But beyond these familiar details, the Brontes' story has remained largely obscure. This landmark book is the first definitive history of this fascinating family. Based on eleven years of research among newly discovered letters by every member of the family, original manuscripts, and the newspapers of that time, it gives a new and fuller picture of the Brontes' lives from beginning to end and, in the process, demolishes many myths. The father, Patrick, was not, as commonly believed, the cold patriarch of a family of victims. Charlotte, ruthlessly self-willed, ran roughshod over her sisters and went so far as to alter or destroy their manuscripts when she disapproved. Emily was so psychologically and physically dependent on her fantasy life that she could not survive in the outside world. Anne, widely regarded as the gentlest of the sisters, had a core of steel and was a more daring and revolutionary author than Charlotte. Branwell, the adored brother, was a talented poet who provided much of Charlotte's inspiration.

    They are first- generation Americans, citizens of other nations, and lifelong New Yorkers. But they all share one thing: They honor their loved ones by living their lives with purpose, and a promise to never forget.These courageous family members share their grief and loss-and hope- speaking in their own words, with love, courage, and strength enough to inspire us all.

    Nevertheless their lives were so closely intertwined, their choices, dreams and tragedies so eerily similar, it seems impossible to consider one without the other.Both women became famous writers; fell in love with brilliant but impossible men; and were single mothers who had children out of wedlock; both lived in exile; fought for their position in society; and thought deeply about how we should live. And both women broke almost every rigid convention there was to break: Wollstonecraft chased pirates in Scandinavia. Shelley faced down bandits in Naples. Wollstonecraft sailed to Paris to witness the Revolution. Shelley eloped in a fishing boat with a married man. Wollstonecraft proclaimed that women’s liberty should matter to everyone.Not only did Wollstonecraft declare the rights of women, her work ignited Romanticism. She inspired Coleridge, Wordsworth and a whole new generation of writers, including her own daughter, who – with her young lover Percy Shelley – read Wollstonecraft’s work aloud by her graveside. At just nineteen years old and a new mother herself, Mary Shelley composed Frankenstein whilst travelling around Italy with Percy and roguish Lord Byron (who promptly fathered a child by Mary’s stepsister). It is a seminal novel, exploring the limitations of human nature and the power of invention at a time of great religious and scientific upheaval. Moreover, Mary Shelley would become the editor of her husband’s poetry after his early death – a feat of scholarship that did nothing less than establish his literary reputation.Romantic Outlaws brings together a pair of visionary women who should have shared a life, but who instead shared a powerful literary and feminist legacy. This is inventive, illuminating, involving biography at its best.

    He is famous for two masterpieces, Miss Lonelyhearts (1933) and The Day of the Locust (1939). Seventy years later, The Day of the Locust remains the most penetrating novel ever written about Hollywood. EILEEN MCKENNEY—accidental muse, literary heroine—was the inspiration for her sister Ruth’s humorous stories, My Sister Eileen, which led to stage, film, and television adaptations, including Leonard Bernstein’s 1953 musical Wonderful Town.  She grew up in Cleveland and moved to Manhattan at 21 in search of romance and adventure. She and her sister lived in a basement apartment in the Village with a street-level window into which men frequently peered.  Husband and wife were intimate with F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dorothy Parker, Katharine White, S.J. Perelman, Bennett Cerf, and many of the literary, theatrical, and movie notables of their era.  With Lonelyhearts, biographer Marion Meade, whose Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin earned accolades from the Washington Post Book World ("Wonderful") to the San Francisco Chronicle ("Like looking at a photo album while listening to a witty insider reminisce about the images"), restores West and McKenney to their rightful places in the rich cultural tapestry of interwar America.

    There, people from around the world visit daily to learn about the tragic period of history from 1933 to 1945 known as the Holocaust. The museum serves as an education, research, and historical center in remembrance of the six million Jews across Europe who were murdered at the hands of the Nazi Party machine led by Adolf Hitler. A special section of Yad Vashem is dedicated to those who carried out acts of courage to save the lives of Jews during the Holocaust. Remembered there is a couple from Dieden of the Netherlands, Frans and Mien Wijnakker. Two Among the Righteous Few: A Story of Courage in the Holocaust is the remarkable tale of how Frans and his wife, Mien, saved the lives of at least two dozen Jews in southern Holland during World War II. They were Catholics who led a simple life in a small town, but they took risks and displayed bravery to help others in dire need, instilling hope during one of the most horrific points of history.

    To say that it’s high time that it was defined by its women falls some way short of an understatement.Jenni Murray draws together the lives 21 women to shed light upon a variety of social, political, religious and cultural aspects of British history. In lively prose Murray reinvigorates the stories behind the names we all know and reveals the fascinating tales behind those less familiar, ultimately producing a unique history of Britain that is as long-overdue as it is absorbing. From famous queens to forgotten visionaries, and from great artists to our most influential political actors, A History of Britain in 21 Women is a veritable feast of page-turning history.A History of Britain in 21 Women will profile Boudicca, Aphra Behn, Elizabeth I (this chapter will also feature Anne Boleyn and Mary Queen of Scots), Fanny Burney, Jane Austen, Mary Wollstonecraft, Constance Markievicz, Nancy Astor, Ada Lovelace, Caroline Herschel, Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, Millicent Garrett Fawcett, Emmeline Pankhurst, Gwen John, Rosalind Franklin, Ethel Smyth, Margaret Thatcher, Nicola Sturgeon, Mary Quant, Barbara Castle and Mary Somerville.

