Search results for ""Author Pauline Matarasso""

Christian Bobin is one of the most prolific and best-selling inspirational writers in France. His ‘lyric essays’, neither prose nor poetry, utilise a limited vocabulary manipulated with the precision of a watchmaker. Bobin often obtains his effects through startling juxtapositions of the ordinary, aimed straight at the heart and not without the intention of drawing blood. Prevalent themes in his work include the natural world, the perspectives of the very old and the very young, and the distilled wisdom of his contemplative Catholic faith. A lifelong sufferer from ‘persuasive melancholy’, Bobin mines the narrow seam of joy and wonder in the dank rock face of depression, and writing has been the tool he has employed to chip it out. The Eighth Day comprises – in an original English translation – a superb collection of Bobin’s writings from the last 30 years. A guaranteed best-selling author in France – his books can sell up to 200,000 copies per edition – he is an inspirational writer yet to be discovered in the English-speaking world. This anthology is designed to introduce him to a new readership, and includes fresh introductions to each chapter by translator and compiler Pauline Matarasso.

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'Whoever listens to a witness, becomes a witness.' – Elie Wiesel When Nazi occupiers arrived in Greece in 1941, it was the beginning of a horror that would reverberate through generations. In the city of Salonica (Thessaloniki), almost 50,000 Jews were sent to Nazi concentration camps during the war, and only 2,000 returned. A Jewish doctor named Isaac Matarasso and his son escaped imprisonment and torture at the hands of the Nazis and joined the resistance. After the city’s liberation they returned to rebuild Salonica and, along with the other survivors, to grapple with the near-total destruction of their community. Isaac was a witness to his Jewish community’s devastation, and the tangled aftermath of grief, guilt and grace as survivors returned home. Talking Until Nightfall presents his account of the tragedy and his moving tribute to the living and the dead. His story is woven together with his son Robert’s memories of being a frightened teenager spared by a twist of fate, with an afterword by his grandson Francois that looks back on the survivors’ stories and his family’s place in history. This slim, wrenching account of loss, survival, and the strength of the human spirit will captivate readers and ensure the Jews of Salonica are never forgotten.

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