Literary Bric-à-Brac and the Victorians

Literary Bric-à-Brac and the Victorians
Author: Jen Harrison
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 227
Release: 2016-05-06
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 131710465X

What are we to make of the Victorians’ fascination with collecting? What effect did their encounters with the curious, exotic and downright odd have on Victorian writers and their works? The essays in this collection take up these questions by examining the phenomenon of bric-à-brac in Victorian literature. The contributors to Literary Bric-à-Brac and the Victorians: From Commodities to Oddities explore sites of unusual concurrence (including museums, the home, art galleries, private collections) and the way in which bric-à-brac brought the alien into everyday settings, the past into the present and the wild into the domestic. Focusing on the representation of material culture in Victorian literature, the essays in this volume seek out miscellaneous and incongruous objects that take readers beyond the commonplace paradigms associated with commodity culture. Individual chapters analyse the work of writers as different as Edward Lear and John Henry Newman, Robert Browning and George Eliot, Charles Dickens and Lewis Carroll. In so doing they shed light on a dizzying array of topics and objects that include class and capitalism, the occult and the sacraments, Darwinism and dandyism, umbrellas, textiles, the Philosopher’s Stone and even the household nail.

Georges Braque

Georges Braque
Author: Alex Danchev
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 443
Release: 2012-02-14
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1628723653

Together with Picasso and Matisse, Georges Braque is unquestionably one of the three great pillars of twentieth-century art. Here is the first full-length biography of this remarkable figure. A pioneer of modern art and founder of Cubism, Georges Braque was a creative genius and tireless innovator, constantly pushing back the boundaries of the possible. In this magisterial work, Alex Danchev taps a wide range of new sources to reveal the heart and mind of one who helped usher in the greatest revolution in the ways of seeing since the Renaissance and changed the face of modern art.

On the Guest List: Adventures of a Music Journalist

On the Guest List: Adventures of a Music Journalist
Author: Maryanne Christiano-Mistretta
Publisher: Next Century Publishing
Total Pages: 198
Release: 2014-08-05
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9781629039084

"On the Guest List: Adventures of a Music Journalist" is a fun, upbeat memoir about a girl who loves music and life in general. Maryanne paints a vivid picture of being a teenager in the 1970s and young woman in the 1980s -- and how the punk, new wave and rock scene was from a young fan's viewpoint. Life truly comes together for Maryanne once she creates a career for herself reporting on the music she loves, writing for publications such as The Aquarian Arts Weekly, music.com and Punk magazine. Unlike other music memoirs, there is no downward spiral into drugs and addiction. Nor is it a groupie "tell all." "On the Guest List" is simply a compilation of mostly happy memories straight from the pages of Maryanne's diaries -- and of course, her heart.

In a Strange City

In a Strange City
Author: Laura Lippman
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Total Pages: 320
Release: 2015-02-03
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0571319998

'A plot worthy of Poe himself. Splendid entertainment.' Guardian 'One of the best crime novelists writing today.' TESS GERRITSEN 'An homage to the city of Baltimore.' Booklist A TESS MONAGHAN MYSTERY Three red roses and a half-empty bottle of cognac have been left on the grave of Edgar Allan Poe every 19th of January for the past fifty years. Baltimore P. I. Tess Monaghan takes on the strangest case of her career when a man approaches her asking her to find out who is behind the ritual. On 19th January, as she watches Poe's grave, two cloaked figures appear. There is a gunshot, and one is killed. Who was the mysterious client who has given her a fake name, and how does an old friend from Tess's past fit into the case? When more cryptic clues are left at her home, Tess realises that someone is watching her every move. Someone bent on killing again. 'Compulsive and beautifully realised.' SHOTS magazine 'Extremely well-written who-done-it. . . A must read for those fellow suspense readers like myself!' 5* reader review 'A satisfying mystery.' 5* reader review PRAISE FOR THE TESS MONAGHAN SERIES 'Tess is a heroine with a nose for what she is not being told, and she is never content with half the story. These Baltimore novels are effective thrillers, because they are stories about wanting to know what happens next.' Times Literary Supplement 'Whip smart female protagonist, gritty Baltimore setting. Loved Tess!' 5* reader review 'Readers won't be able to resist Tess, who, like one of Baltimore's famous crabs, sports a tough shell that hides a sweet centre.' BOOKLIST 'Digestible, fun, tense' NPR 'In this series, Lippman has developed sturdy tales, wry humour, and snappy dialogue wrapped around an insider's view of Baltimore.' SUN-SENTINEL 'Tess, is a ballsy, free-spirited woman who thinks on her feet and has a commanding physical presence. . . Highly recommend' 5* reader review 'What fun! I discovered a new (to me) mystery series. Tess Monaghan is a terrific main character.' 5* reader review 'I really have fallen in love with Tess Monaghan. These mystery novels well deserve the awards Lippman has won.' 5* reader review