    This story of three closely related Oxfordshire communities - a hamlet, the nearby village and a small market town - is based on the author's experiences during childhood and youth. It chronicles May Day celebrations and forgotten children's games, the daily lives of farmworkers and craftsmen, friends and relations - all painted with a gaiety and freshness of observation that make this trilogy an evocative and sensitive memorial to Victorian rural England.With a new introduction by Richard Mabey

    

    Written at the onset of the First World War, My Own Story brings attention to Pankhurst's cause while defending her decision to cease activism until the end of the war. Notable for its descriptions of the British prison system, My Own Story is an invaluable document of a life dedicated to others, of a historical moment in which an oppressed group rose up to advocate for the simplest of demands: equality.Born in a politically active household, Emmeline Pankhurst was introduced to the women's suffrage movement at a young age. In 1903, she founded the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU), an organization dedicated to the suffragette movement. As their speeches, rallies, and petitions failed to make headway, they turned to militant protest, and in 1908 Emmeline was arrested for attempting to enter Parliament to deliver a document to Prime Minister H.H. Asquith. Imprisoned for six weeks, she observed the horrifying conditions of prison life, including solitary confinement. This experience changed her outlook on the struggle for women's suffrage, and she increasingly saw imprisonment as a means of radical publicity. Over the next several years, she would be arrested seven times for rioting, destroying property, and assaulting police officers, and while in prison staged hunger strikes in order to gain the attention of the press and political establishment. My Own Story is a record of one woman's tireless advocacy for the sake of countless others.With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Emmeline Pankhurst's My Own Story is a classic of English literature reimagined for modern readers.

    January 30, 1969 was one of those moments. There are those who were on the periphery of the event that day and heard what was going on; but as one of the few remaining insiders who accompanied the Beatles up onto the cold windswept roof of the Apple building, Ken Mansfield had a front row seat to the full sensory experience of the moment and witnessed what turned out to be beginning of the end. Ken shares in The Roof: The Beatles Final Concert, the sense that something special was taking place before his eyes that would live on forever in the hearts and souls of millions. As the US manager of Apple, Ken Mansfield was on the scene in the days, weeks, and months leading up to this monumental event. He shares his insights into the factors that brought them up onto that roof and why one of the greatest bands of all time left it all on that stage. Join Ken as he reflects on the relationships he built with the Fab Four and the Apple corps and what each player meant to this symphony of music history.

    This "splendid biography" (The New Yorker) gracefully moves through the dramatic life of the woman behind history's most legendary monster.A daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft, author of the daring A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, and the radical philosopher William Godwin, Mary Shelley grew up amid the literary and political avant-garde of early-nineteenth-century London. She escaped to Europe at seventeen with the married poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, causing a great scandal. On a famous night of eerie thunderstorms, in a villa near Lord Byron's on Lake Geneva, they told ghost stories and tales of horror, giving birth to the idea of Frankenstein, a monster who has haunted imaginations for nearly two hundred years. The Mary we meet here, brilliantly brought to life by Seymour from previously unexplored sources, is brave, generous, and impetuous. Struck by tragedy, she lost three of her four children, and when she was only twenty-four, Shelley drowned off the coast of Italy.

    In this innovative biography of the enigmatic eighteenth-century master, the author of Chatterton clarifies at last the true nature of William Blake's extraordinary life and art. 24-page color insert. Illustrations throughout.

    It also relates the extraordinary history of the museum's collection, a collection that has enabled the Van Gogh Museum to evolve into a world-renowned centre of knowledge about Van Gogh's work and the art of his time.

    They bring alive her family and friends, her surroundings and contemporary events with a freshness unparalleled in modern biographies. Above all we recognize the unmistakable voice of the author of such novels as Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. We see the shift in her writing from witty and amusing descriptions of the social life of town and country, to a thoughtful and constructive tone while writing about the business of literary composition. R.W. Chapman's ground-breaking edition of the collected Letters first appeared in 1932, and a second edition followed twenty years later. Now in this third edition of Jane Austen's Letters, Deirdre Le Faye has added new material that has come to light since 1952, and re-ordered the letters into their correct chronological sequence. She has provided discreet and full annotation to each letter, including its provenance, and information on the watermarks, postmarks, and other physical details of the manuscripts, together with new biographical, topographical, and general indexes. Teachers, students, and fans of Jane Austen, at all levels, will find remarkable insight into one of the most popular novelists ever.

    But rather than landed gentry or bohemian travelers, it's a mad extended Iran clan who flee Tehran to 1980s Britain after the fall the Shah. Five year old Shappi and her beloved brother Peyvand arrive with their parents in London—all cold weather and strange food—without a word of English. If adapting to a new culture isn't troubling enough, it soon becomes clear that the Ayatollah's henchmen are in pursuit. With the help of MI5, Shappi's family go into hiding. So apart from checking under the family car for bombs every morning, Shappi's childhood is like any other kids—swings in the park, school plays, kiss-chase, and terrorists.