A Happy Half-Century, And Other Essays
A rediscovered delight for lovers of graceful thought and sharp observation A Happy Half-Century arrives renewed. Agnes Repplier s signature wit and moral intelligence guide readers through a life quietly lived but richly observed in this classic essays collection that spans personal memoir, literary criticism, and cultural reflection. Across essays that range from intimate memoir to probing literary criticism essays, Repplier one of America s finest American essayists explores literature and society with clarity, warmth, and ironic charm. You ll find reflective writing on 19th century literature, keen historical essays, and insightful essays on art, manners, and the everyday surprises of a long life. Her voice balances erudition and accessibility, making each piece both instructive and deeply human. This edition from Alpha Editions restores A Happy Half-Century, And Other Essays after decades out of print. Carefully edited and faithfully reproduced, it s been restored for today s and future generations not merely a reprint but a collector s item and cultural treasure for both casual readers and classic literature collectors. Whether you seek timeless essays for quiet reflection or authoritative cultural commentary for study, this volume is an essential addition to any shelf. Perfect for fans of literary history and anyone drawn to thoughtful cultural criticism, this book reintroduces Agnes Repplier essays that shaped American letters and continues to illuminate the relationship between life, literature, and society.
The Illustrated London Reading Book
A city of stories waits inside these pages The Illustrated London Reading Book returns to life, remodeled for modern readers and collectors alike. This Victorian literature collection gathers vivid extracts, essays, poems and scenes that capture London s streets, people, and history. Designed originally as an educational reading book, the anthology offers timeless English prose and 19th-century illustrations that bring Victorian London to the page: bustling markets, quiet squares, and the social tapestry of an era. Selections range from lyrical snapshots to instructive passages, making it ideal for classrooms, lovers of classic English readings, and those who treasure vintage reading material. More than a simple reprint, Alpha Editions presents a restored edition of this London historical anthology out of print for decades and carefully prepared for today s and future generations. Enhanced for clarity while honoring original typography and artwork, this collector s item sits at the intersection of public domain literature and a renewed cultural treasure. It s a must for anyone building a diverse authors collection or exploring the literary history of London. Whether you re a casual reader seeking evocative scenes of the city, a student of English literature classics, or a collector of rare vintage reading material, this edition brings historical resonance and educational value to your shelf. Discover the charm of classic English readings in a beautifully restored volume that celebrates the enduring spirit of London.
An Introduction To The Study Of Robert Browning'S Poetry
Hook: Rediscover the magnetic complexity of Robert Browning decoded, celebrated, and reissued for a new age. An Introduction to the Study of Robert Browning s Poetry is a lucid, passionate guide that leads readers into Browning s dramatic monologues, psychological insight, and daring Victorian poetry techniques. This classic study distills the essentials of Browning s poetic methods his narrative voice, meter, irony, and character psychology offering clear literary analysis of Browning for both newcomers and seasoned scholars. You ll find concise explanations of Browning s major themes, close readings that illuminate his most famous poems, and a roadmap to understanding Browning s work within the 19th-century poets landscape. Historically significant and long neglected, this volume has been out of print for decades and is now republished by Alpha Editions. Carefully restored for today s and future generations, this edition goes beyond a simple reprint: it s a collector s item and a cultural treasure that preserves an indispensable voice in the study of Robert Browning. Whether you re seeking a practical Browning poetry guide, a rigorous Robert Browning poetry analysis, or an engaging introduction to Browning s poetry, this book blends readable warmth with serious scholarship. Perfect for casual readers intrigued by Browning s dramatic monologues and for collectors of Victorian poetry and literary analysis of Browning, this edition is your doorway to deeper appreciation a definitive Robert Browning book for every bookshelf. Keywords: Robert Browning poetry analysis, study of Robert Browning, Victorian poetry, Browning's poetic techniques.
In The Dozy Hours, And Other Papers
A sparkling companion for late-night thought: Agnes Repplier s keen mind and wry compassion light up every page of this revived essay collection. In The Dozy Hours, and Other Papers gathers Repplier s finest Victorian essays and reflective writing short, luminous pieces that move with the ease of conversation and the authority of close reading. Across memoir, cultural commentary, historical essays, and literary criticism, Repplier examines books, manners, education, travel, and the small moral puzzles of everyday life. Her voice is at once witty and wise, pairing precise observation with playful epigram making each essay a miniature classic of 19th-century literature and women s literature alike. This edition, republished by Alpha Editions, restores a title that had been out of print for decades. Carefully edited and refreshed for today s readers, it preserves the original charm while making the text accessible for modern audiences and future generations. More than a reprint, this volume is presented as a collector s item and a cultural treasure: ideal for casual readers discovering classic non-fiction, scholars of literary analysis, and collectors of timeless essays. Perfect for fans of essay collections and anyone who loves thoughtful, elegantly phrased cultural commentary, this book reclaims Repplier s place in the canon of reflective writing. Rediscover a subtle, civilized voice that shaped thoughtful discourse in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Keywords: Victorian essays, Agnes Repplier essays, literary criticism, essay collection, timeless essays.
In The Track Of The Bookworm
A magnetic invitation to every reader who has ever lost and found themselves in the pages of a book. In The Track of the Bookworm traces the passionate pathways of a devoted reader through rare finds, eccentric dealers, and the quiet thrill of discovery. This edition weaves personal anecdotes, sharp observations, and practical advice into a lively narrative of literary exploration and book lover's journey perfect for casual readers seeking warmth and for collectors craving depth. Through vivid bookworm adventures and clear-eyed literary analysis, the text illuminates reading passion, the pleasures of bibliophilia, and the sometimes quirky lives that orbit great books. Historically rich and lovingly anecdotal, this work offers classic literature insights and a window into literary history: how tastes shift, why certain volumes survive, and what makes a book a bibliophile treasure. The writing balances affectionate tribute with pragmatic book collecting tips and book appreciation, making it an essential book enthusiast guide and a readable primer on the culture of books. Rediscovered and restored by Alpha Editions, this title was out of print for decades and is now republished for today s and future generations. This release is not merely a reprint it s a collector s item and a cultural treasure, meticulously prepared for lovers of Irving Browne writings and anyone who cherishes the enduring joy of reading.
