeice (Doctor Who) as Mayor Sapsea; Janet Dale (Holby; Casualty) as Miss Twinkleton; Ellie Haddington (Luther) as Princess Puffer; and young Alfie Davis plays Deputy.
£6.34
Prototype Publishing Ltd. PROTOTYPE 4
The fourth instalment of Prototype’s annual anthology: a space for new work, open to all and free from formal guidelines or restrictions. Poetry, prose, visual work and experiments in between.Including contributions by ajw, Sascha Akhtar, Chiara Ambrosio, Charlie Baylis, Jack Barker-Clark, Natalie Linh Bolderston, Jo Burns, Nancy Campbell, J. R. Carpenter, Joe Carrick-Varty, Robert Casselton Clark, Rory Cook, Emily Cooper, Kate Crowcroft, Eve Esfandiari-Denney, Alisha Dietzman, Edward Doegar, Nathan Dragon, Laura Elliott, Alan Fielden, Clare Fisher, Livia Franchini, Jay Gao, Honor Gareth Gavin, Emily Hasler, Grace Henes, Martha Kapos, Annie Katchinska, Victoria Manifold, Samra Mayanja, Jessa Mockridge, Helen Palmer, Yannis Ritsos (trans. Paul Merchant), Rochelle Roberts, Kimberly Reyes, fred spoliar, Scott Thurston, Hao Guang Tse, Ralf Webb, Sam Weselowski, Chrissy Williams and Xuela Zhang.
£11.85
Taylor & Francis Ltd Jane Leade: Biography of a Seventeenth-Century Mystic
Jane Leade (1624-1704) is probably the most prolific woman writer and most important female religious leader in late seventeenth-century England, yet, she still remains relatively unknown. By exploring her life and works as a prophetess and mystic, this books opens a fascinating window into the world of a remarkable woman living in a remarkable age. Born in Norfolk into a gentry family, Jane Leade enjoyed a comfortable childhood, married a distant cousin, who was a merchant, and had four children. However, she found herself totally destitute in London when he died, his fortune having been lost abroad. As a widow, she proclaimed herself to be a `Bride of Christ', and eventually became a prolific author and a respected blind, elderly leader of a religious group of well-educated men and women, known as the Philadelphian Society. The structure of this book is informed by the chronological events that happened during her life and is complemented by examining some of the material she published, including her visions of the Virgin Wisdom, or Sophia. She started writing in 1670, but published prolifically in the 1680s and 1690s, and this material offers a fascinating glimpse into the mind of an extraordinary woman. Believing herself to be living in the `End Times' she expected Sophia would return with the second coming of Christ. The Philadelphian Society grew under her charge, until they were buffeted by mobs in London. Jane Leade died in her eighty-first year and is buried in the non-conformist cemetery, Bunhill Fields, in London. By contextualising her and drawing out the nature of her devotions this new book draws attention to her as a figure in her own right. Previous studies have tended to reduce her to one example within a certain tradition, but as this work clearly demonstrates she was in fact a much more complicated character who did not conform to any one particular tradition.
£143.03
Overlook Press The Flavor of Wood: In Search of the Wild Taste of Trees from Smoke and Sap to Root and Bark
Most people don’t expect wood to flavor their food beyond the barbecue, if at all, and gastronomists rarely discuss the significance that wood has on ultimate taste. But trees and wood have a far greater influence over our plate and palate than you might think. So what does wood taste of? And how has it been used in cooking, distilling, fermenting, and even perfume creation to produce a unique flavor and smell? To find out the answers to these questions, food communications expert Artur Cisar-Erlach embarked on a global journey to understand how trees infuse the world’s most delectable dishes with the flavor of their wood. His flavor hunt extended into a three-year exploration covering everything from pizza, whisky, cheese, tea, and perfume to quinine, wine, maple syrup, blue yogurt, and more. From wooden barrels used to age scotch in Austria to wood-burning pizza ovens of Naples to traditional Canadian maple syrup producers, The Flavor of Wood explores how wood infuses some of our best-loved foods through its smoke, sap, roots, and bark. As his quest spans continents and cultures, Cisar-Erlach introduces readers to a colorful cast of characters including Modenese balsamic vinegar producers, Piedmontese truffle hunters, South Tyrolean winemakers, and wild mountain pine chefs. Discovering that wood flavors beverages as well, the author encounters Austrian whisky distillers, Bavarian brewers, avant-garde central London tea merchants, and Indian tea exporters. A world trip brimming with fascinating encounters, unexpected turns, beautiful landscapes, scientific discoveries, and historic connections, The Flavor of Wood is the story of a passionate flavor hunter, and offers readers unparalleled access to some of the world’s highest quality cuisine and unknown tree flavors.
£21.43
Parthian Books GI Limey: A Welsh-American in WWII
Clifford Guard was born in 1923, in the South Wales city of Swansea, into a life of abject poverty. By age 15, he sought escape through joining the merchant navy, and acted on an imperative from his father to reach America where he could forge a different future. When the Second World War broke out, he joined the US Army’s 3rd Armored Division, where he was nicknamed `Limey’ by two friends he’d endure battle with—Trix and The Greek. From the desolation of Omaha Beach to the Battle of the Bulge, they spent the next 11 months dodging gunfire, disarming landmines and liberating towns as they drove the Nazi Army from France. GI Limey is a story about the bond that keeps soldiers together, through the danger of combat and the decades after. In this honest account, Clifford Guard examines how war shaped his identity, one defined by two allied countries an ocean apart.
