Search results for ""Author David Wood""

Habit rules our lives. And yet climate change and the catastrophic future it portends, makes it clear that we cannot go on like this. Our habits are integral to narratives of the good life, to social norms and expectations, as well as to economic reality. Such shared shapes are vital. Yet while many of our individual habits seem perfectly reasonable, when aggregated together they spell disaster. Beyond consumerism, other forms of life and patterns of dwelling are clearly possible. But how can we get there from here? Who precisely is the ‘we’ that our habits have created, and who else might we be? Philosophy is about emancipation—from illusions, myths, and oppression. In Reoccupy Earth, the noted philosopher David Wood shows how an approach to philosophy attuned to our ecological existence can suspend the taken-for-granted and open up alternative forms of earthly dwelling. Sharing the earth, as we do, raises fundamental questions about space and time, place and history, territory and embodiment—questions that philosophy cannot directly answer but can help us to frame and to work out for ourselves. Deconstruction exposes all manner of exclusion, violence to the other, and silent subordination. Phenomenology and Whitehead’s process philosophy offer further resources for an ecological imagination. Bringing an uncommon lucidity, directness, and even practicality to sophisticated philosophical questions, Wood plots experiential pathways that disrupt our habitual existence and challenge our everyday complacency. In walking us through a range of reversals, transformations, and estrangements that thinking ecologically demands of us, Wood shows how living responsibly with the earth means affirming the ways in which we are vulnerable, receptive, and dependent, and the need for solidarity all round. If we take seriously values like truth, justice, and compassion we must be willing to contemplate that the threat we pose to the earth might demand our own species’ demise. Yet we have the capacity to live responsibly. In an unfashionable but spirited defense of an enlightened anthropocentrism, Wood argues that to deserve the privileges of Reason we must demonstrably deploy it through collective sustainable agency. Only in this way can we reinhabit the earth.

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“What a treat. An all-star cast with one thing in common: they worked with David Wood. And just for us he’s brought them to life again – and so vividly – in this irresistible memoir of his ‘brushes with Hollywood'." Gyles Brandreth In this memoir, actor and writer David Wood recalls his ‘brushes with Hollywood’, notably being kissed on the lips by Elizabeth Taylor as midnight struck on his 22nd birthday; playing Richard Burton’s servant on stage in Dr Faustus; being seduced by Shelley Winters in The Vamp, a television two-hander play; hanging upside down from a chandelier and being rescued by David Hemmings in the West End musical Jeeves; singing songs and being shot down in flames as a Royal Flying Corps officer in the film Aces High, in which he was reunited with Malcolm McDowell (his fellow rebel schoolboy in the film If….) and acted alongside Christopher Plummer and Simon Ward; sharing the screen at sea in an oil rig supply vessel with Roger Moore, Anthony Perkins and James Mason in North Sea Hijack; penning the daytime Emmy-nominated Back Home, starring Hayley Mills, thereby becoming a Disney-approved writer; and writing The Queen’s Handbag to celebrate the Queen’s 80th birthday, performed in Buckingham Palace Gardens and seen live by 8,000,000 BBC TV viewers. "I couldn’t put it down. It has all the charm and warmth and wit that is David Wood and his lifelong passion for the theatre is inspiring. I loved it." Hayley Mills

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“That tree has a history. In the old days people called it the See-Saw Tree. One of its branches grew straight out, near to the ground. Children used to balance a plank over the branch and use it as a see-saw. The villagers loved that oak. And the See-Saw Tree was itself like a village. A living community of animals, birds and insects, going about their daily business. It still is. Just imagine how that community will feel should it be threatened. Just imagine what might happen if any of the Council’s plans went ahead and they cut down that oak tree, that special oak tree. Just imagine, just imagine …” So says young eco-activist Elizabeth Green in her passionate speech against the felling of an ancient oak tree to make way for a new supermarket and children’s play area. She imagines the situation from the point of view of the creatures who live on and around the tree, who, thanks to the corporate greed of human beings, are now in danger of losing their much-loved home. The daily lives of tree residents, Owl, Squirrel, Mistlethrush, Dunnock and Bat, along with visitors Jay and Cuckoo, and Rabbit, whose burrow is nearby, are thrown into turmoil by the arrival of the Big Ones, the chainsaw-wielding human agents of destruction. Can the creatures beat the impossible odds and save their home – the See-Saw Tree?

