Publication date: 2008-04-03
Dewey code: 823.8
RRP: £8.99
Price: £3.39
Review George Eliot / Virago Press Ltd:
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 1999-10-20
Dewey code: 920
RRP: £13.99
Price: £8.86
Review Lorca: A Dream of Life / Bloomsbury Publishing PLC:"Today's Spain is called Federico. " These words, from right-wing Spanish premier Jose Maria Aznar in 1998 upon the centenary of his birth, highlight the degree to which Federico Garcia Lorca has become a symbol for post-Franco Spain. His untimely death in 1936 at the hands of the insurgent Granada authorities ensured his immortality as only early death can and gave his image as a metaphor for creative vibrancy brutally cut down. Lorca's appeal in his lifetime had much to do with his personality. Impulsive and swaggeringly confident, he built a reputation based on recitals of his poems, many of which he never wrote down. He became, in Luis Bunuel's words, "his own living masterpiece". He played the piano magnificently, his surrealist drawings could stand comparison with those of Miro or Dali, and his mind was constantly conceiving projects, of which he would realise "four at the most". This maelstrom yielded lyrical poetry, difficult experimental drama and the more naturalistic rural trilogy for which he is most famous: Blood Wedding, Yerma, and The House of Bernardo Alba. His work contemplated nature, fertility and almost always death; today he is the most produced Spanish dramatist in the English-speaking world. Leslie Stainton's is a sensitive appraisal and though the prose may not share the subject's joie de vivre, in the context that may not be a bad thing. [+]Lorca emerges as a great artist with even greater potential, who sparkled with the promise of art, and for whom Spain is right to be still grieving. -David Vincent.
Publication date: 2005-06-02
Dewey code: 920
RRP: £16.99
Price: £7.92
Review 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare / Faber and Faber:
Creator: Ian Angus
Publication date: 2007-04-26
Dewey code: 828.91209
RRP: £12.99
Price: £6.25
Review George Orwell: The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters: As I Please, 1943-1945 v. 3 (Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters George Orwell) / David R. Godine Publisher:
Publication date: 2008-03-24
RRP: £7.99
Price: £4.20
Review No Laughing Matter: How I Carried On: How I Carried on / Apex Publishing Ltd, Essex:
Publication date: 2004-11-05
Dewey code: 920
RRP: £17.99
Price: £4.99
Review Nell / Penguin Ireland:
Creator: Doris Elaine Sauter
Publication date: 2006-10-27
RRP: £7.99
Price: £2.97
Review What If Our World Is Their Heaven?: The Final Conversations of Philip K. Dick / Gerald Duckworth & Co Ltd:
Publication date: 2008-04-01
Dewey code: 200
RRP: £14.50
Price: £6.32
Review The Quest for Shakespeare / Ignatius Press,U.S.:
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 1999-10-04
Dewey code: 920
RRP: £9.99
Price: £4.90
Review Elizabeth Gaskell: A Habit of Stories / Faber and Faber:
Publication date: 1969-06
Dewey code: 818.5203
Price: £12.00
Review The Diary of Anais Nin 1931-1934: 001 (Diary of Anais Nin) / Harcourt Publishers Ltd:
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 2005-09-01
RRP: £8.99
Price: £0.81
Review In Search of Shakespeare / BBC Books:There can be few more appropriate writers and TV presenters to go In Search of Shakespeare than Michael Wood. Having already gone In Search of England and pursued the history of the Conquistadors in his recent acclaimed series, Wood has now taken on The Bard in the book to accompany his latest TV series. This is well-trodden ground, but Wood tells the story with relish and an historian's eye for detail, dismissing Bardolatry in favour of a "tale of one man's life, lived through a time of revolution-a time when not only England, but the larger world beyond, would go through momentous changes. " From Shakespeare's early days in Warwickshire to the sophisticated world of theatrical life and political skulduggery in London, Wood makes few claims to new discoveries, but offers a refreshingly global understanding of what drove Shakespeare and his creativity, from his Catholic origins to the Black Londoners that he met every day. Wood too often has to "enter the realm of diverting speculation rather than that of verifiable historical fact". Did Shakespeare have an affair with Emilia Lanier? Did he die an alcoholic? Wood colourfully poses such questions, though too many remain unanswered; he cheerfully admits that he's no Shakespeare scholar, but a popular historian who has enthusiastically placed Shakespeare back into the extraordinarily fertile world that produced him. -Jerry Brotton.