£10.03
University of Washington Press Japan Envisions the West: 16th-19th Century Japanese Art from Kobe City Museum
This extraordinary book features significant works of art from the Kobe City Museum, whose collection focuses on Western-style Japanese art created between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries. Japan Envisions the West considers how Japan encountered the West and learned about and adopted their arts, culture, and science, and how the West discovered Japanese arts and culture. Maps bear important witness in telling the story of how each region recognized and understood the lands of the other. Selected maps mark milestones in illustrating each state of understanding between Japan and the West. Portuguese and Spanish missionaries and merchants from the late sixteenth to early seventeenth centuries conveyed Western culture, religion, art, food, and music to the Japanese, and they were the first Westerners to have a strong impact in Japan. Namban refers to Japanese art created under the influence of Portugal and Spain. After Christianity was excluded from Japan in the 1630s, Nagasaki became the only port open for trading with Dutch merchants. Artists in this region, especially painters serving the government, had the opportunity to see foreign people, culture, and art firsthand. They made visual records, copied important objects, and studied these records for their work. When the Tokugawa Shogunate Yoshimune relaxed restrictions on imported Western books in 1720, with the exception of Christian books, scholarly artists and scientists were free to study them, leading to Komo, Japanese art created under the influence of Holland, and to more popular paintings, prints, and decorative arts that demonstrate the fusion of Japanese and Western styles. At the same time, objects were made specifically for trade with Europe through the East India Companies established in European countries. Finally, visual images produced in the nineteenth century show the effort, surprise, and curiosity of the Japanese as they tried to understand America and Americans.
£32.75
Johns Hopkins University Press The Trouble with Tea: The Politics of Consumption in the Eighteenth-Century Global Economy
Americans imagined tea as central to their revolution. After years of colonial boycotts against the commodity, the Sons of Liberty kindled the fire of independence when they dumped tea in the Boston harbor in 1773. To reject tea as a consumer item and symbol of "taxation without representation" was to reject Great Britain as master of the American economy and government. But tea played a longer and far more complicated role in American economic history than the events at Boston suggest. In The Trouble with Tea, historian Jane T. Merritt explores tea as a central component of eighteenth-century global trade and probes its connections to the politics of consumption. Arguing that tea caused trouble over the course of the eighteenth century in a number of different ways, Merritt traces the multifaceted impact of that luxury item on British imperial policy, colonial politics, and the financial structure of merchant companies. Merritt challenges the assumption among economic historians that consumer demand drove merchants to provide an ever-increasing supply of goods, thus sparking a consumer revolution in the early eighteenth century. The Trouble with Tea reveals a surprising truth: that concerns about the British political economy, coupled with the corporate machinations of the East India Company, brought an abundance of tea to Britain, causing the company to target North America as a potential market for surplus tea. American consumers only slowly habituated themselves to the beverage, aided by clever marketing and the availability of Caribbean sugar. Indeed, the "revolution" in consumer activity that followed came not from a proliferation of goods, but because the meaning of these goods changed. By the 1750s, British subjects at home and in America increasingly purchased and consumed tea on a daily basis; once thought a luxury, tea had become a necessity. This fascinating look at the unpredictable path of a single commodity will change the way readers look at both tea and the emergence of America.
£50.39
Tuttle Publishing Houses and Gardens of Kyoto: Revised with a new foreword by Matthew Stavros
Kyoto, considered the quintessential birthplace of Japanese culture, has survived centuries of damage and the onslaught of modernization, yet remains the undisputed home of the country's architectural and cultural history. This vibrant collection of Japanese garden design and landscaping photographs introduces a wide variety of traditional houses, from aristocratic villas, temple residences, and merchant townhouses, to ryokan inns and private retreats each uniquely equipped with their own garden space. Houses And Gardens of Kyoto features residences many of which have never before been photographed or shown in any other book hand-picked by photographer Akihiko Seki. The accompanying text is informative and is sure to be a standard reference guide on the topic for years to come. Each entry in this Japanese gardening and landscape design book is a colourful example of the finest classic Japanese houses and garden styles, and will serve as a lasting inspiration to anyone who is captivated by Japanese architecture and design.
£24.18
Schnell & Steiner GmbH, Verlag Sancian, Gate to China: Kaspar Castner's Account of the Grave of Saint Francis Xaver
In 1552, St. Francis Xavier died on the island of Sancian without setting foot on mainland China. Since then, this image of Francis Xavier on Sancian has been enshrined in Western memory, and many missionaries, merchants and adventurers have tried to realise the unfinished dream of Francis Xavier. In 1700, the German Jesuit Kaspar Castner was sent to build a tomb for Francis Xavier on Sancian. During the three months he and his workers spent there, he encountered the local population and the soldiers that the Chinese government had installed there to protect them from pirates. Castner wrote a report on this period, which is presented here for the first time in a modern scholarly translation into German, English and Chinese. Kastner's report is a unique contemporary document that provides a glimpse of the clash of different worldviews, cultures, ethnicities and religions. The publication is rounded off by a facsimile of the Latin report cut in wood from the University Library of the LMU Munich.