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Collected essays by a leading philosopher situating the question of the animal in the broader context of a relational ontology There is a revolution under way in our thinking about animals and, indeed, life in general, particularly in the West. The very words man, animal, and life have turned into flimsy conceptual husks—impediments to thinking about the issues in which they are embroiled. David Wood was a founding member of the early 1970s Oxford Group of philosophers promoting animal rights; he also directed Ecology Action (UK). Thinking Plant Animal Human is the first collection of this major philosopher’s influential essays on “animals,” bringing together his many discussions of nonhuman life, including the classic “Thinking with Cats.”Exploring our connections with cats, goats, and sand crabs, Thinking Plant Animal Human introduces the idea of “kinnibalism” (the eating of mammals is eating our own kin), reflects on the idea of homo sapiens, and explores the place of animals both in art and in children’s stories. Finally, and with a special focus on trees, the book delves into remarkable contemporary efforts to rescue plants from philosophical neglect and to rethink and reevaluate their status. Repeatedly bubbling to the surface is the remarkable strangeness of other forms of life, a strangeness that extends to the human. Wood shows that the best way of resisting simplistic classification is to attend to our manifold relationships with other living beings. It is not anthropocentric to focus on such relationships; they cast light in complex ways on the living communities of which we are part, and exploring them recoils profoundly on our understanding of ourselves.

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Collected essays by a leading philosopher situating the question of the animal in the broader context of a relational ontology There is a revolution under way in our thinking about animals and, indeed, life in general, particularly in the West. The very words man, animal, and life have turned into flimsy conceptual husks—impediments to thinking about the issues in which they are embroiled. David Wood was a founding member of the early 1970s Oxford Group of philosophers promoting animal rights; he also directed Ecology Action (UK). Thinking Plant Animal Human is the first collection of this major philosopher’s influential essays on “animals,” bringing together his many discussions of nonhuman life, including the classic “Thinking with Cats.”Exploring our connections with cats, goats, and sand crabs, Thinking Plant Animal Human introduces the idea of “kinnibalism” (the eating of mammals is eating our own kin), reflects on the idea of homo sapiens, and explores the place of animals both in art and in children’s stories. Finally, and with a special focus on trees, the book delves into remarkable contemporary efforts to rescue plants from philosophical neglect and to rethink and reevaluate their status. Repeatedly bubbling to the surface is the remarkable strangeness of other forms of life, a strangeness that extends to the human. Wood shows that the best way of resisting simplistic classification is to attend to our manifold relationships with other living beings. It is not anthropocentric to focus on such relationships; they cast light in complex ways on the living communities of which we are part, and exploring them recoils profoundly on our understanding of ourselves.

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Alfredo Bryce Echenique is one of the most widely-read and most widely translated Latin American authors of recent decades, yet this is the first critical edition that makes his work available to students of Hispanic literatures in the English-speaking world. Combining humour and informal language to explore adolescence in middle-class Peru, this edition provides ready points of engagement for young (and not-so-young) adults. The stories and main themes are explained and analysed through a critical introduction, comprehensive notes and vocabulary prepared by one of the leading international scholars of the author’s work.Huerto cerrado offers an ideal point of entry to many of the key issues of contemporary Latin American literature, such as the concern with youth and popular culture, issues relating to sexuality, and challenges to dominant social and political structures. This edition offers insights not only into contemporary Peru and the relationship between that country’s society and its literature, but also the work of one of the continent’s outstanding literary voices.