Essay On Burns
A luminous reintroduction to one of Scotland s greatest voices rediscover Thomas Carlyle s Essay on Burns, restored and reborn by Alpha Editions. This passionate, penetrating study brings Robert Burns biography and poetic genius into sharp relief, offering readers a vivid Scottish poet analysis that blends biography, criticism, and heartfelt admiration. Carlyle traces Burns s life from humble Ayrshire origins to his towering cultural influence, unpacking how the poet s songs and songs of the people reshaped Scottish literary history and the Romantic era poetry landscape. Written with Carlyle s characteristic vigor, the essay is at once a close literary criticism of Burns and a sweeping meditation on the social and moral forces that shaped his art. Historically significant and eloquently argued, this work is a cornerstone of 19th-century literature and an essential window into Carlyle s literary works and critical method. It offers scholars and casual readers alike clear analysis of Scottish poetry, reflections on Burns s influence, and thoughtful historical essays on poets that illuminate the broader cultural impact of Burns. Long out of print and now carefully restored for today s readers and future generations, this Alpha Editions release is more than a reprint it is a collector s item and cultural treasure, presented with fidelity to the original text and renewed accessibility. Ideal for collectors of Scottish literary history, lovers of Romantic era poetry, and anyone seeking authoritative literary criticism of Burns.
Ivory, Apes And Peacocks
A daring celebration of beauty, wit, and fierce taste Ivory, Apes and Peacocks invites you into the electric mind of James Huneker. This vivid collection of art criticism essays and literary essays collection surveys the triumphs and follies of early 20th century culture with sparkle, authority, and irresistible voice. Huneker ranges from music and art analysis to trenchant cultural commentary, offering historical art insights and essays on aesthetics that remain uncannily modern: portraits of composers, painters, performers, and the social scenes that shaped them, written in intellectual prose that entertains as it enlightens. More than a period piece, Ivory, Apes and Peacocks book is a work of enduring insight part manifesto, part salon conversation capturing the passions and paradoxes of an age when art remade daily life. Its keen, sometimes acerbic reviews teach readers how to listen, look, and think about beauty in any era. This edition restores Huneker s voice for today s readers and collectors alike, balancing readable critique with profound historical perspective. Out of print for decades and now republished by Alpha Editions, this restored edition is not merely a reprint it s a collector s item and a cultural treasure, carefully prepared for today s and future generations. Essential for fans of James Huneker literature, art and music critique, and anyone seeking a spirited guide through the aesthetic currents of a transformative era.
The Erotic Motive In Literature
A provocative rediscovery that changes how we read desire: The Erotic Motive in Literature unlocks the hidden currents of longing that drive great works of art. Albert Mordell s classic study maps the subtle architecture of eroticism across centuries of fiction and poetry. With keen psychological insight and rigorous literary criticism, Mordell traces how erotic themes in literature shape character, plot, symbol, and moral imagination from veiled allusions in the canon to explicit treatments that scandalized earlier readers. This book explores literature and sexuality not as sensationalism but as a vital engine of narrative and aesthetic power, offering readers a lucid historical literary analysis and a nuanced psychology of literature. Long unavailable and quietly influential, this Albert Mordell book resurfaces in a finely restored Alpha Editions volume. This edition has been revived from decades out of print, carefully restored for today s and future generations, and presented as more than a reprint a collector s item and cultural treasure for classic literature collectors and curious newcomers alike. Whether you re drawn to erotic literature analysis, literary theory, or the intersections of literature and desire, this edited and annotated release illuminates erotic motive study, eroticism in art, and classic literary critique with clarity and passion. Essential for students, scholars, and readers eager to confront how desire shapes stories, thought, and history.
Idle Hours In A Library
Step into the hush of a grand reading room and let a gifted guide show you the quiet wonders waiting on every shelf. Idle Hours in a Library collects William Henry Hudson s luminous essays library essays, literary reflections, and literature essays that celebrate the pleasures of idle reading and book appreciation. Through graceful, affectionate prose Hudson wanders among authors, anecdotes, and curiosities, offering sharp classic literature analysis and warm essays on books that make the act of reading feel like a discovery. These library musings range from erudite criticism to intimate book-lover s reveries, perfect for anyone who treasures reading in leisure. Historically significant and richly perceptive, Hudson s work influenced early 20th-century literary criticism and remains a fresh voice for modern readers. This volume showcases his unique blend of naturalist observation and humanistic insight, turning casual perusal into an artful practice. It s both a primer in literary criticism and a companion for quiet hours with a favorite text. Alpha Editions is proud to republish this long-neglected classic: out of print for decades, now restored for today s and future generations. This edition is more than a reprint it s a collector s item and cultural treasure, carefully restored and presented for the book lover s collection. Whether you re a casual reader seeking gentle literary companionship or a collector of classic literature analysis, Idle Hours in a Library offers enduring delight and thoughtful company among the stacks.
Illustrated History Of Ancient Literature, Oriental And Classical
A luminous revival of a long-forgotten classic this Illustrated History Of Ancient Literature, Oriental And Classical by John D. Quackenbos opens a doorway into the world s earliest voices. Concise and richly illustrated, Quackenbos s guide maps the birth and evolution of ancient literature history: from Oriental literature exploration across Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, Persia, China and the Hebrew traditions, to the flowering of classical literature analysis in Greece and Rome. Readable yet erudite, the book blends narrative overview, close readings, and cultural context to reveal how myths, epics, religious texts, and early philosophy shaped civilization s literary foundations. This edition out of print for decades and now republished by Alpha Editions has been carefully restored for today s and future generations. More than a reprint, it s a collector s item and cultural treasure: enhanced for clarity and preserved with respect for the original scholarship and the beautiful ancient text illustrations that accompany the study. Ideal for casual readers seeking engaging historical literature insights and for classic literature collectors curating authoritative references. Whether you are tracing ancient literary traditions, studying classical and Oriental literature side-by-side, or delving into Quackenbos s influential perspective, this Illustrated literary history offers enduring insight. Rediscover a foundational literary history book that connects past and present essential for students, aficionados, and anyone captivated by the origins of storytelling.
