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The Start, 1904–1930 (Twentieth Century Journey #1)
By William L. Shirer. 2013
The former CBS foreign correspondent provides an invaluable look back at his life—and the events that forged the twentieth century.…
A renowned journalist and author of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, William L. Shirer chronicles his own life story—in a personal history that parallels the greater historical events for which he served as a witness. In the first of a three-volume series, Shirer tells of his early life, growing up in Cedar Rapids, and later serving as a new reporter in Paris. In this surprisingly intimate account, Shirer details his youthful challenges, setbacks, rebellions, and insights into the world around him. He offers personal accounts of his friendships with notable people including Isadora Duncan, Ernest Hemingway, and Sinclair Lewis. This fascinating personal account also provides an illuminating look into a lost pre-World War II era—and is notable as much for its historical value as for its autobiographical detail. Ideal for anyone fascinated by this period in history.
Literary Philadelphia: A History of Poetry & Prose in the City of Brotherly Love
By Thom Nickels. 2015
&“Peppered with many . . . unexpected literary treasures . . . A wonderful introduction to/overview of [Philadelphia&’s] abundant literary heritage&” (Philly.com). Since Thomas Paine…
and Benjamin Franklin put type to printing press, Philadelphia has been a haven and an inspiration for writers. Local essayist Agnes Repplier once shared a glass of whiskey with Walt Whitman, who frequently strolled Market Street. Gothic writers like Edgar Allan Poe and George Lippard plumbed the city&’s dark streets for material. In the twentieth century, Northern Liberties native John McIntyre found a backdrop for his gritty noir in the working-class neighborhoods, while novelist Pearl S. Buck discovered a creative sanctuary in Center City. From Quaker novelist Charles Brockden Brown to 1973 US poet laureate Daniel Hoffman, author Thom Nickels explores Philadelphia&’s literary landscape. Includes photos
Inspector Morse: A Mysterious Profile (Mysterious Profiles)
By Colin Dexter. 2009
The international-bestselling author answers readers’ questions and discusses the origins of the Oxford inspector with a penchant for classical music.In…
1975, Inspector Morse debuted, working to solve the case of a murdered hitchhiker in Colin Dexter’s Last Bus to Woodstock. The book led to a multimillion-bestselling mystery series and a television show that spawned a spinoff and a prequel. But how did the beloved DCI from Oxford come to be exactly?In this quick read, Colin Dexter addresses some of the many questions posed to him by his readers. He reveals what motived him to break into crime writing and which authors and novels influenced him. He discusses Morse’s many traits and inner workings, as well as how he got his first Morse novel published. He also shares how he maintains a discipline with writing, how he deals with critics, and what it’s like to transform a series of novels into a television series.Praise for the Inspector Morse Novels“[Morse is] the most prickly, conceited, and genuinely brilliant detective since Hercule Poirot.” —The New York Times Book Review“A masterful crime writer whom few others match.” —Publishers Weekly “Let those who lament the decline of the English detective story reach for Colin Dexter.” —The Guardian“It is a delight to watch this brilliant, quirky man [Morse] deduce.” —Minneapolis Star-Tribune
Mark Twain in Washington, D.C.: The Adventures of a Capital Correspondent
By John Muller. 2013
A rollicking account of how Mark Twain mocked and mined DC&’s self-important, incompetent, and corrupt political scene to further his…
literary career. When young Samuel Clemens first visited the nation&’s capital in 1854, both were rough around the edges and of dubious potential. Returning as Mark Twain in 1867, he brought his sharp eye and acerbic pen to the task of covering the capital for nearly a half-dozen newspapers. He fit in perfectly among the other hard-drinking and irreverent correspondents. His bohemian sojourn in Washington, DC, has been largely overlooked, but his time in the capital city was catalytic to Twain&’s rise as America&’s foremost man of letters. While in Washington City, Twain received a publishing offer from the American Publishing Company that would jumpstart his fame. Through original research unearthing never-before-seen material, author John Muller explores how Mark Twain&’s adventures as a capital correspondent proved to be a critical turning point in his career. Includes photos! &“Muller&’s careful research, hard facts, well-chosen illustrations, and fresh discoveries bring Twain&’s Washington period back to life.&” —TwainWeb
The Islander: A Biography of Halldor Laxness
By Halldor Gudmundsson. 2004
"An enthralling, heartening study of a man of unflagging interest in life" Independent"A thoroughly researched biography" New York Review of…