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Jacques Derrida's prolific output has been the delight (and sometimes the despair) of philosophers and literary theorists for over twenty years. His influence on the way we read theoretical texts continues to be profound. No serious contemporary thinker can fail to come to terms with deconstruction and there have been a number of monographs devoted to his work. Very few, however, have combined a critical edge with a detailed knowledge of his writing. The contributors to this volume were each asked - in the most positive sense - to take just such a critical approach. There are substantive papers by Jean-Luc Nancy, Manfred Frank, John Sallis, Robert Bernasconi, Irene Harvey, Michel Haar, Christopher Norris, Geoff Bennington, John Llewelyn and an introduction by David Wood.

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"Head First Object Oriented Analysis and Design" is a refreshing look at subject of OOAD. What sets this book apart is its focus on learning. The authors have made the content of OOAD accessible, usable for the practitioner." - Ivar Jacobson, Ivar Jacobson Consulting. "I just finished reading "HF OOA&D" and I loved it! The thing I liked most about this book was its focus on why we do OOA&D - to write great software!" - Kyle Brown, Distinguished Engineer, IBM. "Hidden behind the funny pictures and crazy fonts is a serious, intelligent, extremely well-crafted presentation of OO Analysis and Design. As I read the book, I felt like I was looking over the shoulder of an expert designer who was explaining to me what issues were important at each step, and why." - Edward Sciore, Associate Professor, Computer Science Department, Boston College. Tired of reading Object Oriented Analysis and Design books that only makes sense after you're an expert? You've heard OOA&D can help you write great software every time-software that makes your boss happy, your customers satisfied and gives you more time to do what makes you happy. But how? "Head First Object-Oriented Analysis & Design" shows you how to analyze, design, and write serious object-oriented software: software that's easy to reuse, maintain, and extend; software that doesn't hurt your head; software that lets you add new features without breaking the old ones. Inside you will learn how to: use OO principles like encapsulation and delegation to build applications that are flexible; apply the Open-Closed Principle (OCP) and the Single Responsibility Principle (SRP) to promote reuse of your code; leverage the power of design patterns to solve your problems more efficiently; and, use UML, use cases, and diagrams to ensure that all stakeholders are communicating clearly to help you deliver the right software that meets everyone's needs. By exploiting how your brain works, "Head First OOA&D" compresses the time it takes to learn and retain complex information. Expect to have fun, expect to learn, expect to be writing great software consistently by the time you're finished reading this!

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Habit rules our lives. And yet climate change and the catastrophic future it portends, makes it clear that we cannot go on like this. Our habits are integral to narratives of the good life, to social norms and expectations, as well as to economic reality. Such shared shapes are vital. Yet while many of our individual habits seem perfectly reasonable, when aggregated together they spell disaster. Beyond consumerism, other forms of life and patterns of dwelling are clearly possible. But how can we get there from here? Who precisely is the ‘we’ that our habits have created, and who else might we be? Philosophy is about emancipation—from illusions, myths, and oppression. In Reoccupy Earth, the noted philosopher David Wood shows how an approach to philosophy attuned to our ecological existence can suspend the taken-for-granted and open up alternative forms of earthly dwelling. Sharing the earth, as we do, raises fundamental questions about space and time, place and history, territory and embodiment—questions that philosophy cannot directly answer but can help us to frame and to work out for ourselves. Deconstruction exposes all manner of exclusion, violence to the other, and silent subordination. Phenomenology and Whitehead’s process philosophy offer further resources for an ecological imagination. Bringing an uncommon lucidity, directness, and even practicality to sophisticated philosophical questions, Wood plots experiential pathways that disrupt our habitual existence and challenge our everyday complacency. In walking us through a range of reversals, transformations, and estrangements that thinking ecologically demands of us, Wood shows how living responsibly with the earth means affirming the ways in which we are vulnerable, receptive, and dependent, and the need for solidarity all round. If we take seriously values like truth, justice, and compassion we must be willing to contemplate that the threat we pose to the earth might demand our own species’ demise. Yet we have the capacity to live responsibly. In an unfashionable but spirited defense of an enlightened anthropocentrism, Wood argues that to deserve the privileges of Reason we must demonstrably deploy it through collective sustainable agency. Only in this way can we reinhabit the earth.