Essays, Or Discourses Volume 1
A rediscovered spark of the Spanish Enlightenment returns to light lucid, provocative, and indispensable. Essays, Or Discourses Volume 1 collects the pioneering Spanish Enlightenment essays of Benito Jer nimo Feijoo, a bold thinker who challenged superstition and championed reason across 18th-century Spain. These translated essays guide readers through philosophical inquiries, cultural critique, and practical arguments on science, religion, education, and everyday belief, offering a vivid portrait of Enlightenment thought in Spain. Feijoo s clear reasoning and engaging voice make complex ideas accessible to curious newcomers while rewarding collectors and scholars with sharp insights into Spanish intellectual history. This edition is historically significant: Feijoo s works helped lay the groundwork for modern Spanish philosophical discourse, blending empirical curiosity with moral concern. Alpha Editions has restored this long out-of-print classic for today s and future generations not merely a reprint but a carefully curated collector s item and cultural treasure. Meticulously translated and presented, this volume preserves Feijoo s original spirit while improving readability for modern audiences. Perfect for readers of classic Spanish essays, students of historical Spanish discourses, and collectors of rare Enlightenment texts, Feijoo Volume 1 essays illuminate the roots of Spanish philosophical writings and the evolution of ideas that shaped modern Spain. Rediscover Feijoo s translated essays and own a restored piece of 18th-century Spanish literature.
In Defence Of Harriet Shelley
A hidden portrait of a scandalized life boldly reclaimed for a new generation. In Defence of Harriet Shelley is Mark Twain s passionate, witty plea for a woman history long misjudged. Twain s essay revisits the life of Harriet Shelley with forensic sympathy and cutting humor, unpacking how Victorian literature s moralizing lens warped public memory. With sharp literary analysis and compassionate storytelling, Twain interrogates the Shelley family myths and offers a corrective to generations of critics who reduced Harriet to caricature. Readers encounter engaging reflections on 19th century authors, the cultural machinery that frames English poets, and the human cost of literary criticism. This edition is historically significant: a rare Mark Twain biography-style essay mixing personal defense and social commentary, contextualized for Mary Shelley context and the wider Romantic circle. Alpha Editions has republished this work after decades out of print, fully restored for today s and future generations. More than a reprint, this volume is a collector s item a cultural treasure for classic literature devotees and casual readers alike. Ideal for lovers of Victorian literature, scholars of literary criticism, and fans of Mark Twain essays, this book bridges historical biography and spirited commentary. Rediscover Harriet Shelley through Twain s unique voice, and reclaim a story that reshapes how we read the lives behind the poems. Keywords: Mark Twain biography, Harriet Shelley defense, literary analysis, 19th century authors, Shelley family.
Every Moment Is a Life
Compiled by bestselling author susan abulhawa, an Arabic-English bilingual anthology of essays from eighteen young Palestinian writers trying to survive the genocide in Gaza. In early 2024, writer and activist susan abulhawa managed to enter Gaza twice through the Rafah crossing. There, at the Culture and Free Thought Association, susan held a series of workshops for young people who had been displaced to tent encampments. The lives of all participants were marked by unrelenting Israeli violence and extraordinary loss--of home, family, safety, education, electricity, and all the structures of life. They'd fled from place to place as Israel's colonial violence swirled around them, complete with food and water insecurity and constant threat. Still, despite the bitterness of life in tents and the dangers of travel, they came together to share in the refuge of writing and community. Samya recounts a tender moment with an old man mending shoes in the street, while her cousin Saja hides books in her closet, hoping they and her home will still be there when she returns. Ghassan is haunted by the baby he rescued from the rubble, who for a time became his son. Fatima risks it all retrieve her clothes from a danger zone buzzing with drones and warplanes. Maram's loving aunt is gone, and chaos inhabits Amr's mind. Samah, Lubna, Rizq, and Nebal take us by the hand through raining death, trails of tears, classroom shelters, and shared clothes in crowded tents. Every Moment Is a Life delivers rare, unfiltered portraits of life under genocide, platforming the emerging voices struggling to survive in Gaza today. These essays are raw and real, capturing human moments--buying bread, going to the bathroom, sharing a meal, drinking coffee--all set against the backdrop of history's first livestreamed ethnic cleansing. With courage, anger, love, agony, and--impossibly--hope, these achingly tender voices from Gaza will stay with us, captured in these pages, forever. *All proceeds go to the contributors in Gaza and to Palestine Writes Literature Festival
Wild Fictions
From the 2025 recipient of the Pak Kyongni Prize, often referred to as Korea's Nobel Prize in Literature. A collection of essays on themes central to Ghosh's work: imperialism and decolonization, climate change, and the stories of ordinary people making lives amid these historical forces. Wild Fictions brings together Amitav Ghosh's extraordinary writings on subjects that have obsessed him over the last twenty-five years: literature and language; climate change and the environment; and human lives, travel, and discoveries. Threaded throughout the collection are his reflections on the spaces that we inhabit and how we occupy them. From the significance of the commodification of the clove to the diversity of the mangrove forests in Bengal and the radical fluidity of multilingualism, Wild Fictions is a powerful refutation of imperial violence, a fascinating exploration of the fictions we weave to absorb history, and a reminder of the importance of sensitivity and empathy. With the combination of moral passion, intellectual curiosity, and literary elegance that defines his writing, Ghosh makes readers understand the world in new and urgent ways. Together, the pieces in Wild Fictions chart a course that allows us to heal our relationships and restore the delicate balance with the volatile landscapes to which we all belong.