Books"Provides readers of English with a perfect introduction to the life and works of an outstanding writer, one whom everyone should read" Irish Times"I am thoroughly convinced by Gudmundsson's portrayal of Laxness" J. M COETZEEA strong and memorable portrayal of a man who fought heroically to write for the world, but in one of its rarest languages. Halldór Laxness won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1955. During his life, which spanned nearly the entire century, he not only wrote sixty books, but also became an active participant in Europe's idealistic debates and struggles.In the 1930s, Laxness became attracted to Soviet communism. He travelled widely in the Soviet Bloc and, despite witnessing some atrocities, remained a defender of communism until the 1960s. But his political leanings never dominated his work. Laxness continually sought to divulge the world of beauty that lurks beneath the everyday, ensuring his artistry remained a sanctuary of humanism and reflection.In this biography, Guðmundsson has been granted access to unique material by Laxness' family. As a result, the interrelationships between Laxness' personal life, his politics and his career are meticulously examined. What emerges is a grand description of a fascinating personality in which the manifold conflicts of the 20th century are mirrored."Laxness is a writer of the first degree, a writer I dreamed of coming close to" BORIS PASTERNAK, 1960"When in a bad mood I have picked one of your books. And there the pure and deep sound has welcomed me, strong and charming from the first page" KAREN BLIXEN in an open letter to Laxness in 1952Translated from Icelandic by Philip Roughton
The Islander: A Biography of Halldor Laxness
By Halldor Gudmundsson. 2004
"An enthralling, heartening study of a man of unflagging interest in life" Independent"A thoroughly researched biography" New York Review of…
Books"Provides readers of English with a perfect introduction to the life and works of an outstanding writer, one whom everyone should read" Irish Times"I am thoroughly convinced by Gudmundsson's portrayal of Laxness" J. M COETZEEA strong and memorable portrayal of a man who fought heroically to write for the world, but in one of its rarest languages. Halldór Laxness won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1955. During his life, which spanned nearly the entire century, he not only wrote sixty books, but also became an active participant in Europe's idealistic debates and struggles.In the 1930s, Laxness became attracted to Soviet communism. He travelled widely in the Soviet Bloc and, despite witnessing some atrocities, remained a defender of communism until the 1960s. But his political leanings never dominated his work. Laxness continually sought to divulge the world of beauty that lurks beneath the everyday, ensuring his artistry remained a sanctuary of humanism and reflection.In this biography, Guðmundsson has been granted access to unique material by Laxness' family. As a result, the interrelationships between Laxness' personal life, his politics and his career are meticulously examined. What emerges is a grand description of a fascinating personality in which the manifold conflicts of the 20th century are mirrored."Laxness is a writer of the first degree, a writer I dreamed of coming close to" BORIS PASTERNAK, 1960"When in a bad mood I have picked one of your books. And there the pure and deep sound has welcomed me, strong and charming from the first page" KAREN BLIXEN in an open letter to Laxness in 1952Translated from Icelandic by Philip Roughton
The yellow house: A Memoir (2019 National Book Award Winner) (National Book Award Winner)
By Sarah M. Broom, Sarah M Broom. 2019
The author relates a century of her family and their collective relationship with a home in a neglected area of…
New Orleans, even after Hurricane Katrina wiped it off the map. Discusses pride, familial love, and issues of class, race, and internalized shame. Strong language. 2019
Happy-go-lucky
By David Sedaris. 2022
"Back when restaurant menus were still printed on paper, and wearing a mask--or not--was a decision made mostly on Halloween,…
David Sedaris spent his time doing normal things. As Happy-Go-Lucky opens, he is learning to shoot guns with his sister, visiting muddy flea markets in Serbia, buying gummy worms to feed to ants, and telling his nonagenarian father wheelchair jokes. But then the pandemic hits, and like so many others, he's stuck in lockdown, unable to tour and read for audiences, the part of his work he loves most. To cope, he walks for miles through a nearly deserted city, smelling only his own breath. He vacuums his apartment twice a day, fails to hoard anything, and contemplates how sex workers and acupuncturists might be getting by during quarantine. As the world gradually settles into a new reality, Sedaris too finds himself changed. His offer to fix a stranger's teeth rebuffed, he straightens his own, and ventures into the world with new confidence. Newly orphaned, he considers what it means, in his seventh decade, no longer to be someone's son. And back on the road, he discovers a battle-scarred America: people weary, storefronts empty or festooned with Help Wanted signs, walls painted with graffiti reflecting the contradictory messages of our time: Eat the Rich. Trump 2024. Black Lives Matter. In Happy-Go-Lucky, David Sedaris once again captures what is most unexpected, hilarious, and poignant about these recent upheavals, personal and public, and expresses in precise language both the misanthropy and desire for connection that drive us all. If we must live in interesting times, there is no one better to chronicle them than the incomparable David Sedaris." -- Provided by publisher
Brother, I'm dying
By Edwidge Danticat. 2007
Author recalls her childhood in Haiti where she was raised by her uncle Joseph, a minister. Describes their volatile Port-au-Prince…
neighborhood and her uncle's treatment at the hands of a pro-Aristide mob and U.S. Customs officials. Some violence and some strong language. Nat'l Book Award Finalist. 2007
Good dog, stay (Thorndike Nonfiction Ser.)