£40.18
Surtees Society Northallerton Wills and Inventories, 1666-1719
Edition of wills and inventories throws new light on early modern economic history. This collection of 153 wills and inventories provides a vivid insight into the socio-economic life of the small Yorkshire market town of Northallerton during a time of growing prosperity, when its position on the main road to thenorth also enabled it to prosper from wider trading links. Trades and professions represented in the collection include yeomen, merchants, tallow chandlers, weavers, a maltman, innkeepers and a wide range of leather workers; the documents collected here provide a wealth of information regarding their houses and their contents, lifestyles and standards of living in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The volume also contains an extensive glossary of obsolete and dialect terms; a substantial introduction, discussing the history of the town during this period; and comprehensive notes. Christine M Newman is an Honorary Fellow in the Department of History, Durham University; Dorothy Edwards worked in teacher training at Northampton University, and is a local historian.
£48.25
Holy Trinity Publications A Gathering of Spiritual Riches
As a merchant gathers various goods from different countries and carries them home and stores them up, so the Christian may gather edifying thoughts and lay them up in the storeroom of his heart, and enrich his soul with them.Drawing upon numerous examples from daily life and human relationships, St Tikhon weaves together wisdom on how to live a life pleasing to God. His words are frequently embellished by scripture and together these call the reader to repentance and a fuller embrace of godly living. In a world that typically only values material goods his writing constantly reminds the reader of that which is of true value - the knowledge and love of God. As the reader progresses deeper into this work his soul will find refreshment, purpose and meaning for his life. His message is clear: True riches are not of this world, but of the age to come. These riches both can and should be acquired now.
£30.38
£91.69
HarperCollins Publishers Burmese Days (Collins Classics)
HarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics. We walk about under a load of memories which we long to share and somehow never can. John Flory, a white timber merchant in 1920s Burma, has unorthodox views. To him, the Burmese culture and people should be appreciated as things of beauty and worth. To the other white members of the European club of which he is member, these views are dangerous, undermining the foundation of British colonial rule. Flory is drawn into a deadly rivalry when he befriends Veraswami, an Indian doctor, who is under the scrutiny of a corrupt magistrate. Flory defies the convention of imperial bigotry in Burma by offering to help his new friend, but the consequences to him, and Elizabeth Lackersteen, the woman he loves, will be explosive. Based on his experiences as a policeman in Burma, Burmese Days was Orwell’s first novel, and sparked controversy for its scathing portrayal of colonial society.
£10.74
American Society of Overseas Research On the Third Dynasty of Ur: Studies in Honor of Marcel Sigrist
Includes 36 b/w illustrations. The Ur III period (2112-2004 BCE) was one of the more significant periods in the history of ancient Mesopotamia for modern scholarship and for native cultural traditions and historiography as well. The centralized patrimonial bureaucracy of the time is documented by almost a hundred thousand known documents, and this was when much of what we know as classical Sumerian literature was first initiated. We would not have so many published texts at our disposal if it were not for the tireless efforts of Marcel Sigrist of the Ecole Biblique in Jerusalem, whose scholarship and generosity are celebrated in this volume in twenty-seven essays by an international group of grateful experts on Ur III studies. The subjects range from the publication of new administrative and magical texts, as well as a new piece of the Sumerian King List, to studies of merchants, land tenure, court records, royal concubines, scribes, foreign bodyguards, and even of cuisine.
£73.89
Pen & Sword Books Ltd Britain and the Ocean Road
Britain and the Ocean Road uses new firsthand research and unconventional interpretations to take a fresh look at British maritime history in the age of sail.The human stories of eight shipwrecks serve as waypoints on the voyage, as the book explores how and why Britain became a global sea power. Each chapter has people at its heart sailors, seafaring families, passengers, merchants, pirates, explorers, and many others. The narrative encompasses an extraordinary range of people, ships and events, such as a bloody maritime civil war in the 13th century, a 17th-century American teenager who stepped from one ship to another - and into a life of piracy, a British warship that fought at Trafalgar (on the French side), and the floating hell of a Liverpool slave-ship, sunk in the year before the slave trade was abolished.The book is full of surprising details and scenes, including England's rudest and crudest streetname, what it was like to be a passenger in a medieval ship (take a guess), h
£15.03
Little, Brown Book Group The Birth Of Venus
Alessandra is not quite fifteen when her prosperous merchant father brings a young painter back with him from Holland to adorn the walls of the new family chapel. She is fascinated by his talents and envious of his abilities and opportunities to paint to the glory of God. Soon her love of art and her lively independence are luring her into closer involvement with all sorts of taboo areas of life. On excursions into the streets of night-time Florence she observes a terrible evil stalking the city and witnesses the rise of the fiery young priest, Savanarola, who has set out to rid the city of vice, richness, even art itself. Alessandra must make crucial decisions about the shape of her adult life, as Florence itself must choose between the old ways of the luxury-loving Medicis and the asceticism of Savanorola. And through it all, there is the painter, whose love will change everything.