Finding the Right Words
"John Moss has been a major force in shaping Canadian literary criticism and in advancing the understanding of Canada's literary culture."- Citation when elected to the Royal Society of Canada, 2006"Finding the right words is a challenge. Over five decades I've tried to illuminate our struggle as Canadians to find ourselves in words we could feel were our own, from colonial doggerel to postmodern discourse. Many of the essays here were originally published from lectures abroad and are difficult to access. Taken together they trace the evolution of English Canadian language, literature, and culture to the beginnings of the present century. An ongoing fascination with structural differences between writing by men and by women vies with my interest in language throughout, centred on such radically engaged writers as Robert Kroetsch, George Bowering, and, inevitably, Margaret Atwood. Critical analyses give way to what may be described as critical fiction, which in turn leads to fiction as fiction, before veering back to the personal. I have concluded with two pieces which examine aspects of my writing from other perspectives, before a few last words of my own." JM
Dangerous Fictions
In a political moment when social panics over literature are at their peak, Dangerous Fictions is a mind-expanding treatise on the nature of fictional stories as cultural battlegrounds for power. Fictional stories have long held an uncanny power over hearts and minds, especially those of young people. In Dangerous Fictions, Lyta Gold traces arguments both historical and contemporary that have labeled fiction as dark, immoral, frightening, or poisonous. Within each she asks: How "dangerous" is fiction, really? And what about it provokes waves of moral panic and even censorship? Gold argues that any panic about art is largely a disguised panic about power. There have been versions of these same fights over fiction for centuries. By exposing fiction as a social danger and a battleground of immediate public concern, we can see what each side really wants--the right to shape the future of a world deeply in flux and a distraction from more pressing material concerns about money, access, and the hard work of politics. From novels about people driven insane by reading novels to "copaganda" TV shows that influence how viewers regard the police, Gold uses her signature wit, research, and fearless commentary to point readers toward a more substantial question: Fiction may be dangerous to us, but aren't we also dangerous to it?
Bird of Paradox and Other Tales
Bird of Paradox and Other Tales gathers vivid, true-to-life stories from John Devlin's years drifting between Ireland, London, China, and Vietnam. Classrooms, bars, backstreets, lakeside promenades, and long bus rides become stages where the ridiculous rubs shoulders with the tragic. The author teaches English abroad, falls in and out of love, and collects characters you could not invent: managers with whiskey noses, beggars on trolleys, songbird clubs at dawn, and a saxophonist whose music drifts across Luhu Lake. Some pieces will make you laugh, others will sting, and many sit in that murky in-between where life actually happens. Arranged as a loose journey from London to China and on to Vietnam with detours home to Ireland, the book reads like a box of ticket stubs and scribbled notes that finally grew into polished stories. It is creative non-fiction told with a journalist's eye and a traveler's appetite for chance encounters. Whether it is an online romance arranged between shifts, a lockdown walk to the supermarket, or a night out that turns into a minor epic, Devlin captures the texture of place and the voices of people you will not forget. For readers of travel writing, memoir, and literary essays who like their truth messy, human, and full of heart.
Good Bones
The heyday of reading is probably behind us, but in these shrewd and witty essays Brooke Allen examines the relics of the saints (and sinners) who made it what it was. Focused as much on literary lives as oeuvres, she excavates the glories of August Strindberg, George Sand, Patricia Highsmith, Anthony Powell, Truman Capote and even the late great diarist Richard Burton (who also did some acting). There are 22 essays in all, drawn from the New York Times, the Atlantic, the New Criterion and elsewhere, and Allen offers delight and surprise on every page. If the age of reading isn't yet behind you, get this book in front of you."Her prose swaggers with an authority drawn from true learning, and she cracks her snobbery like a whip." - John Freeman, The Wall Street Journal
Reasons and Feelings
This book of practical writing and publishing advice celebrates the creative, community-building pleasures of humanist expertise. Humanities experts today are embattled. In a world of crises undermining higher education at every turn, what can still motivate humanists to write? Galvanizing, imaginative, and unrepentantly nerdy, Sarah Mesle's Reasons and Feeling offers practical writing and publishing advice alongside a forcefully affirmative account of why humanities writing matters. Mesle proposes that writing can help envision sustainable community, but only when we recognize that humanist authority comes from both our reasons and our feelings. Alongside everyday compositional advice--including strategies for addressing different audiences, pitching publications, and managing writing anxiety--readers will find an account of how such craft practices connect to both their intellectual commitments and their historical conditions. Mesle shows how university-trained writers at all levels benefit from embracing a broader range of styles and affects. Doing so helps them harness their writing's community-building potential and makes them better able to value their own expertise, whether they write for the classroom, in public venues, or for the specialized scholarly communities that share their niche, weird, or beloved, objects of study. Reasons and Feelings draws on Mesle's expertise as a professor of writing and her work as an editor helping academics shift between writing for scholarly venues and journalistic ones. In a voice that's honest, warm, accessible, and bracingly funny, Reasons and Feelings gives humanists a path toward bolder fantasies of the worlds their writing can make.