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In Thinking After Heidegger, David Wood takes up the challenge posed by Heidegger - that after the end of philosophy we need to learn to think. But what if we read Heidegger with the same respectful irreverence that he brought to reading the Greeks, Kant, Hegel, Husserl and the others? For Wood, it is Derrida's engagements with Heidegger that set the standard here – enacting a repetition through transformation and displacement. But Wood is not content to crown the new king. Instead he sets up a many-sided conversation between Heidegger, Hegel, Adorno, Nietzsche, Blanchot, Kierkegaard, Derrida and others. Derrida and deconstruction are first critically addressed and then drawn into the fundamental project of philosophical renewal, or renewal as philosophy. The book begins by rewriting Heidegger's inaugural lecture, 'What is Metaphysics?' and ends with an extended analysis of the performativity of his extraordinary Beitrage. Thinking after Heidegger will be a valuable text for scholars and students of contemporary philosophy, literature and cultural studies.

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This is the second edition of a textbook that has met with enthusiastic acclaim since its publication in 1988. It explores in detail theories and discussions of how children think and learn. It also looks at the practical implications of research and acknowledges some of the difficult problems teachers face when trying to put theory and research into practice in the classroom. Discusses important new research in developmental psychology that has taken place since the first edition was published in 1988 Provides an excellent resource for both psychology students and educationalists Includes substantially revised chapters on mathematics and classroom education

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This book proposes a new Ethics of Political Commemoration adapted from the Just War tradition, reflecting that remembrance is often conducted with political – and even coercive – intent. With its Ius ad Memoriam (what to commemorate) and Ius in Memoria (how to commemorate) criteria, the framework looks to guide debates that are currently inchoate so that remembrance of the past can transform relationships in the present and build a shared future. Offering a moral argument with memorable illustrations, Gutbrod and Wood draw on experiences from Armenia, Georgia, Ireland, Lebanon, and Libya, while connecting to mainstream debates in Western Europe and the United States. Bringing together an ethical tradition with the practice of conflict transformation, the framework fuses two perspectives that enrich each other. The book, in providing a first systematic presentation of the ethics, seeks to engage citizens and scholars, and help those who work to transform conflicts.

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Recent discussions in the philosophy of religion, ethics, and personal political philosophy have been deeply marked by the influence of two philosophers who are often thought to be in opposition to each other, Søren Kierkegaard and Emmanuel Levinas. Devoted expressly to the relationship between Levinas and Kierkegaard, this volume sets forth a more rigorous comparison and sustained engagement between them. Established and newer scholars representing varied philosophical traditions bring these two thinkers into dialogue in 12 sparkling essays. They consider similarities and differences in how each elaborated a unique philosophy of religion, and they present themes such as time, obligation, love, politics, God, transcendence, and subjectivity. This conversation between neighbors is certain to inspire further inquiry and ignite philosophical debate.

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Collins Arabic Big Cat is a guided reading series for ages 3 to 11. The series is structured with reference to the learning progression of Arabic at nursery and primary schools researched especially for Collins. This carefully graded approach allows children to build up their reading knowledge of Arabic step by step. Level 15 books provide more complex plots and longer chapters to help develop reading stamina and to help develop sustained engagement with texts. Level 15 books use a wide range of language structures to reflect progression in the teaching of Arabic grammar. Paragraphs and other text devices become more evident in these longer books. When the Three Bears leave their house for a walk, a young girl named Budoor appears and is drawn in to the house by the smell of hot porridge. But what happens when the bears return and find their porridge is gone? This fun rhyming play by the “national children’s dramatist” David Wood is wonderfully illustrated by Tom Percival and creatively adapted into Arabic rhyme for this edition. Pages 30 and 31 present a radio interview with the Three Bears, exploring their thoughtstowards the events of the play.