£11.45
Headline Publishing Group The Butcher of St Peter's (Last Templar Mysteries 19): Danger and intrigue in medieval Britain
When a merchant in Exeter hears an intruder in his home one night, his first thought is to conceal his adulterous lover. But then he witnesses a sinister figure stooping over the bed of his only child, a figure who seems to vanish into thin air.Two years on and the identity of the intruder has become common knowledge: the idiot of the city who lost his own children many years ago, and who seems doomed to wander the town searching for them. But when a boy then disappears, suspicion immediately falls on him.The local constable is determined to solve the mystery, as his own son disappeared some years ago and he always suspected the fool. Sir Baldwin is asked to follow a lead to the manor of Bishop's Clyst to try and find out what has happened. While he is there a body is found under the stone bridge - the body of a boy, but not the one who recently went missing...
£10.74
UEA Publishing Project Logo Rewind: Trademarks of Medieval Norwich
Logo Rewind is a fascinating and uniquely enriching source of inspiration for modern designers and provides a treasure trove for anyone interested in UK history, students of history and design, creatives, and the contemporary design community more broadly, both nationally and internationally.The book includes introductions and essays by Jens Müller and Minnie Moll and contributions from other big names from the world of design alongside UEA academics exploring the history of these cultural artefacts, each annotated with their name, occupation, location, and year of identification.'This marvellous book has opened my eyes to an exciting new angle on the long history of branding. I’ve advised on branding, and taught it, for 30 years, but this story was completely new to me. Of course, the medieval merchants of Norwich wouldn’t have used the word ‘brand’. But they instinctively understood the power of branding. They created symbols as shorthand for their businesses – symbols we’d now call logos.' - Robert Jones, Professor of Brand Leadership UEA
£34.51
Fonthill Media Ltd Battle for the Channel: The First Month of the Battle of Britain 10 July - 10 August 1940
This volume carries on where FIRST OF THE FEW finished, in the same style and format. 10 July-the official first day of the Battle of Britain-witnessed increased aerial activity over the Channel and along the eastern and southern seaboards of the British coastline. The main assaults by ever-increasing formations of Luftwaffe bombers, escorted by Bf109s and Bf110s, were initially aimed at British merchant shipping convoys plying their trade of coal and other materials from the north of England to the southern ports. These attacks by the Germans often met with increasing success although RAF Spitfires and Hurricanes endeavoured to repel the Heinkels, Dorniers and Ju88s, frequently with ill-afforded loss in pilots and aircraft. Within a month the Channel was effectively closed to British shipping. Only a change in the Luftwaffe's tactics in mid-August, when the main attack changed to the attempted destruction of the RAF's southern airfields, allowed small convoys to resume sneaking through without too greater hindrance.
£17.34
Oro Editions Fantastic State of Ruin: The Painted Towns of Rajasthan
This book tells the story of the painted towns of Shekhawati in rural Rajasthan, India. For centuries, the painted buildings served the towns as trading houses, pleasure palaces, temples, caravansaries, and private homes. Following independence, the descendants of the merchant families left Shekhawati for India's burgeoning cities, abandoning their opulent structures. Some were left in the charge of caretakers; squatters took up residence in many; most simply remain vacant. The buildings have slowly deteriorated over time, ravaged by climate and neglect, and now lie scattered among the desert settlements as an elegiac collection of beautiful living ruins--a crumbling open-air gallery set amid the ordinary affairs of small town life. This book portrays the fascinating ruinous beauty of the painted towns, and, along the way, provides an intimate look at life and landscape on the arid fringes of Rajasthan. This world, too, is fading, and so the book's photographs, in the end, are a visual study of both place and society at the edge of time.
£27.10
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC A World History of the Seas: From Harbour to Horizon
Offering an introduction to the world’s seas as a platform for global exchange and connection, Michael North offers an impressive world history of the seas over more than 3,000 years. Exploring the challenges and dangers of the oceans that humans have struggled with for centuries, he also shows the possibilities and opportunities they have provided from antiquity to the modern day. Written to demonstrate the global connectivity of the seas, but also to highlight regional maritime power during different eras, A World History of the Seas takes sailors, merchants and migrants as the protagonists of these histories and explores how their experiences and perceptions of the seas were consolidated through trade and cultural exchange. Bringing together the various maritime historiographies of the world and underlining their unity, this book shows how the ocean has been a vital and natural space of globalization. Carrying goods, creating alliances, linking continents and conveying culture, the history of the ocean played a central role in creating our modern globalized world.