Charismatic Nations
At the core of nationalism, the nation has always been defined and celebrated as a fundamentally cultural community. This pioneering cultural history shows how artists and intellectuals since the days of Napoleon have celebrated and taken inspiration from an idealized nationality, and how this in turn has informed and influenced social and political nationalism. The book brings together tell-tale examples from across the entire European continent, from Dublin and Barcelona to Istanbul and Helsinki, and from cultural fields that include literature, painting, music, sports, world fairs and cinema as well as intellectual history. Charismatic Nations offers unique insights into how the unobtrusive soft power of nationally-inspired culture interacts with nationalism as a hard-edged political agenda. It demonstrates how, thanks to its pervasive cultural and 'unpolitical' presence, nationalism can shape-shift between romantic insurgency and nativist populism. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
Anywhere Else
A memoir of growing up in Florida interwoven with cultural reflections of the state from The X-Files to Emerson--revealing the complex truths of life as a FloridianFlorida and pop culture are a magnetic, viral match. From true crimes on social media to spring break movies to Miami Vice, the state has been served up for the rest of the world as a place of swamp things, serial killers, beach bums, teen girls, and dead poets. In Anywhere Else, Rachel Knox weaves her own story around the media caricatures, digging deeper into what it's like to be from a "wild" place--and who gets to decide what that means.Knox writes from her own experiences of Florida as a child in Sunday school, a student on field trips to Everglades National Park, and a bartender making drinks for both out-of-state partiers and locals. She blends these memories with critical looks at touchstones from different cultural moments, such as Aileen Wuornos, America's most famous female serial killer; Florida's Highwaymen artists and Thomas Kinkade, the much-beloved religious "Painter of Light"; Ralph Waldo Emerson, the transcendentalist writer who spent time in St. Augustine; the gloriously trashy 90s neo-noir Wild Things; and the "Monster of the Week" episodes of The X-Files.Writing with clarity and searing honesty about real issues refracted through this prism of pop culture, Knox is both witty and vulnerable. In these essays, whether she's bobbing in the warm waters of the Gulf or running through the trailer parks of her childhood, Knox portrays a Floridian struggling with a deep, complicated love of her home state. Anywhere Else is a book for anyone who resonates with the message that home may not be a perfect place, but that it is worth fighting for.
Bargain Witch
An occult history that grounds the sacred yearning for magic in real life. In these essays by scholar and self-initiated witch Brooke Palmieri, occult history, the eternal now, and our magickal queer futures align, connecting us to an enchantment both contemporary and classic. Drawing upon the knowledge and influence of practitioners from Rachel Pollack to Tituba, Palmieri grounds the sacred yearning for magic in real life, whether exploring the gossip of feuding Salem witches, paying the rent by playing "wizard" for news cameras, or detailing the psychic ups and downs of working in an occult bookshop. Written in a voice electrified with love for the craft and its lineage of eccentrics, Bargain Witch shows us witch life in all its quotidian humor and splendor, taking its place amongst the magickal classics that inspired it, a literary ouroboros.
Quotable Austen
Celebrating Jane Austen's 250th birthday, this book is a charming collection of notable quotes from her most celebrated nineteenth-century novels. A fine collection of the wisest and wittiest quotes from one of the most beloved and prominent British writers of all time, this book is sure to win you over with Jane Austen's ability for turning typical people and mundane events into charming and relatable stories. With over 140 quotes from her completed novels - Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Northanger Abbey and Persuasion - this book is the perfect opportunity for readers to immerse themselves in the refinement of the Regency era. Austen was well known for her astute social observation and keen insight into the lives of women in the early nineteenth century. This collection will urge you to: - Ardently admire and love - Feel the pangs of disappointed love - Find comfort in words of wisdom - Acquaint yourself with the refinements of polished society - Learn witty comebacks to leave your friends speechless After all, it is a truth universally acknowledged that this would be the ultimate gift for Janeites and Austenites.
Daughters in their Mothers' Gardens
The book explores the thematics of the mother-daughter relationships in selected texts by contemporary Chinese American women writers Maxine Hong Kingston, Amy Tan, Fae Myenne Ng and Gish Jen. The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood among Ghosts, The Joy Luck Club and The Kitchen God's Wife, Bone and Mona in the Promised Land altogether reflect an array of matrilineal traditions highly receptive to the conventional wisdom that daughters must separate from their mothers to become strong individuals. I argue that the considered narratives problematize the Western domestic storylines by hinging back to a complex mesh of racial histories, misogyny, rape, displacement, and enforced separation. The book emphasizes a universal impulse for perfection which dovetails with an endeavour to point out the diversity and complementarity of their challenging reactions to the dominant myths of female connection and disconnection. The selected texts relocate the universal romance of symbiosis-individuation at the intersection of a fluid but, nurturing positioning across different worlds and cultures. They demonstrate the crucial significance of storytelling in undercutting the unconscious essence of the mother-daughter rift. Hence, the purely psychological universal friction between every mother and daughter significantly shapes the examined matrilineal stories just as the characters᾽ positioning amid liminal hyphenated spaces do. The discussion contributes to reorienting the homophobic dimension in the mother-daughter attachment toward multicultural issues of consent and descent. The concerned plots create a tour de force in the mainstream matrilineal tradition, through narrative scenarios wherein the mothers and daughters foreground the impossibility of separation.
Dialogue with a Somnambulist
Renowned internationally for her lyrically unsettling novels, PEN/Faulkner Award winner Chloe Aridjis now offers readers her first collection of shorter works, with an introduction by Tom McCarthy Chloe Aridjis's stories and essays are known to transport readers into liminal, often dreamlike, realms. In this collection of works, we meet a woman guided only by a plastic bag drifting through the streets of Berlin who discovers a nonsense-named bar that is home to papier-m璽ch矇 monsters and one glass-encased somnambulist. Floating through space, cosmonauts are confronted not only with wonder and astonishment, but tedium and solitude. And in Mexico City, stray dogs animate public spaces, "infusing them with a noble life force." In her pen portraits, Aridjis turns her eye to expats and outsiders, including artists and writers such as Leonora Carrington, Mavis Gallant, and Beatrice Hastings. Exploring the complexity of exile and urban alienation, Dialogue with a Somnambulist showcases "the rare writer who reinvents herself in each book" (Garth Greenwell) and who is as imaginatively at home in the short form as in her longer fiction.
Modernism
An engaging, approachable introduction to literary modernism Modernism represented an astonishing outbreak of cultural innovation, spanning artforms and nations. It was centred around feelings of growing alienation in an industrial world, and a desire to change how people live together in society. Art, architecture, literature, and music all underwent a radical revolution. Although it was confined to small coteries of artists and lasted no more than thirty years, its techniques were appropriated by mass culture and became familiar to millions of citizens who have never heard of Paul Klee or Gertrude Stein. It represents one of the most productive moments in art since the Renaissance, which in its scope, originality, and imaginative audacity has never been equalled. Terry Eagleton presents a compelling and entertaining guide to modernism. From Ezra Pound to Virginia Woolf, James Joyce to H.D., Eagleton explores the literature and ideas of prominent modernists, emphasising the profound impact they had on subsequent generations.
