The Real Lolita: The Kidnapping of Sally Horner and the Novel that Scandalized the World


Sarah Weinman - 2018
    And yet, very few of its readers know that the subject of the novel was inspired by a real-life case: the 1948 abduction of eleven-year-old Sally Horner.Weaving together suspenseful crime narrative, cultural and social history, and literary investigation, The Real Lolita tells Sally Horner’s full story for the very first time. Drawing upon extensive investigations, legal documents, public records, and interviews with remaining relatives, Sarah Weinman uncovers how much Nabokov knew of the Sally Horner case and the efforts he took to disguise that knowledge during the process of writing and publishing Lolita.Sally Horner’s story echoes the stories of countless girls and women who never had the chance to speak for themselves. By diving deeper in the publication history of Lolita and restoring Sally to her rightful place in the lore of the novel’s creation, The Real Lolita casts a new light on the dark inspiration for a modern classic.

Abbot Suger on the Abbey Church of St. Denis and Its Art Treasures


Abbot Suger - 1979
    Gerda Panofsky-Soergel has updated the commentary in the light of new material, and the bibliography that she has prepared reflects the scholarship on St.-Denis in the last three decades. She has obtained some additional and more recent photographs, and the illustrations include a new ground plan and a new section of the chevet of the Abbey Church, both drawn under the supervision of Sumner McKnight Crosby.

Charles Bukowski


Barry Miles - 2005
    A major new biography on an increasingly important American literary icon, by the most acclaimed writer on the Beat Generation, Barry Miles. Miles knew all the key players in the Beat era, including William Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg, and also recorded with Bukowski. Having spoken with people close to Bukowski, and with a full examination of Bukowski's extensive writings, Miles has written the definitive story of the laureate of American low-life.

The History of London


Walter Besant - 1894
    You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al Madinah And Meccah: Volume 2


Richard Francis Burton - 1906
    This Elibron Classics book is a facsimile reprint of a 1898 edition by George Bell & Sons, London.

A Book of Common Prayer


Joan Didion - 1977
    Grace Strasser-Mendana controls much of the country's wealth and knows virtually all of its secrets; Charlotte Douglas knows far too little. "Immaculate of history, innocent of politics," she has come to Boca Grande vaguely and vainly hoping to be reunited with her fugitive daughter. As imagined by Didion, her fate is at once utterly particular and fearfully emblematic of an age of conscienceless authority and unfathomable violence.

Sulla: The Last Republican


Arthur Keaveney - 1982
    Completely rewritten and updated to include the further discoveries of the last two decades, it challenges traditional views of Sulla as a tyrant and harsh military dictator and instead delivers a compellingly complex portrait of a man obsessed with the belief that he was blessed with divine favour.Written by a leading authority on the classical world, this lively and entertaining book transports us through Sulla's rise from poverty and obscurity to his dictatorship of Rome, highlighting his dedication and achievements in better ordering the Republic before his decline a generation later.

Timaeus and Critias


Plato
    In Timaeus, he gives a thorough account of the world in which we live, describing a cosmos composed of four elements earth, air, fire and water which combine to give existence to all things. An exploration of the origins of the universe, life and humanity, which outlines not just physical laws but also metaphysical and religious principles, it remained a paradigm of science for two thousand years. The mysterious preamble to Timaeus contains the first account in literature of Atlantis, while the fragmentary Critias, unfinished by its author, provides a spellbinding description of the lost continent's ideal society, which Critias asserts was created by the god-like children of Poseidon himself.

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich: A Critical Companion


Alexis Klimoff - 1997
    Also included are fascinating primary sources and background materials, an annotated bibliography, and discussions of the work by leading scholars Robert Louis Jackson, Richard Tempest, and Dariusz Tolczyk. Combining scholarship with accessibility, this critical companion--part of the acclaimed AATSEEL series--illuminates a great work of literature and will enhance its appreciation by students and teachers.

Greek Tragedy


AeschylusAristophanes - 1988
    In Sophocles' Oedipus Rex the king sets out to uncover the cause of the plague that has struck his city, only to disover the devastating truth about his relationship with his mother and his father.Medea is the terrible story of a woman's bloody revenge on her adulterous husband through the murder of her own children.

Herman Melville: Moby-Dick: Essays - Articles - Reviews


Nick Selby - 1998
    This "Columbia Critical Guide" starts with extracts from Melville's own letters and essays and from early reviews of "Moby-Dick" that set the terms for later critical evaluations. Subsequent chapters deal with the "Melville Revival" of the 1920s and the novel's central place in the establishment, growth, and reassessment of American Studies in the 1940s and 1950s. The final chapters examine postmodern New Americanist readings of the text, and how these provide new models for thinking about American culture.

I Can't But Jesus Can: Experiencing the Power of Surrender


Adam Houge - 2015
    Before you can make a difference first you need to learn and be changed by the power of surrender. In this book you will discover everything you need to understand God’s will, increase your faith, and experience Jesus more intimately in your life. All you have to do is begin with surrender.

Fatal Treasure: Greed and Death, Emeralds and Gold, and the Obsessive Search for the Legendary Ghost Galleon Atocha


Jedwin Smith - 2003
    Fatal Treasure is a truly compelling read.-Aphrodite Jones, New York Times bestselling author of Cruel Sacrifice and All She WantedIn 1622, hundreds of people lost their lives to the curse of the Spanish galleon Atocha-and they would not be the last. Fatal Treasure combines the rousing adventure of Ship of Gold in the Deep Blue Sea with the compelling characters and local color of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. It tells the powerful true story of the relentless quest to find the Atocha and reclaim her priceless treasures from the sea. You'll follow Mel Fisher, his family, and their intrepid team of treasure hunters as they dive beneath the treacherous waters of the Florida Straits and scour the ocean floor in search of gold, silver, and emeralds. And you'll discover that nearly four centuries after the shipwreck, the curse of the Atocha is still a deadly force.""On this day, the sea once again relinquished its hold on the riches and glory of seventeenth-century Spain. And by the grace of God, I would share the moment of glory . . . . I was reaching for my eighth emerald, another big one, when the invisible hands squeezed my trachea. In desperation, I clutched at my throat to pry away the enemy's fingers. But no one had hold of me.""-From the Prologue

The Geography of the Imagination: Forty Essays


Guy Davenport - 1981
    In the 40 essays that constitute this collection, Guy Davenport, one of America's major literary critics, elucidates a range of literary history, encompassing literature, art, philosophy and music, from the ancients to the grand old men of modernism.

The Irresistible Fairy Tale: The Cultural and Social History of a Genre


Jack D. Zipes - 2012
    Yet we still have great difficulty understanding how it originated, evolved, and spread--or why so many people cannot resist its appeal, no matter how it changes or what form it takes. In this book, renowned fairy-tale expert Jack Zipes presents a provocative new theory about why fairy tales were created and retold--and why they became such an indelible and infinitely adaptable part of cultures around the world.Drawing on cognitive science, evolutionary theory, anthropology, psychology, literary theory, and other fields, Zipes presents a nuanced argument about how fairy tales originated in ancient oral cultures, how they evolved through the rise of literary culture and print, and how, in our own time, they continue to change through their adaptation in an ever-growing variety of media. In making his case, Zipes considers a wide range of fascinating examples, including fairy tales told, collected, and written by women in the nineteenth century; Catherine Breillat's film adaptation of Perrault's Bluebeard; and contemporary fairy-tale drawings, paintings, sculptures, and photographs that critique canonical print versions.While we may never be able to fully explain fairy tales, The Irresistible Fairy Tale provides a powerful theory of how and why they evolved--and why we still use them to make meaning of our lives.