£38.66
Cornell University Press Incomplete Conquests: The Limits of Spanish Empire in the Seventeenth-Century Philippines
In Incomplete Conquests, Stephanie Joy Mawson uncovers the limitations of Spanish empire in the Philippines, unearthing histories of resistance, flight, evasion, conflict, and warfare from across the breadth of the Philippine archipelago during the seventeenth century. The Spanish colonization of the Philippines that began in 1565 has long been seen as heralding a new era of globalization, drawing together a multiethnic world of merchants, soldiers, sailors, and missionaries. Colonists sent reports back to Madrid boasting of the extraordinary number of souls converted to Christianity and the number of people paying tribute to the Spanish Crown. Such claims constructed an imagined imperial sovereignty and were not accompanied by effective consolidation of colonial control in many of the regions where conversion and tribute collection were imposed. Incomplete Conquests foregrounds the experiences of indigenous, Chinese, and Moro communities and their responses to colonial agents, weaving together stories that take into account the rich cultural and environmental diversity of this island world.
£27.90
University of British Columbia Press On the Northwest: Commercial Whaling in the Pacific Northwest, 1790-1967
On the Northwest is the first complete history of commercial whaling in the Pacific Northwest from its shadowy origins in the late 1700s to its demise in western Canada in 1967. Whaling in the eastern North Pacific represented a century and a half of exploration and exploitation which involved the entrepreneurs, merchants, politicians, and seamen of a dozen nations.The results of the whaling effort mirrored the outcome of whaling throughout the world. By exploiting the large whales without considering their finite numbers or reproductive capacity, the industry drove its prey to commercial extinction.It was the seamen themselves, however, who gave substance to the business of whaling. On the Northwest focuses on the working lives of these men: the shellbacks 'before the mast,' the colourful harpoon gunners who chased the whales from spray-soaked gun platforms, and shore-station workers who preserved the international flavour of the Pacific Northwest whaling industry until its demise only two decades ago.
£76.55
University of Massachusetts Press Stripped and Script: Loyalist Women Writers of the American Revolution
Female loyalists occupied a nearly impossible position during the American Revolution. Unlike their male counterparts, loyalist women were effectively silenced - unable to officially align themselves with either side or avoid being persecuted for their family ties. In this book, Kacy Dowd Tillman argues that women's letters and journals are the key to recovering these voices, as these private writings were used as vehicles for public engagement. Through a literary analysis of extensive correspondence by statesmen's wives, Quakers, merchants, and spies, Stripped and Script offers a new definition of loyalism that accounts for disaffection, pacifism, neutralism, and loyalism-by-association. Taking up the rhetoric of violation and rape, this archive repeatedly references the real threats rebels posed to female bodies, property, friendships, and families. Through writing, these women defended themselves against violation, in part, by writing about their personal experiences while knowing that the documents themselves may be confiscated, used against them, and circulated.
£99.94
The History Press Ltd Dazzle, Disruption and Concealment: The Science, Psychology and Art of Ship Camouflage
Many people are familiar with the term ‘dazzle design’, but what of its origins and objectives as a defensive practice at sea? And was it the only approach to the painted protection of merchant and naval vessels during the two world wars? David L. Williams examines the origins of maritime camouflage, how it was originally influenced by natural concealment as seen in living creatures and plants and was followed by the emergence of two fundamentally opposed schools of thought: reduced visibility and disruption to visual perception.Dazzle, Disruption & Concealment explores the objectives and design features of each of the various strategies advocated as forms of painted protection by looking at the scientific and artistic principles involved (the behaviour of light and the process of vision). It considers their effectiveness as a means of reducing visibility or in disturbing the comprehension of crucial target attributes (ship’s speed, distance and bearing). It also identifies the key individuals engaged in maritime camouflage development as well as the institutions set up to conduct in depth research into these practices.
£24.21
Kensington Dark Is the Night
From the bestselling chroniclers of the American West comes the second gun-blazing adventure that could only happen in Texas. Meet Cullen McCabe, a Lone Star sheriff who learned—the hard way—that there are two sure things in life . . . The great state of Texas is a land of opportunity. For outlaws. And that he’s the man to protect the good people of Texas at any cost—and put the blast on anyone who gets in his way. . .YOU ARE NOW ENTERING TEXAS. SAY YOUR PRAYERS.There are a million ways to die in the great state of Texas. And on the lawless streets of New Hope, the odds are even worse. Once the home of Comanche, the region has been up for grabs since the settlers drove off the natives. Now it’s a magnet for settlers looking for cheap land, merchants looking to exploit its resources—and outlaws looking for a place to hide in between robbing and killing. With shootouts and showdowns being a nightly occurrence, it&rs
£8.55
The History Press Ltd Ordinary Heroes: Untold Stories from the Falklands Campaign
In 1982, 8,000 miles from home, in a harsh environment and without the newest and most sophisticated equipment, the numerically inferior British Task Force defeated the Argentinian forces occupying the Falkland Islands and recaptured this far-flung outpost of what was once an empire. It was a much-needed triumph for Margaret Thatcher’s government and for Britain. Many books have been published on the Falklands War, some offering accounts from participants in it. But this is the first one only to include interviews with the ordinary seamen, marines, soldiers and airmen who achieved that victory, as well as those whose contribution is often overlooked – the merchant seaman who crewed ships taken up from trade, the NAAFI personnel who supplied the all-important treats that kept spirits up, the Hong Kong Chinese laundrymen who were aboard every warship. Published to mark the thirtieth anniversary of the conflict, this is the story of what ‘Britain’s last colonial war’ was really like.