The Cambridge Companion to American Prison Writing and Mass Incarceration
This book tells the story of mass Incarceration in America through the writers who experienced it first-hand. It begins at mid-century with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, whose insights about racism and the criminal justice system warned of what was to come. It takes off in the 1960s and 1970s with revolutionary writers like George Jackson, Assata Shakur, and Mumia Abu-Jamal, seeking liberation not just from prison but the oppressive structure of society that sustains it. It evolves in the post-revolutionary era with witnesses like Wilbert Rideau, Jack Henry Abbott, and Jimmy Santiago Baca, seeking self-determination and justice from these increasingly cavernous prison warehouses. And it ends with the stories of survivors like Shaka Senghor, Jarvis Masters, and Susan Burton in the 21st century seeking healing from the psychological trauma that led to prison as well as the trauma of prison.
The Prophet
THE MOST IMPACTFUL LESSONS OF KAHLIL GIBRAN PAIRED WITH THOUGHTFUL ANALYSIS AND MODERN APPLICATIONS IN AN ELEGANT AND ACCESSIBLE FORMAT Kahlil Gibran's The Prophet is a poetic meditation on life's deepest questions, offering timeless reflections on love, work, freedom, and the human spirit. Beloved around the world, this lyrical masterpiece has captivated generations with its profound simplicity and universal truths, presenting a vision of life that is as inspiring as it is comforting. Its brilliance lies in its ability to speak directly to the heart, transcending culture and time. This edition will invite you to explore life's beauty and challenges with new clarity and depth. With engaging double-page spreads, it distills Gibran's most inspiring passages, pairing them with thoughtful analysis and practical insights to enrich your perspective. Calibrated to deliver profound insights rapidly and directly, it opens the door to the luminous wisdom of one of the world's most cherished works. WHY NOT EXPLORE FURTHER CONCISE CLASSICS FROM THIS SERIES?Also available: Think and Grow Rich, The Art of War, Meditations, and Autobiography of a Yogi.
Beatdom #25
This is the 25th issue of Beatdom literary journal and it is released on the 70th anniversary of the 6 Gallery reading, a landmark literary event that is said to have begun the San Francisco Renaissance. It contains many essays that examine that movement.
Your Historical Loveliness Knows No Bounds
Moving freely between essay, close-reading, ekphrasis, memoir, travelogue, lecture notes, poetry, and even monologue, Your Historical Loveliness Knows No Bounds presents a series of "thinking-throughs" of formally innovative and politically oriented poets pushing the boundaries of what poetry can hold. Tracing a personal family history of immigration amidst larger concerns of diaspora, "unsayability," and absence, Wendy Xu reads the work of poets including Layli Long Soldier, Inger Christensen, Ocean Vuong, Liu Xia, giovanni singleton, Bei Dao, Diana Khoi Nguyen, and others. She explores existential and pedagogical questions in poetry from the point of view of a reader and a teacher. Why write? and why invite the paradoxes of a documentary approach into that writing? Not an overview or primer, least of all the final word, this free-ranging exploration of contemporary poetry considers larger questions of belonging, diaspora, the violence of language, the allure of the past, genre, witness, and form. It returns to memorable touchstone texts in the author's life with renewed curiosity about their inner workings. Essays move with restless curiosity across topics, bringing them into conversation with poetry, from considering depictions of Christ in Pier Paolo Pasolini's The Gospel According to St. Matthew, to the ecstatic illegible texts of Henri Michaux, discomfiting likenesses of agoraphobia and political imprisonment, and the epistolary trouble of fan-mail. Xu is drawn to poetry works of radical hybridity alongside personal experiences of formal intensity, as an immigrant daughter, a parentified child, an occasional agoraphobe, and a writer. Your Historical Loveliness Knows No Bounds is a tour of poetic influences and the futures they've made possible.
Dear Orchid
"Powerful, haunting, and precise. Each of the essays and stories in Van Den Hende's collection-whether a three-page reverie of childhood's joys and tragedies or a candid peek into the life of a wounded hero-land with a piercing clarity." -FIONA DAVIS, New York Times bestselling author of The Stolen QueenTHESE AREN'T JUST STORIES. THEY'RE LOVE LETTERS.Dear Orchid opens the heart in unexpected ways: through true stories and new fiction that explore loss and love, silence and recovery, and hard-won resilience. This collection is an Asian American author's homage to Mary-Louise Parker's Dear Mr. You, through letters to a girl newly freed from East Berlin, an aunt lost to Communist-era borders, and Purple Heart-decorated heroes. These intimate portraits explore the messy beauty of friendship, family, disability, and belonging. You'll meet a wounded hero who jokes through his pain, a beloved cat with a crayon note taped to his back ("HELP ME"), and people who refuse to be defined by what they've lost.The final chapter brings a fictional reunion with the unforgettable characters from the Goodbye Orchid trilogy, offering healing, closure, and second chances.Told in a lyrical, letter-style format, this collection blends memoir and imagination in a deeply personal exploration of grief, identity, and human connection. It's a window into private moments that echo something universal, especially for those who have ever felt unseen, misunderstood, or left behind.Underneath the heartbreak and humor runs the quiet pull between star-crossed lovers, whose stories unfold across time, distance, and impossible odds. These tales include elements of multicultural and medical romance and unforgettable moments of vulnerability and hope. Whether you're drawn to true stories of survival or fictional narratives filled with tenderness and truth, Dear Orchid offers an emotional journey that celebrates love in all its forms.A collection for anyone who's ever loved, lost, or longed to understand the emotional truth behind the quiet moments that shape us.These aren't just stories.They're letters to everyday heroes.For you. For us. For the moments that make us human.