By Anna Quindlen. 2007
The author tells of her beloved black Labrador retriever, Beau. She reflects on how her life has unfolded in tandem…
with Beau's and on the lessons she's learned by watching him
J M Barrie and the Lost Boys: The Real Story Behind Peter Pan
By Andrew Birkin. 2003
This literary biography is &“a story of obsession and the search for pure childhood . . . Moving, charming, a revelation&” (Los Angeles…
Times). J. M. Barrie, Victorian novelist, playwright, and author of Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn&’t Grow Up, led a life almost as interesting as his famous creation. Childless in his marriage, Barrie grew close to the five young boys of the Davies family, ultimately becoming their guardian and surrogate father when they were orphaned. Andrew Birkin draws extensively on a vast range of material by and about Barrie, including notebooks, memoirs, and hours of recorded interviews with the family and their circle, to describe Barrie&’s life, the tragedies that shaped him, and the wonderful world of imagination he created for the boys. Updated with a new preface and including photos and illustrations, this &“absolutely gripping&” read reveals the dramatic story behind one of the classics of children&’s literature (Evening Standard). &“A psychological thriller . . . One of the year&’s most complex and absorbing biographies.&” —Time &“[A] fascinating story.&” —The Washington Post
The Collected Autobiographies of Maya Angelou
By Maya Angelou. 1997
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Maya Angelou&’s classic memoirs have had an enduring impact on American literature and culture. Her life…
story is told in the documentary film And Still I Rise, as seen on PBS&’s American Masters.This Modern Library edition contains I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Gather Together in My Name, Singin&’ and Swingin&’ and Gettin&’ Merry Like Christmas, The Heart of a Woman, All God&’s Children Need Traveling Shoes, and A Song Flung Up to Heaven. When I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings was published to widespread acclaim in 1969, Maya Angelou garnered the attention of an international audience with the triumphs and tragedies of her childhood in the American South. This soul-baring memoir launched a six-book epic spanning the sweep of the author&’s incredible life. Now, for the first time, all six celebrated and bestselling autobiographies are available in this handsome one-volume edition. Dedicated fans and newcomers alike can follow the continually absorbing chronicle of Angelou&’s life: her formative childhood in Stamps, Arkansas; the birth of her son, Guy, at the end of World War II; her adventures traveling abroad with the famed cast of Porgy and Bess; her experience living in a black expatriate &“colony&” in Ghana; her intense involvement with the civil rights movement, including her association with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X; and, finally, the beginning of her writing career. The Collected Autobiographies of Maya Angelou traces the best and worst of the American experience in an achingly personal way. Angelou has chronicled her remarkable journey and inspired people of every generation and nationality to embrace life with commitment and passion.
The Book of Separation: A Memoir
By Tova Mirvis. 2016
The memoir of a woman who leaves her faith and her marriage and sets out to navigate the terrifying, liberating terrain…
of a newly mapless world Born and raised in a tight-knit Orthodox Jewish family, Tova Mirvis committed herself to observing the rules and rituals prescribed by this way of life. After all, to observe was to be accepted and to be accepted was to be loved. She married a man from within the fold and quickly began a family. But over the years, her doubts became noisier than her faith, and at age forty she could no longer breathe in what had become a suffocating existence. Even though it would mean the loss of her friends, her community, and possibly even her family, Tova decides to leave her husband and her faith. After years of trying to silence the voice inside her that said she did not agree, did not fit in, did not believe, she strikes out on her own to discover what she does believe and who she really is. This will mean forging a new way of life not just for herself, but for her children, who are struggling with what the divorce and her new status as &“not Orthodox&” mean for them. This is a memoir about what it means to decide to heed your inner compass at long last. To free the part of yourself that has been suppressed, even if it means walking away from the only life you&’ve ever known. Honest and courageous, Tova takes us through her first year outside her marriage and community as she learns to silence her fears and seek adventure on her own path to happiness.