£10.48
Bloomsbury Publishing Plc A Practical Approach to Merchandising Mathematics Revised First Edition Bundle Book Studio Access Card
£129.80
Johns Hopkins University Press True Yankees: The South Seas and the Discovery of American Identity
With American independence came the freedom to sail anywhere in the world under a new flag. During the years between the Treaty of Paris and the Treaty of Wangxi, Americans first voyaged past the Cape of Good Hope, reaching the ports of Algiers and the bazaars of Arabia, the markets of India and the beaches of Sumatra, the villages of Cochin, China, and the factories of Canton. Their South Seas voyages of commerce and discovery introduced the infant nation to the world and the world to what the Chinese, Turks, and others dubbed the "new people." Drawing on private journals, letters, ships' logs, memoirs, and newspaper accounts, Dane A. Morrison's True Yankees traces America's earliest encounters on a global stage through the exhilarating experiences of five Yankee seafarers. Merchant Samuel Shaw spent a decade scouring the marts of China and India for goods that would captivate the imaginations of his countrymen. Mariner Amasa Delano toured much of the Pacific hunting seals. Explorer Edmund Fanning circumnavigated the globe, touching at various Pacific and Indian Ocean ports of call. In 1829, twenty-year-old Harriett Low reluctantly accompanied her merchant uncle and ailing aunt to Macao, where she recorded trenchant observations of expatriate life. And sea captain Robert Bennet Forbes's last sojourn in Canton coincided with the eruption of the First Opium War. How did these bold voyagers approach and do business with the people in the region, whose physical appearance, practices, and culture seemed so strange? And how did native men and women-not to mention the European traders who were in direct competition with the Americans-regard these upstarts who had fought off British rule? The accounts of these adventurous travelers reveal how they and hundreds of other mariners and expatriates influenced the ways in which Americans defined themselves, thereby creating a genuinely brash national character-the "true Yankee." Readers who love history and stories of exploration on the high seas will devour this gripping tale.
£28.74
Getty Trust Publications Holbein: Capturing Character
Nobles, ladies, scholars, and merchants were the subjects of Hans Holbein the Younger (1497/98–1543), an inventive German artist best known for his dazzling portraits. Holbein developed his signature style in Basel and London amid a rich culture of erudition, self-definition, and love of luxury and wit before becoming court painter to Henry VIII. Accompanying the first major Holbein exhibition in the United States, this catalogue explores his vibrant visual and intellectual approach to personal identity. In addition to reproducing many of the artist's painted and drawn portraits, this volume delves into his relationship with leading intellectuals, such as Erasmus of Rotterdam and Thomas More, as well as his contributions to publishing and book culture, meticulous inscriptions, and ingenious designs for jewels, hat badges, and other exquisite objects.
£46.46
Fordham University Press Chouboli & Other Stories, Vol II
The rollicking, folk-based tales of Rajasthani writer Vijaydan Detha have been winning awards in India since the 1970s. Only recently, however, have they been available in English translation. Detha has a gift for selecting the most provocative tales he hears from his fellow villagers and re-creating them in a literary form as engaging and daring as his oral sources. In one tale a ghost uses his powers to change a woman’s sex so that she can stay married to the woman she loves. In another—re-created in film by Mani Kaul in the early 1970s as Duvidha and more recently by Bollywood director Amol Palekar as the wildly successful Paheli—a ghost falls in love with a young bride and assumes her husband’s form so convincingly even her in-laws are fooled. In the title story of this collection, a group of Bania merchants engage in battle to the death with a group of nomadic Banjaras over a misplaced fleck of straw. These stories pose riddles that fi nd new relevance across languages and eras: Who has the right to tell us whom to marry? What counts as truth when it comes to protecting someone we love? How do the epic stories we hear encourage us to repeat scenes of ethnic violence? Detha’s tales combine the local Rajasthani storytelling idiom with narrative technique from the modern short story to set a new standard for contemporary writing in India. Translator Christi A. Merrill has worked with the author and his Hindi translator Kailash Kabir to craft a style that allows these stories to come alive in English with equal inventiveness and vibrancy.
£85.13
Hachette Children's Group A Shakespeare Story: Much Ado About Nothing
A lively retelling of Shakespeare's famous work about the foolish ways people behave when they're in love. With Notes on Shakespeare and the Globe Theatre and Love and Lies in Much Ado About Nothing. The tales have been retold using accessible language and with the help of Tony Ross's engaging black-and-white illustrations, each play is vividly brought to life allowing these culturally enriching stories to be shared with as wide an audience as possible.Have you read all of The Shakespeare Stories books? Available in this series: A Midsummer Night's Dream, Macbeth, Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, Hamlet, Twelfth Night, Antony and Cleopatra, Much Ado About Nothing, The Merchant of Venice, Henry V, Julius Caesar, As You Like It, Othello, The Taming of the Shrew, Richard III, and King Lear.
