Best of
Memoir

1971

A Circle of Quiet


Madeleine L'Engle - 1971
    This journal shares fruitful reflections on life and career prompted by the author's visit to her personal place of retreat near her country home.

Love and War in the Apennines


Eric Newby - 1971
    This story recounts his experiences and the invaluable aid given by the local people, especially the woman who became his life-long love.

The Moon's a Balloon


David Niven - 1971
    One of the bestselling memoirs of all time, David Niven's The Moon's a Balloon is an account of one of the most remarkable lives Hollywood has ever seen.Beginning with the tragic early loss of his aristocratic father, then regaling us with tales of school, army and wartime hi-jinx, Niven shows how, even as an unknown young man, he knew how to live the good life.But it is his astonishing stories of life in Hollywood and his accounts of working and partying with the legends of the silver screen - Lawrence Oliver, Vivien Leigh, Cary Grant, Elizabeth Taylor, James Stewart, Lauren Bacall, Marlene Dietrich, Noel Coward and dozens of others, while making some of the most acclaimed films of the last century - which turn David Niven's memoir into an outright masterpiece.An intimate, gossipy, heartfelt and above all charming account of life inside Hollywood's dream factory, The Moon is a Balloon is a classic to be read and enjoyed time and again..

The Village Horse Doctor


Ben K. Green - 1971
    In old Doc's books, they recognize a man who knew horses and cattle to the bone and could tell about them with honest prose and a sly cowboy sense of humor. I've read them all, as have most of the cowboys I know."-John R. Erickson, rancher and author of the Hank the Cowdog series. Ben K. Green takes us back to the deep Southwest and the never-a-dull-moment years he spent as a practicing horse doctor along the Pecos and the Rio Grande. With precious little formal schooling but a perfect corral-side manner and plenty of natural wit, Green became the first to hang up a shingle in the trans-Pecos territory. Hear him tell the tales of his struggles with mean stockmen, yellowweed fever, banditos, poison hay, and "drouth." His canny mix of science and horse sense when treating animals "that ain't house pets" is 100-proof old time pleasure. A veterinarian in the far Southwest for much of his life, Ben K. Green retired to ranch in Texas until his death in 1974.

My Way of Life


Joan Crawford - 1971
    Even when the cameras quit rolling, her life never stopped being over-the-top. In My Way of Life, a cult classic since it was first published in the early 1970s, Crawford shares her secrets.Part memoir, part self-help book, part guide to being fabulous, My Way of Life advises the reader on everything from throwing a small dinner party for eighteen to getting the most out of a marriage. Featuring tips on fashion, makeup, etiquette, and everything in between, it is an irresistible look at a bygone era, when movie stars were pure class, and Crawford was at the top of the heap.

The golden evenings of summer


Will Stanton - 1971
    . . the aroma of the backyard lilac bush . . . the inviting appeal of the vacant lot next door . . . the riches of a bottle-cap collection . . . the temptation of the cookie jar . . . the summers that never ended.Capture a moment and journey back with us to the good old days . . . those very, very good old days.

A Joyful Noise


Janet L. Gillespie - 1971
    There was grandmother Baba, erect and small, bellowing messages from porch to boathouse via a megaphone; Mother and siblings, at work on Father's clerical vocation ("Guess what God's done now!"); and Father, gentle and high-spirited, bird-walk guide, organizer of expeditions, and an enthusiast like the others, of bracing seascapes. There is a delicate, compassionate portrait of Uncle Tink, a mental retardate in his twenties (but only ""two or three inside""), which encompasses a natural, affectionate and genial hilarity at some of his pecadillos. Warm but not the least cloying.

North to Cree Lake: The Rugged Lives of the Trappers Who Leave Civilization Behind


A.L. Karras - 1971
    The onset of the Great Depression meant there were few opportunities for young men on the prairies, so the pair decided to pursue their dream of trapping in the North.This is a vividly recounted tale of life in the northern Saskatchewanwilderness, "the old North, land of mystery and deep silences" only accessible by canoe in summer, by dog team in winter, or by aircraft. The young men embrace the challenges of travelling in the North, and not only survive, but thrive. North to Cree Lake is full of fascinating details about everyday life in the North - what they ate, how they travelled, how to prepare moose nose - and offers insights into the men who chose to live in such an isolated and perilous region. Karras wrote North to Cree Lake many years after he left northern Saskatchewan, but the clarity of his memories is remarkable, as is his deep love of the North.A farmer's assistant for $2 a day, a grain buyer, and ultimately a school administrator, Arthur Karras no longer hunted when he returned to civilization but continued to fish. The writing of North to Cree Lake occupied his thoughts for many years. Karras lived in Indian Head, Saskatchewan, with his wife and two sons, and wrote one other non-fiction book.

Confessions Of Edward Dahlberg ( Universal Library, Volume 12 )


Edward Dahlberg - 1971
    

Stalking the Good Life


Euell Gibbons - 1971
    

Strange Experience: The Autobiography of a Hexenmeister


Lee R. Gandee - 1971
    

Gemini: An Extended Autobiographical Statement on My First Twenty-Five Years of Being a Black Poet


Nikki Giovanni - 1971
    

The Peninsula


Louise Dickinson Rich - 1971
    Best of all, it is written with the insight and the humility that her subject requires." Rachel Carson quote on the front cover.

Crossing


Jan Yoors - 1971
    Crossing is a moving and gripping work of literature, at once an unforgettable portrait of a vanished way of life, a decimated people, a nightmare experience, and the precise description of what happened to the mind and soul of a young man for whom violence and death became, by force of circumstance, the ordinary themes of life.

Among Friends


M.F.K. Fisher - 1971
    F. K. Fisher begins her recollections in Albion, Michigan, but they soon lead her to Whittier, California, where her family moved in 1912, when she was four. The "Friends" of the title range from the hobos who could count on food at the family’s back door to the businessmen who advertised in Father’s paper—but above all they are the Quakers who were the prominent group in Whittier. Mary Frances Kennedy found them unusual friends indeed, in the more than forty years that she lived in Whittier she was never invited inside a Friend’s house.Her portraits of her father, Rex—her mentor, himself the editor of the local newspaper—her mother, Edith, and the other members of her family are memorable and moving. Originally published in 1970, Among Friends provides a fascinating glimpse into the background and development of one of our most delightful and best-loved writers, Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher.

Ezra Pound, Father And Teacher: Discretions


Mary de Rachewiltz - 1971
    Traduzione dell'autrice

The Gray Mare's Colts


Judy Van Der Veer - 1971
    The author relates her experience with horses beginning with the old gray mare.