Ritsos in Parentheses
Winner of the Harold Morton Landon Translation Award, Academy of American Poets A bilingual edition of three major poetry collections by one of the most important Greek poets of the twentieth century One of the most prolific and popular of modern Greek poets, Yannis Ritsos follows such eminent predecessors as Cavafy, Sikelianos, and Seferis in the dramatic and symbolic expression of a tragic sense of life. The three volumes of Ritsos's poetry translated here--Parentheses, 1946-47, Parentheses, 1950-61, and The Distant--document a three-decade poetic journey that reveals the evolution of the poet's sensibility. This bilingual edition also features an insightful introduction from translator Edmund Keeley, whom Paul Muldoon has called "the gold standard in translators of Greek poetry."
The Position of Spoons
A feast of observations about everything from the particular beauty of lemons on a table, to the allure of Colette, to the streets of Paris, by the inimitable Deborah Levy. Deborah Levy's vital literary voice speaks about many things. On footwear: "It has always been very clear to me that people who wear shoes without socks are destined to become my friends and lovers." On public parks: "A civic garden square gentles the pace of the city that surrounds it, holding a thought before it scrambles." On Elizabeth Hardwick: "She understands what is at stake in literature." On the conclusion of a marriage: "It doesn't take an alien to tell us that when love dies we have to find another way of being alive." Levy traces and measures her life against the backdrop of different literary imaginations; each page is a beautiful, questioning composition of the self. The Position of Spoons is full of wisdom and astonishments and brings us into intimate conversation with one of our most insightful, intellectually curious writers.
Graveyards
From the author of Gothic, a marvelously illustrated cultural history of graves and graveyards, from the earliest known burial sites to today's green burials Why, how, and where do we inter our dead? How have people throughout history responded to the problem of laying their dead to rest? Roger Luckhurst sets out in search of answers in this arresting book. Taking readers on an unforgettable tour of the rich and unusual visual culture of the grave, he visits locales such as the pyramids of Giza, the catacombs and columbaria of Rome, and the cenotaphs erected to the world's war dead. Along the way, he examines the diverse role of graveyards in literature, art, film, and television. In engaging chapters that look at all aspects of the treatment of the dead, Luckhurst covers topics ranging from early burials and the emergence of necropolises and catacombs to grave robbing, garden cemeteries, the perilous overcrowding of the urban dead, and the emergence of modern funerary culture. Exploring the cultural afterlives of burial and memorial sites in the popular imagination, he shows how graves have served as guides to the underworld, poignant dedications to those we have lost, as reminders of our own mortality, and settings in gothic horror. Blending lively storytelling with a wealth of stunning illustrations, Graveyards is a lyrical, frequently unexpected account of the grave as a signpost to the afterlife, a site of remembrance and self-reflection, and an object of enduring fascination.
What's in a Name?
A compelling tour of Shakespeare's England that makes a powerful contribution to the 'authorship question'. How do we know Shakespeare was Shakespeare? Could a glover's son who left school at fifteen really be the author behind such masterpieces as Hamlet, King Lear and The Tempest? Yes! says historian Susan Amussen. She transports readers back to early modern England, to travel the path that carried William Shakespeare from humble origins in Stratford to literary greatness on the London stage. This was a society undergoing rapid change. Grammar schools made education in Latin and Greek available to commoners, while touring players brought the latest dramatic productions to the masses. And in London, a metropolis filled with European visitors, ordinary people had the opportunity to see courtly life up close. No serious historian doubts that Shakespeare was the author of the plays that bear his name. Susan Amussen shares what they know: that Shakespeare's England was a complex and cosmopolitan place, with everything a talented young playwright needed to develop his craft and furnish his imagination.
Heretic
A memoir of leaving the evangelical church and the search for radical new ways to build community. Jeanna Kadlec knew what it meant to be faithful--in her marriage to a pastor's son, in the comfortable life ahead of her, in her God--but there was no denying the truth that lived under that conviction: she was queer and, if she wanted to survive, she would need to leave behind the church and every foundational building block she knew. Heretic is a memoir of rebirth. Within, Kadlec reckons with religious trauma and Midwestern values, as a means of unveiling how evangelicalism directly impacts every American--religious or not--and has been a major force in driving our democracy towards fascism. From the story of Lilith to celebrity purity rings, Kadlec interrogates how her indoctrination and years of piety intersects with her Midwest working-class upbringing. As she navigated graduate school, a new home on the East Coast, and a new marriage, another insidious truth began to reveal itself --that conservative Christianity has both built and undermined our political power structures, poisoned our pop culture, and infected how we interact with one another in ways that the secular population couldn't see. Weaving the personal with powerful critique, Heretic explores how we can radically abandon these painful systems by taking a sledgehammer to the comfortable. Whether searching for community in the face of millennial loneliness or wanting to reclaim a secular form of fellowship in everyday life, Kadlec envisions the brilliant possibilities that come with not only daring to want a different way but actually striking out and claiming it for ourselves.
The Appleman and the Poet
The Appleman and the Poet, the fifth volume of Hubert Butler s essays, completes a thirty-year odyssey embarked upon by The Lilliput Press in 1984. Our flagship author has finally come home, welcomed by Fintan O Toole in his foreword: One of the great joys of these essays is the discovery of sentences as sharp and lithe as a Toledo rapier. The Appleman and the Poet places a capstone upon a project begun with Escape from the Anthill in 1985. Butler s essays, written over six decades, establish him as one of Ireland s great twentieth- century prose writers and thinkers.
The Raven
Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven" comes to life for young readers in this enchantingly illustrated picture book of the classic spooky poem. Once upon a midnight dreary . . . So begins the story of a man and his unusual encounter with a raven on a dark winter's night in Edgar Allan Poe's infamous "The Raven." The man's struggle with his deep sadness at the loss of the love his life is heightened with the arrival of the raven, who sits watching him, and only uttering a single word: nevermore. As the night grows darker, the man tries to escape the shadows of his grief before it is too late. Poe's beloved and mysterious poem is brought to life for young readers and adult fans alike by Chloe Bristol's rich, moody illustrations. The Raven is the perfect book to snuggle in and read as a family during the Halloween season or on any blustery, cold day.