£5.66
ACA Publishing Limited The Elm Tree (Volume 1): Seeds of Change
Will the newest branch of a decaying house be bent or broken by these uncertain times? It has been six years since China threw off imperial rule, yet Beijing seems largely unchanged. The city is a chaotic, roiling sea of humanity inhabited by merchants, hawkers and street urchins. In the midst of it all, Qi Yuexuan, the sole scion of a distinguished family, lives a life of indolence. But change is coming. Forces from within and without are becoming increasingly influential, while the new ideas they bring are shaking the foundations of the nation. Reappraising his entrenched values, Qi is torn between tradition and the new order. The Elm Tree paints an intimate, yet vivid picture of an extraordinary cast of characters associated with the Qi household. It documents a forgotten way of life before it was swept away by the turmoil of foreign occupation and civil war...
£18.91
Harvard Business Review Press Can China Lead?: Reaching the Limits of Power and Growth
It's time to rethink the way we think about China. In this thought-provoking book, noted China experts from Harvard Business School and the Wharton School assert that while China has experienced remarkable economic growth in recent decades (nearly 10 percent for more than thirty years), it now faces major challenges--tests that could shift the country's political and economic trajectory. A lack of accountability, transparency, and ease of operating in China--combined with growing evidence of high-level corruption--has made domestic and foreign businesspeople increasingly wary of the "China model." These issues have deep roots in Chinese history and the country's political system. Regina M. Abrami of the Wharton School and William C. Kirby and F. Warren McFarlan of Harvard Business School contend that the country's dynamic private sector could be a source of sustainable growth, but it is constrained by political favoritism toward state-owned corporations. Disruptive innovation, research, and development are limited by concerns about intellectual property protection. Most significant of all is the question of China's political future: does a system that has overseen dramatic transformations in recent years now have the capacity to transform itself? Based on a new and popular course taught by the authors at Harvard Business School, this book draws on more than thirty Harvard Business School case studies on Chinese and foreign companies doing business in the region, including Sealed Air, China Merchants Bank, China Mobile, Wanxiang Group, Microsoft, UFIDA, and others. Can China Lead? asserts that China is at an inflection point that cannot be ignored. An understanding of the forces that continue to shape its business landscape is crucial to establishing--and maintaining--a successful enterprise in China.
£28.28
Quercus Publishing The Heart of Man
After coming through the blizzard that almost cost them everything, Jens and the boy are far from home, in a fishing community at the edge of the world. Taken in by the village doctor, the boy once again has the sense of being brought back from the grave. But this is a strange place, with otherworldly inhabitants, including flame-haired Álfheiður, who makes him wonder whether it is possible to love two women at once; he had believed his heart was lost to Ragnheiður, the daughter of the wealthy merchant in the village to which he must now inexorably return. Set in the awe-inspiring wilderness of the extreme north, The Heart of Man is a profound exploration of life, love and desire, written with a sublime simplicity. In this conclusion to an audacious trilogy, Stefánsson brings a poet's eye and a philosopher's insight to a tale worthy of the sagasmiths of old.
£10.74
Penguin Books Ltd The Art of Life Admin: How To Do Less, Do It Better, and Live More
This book will give you many hours of your life back.'Timely and necessary . . . a must-read' Cal Newport, author of Digital MinimalismScheduling doctor's appointments. Planning a party. Buying a present. Filling out paperwork. These are the kind of secretarial and managerial tasks necessary to run a life and a household. Elizabeth Emens was a working mother with two young children, swamped like so many of us, when she realised that 'life admin' was consuming her. Desperate to survive and to help others along the way, she gathered favourite tips and tricks, admin confessions, and the secrets of admin-happy households.Drawing on her research and writing in a wholly original manner, she shows how admin affects our lives; how we might reduce, redistribute and even prevent it; what 'admin personalities' we might have; and how to deal with it in relationships. The Art of Life Admin teaches us all how to do less of it, and to do it better.Examples from the book:1) Find ways to make things end. For instance, try writing No Need to Reply (NNR) on texts and emails. Save others time; they might even return the favour.2) Start bypassing the to-do list when you face real-time admin requests. Email someone the information she wants while she's still standing there - so it never goes on your to-do list. 3) Spend your Admin Savings Time well. If you save yourself an hour, spend that hour doing something you really want - or need - for yourself.***'Reading The Art of Life Admin is like sitting down with a friend who knows exactly how it feels to be drowning in your To Do list, and throws you a very welcome lifeline to help you to make your way out'Brigid Schulte, author of the New York Times bestseller Overwhelmed'Every so often you come across a book that really does profoundly change how you see the world. This is just such a book - it will, by force of its own genius, reprogram your life and give you new tools for seeing things as they actually are'Tim Wu, author of The Attention Merchants'Emens maps the political, psychological and practical landscape of "admin hell" with humour and hopefulness. This intelligent, witty book will shed new light on everyone's to-do list'Dr Clare Carlisle Tresch, King's College London
£11.45
FreeLance Academy Press The Book of Historic Fashion: A Newcomer's Guide to Medieval Clothing (1300 - 1450)
The Late Middle Ages (c.1350 - 1500) provides us with many of our stock, childhood images of the 'Middle Ages': the knight in shining armour, the joust, lords and ladies dressed in rich, voluminous robes and elegant dresses. Yet it is a paradox, for at the start of the period, Europe had endured the worst pandemic of recorded history: the Black Death, the climate was rapidly cooling, causing massive crop failures and France and England were locked in the brutal, dynastic struggle of the Hundred Years War. Meanwhile, in the second half of the period, intrepid merchants became the new knighthood of Europe, seeking new wealth in Asia and Africa, and launching what has been called the 'Age of Discovery' while a new interest in Classical culture would give birth to the Renaissance. All of these elements have long intrigued and inspired writers, researchers and reenactors to take a trip through the looking glass to this lost world. In the Book of Historic Fashion: A Newcomer's Guide to Medieval Clothing (1300 - 1450), authors Allen and Mele provide a visual snap shot of the courtly elegance and common wear of the period. Filled with hundreds of sketches taken from original sources, mechanical drawings and detailed 'layer drawings' demonstrating how the clothing was worn, this entrée both introduces the period and helps newcomers find their way forward in the study of primary and secondary sources. Whether you are a teacher or professor who wants your students to understand what the clothing of the day really looked like, a costume designers working in theater, TV and film looking for visual reference or just new to medieval reenacting who wants guidance on what to wear in order to be appropriately dressed at events, this volume is for you.