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A guidebook to 41 graded walks and scrambles in the Anti-Atlas mountains. Exploring the dramatic scenery of southern Morocco, the walks are suitable for confident walkers and scramblers with good navigation skills. Walks range from 3 to 40km (2–25 miles), taking between 1hr to 2 days to walk. The scrambles are graded from 1 to 3+ allowing you to choose routes suitable for your ability. A 1-week 110km (68 mile) long-distance trek from Ait Baha to Ait Mansour across the north-west Anti-Atlas is also described. 1:50,000 maps are included for each walk and topos for scrambling routes GPX files available to download Detailed information on planning, facilities and accommodation Highlights include Jebel El Kest.

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The Internet's "killer app" is not the World Wide Web or Push technologies: it is humble electronic mail. More people use email than any other Internet application. As the number of email users swells, and as email takes on an ever greater role in personal and business communication, Internet mail protocols have become not just an enabling technology for messaging, but a programming interface on top of which core applications are built. Programming Internet Email unmasks the Internet Mail System and shows how a loose federation of connected networks have combined to form the world's largest and most heavily trafficked message system. Programming Internet Email tames the Internet's most popular messaging service. For programmers building applications on top of email capabilities, and power users trying to get under the hood of their own email systems, Programming Internet Email stands out as an essential guide and reference book. In typical O'Reilly fashion, Programming Internet Email covers the topic with nineteen tightly written chapters and five useful appendixes. Following a thorough introduction to the Internet Mail System, the book is divided into five parts: Part I covers email formats, from basic text messages to the guts of MIME. Secure email message formats (OpenPGP and S/MIME), mailbox formats and other commonly used formats are detailed in this reference section. Part II describes Internet email protocols: SMTP and ESMTP, POP3 and IMAP4. Each protocol is covered in detail to expose the Internet Mail System's inner workings. Part III provides a solid API reference for programmers working in Perl and Java. Class references are given for commonly used Perl modules that relate to email and the Java Mail API. Part IV provides clear and concise examples of how to incorporate email capabilities into your applications. Examples are given in both Perl and Java. Part V covers the future of email on the Internet. Means and methods for controlling spam email and newly proposed Internet mail protocols are discussed. Appendixes to Programming Internet Email provide a host of explanatory information and useful references for the programmer and avid user alike, including a comprehensive list of Internet RFCs relating to email, MIME types and a list of email related URLs. Programming Internet Email will answer all of your questions about mail and extend your abilities into this most popular messaging frontier.

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The new geological epoch we call the Anthropocene is not just a scientific classification. It marks a radical transformation in the background conditions of life on Earth, one taken for granted by much of who we are and what we hope for. Never before has a species possessed both a geological-scale grasp of the history of the Earth and a sober understanding of its own likely fate. Our situation forces us to confront questions both philosophical and of real practical urgency. We need to rethink who “we” are, what agency means today, how to deal with the passions stirred by our circumstances, whether our manner of dwelling on Earth is open to change, and, ultimately, “What is to be done?” Our future, that of our species, and of all the fellow travelers on the planet depend on it. The real-world consequences of climate change bring new significance to some very traditional philosophical questions about reason, agency, responsibility, community, and man’s place in nature. The focus is shifting from imagining and promoting the “good life” to the survival of the species. Deep Time, Dark Times challenges us to reimagine ourselves as a species, taking on a geological consciousness. Drawing promiscuously on the work of Nietzsche, Heidegger, Foucault, Derrida, Deleuze, and other contemporary French thinkers, as well as the science of climate change, David Wood reflects on the historical series of displacements and de-centerings of both the privilege of the Earth, and of the human, from Copernicus through Darwin and Freud to the declaration of the age of the Anthropocene. He argues for the need to develop a new temporal phronesis and to radically rethink who “we” are in respect to solidarity with other humans, and responsibility for the nonhuman stakeholders with which we share the planet. In these brief, lively chapters, Wood poses a range of questions centered on our individual and collective political agency. Might not human exceptionalism be reborn as a sort of hyperbolic responsibility rather than privilege?