Unexploded Ordnance
WINNER OF THE 2023 RESTLESS BOOKS PRIZE FOR NEW IMMIGRANT WRITINGIn imaginative prose that interrogates the past with a poet's curiosity and a scientist's pen, Unexploded Ordnance seeks to answer how we are shaped by the stories we inherit. After moving from Germany to the US to work as a professor of biology, Catharina Coenen takes up residence in a second language to voice the questions she could not ask at home. To what extent was her grandfather implicated in World War II? What exactly did her grandmother, mother, and aunt live through? And why are women's wartime stories so seldom told? Coenen peels back generational silences to walk alongside her grandmother, who comes of age during Hitler's rise to power, watches friends disappear one by one, and flees bombing raids with her tiny daughters. Weaving reflections on language, biology, queerness, art, and memory, Coenen moves between the personal and the universal with stunning honesty and elegance.
An Eye For Joy
A book about the impulse to wonder, the practice of noticing, and the inclination toward joy. Despite its difficulties, the good world is everywhere, and its wonders can be seen and savored every day. Smart, witty, and full of heart, this collection of essays offers a fresh, joyous perspective reminiscent of Anne Fadiman, E.B. White, and Erma Bombeck. Each essay is a "diamond necklace" of moments that illuminate the beauty often overlooked, reminding readers that paying attention is a life-saving spiritual practice accessible to all. Perfect for fans of Ross Gay and lovers of literary nonfiction, this book is an uplifting gift and a bright reminder that joy can be found in the smallest details--if only we choose to look.
How to Tell When We Will Die
"A book for the moment and for the ages. It's questing, pissed, propulsive, funny, generous, pervy, and original--full of love and pain in all their entwined glory." --Maggie Nelson, author of The ArgonautsWINNER OF THE AMBER HOLLIBAUGH AWARD FOR LGBTQ+ SOCIAL JUSTICE WRITINGThe long-awaited essay collection from one of the most influential voices in disability activism that detonates a bomb in our collective understanding of care and illness, showing us that sickness is a fact of life.In the wake of the 2014 Ferguson riots, and sick with a chronic condition that rendered them housebound, Johanna Hedva turned to the page to ask: How do you throw a brick through the window of a bank if you can't get out of bed? It was not long before this essay, "Sick Woman Theory", became a seminal work on disability, because in reframing illness as not just a biological experience but a social one, Hedva argues that under capitalism--a system that limits our worth to the productivity of our bodies--we must reach for the revolutionary act of caring for ourselves and others. How to Tell When We Will Die expands upon Hedva's paradigm-shifting perspective in a series of slyly subversive and razor-sharp essays that range from the theoretical to the personal--from Deborah Levy and Susan Sontag to wrestling, kink, mysticism, death, and the color yellow. Drawing from their experiences with America's byzantine healthcare system, and considering archetypes they call The Psychotic Woman, The Freak, and The Hag in Charge, Hedva offers a bracing indictment of the politics that exploit sickness--relying on and fueling ableism--to the detriment of us all. With the insight of Anne Boyer's The Undying and Leslie Jamison's The Empathy Exams, and the wit of Samantha Irby, Hedva's debut collection upends our collective understanding of disability. In their radical reimagining of a world where care and pain are symbiotic, and our bodies are allowed to live free and well, Hedva implores us to remember that illness is neither an inconvenience or inevitability, but an enlivening and elemental part of being alive.
Journeys of Hope
Meyer Fortes and Sonia Donen grew up in a Jewish immigrant community in South Africa, where they met and fell in love. In 1927, Meyer set off, alone, to study in London. Sonia stayed behind in South Africa and they kept up a lively correspondence to keep in touch. Their letters chart their hopes, fears, disappointments and successes, as Meyer struggles to make a life for himself in London and prepare for Sonia's arrival.Members of both their families had undergone their own journeys, fleeing from danger in the Jewish Pale of Settlement of the Russian Empire. Meyer's father, Nathan, had first emigrated to Memphis, Tennessee and spent a period of time in Leeds, UK. Meyer's half-sister, Annie, had recently travelled back to Memphis, having been briefly incarcerated on Ellis Island, USA, and was temporarily separated from her husband. Sonia, herself, had been a refugee from the Russian Civil War that followed the 1917 Russian Revolution.The letters offer unique insights into universal challenges, chiming with current affairs and prompting a journey of discovery through eastern Europe. Few traces now remain of this important period of history, overlaid by more immediate, recent conflicts. Some of the contemporary citizens, descendants of those who stayed, are now facing similar challenges to the families who feature in the letters.
Men I Hate
A rare spouse's perspective on a partner's transition that asks what happens to us when the people we are closest to change. Can a lesbian who loves a trans man still call herself a lesbian? Against the backdrop of a traditional Sicilian American upbringing, Lynette D'Amico identified as a lesbian despite the expectation that her future hinged on the man she married. As a teenager, she fled her St. Louis home in the dark of night to escape her fate. No boys allowed, until one day D'Amico's life was completely upended when her lover and spouse of twenty years-P. Carl, the acclaimed author of Becoming a Man: The Story of a Transition-told her he was a man. Seemingly overnight, D'Amico no longer recognized her spouse in photos of past vacations or of the couple celebrating their legal gay marriage. In Men I Hate, she asks: What happens when the people we are closest to change? As D'Amico tries to engage more deeply with the man she is married to, she looks at all the men-historical figures, politicians, men in her family-in search of clear dividing lines between good men and bad, between the men she loves and the men she hates. These lines dissolve as she writes her way toward an understanding of the words marriage, husband, and home-and how we reconcile who we are with who we become.
The Shakespeare Synopsis
I have written a synopsis of 24 Shakespeare plays.The idea is that students can read my synopsis before they tackle the play.Shakespeare is not an easy read, but by reading the one synopsis, students will understand what the play is about.