£32.96
Little, Brown & Company Thermae Romae: The Complete Omnibus
When Roman architect Lucius is criticized for his outdated thermae designs, he retreatsto the local bath to collect his thoughts. All Lucius wants is to recapture the Rome ofearlier days, when one could enjoy a relaxing bath without the pressure of merchantsand roughhousing patrons. But as he slips deeper into the water, Lucius is caught inthe drainage and dragged through the bottom of the bath!He emerges amid a group of strange-looking foreigners with the most peculiarbathhouse customs...over 1,500 years in the future in modern-day Japan! Hiscontemporaries wanted him to modernize, so—borrowing the customs of thesemysterious bath-loving people—Lucius opens what quickly becomes the most popularnew bathhouse in Rome: Thermae Romae! Soak in Mari Yamazaki's fantastic story andart in this deluxe omnibus!
£64.80
Tanglewood Press Chengli and the Silk Road Caravan
Chengli is an orphaned errand boy who lives in Chang'an China in 630 A.D. His mother has died from illness and his father is presumed dead after disappearing into the desert when Chengli was a baby. Now thirteen, Chengli feels ready for independence. He is drawn to the desert, beckoned by the howling of strange winds and the hope of learning something about his father--who he was and how he died. Chengli joins the caravan to travel down the merchant route known as the Silk Road, but it is a dangerous life, as his father knew. The desert is harsh, and there are many bandits, particularly drawn to Chengli's caravan because a princess, her servants, and royal guards are traveling with them. This story invites readers to experience the sights, sounds, and smells of this fabled desert route.
£10.56
Little, Brown & Company City on the Edge
1972, Beirut, Lebanon. Young American boy Matthew lives with his mother and father, a rising foreign service attache, in an exclusive community of ex-patriots. It is the summer Matthew becomes a teenager, falls in love, nearly dies, and watches his family, and the city, fall apart.It is in this world of Western schemers and local merchants, of hoodlums and politicians, that Matthew begins to solve the mystery of who his father really is, and what role he is really playing in the upheaval that is shaking the city loose of its old, civilized and way and ushering in a new and frightening radicalism.This is the story of a boy and a family, besieged. Intimate in scope and wrenching in its vision of lost innocence, CITY ON THE EDGE is a mystery and spy story from the past, and a coming of age story for our time.
£26.28
Penguin Books Ltd The Sea is My Brother: The Lost Novel
'His first novel is a revelation ... the writing is vivid, serious and extraordinary ... wonderful' The Times The Sea is My Brother is Jack Kerouac's very first novel, begun shortly after his tour as a merchant sailor in 1942. Lost during his lifetime, it is an intense portrait of friendship and brotherhood and a meditation on the desire to escape society, following the fortunes of two men as they impulsively decide to work their passage on the S.S. Westminster: drinking, arguing, playing cards, dodging torpedoes and contemplating the vast, terrible beauty of the sea. Published with fragments of early stories and letters, this visceral work gives a unique insight into the young Kerouac and the formation of his genius. 'What's clear from this newly published first novel is that Kerouac was positively fizzing with talent at an early age' Sunday Times
£11.45
Cornell University Press The Witness and the Other World: Exotic European Travel Writing, 400–1600
Surveying exotic travel writing in Europe from late antiquity to the age of discover, The Witness and the Other World illustrates the fundamental human desire to change places, if only in the imagination. Mary B. Campbell looks at works by pilgrims, crusaders, merchants, discoverers, even armchair fantasists such as Mandeville, as well as the writings of Marco Polo, Columbus, and Walter Raleigh. According to Campbell, these travel accounts are exotic because they bear witness to alienated experiences; European travelers, while claiming to relate fact, were often passing on monstrous projections. She contends that their writing not only documented but also made possible the conquest of the peoples whom she travelers described, and she shows how travel literature contributed to the genesis of the modern novel and the modern life sciences.
£28.73