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Global attention to biodiversity has expanded in the past decade. Agricultural biodiversity is the most important part of biodiversity for human survival, yet has been neglected as a topic. This book provides a broad review of current thinking on agrobiodiversity - what it is, how it is conserved, and how it can be better utilized in sustainable farming. It brings together contributions from a wide geographical and disciplinary background. Emphasis is placed on functional interactions between components of agrobiodiversity in a range of farming systems, illustrated by many case studies. The book relates the evolution of agrobiodiversity and its successful management to the broader environment and to the growing need to conserve biodiversity in productive agricultural systems. It is essential reading for ecologists, biologists and agricultural scientists.

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Is death inevitable? Until now, the history of mankind has been marked by this fatal fact. Religions, borders and progress are born from an ancient fear of death, comfort from this fear man often found only in religious paradigms. But according to José Luis Cordeiro and David Wood, the incontrovertible fact of death is no longer an absolute certainty - science and technology are preparing to tear down the final frontier: that of immortality.This accessible book provides insight into recent exponential advances in artificial intelligence, tissue regeneration, stem cell treatment, organ printing, cryopreservation, and genetic therapies that, for the first time in human history, offer a realistic chance to solve the problem of the aging of the human body. In this book, Cordeiro and Wood not only present all the major developments, initiatives, and ideas for eternal life, they also show why there are a number of good arguments for seeing death for what it is: the last undefeated disease.Enter any drugstore or bookstore, and we confronted with a mountain of nonsense concerning the aging process. Society seems obsessed with aging. That is why The Death of Death is such a refreshing delight, able to cut through the hype and reveal a balanced, authoritative, and lucid discussion of this controversial topic. It summarizes the astonishing breakthroughs made recently in revealing how science may one day conquer the aging process.Michio Kaku, theoretical physicist and author of The God Equation: The Quest for a Theory of Everything We are entering a Fantastic Voyage into life extension, crossing different bridges that will take us to indefinite life spans. The Death of Death explains clearly how we might soon reach longevity escape velocity and live long enough to live forever. Ray Kurzweil, co-author of Fantastic Voyage: Live Long Enough to Live Forever and co-founder of Singularity University The Death of Death is a truly revolutionary book. This is a visionary book that confronts us with the terrible reality of aging, and its authors are friends and connoisseurs of the subject. I believe that the authoritative and exhaustive description of this crusade that José and David make in this excellent book will accelerate this process. Forward! Aubrey de Grey, founder of LEV (Longevity Escape Velocity) Foundation and co-author of Ending Aging

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Which one of your classmates is most like horrible Mr Twit by Roald Dahl?Children will have a splendiferous time - and their friends won't believe their gogglers!Roald Dahl, the best-loved of children's writers, was born in Wales of Norwegian parents. His books continue to be bestsellers, despite his death in 1990, and worldwide booksales are over 100 million!

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THE WITCHES by Roald Dahl adapted for school plays. Dare you take on the role of the Grand High Witch?Children will have a splendiferous time - and their friends won't believe their gogglers!Roald Dahl, the best-loved of children's writers, was born in Wales of Norwegian parents. His books continue to be bestsellers, despite his death in 1990, and worldwide booksales are over 100 million!

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Looking for a whizzpoppingly wonderful collection of plays for your whole class? Want some ready-made, delumptious lesson plans to accompany them? Biffsquiggled at the thought of how to stage these pieces? Well, look no further because this is a scrumdiddlyumptious selection of David Wood's plays; paired with all the information and materials you need to use them in class or on stage, edited by Paul Bateson, an experienced primary-level drama teacher. The plays create worlds that trigger children's imaginations as well as entertain them, make them think as well as make them laugh, and open their minds to new ideas and the power of storytelling through theatre. Plays included are: The Gingerbread Man The See-Saw Tree The BFG Save the Human Mother Goose's Golden Christmas This book also contains a new foreword by David Wood.