Reforming the Common European Asylum System

Reforming the Common European Asylum System
Author: Vincent Chetail
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 549
Release: 2016-02-15
Genre: Law
ISBN: 9004308660

This book, edited by Vincent Chetail, Philippe De Bruycker and Francesco Maiani, is aimed at analysing the recent changes of the Common European Asylum System, the progress achieved and the remaining flaws. The overall objective and key added value of this volume are to provide a comprehensive and critical account of the recast instruments governing asylum law and policy in the European Union. This book is the outcome of the 7th Congress of the Academic Network for Legal Studies on Immigration and Asylum in Europe held in Brussels in 2014. Contributors are: Hemme Battjes, Céline Bauloz, Ulrike Brandl, Vincent Chetail, Cathryn Costello, Philippe De Bruycker, Madeline Garlick, Elspeth Guild, Emily Hancox, Lyra Jakuleviciene, Francesco Maiani, Barbara Mikołajczyk, Géraldine Ruiz, Evangelia (Lilian) Tsourdi, Patricia Van De Peer and Jens Vedsted-Hansen.

In Memory of Memory

In Memory of Memory
Author: Maria Stepanova
Publisher: New Directions Publishing
Total Pages: 436
Release: 2021-02-09
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 0811228843

An exploration of life at the margins of history from one of Russia’s most exciting contemporary writers Shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize Winner of the MLA Lois Roth Translation Award With the death of her aunt, the narrator is left to sift through an apartment full of faded photographs, old postcards, letters, diaries, and heaps of souvenirs: a withered repository of a century of life in Russia. Carefully reassembled with calm, steady hands, these shards tell the story of how a seemingly ordinary Jewish family somehow managed to survive the myriad persecutions and repressions of the last century. In dialogue with writers like Roland Barthes, W. G. Sebald, Susan Sontag, and Osip Mandelstam, In Memory of Memory is imbued with rare intellectual curiosity and a wonderfully soft-spoken, poetic voice. Dipping into various forms—essay, fiction, memoir, travelogue, and historical documents—Stepanova assembles a vast panorama of ideas and personalities and offers an entirely new and bold exploration of cultural and personal memory.

Intimacies

Intimacies
Author: Lucy Caldwell
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Total Pages: 155
Release: 2021-05-04
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0571353762

*Includes the winner of the 2021 BBC National Short Story Award* 'Outstanding.' Guardian 'Eleven perfect stories.' Irish Independent 'Glorious.' The Times 'My FAVE collection ever.' Pandora Sykes In eleven stories, Intimacies exquisitely charts the steps and missteps of young women trying to find their place in the world. From a Belfast student ordering illegal drugs online to end an unwanted pregnancy to a young mother's brush with mortality, and from a Christmas Eve walking the city centre streets when everything seems possible, to a night flight from Canada which could change a life irrevocably, these are stories of love, loss and exile, of new beginnings and lives lived away from 'home'. 'Embedded in these stories are exquisite, often moving descriptions where everyday moments mix with the monumental.' Financial Times