Truth Worth Telling: A Reporter's Search for Meaning in the Stories of Our Times
By Scott Pelley. 2019
This inspiring memoir of life on the frontlines of history is a “riveting blend of investigative reporting, color commentary, and…
personal reminiscence” (Publishers Weekly, starred review).A 60 Minutes correspondent and former anchor of the CBS Evening News, Scott Pelley writes as a witness to events that changed our world. In moving, detailed prose, he stands with firefighters at the collapsing World Trade Center on 9/11, advances with American troops in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq, and reveals private moments with presidents (and would-be presidents) he’s known for decades. Pelley also offers a resounding defense of free speech and a free press as the rights that guarantee all others.Above all, Truth Worth Telling offers a collection of inspiring tales that reminds us of the importance of sticking to our values in uncertain times. For readers who believe that values matter, and that truth is worth telling, Pelley writes, “I have written this book for you.”
Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies: How Doubting the Bard Became the Biggest Taboo in Literature
By Elizabeth Winkler. 2023
An &“extraordinarily brilliant&” and &“pleasurably naughty&” (André Aciman) investigation into the Shakespeare authorship question, exploring how doubting that William Shakespeare…
wrote his plays became an act of blasphemy…and who the Bard might really be.The theory that Shakespeare may not have written the works that bear his name is the most horrible, unspeakable subject in the history of English literature. Scholars admit that the Bard&’s biography is a &“black hole,&” yet to publicly question the identity of the god of English literature is unacceptable, even (some say) &“immoral.&” In Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies, journalist and literary critic Elizabeth Winkler sets out to probe the origins of this literary taboo. Whisking you from London to Stratford-Upon-Avon to Washington, DC, she pulls back the curtain to show how the forces of nationalism and empire, religion and mythmaking, gender and class have shaped our admiration for Shakespeare across the centuries. As she considers the writers and thinkers—from Walt Whitman to Sigmund Freud to Supreme Court justices—who have grappled with the riddle of the plays&’ origins, she explores who may perhaps have been hiding behind his name. A forgotten woman? A disgraced aristocrat? A government spy? Hovering over the mystery are Shakespeare&’s plays themselves, with their love for mistaken identities, disguises, and things never quite being what they seem. As she interviews scholars and skeptics, Winkler&’s interest turns to the larger problem of historical truth—and of how human imperfections (bias, blindness, subjectivity) shape our construction of the past. History is a story, and the story we find may depend on the story we&’re looking for. &“Lively&” (The Washington Post), &“fascinating&” (Amanda Foreman), and &“intrepid&” (Stacy Schiff), Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies will forever change how you think of Shakespeare…and of how we as a society decide what&’s up for debate and what&’s just nonsense, just heresy.
La verdad sea dicha
By Germán Espinosa. 2003

Everything is Everything: The Top 10 Bestseller
By Clive Myrie. 2023
'Infinitely more readable than the average journalism memoir, and decidedly more important.' - Sathnam Sanghera, The Times'So engaging. You feel…
as if he is talking to you, sharing ideas and thoughts, as if you were a friend.' - Yasmin Ahlibai-BrownAs a Bolton teenager with a paper round, Clive Myrie read all the newspapers he delivered from cover to cover and dreamed of becoming a journalist. In this deeply personal memoir, he tells how his family history has influenced his view of the world, introducing us to his Windrush generation parents, a great grandfather who helped build the Panama Canal, and a great uncle who fought in the First World War, later to become a prominent police detective in Jamaica.He reflects on how being black has affected his perspective on issues he's encountered in thirty years reporting some of the biggest stories of our time (most recently from Ukraine), showing us how those experiences gave him a better idea of what it means to be an outsider. He tells of his pride in his roots, but his determination not to be defined by his background in dealing with the challenges of race and class to succeed at the highest level. Moving, engaging, revealing, Everything is Everything is a story of love and hate - but also hope.
I Will Write to Avenge My People: The Nobel Lecture
By Annie Ernaux. 2022
Published for the first time in a beautiful collectible edition, the essential lecture delivered by the 2022 recipient of the…
Nobel Prize in Literature, Annie Ernaux.«J&’écrirai por venger ma race»It was as a young woman that Annie Ernaux first wrote these words in her diary, giving a name to her purpose in life as a writer. She returns to them in her stirring defense of literature and of political writing in her Nobel Lecture, delivered in Stockholm on December 7, 2022.To write of her own life, she asserts, is to &“shatter the loneliness of experiences endured and repressed;&” to mine individual experience is to find collective emancipation. Ernaux&’s speech is a bold assertion of the capacity of writing to give people a sense of their own worth, and of one writer&’s commitment to bearing witness to life, its joys and its injustices.Includes Annie Ernaux's Nobel lecture, her Nobel banquet speech, a congratulatory speech by Professor Anders Olsson, Chair of the Nobel Committee for Literature, and the Nobel opening address by Professor Carl-Henrik Heldin, Chairman of the board of the Nobel Foundation.