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Setting the stage with a selection of readings from important nineteenth century philosophers, this reader on truth puts in conversation some of the main philosophical figures from the twentieth century in the analytic, continental, and pragmatist traditions. Focuses on the value or normativity of truth through exposing the dialogues between different schools of thought Features philosophical figures from the twentieth century in the analytic, continental, and pragmatist traditions Topics addressed include the normative relation between truth and subjectivity, consensus, art, testimony, power, and critique Includes essays by Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, James, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty, Wittgenstein, Levinas, Arendt, Foucault, Rorty, Davidson, Habermas, Derrida, and many others

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Build your child’s reading confidence at home with books at the right level Cinderella is tired of a life of chores, but everything changes when her fairy godmother turns up. Just as she meets her perfect prince, though, the clock chimes twelve and she has to run. Will this hilarious retelling of the traditional fairytale, as a play by “the nation’s dramatist” David Wood, end happily ever after? White/Band 10 books have more complex sentences and figurative language. Text type: A playscript of a traditional story. A newspaper article of the palace ball on pages 30 and 31 helps children to recap the main events of the story. Curriculum links: Citizenship: Taking part – developing skills of communication and participation; Music: Play it again – exploring rhythmic patterns. This book has been quizzed for Accelerated Reader.

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Described by The Times as 'the national children's dramatist', David Wood has been writing, adapting, directing and acting in plays for children for more than twenty-five years. His best known work, from his play The Gingerbread Man to his adaptations of Roald Dahl's The BFG and The Witches have enjoyed national and international professional success and entered the repertory of amateur companies and school dramatic societies. Now David has written the definitive book on theatre for children. He analyses the skills involved in entertaining audiences of children everywhere and reveals his special techniques for catching and holding a child's attention. This practical, step-by-step comprehensive guide is essential reading for professionals and amateurs alike, and anyone wanting to be involved in theatre for children.

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Eco-Deconstruction marks a new approach to the degradation of the natural environment, including habitat loss, species extinction, and climate change. While the work of French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1930–2004), with its relentless interrogation of the anthropocentric metaphysics of presence, has already proven highly influential in posthumanism and animal studies, the present volume, drawing on published and unpublished work by Derrida and others, builds on these insights to address the most pressing environmental issues of our time. The volume brings together fifteen prominent scholars, from a wide variety of related fields, including eco-phenomenology, eco-hermeneutics, new materialism, posthumanism, animal studies, vegetal philosophy, science and technology studies, environmental humanities, eco-criticism, earth art and aesthetics, and analytic environmental ethics. Overall, eco-deconstruction offers an account of differential relationality explored in a non-totalizable ecological context that addresses our times in both an ontological and a normative register. The book is divided into four sections. “Diagnosing the Present” suggests that our times are marked by a facile, flattened-out understanding of time and thus in need of deconstructive dispositions. “Ecologies” mobilizes the spectral ontology of deconstruction to argue for an originary environmentality, the constitutive ecological embeddedness of mortal life. “Nuclear and Other Biodegradabilities,” examines remains, including such by-products and disintegrations of human culture as nuclear waste, environmental destruction, and species extinctions. “Environmental Ethics” seeks to uncover a demand for justice, including human responsibility for suffering beings, that emerges precisely as a response to original differentiation and the mortality and unmasterable alterity it installs in living beings. As such, the book will resonate with readers not only of philosophy, but across the humanities and the social and natural sciences.

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DANNY THE CHAMPION OF THE WORLD by Roald Dahl - brilliantly adapted into a stage play for children to perform in schools. Could you be Danny, or his dad, or even red-faced Mr Victor Hazell? Danny thinks his dad is the most marvellous and exciting father a boy could wish for. Now you can join in their daring and devilish plots with these fun-to-perform plays adapted by David Wood.David Wood is very well known in children's theatre (most recently for Goodnight Mister Tom).Roald Dahl, the best-loved of children's writers, was born in Wales of Norwegian parents. His books continue to be bestsellers, despite his death in 1990, and worldwide book sales are over 100 million!

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Agrobiodiversity provides most of our food through our interaction with crops and domestic animals. Future global food security is firmly anchored in sound, science-based management of agrobiodiversity. This book presents key concepts of agrobiodiversity management, critically reviewing important current and emerging issues including agricultural development, crop introduction, practical diversity in farming systems, impact of modern crop varieties and GM crops, conservation, climate change, food sovereignty and policies. It also addresses claims and misinformation in the subject based on sound scientific principles.