Edition: Abridged Ed
Publication date: 2004-06-03
RRP: £14.99
Price: £8.34
Review Me Talk Pretty One Day / Time Warner AudioBooks:David Sedaris became a star autobiographer on public radio, onstage in New York, and on bestseller lists, mostly on the strength of Santaland Diaries a scathing, hilarious account of his stint as a Christmas elf at Macy's department store. Sedaris's caustic gift has not deserted him in his fourth book, which mines poignant comedy from his peculiar childhood in North Carolina, his bizarre career path and his move with his lover to France. Though his anarchic inclination to digress is his glory, Sedaris does have a theme in these reminiscences: the inability of humans to communicate. The title is his rendition in transliterated English of how he and his fellow students of French in Paris mangle the Gallic language. In the essay "Jesus Shaves", he and his classmates from many nations try to convey the concept of Easter to a Moroccan Muslim. "It is a party for the little boy of God", says one. "Then he be die one day on two. morsels of. [+]lumber", says another. Sedaris muses on the disputes between his Protestant mother and his father, a Greek Orthodox man whose Easter fell on a different day. Other essays explicate his deep kinship with his eccentric mother and absurd alienation from his IBM-exec dad: "To me, the greatest mystery of science continues to be that a man could father six children who shared absolutely none of his interests". Every glimpse we get of Sedaris's family and acquaintances delivers laughs and insights. He thwarts his North Carolina speech therapist ("for whom the word pen had two syllables") by cleverly avoiding all words with "s" sounds, which reveal the lisp she sought to correct. His midget guitar teacher, Mister Mancini, is unaware that Sedaris doesn't share his obsession with breasts, and sings "Light My Fire" all wrong-"as if he were a Webelo scout demanding a match". As a remarkably unqualified teacher at the Art Institute of Chicago, Sedaris had his class watch soap operas and assign "guessays" on what would happen in the next day's episode. It all adds up to the most distinctively skewed autobiography since Spalding Gray's Swimming to Cambodia. -Tim Appelo.
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 2006-04-20
Dewey code: 822.30922
RRP: £8.99
Price: £3.28
Review Roaring Boys: Shakespeare's Rat Pack / The History Press Ltd:
Publication date: 2002-05-30
Dewey code: 809
Price: £9.99
Review Illuminations / Random House USA Inc:
Authors
- Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 1998-01-29
Dewey code: 823.8
RRP: £9.99
Price: £4.19
Review The Life of Charlotte Bronte / Penguin Classics:
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 2000-03-30
Dewey code: 823.912
Price: £6.99
Review Three Corvettes / Phoenix:
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 2006-02-23
Dewey code: 821.8
RRP: £10.99
Price: £4.99
Review Edward Lear: The Life of a Wanderer / The History Press Ltd:
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 2004-11-01
Dewey code: 910
RRP: £7.99
Price: £3.30
Review Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer / Flamingo:
Edition: New Ed
Publication date: 1997-01-30
Dewey code: 813.54
RRP: £7.99
Price: £19.76
Review The Basketball Diaries / Penguin Books Australia Ltd:
Publication date: 2001-09-27
Dewey code: 809
RRP: £16.99
Price: £29.91
Review J.K.Rowling: A Biography - The Genius Behind Harry Potter / Michael O'Mara Books:
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George Eliot, Lorca: A Dream of Life, 1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare, George Orwell: The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters: As I Please, 1943-1945 v. 3 (Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters George Orwell), No Laughing Matter: How I Carried On: How I Carried on, Nell, What If Our World Is Their Heaven?: The Final Conversations of Philip K. Dick, The Quest for Shakespeare, Elizabeth Gaskell: A Habit of Stories, The Diary of Anais Nin 1931-1934: 001 (Diary of Anais Nin), In Search of Shakespeare, Me Talk Pretty One Day, Roaring Boys: Shakespeare's Rat Pack, Illuminations, The Life of Charlotte Bronte, Three Corvettes, Edward Lear: The Life of a Wanderer, Footsteps: Adventures of a Romantic Biographer, The Basketball Diaries, J.K.Rowling: A Biography - The Genius Behind Harry Potter |