Blue Collar Intellectuals: When the Enlightened and the Everyman Elevated America
By Daniel J. Flynn. 2011
Stupid is the new smart—but it wasn&’t always so Popular culture has divorced itself from the life of the mind.…
Who has time for great books or deep thought when there is Jersey Shore to watch, a txt 2 respond 2, and World of Warcraft to play? At the same time, those who pursue the life of the mind have insulated themselves from popular culture. Speaking in insider jargon and writing unread books, intellectuals have locked themselves away in a ghetto of their own creation. It wasn&’t always so. Blue Collar Intellectuals vividly captures a time in the twentieth century when the everyman aspired to high culture and when intellectuals descended from the ivory tower to speak to the everyman. Author Daniel J. Flynn profiles thinkers from working-class backgrounds who played a prominent role in American life by addressing their intellectual work to a mass audience. Blue Collar Intellectuals tells the fascinating story of the unschooled hobo who migrated from skid row anonymity to White House chats with the president and prime-time TV specials. Blue Collar Intellectuals tells the fascinating story of: •The scandalous teacher-student romance that spawned a half-century labor of love in writing the history of the world. •The Ivy League Ph.D. who held neither a high school nor college degree, and fittingly launched a renaissance in reading the great books outside of formal schools. •The scholarship student who experienced the free market firsthand waiting tables and peddling socks, and who became one of capitalism&’s most influential exponents. •The impoverished outcast who became the poet of the pulps, elevating millions of readers along with heretofore marginal genres. Guiding us through a world now vanished, Flynn causes us to look anew at our own digital age and its nostrums: Video gaming is just a new form of literacy, Reality shows . . . Challenge our emotional intelligence, and Who cares if Johnny can&’t read? The value of books is overstated. Blue Collar Intellectuals shows us how much everyone intellectual and everyman alike has suffered from mass culture&’s crowding out of higher things and the elite&’s failure to engage the masses.
The World According to Joan Didion
By Evelyn McDonnell. 1968
A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF 2023 by The Millions • “Shaped by intellectual rigor and artistic grace … McDonnell’s portrait…
is vibrant, fluent, sensitive, and clarifying.” — Booklist, starred review"A wonderfully fitting tribute to Joan Didion: one that avoids simple platitudes, approaching the great writer with a fierce, probing intelligence, flawless language, and the impulse, which drove Didion's finest work, to understand the dreams of another." — Hua Hsu, Pulitzer-winning author of Stay TrueAn intimate exploration of the life, craft, and legacy of one of the most revered and influential writers, an artist who continues to inspire fans and creatives to cultivate practices of deep attention, rigorous interrogation and beautiful style.Joan Didion was a writer’s writer; not only a groundbreaking journalist, essayist, novelist and screenwriter, but a keen observer who honed her sights on life’s telling details. Her insights continue to influence creatives and admirers, encouraging them to become close observers of the world, unsentimental critics, and meticulous stylists.An antidote to a global view that narrows our vision to the smallest screens, The World According To Joan Didion is a meditation on the people, places, and objects that propelled Didion’s prose and an invitation to journalists, storytellers, and life adventurers to “throw themselves into the convulsions of the world,” as she once said.Evelyn McDonnell, the acclaimed journalist, essayist, critic, feminist, native Californian, and university professor who regularly teaches Didion’s work, is attuned to interpret Didion’s vision for readers today. Inspired by Didion’s own words—from her works both published and unpublished—and informed by the people who knew Didion and those whose lives she shaped, The World According to Joan Didion is an illustrated journey through her life, tracing the path she carved from Sacramento, Portuguese Bend, Los Angeles, and Malibu to Manhattan, Miami, and Hawaii. McDonnell reveals the world as it was seen through Didion’s eyes and explores her work in chapters keyed to the singular physical motifs of her writing: Snake. Typewriter. Hotel. Notebook. Girl. Etc.One of the first books to be published after the revered writer’s death in 2021, The World According to Joan Didion is a literary companion for those embarking on new journeys and a guide to innovative ways of being. It will radically transform the way you explore the world, and will help you answer the question as you sit in a café, or on a plane or train, pondering the future: What would Joan Didion have seen?The World According to Joan Didion includes 19 black-and-white illustrations and photos throughout.