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Eco-Deconstruction marks a new approach to the degradation of the natural environment, including habitat loss, species extinction, and climate change. While the work of French philosopher Jacques Derrida (1930–2004), with its relentless interrogation of the anthropocentric metaphysics of presence, has already proven highly influential in posthumanism and animal studies, the present volume, drawing on published and unpublished work by Derrida and others, builds on these insights to address the most pressing environmental issues of our time. The volume brings together fifteen prominent scholars, from a wide variety of related fields, including eco-phenomenology, eco-hermeneutics, new materialism, posthumanism, animal studies, vegetal philosophy, science and technology studies, environmental humanities, eco-criticism, earth art and aesthetics, and analytic environmental ethics. Overall, eco-deconstruction offers an account of differential relationality explored in a non-totalizable ecological context that addresses our times in both an ontological and a normative register. The book is divided into four sections. “Diagnosing the Present” suggests that our times are marked by a facile, flattened-out understanding of time and thus in need of deconstructive dispositions. “Ecologies” mobilizes the spectral ontology of deconstruction to argue for an originary environmentality, the constitutive ecological embeddedness of mortal life. “Nuclear and Other Biodegradabilities,” examines remains, including such by-products and disintegrations of human culture as nuclear waste, environmental destruction, and species extinctions. “Environmental Ethics” seeks to uncover a demand for justice, including human responsibility for suffering beings, that emerges precisely as a response to original differentiation and the mortality and unmasterable alterity it installs in living beings. As such, the book will resonate with readers not only of philosophy, but across the humanities and the social and natural sciences.

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Broadcast to mark the 3000th programme of the much-loved children's series Jackanory, The Hobbit was transmitted over two weeks and 10 episodes in 1979. It told the gripping story of Bilbo Baggins and his band of dwarves, who are on a quest for the treasure guarded by the fearsome dragon Smaug. As he leaves his cosy hobbit-hole and travels into the wild, Bilbo's adventures begin. On his journey, he will encounter trolls, goblins, elves and giant spiders - as well as a mysterious and magical ring and a strange, sinister creature named Gollum... Read by Bernard Cribbins, Jan Francis, Maurice Denham and David Wood, this rare audio soundtrack is sure to offer a treat for all fans of J. R. R. Tolkien.2 CDs. 2 hrs 28 mins.

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Between 1959 and 2005, David Wood (‘the national children’s dramatist’) corresponded with his mentor, Frank Whitbourn, teacher, writer and theatre practitioner. Frank Exchanges opens with a letter from Whitbourn, praising a young Wood following a performance in one of his plays, and documents an almost fifty-year correspondence before Whitbourn’s death in 2005. Wood sent Whitbourn the first draft of every play he wrote, and Whitbourn commented constructively and often came to see and ‘review’ the plays in production. The letters chronicle Wood’s development as a playwright, director and producer, and Whitbourn’s memories of pre-war theatre-going and meeting Sybil Thorndike, Harcourt Williams and other eminent theatre folk. It is a reflection on the provision, content and status of theatre for young audiences, and ultimately a testimony to the man who Wood considered a friend and mentor.

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Build your child’s reading confidence at home with books at the right level When the Three Bears leave their house for a walk, a young girl named Goldilocks appears and is drawn in to the house by the smell of hot porridge. But what happens when the bears return and find their porridge is gone? This fun rhyming play by the ‘national children’s dramatist’ David Wood is wonderfully illustrated by Tom Percival. This is a Band 11/Lime book in the Collins Big Cat reading programme which has longer sentence structures and a greater use of literary language. This story is a playscript of a traditional tale, and pages 30 and 31 present a radio interview with the Three Bears which explores their thoughts towards the events of the play. This book supports literacy as well as learning about dialogue and plays. This book has been quizzed for Accelerated Reader. For more guided reading books in this Collins Big Cat band, try Oliver (9780007462094) written by Hilary McKay and illustrated by Rupert Van Wyk.

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