And yet, for most people, and in much of the world, Islam remains a little-known religion. Whether the issue is violence, terrorism, women's rights or slavery, Muslims are today expected to provide answers and to justify what Islam is - or is not. But little opportunity exists, either in the media or in society as a whole, to describe Islam: precisely the question this short and extremely accessible book sets out to answer. In simple, direct language it will introduce readers to Islam, to its spirituality, its principles, its rituals, its diversity and its evolution.

    What is beauty? Umberto Eco, among Italy’s finest and most important contemporary thinkers, explores the nature, the meaning, and the very history of the idea of beauty in Western culture. The profound and subtle text is lavishly illustrated with abundant examples of sublime painting and sculpture and lengthy quotations from writers and philosophers. This is the first paperback edition of History of Beauty, making this intellectual and philosophical journey with one of the world’s most acclaimed thinkers available in a more compact and affordable format.From the Trade Paperback edition

    Legends about Cornell abound--as the shy hermit, the devoted family caretaker, the artistic innocent--but never before Utopia Parkway has he been presented for what he was: a brilliant, relentlessly serious artist whose stature has now reached monumental proportions. Cornell was haunted by dreams and visions, yet the site of his imaginings couldn't have been more ordinary: a small house he shared with his mother and invalid brother in Queens, New York. In its cluttered basement, he spent his nights arranging photographs, cut-outs and other humble disjecta into some of the most romantic works to exist in three dimensions. Cornell was no recluse, however: admired by successive generations of vanguard artists, he formed friendships with figures as diverse as Duchamp, de Kooning, and Warhol and had romantically charged encounters with Susan Sontag and Yoko Ono--not to mention unrequited crushes on countless shop girls and waitresses. All this he recorded compulsively in a diary that, along with his shadow boxes, forms one of the oddest and most affecting records ever made of a life. It is from such documents, and from a decade of sustained attention to Cornell, that Deborah Solomon has fashioned the definitive biography of one of America's most powerful and unusual modern artists.

    Here, acclaimed scholar Stephen Greenblatt explores it with profound appreciation for its cultural and psychological power as literature. From the birth of the Hebrew Bible to the awe-inspiring contributions of Augustine, Dürer, and Milton in bringing Adam and Eve to vivid life, Greenblatt unpacks the story’s many interpretations and consequences over time. Rich allegory, vicious misogyny, deep moral insight, narrow literalism, and some of the greatest triumphs of art and literature: all can be counted as children of our “first” parents.

    Longtime skateboard artist Sean Cliver put together this staggering survey of over 1,000 skateboard graphics from the last 30 years, creating an indispensable insiders' history as he did so.Alongside his own history, Sean has assembled a wealth of recollections and stories from prominent artists and skateboarders such as: Andy Howell, Barry McGee, Ed Templeton, Steve Caballero, and Tony Hawk.The end result is a fascinating historical account of art in the skateboard subculture, as told by those directly involved with shaping its legendary creative face.

    With little experience as a painter (though famed for his sculpture David), Michelangelo was reluctant to begin the massive project. Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling recounts the four extraordinary years Michelangelo spent laboring over the vast ceiling while the power politics and personal rivalries that abounded in Rome swirled around him. Battling against ill health, financial difficulties, domestic problems, the pope's impatience, and a bitter rivalry with the brilliant young painter Raphael, Michelangelo created scenes so beautiful that they are considered one of the greatest masterpieces of all time. A panorama of illustrious figures converged around the creation of this great work-from the great Dutch scholar Desiderius Erasmus to the young Martin Luther-and Ross King skillfully weaves them through his compelling historical narrative, offering uncommon insight into the intersection of art and history.

    Now, for the first time, Olivia's work has been compiled into one deluxe book. Included are over 100 drawings and paintings, many previously unpublished, spanning the past fifteen years.

    This is the story of Mahatma Gandhi, a man who owned nothing-and gained everything!!

    Bronowski's exciting, illustrated investigation offers a perspective not just on science, but on civilization itself. Lower than the angelsForewordThe harvest of the seasons The grain in the stoneThe hidden structure The music of the spheresThe starry messanger The majestic clockworkThe drive for power The ladder of creation World within world Knowledge or certainty Generation upon generationThe long childhoodBibliographyIndex

    It is not geography that is the issue; Kashmir also guards the frontiers of ideology. If there was a glow of hope in the deepening shadows of a bitter partition, then it was Kashmir, whose people consciously rejected the false patriotism of fundamentalism and made common cause with secular India instead of theocratic Pakistan. Kashmir was, as Sheikh Abdullah said and Jawaharlal Nehru believed, a stabilising force for India. Why has that harmony disintegrated? Why has the promise been stained by the blood of rebellion? M.J. Akbar, the celebrated author of India: The Siege Within, Nehru: The Making of India, Riot After Riot and The Shade of Swords: Jihad and the Conflict between Islam and Christianity delves deep into the past for the roots of Kashmiriyat, the identity and culture that has blossomed within the ring of mountains for thousands of years. He records Kashmir's struggle in the century to first free itself from feudal oppression and then enter the world of modern India in 1947. Placing the mistakes and triumphs of those early, formative years in the perspective of history, the author goes on to explain how the 1980s have opened the way for Kashmir's hitherto marginalised secessionists. Both victory and defeat have their lessons; to forget either is to destablise the future. Kashmir and the mother country are inextricably linked. India cannot afford to be defeated in her Kashmir.

     A review of contemporary theory of art history provides readers with lucid prose and concrete examples. Discussion of eighteenth- and nineteenth- century theories that are important to art history offers readers a review of historically important issues in philosophy. Illustrations of well-known works of art show readers how theory has application to images. Art historians and educators.

    16 years later, the French Ambassador Hugues de Terlon secretly unearthed Descartes' bones & transported them to France. Why would this devoutly Catholic official care so much about the remains of a philosopher who was hounded from country to country on charges of atheism? Why would Descartes' bones take such a strange, serpentine path over the next 350 years—a path intersecting some of the grandest events imaginable: the birth of science, the rise of democracy, the mind-body problem, the conflict between faith & reason? Their story involves people from all walks of life—Louis XIV, a Swedish casino operator, poets & playwrights, philosophers & physicists, as these people used the bones in scientific studies, stole them, sold them, revered them as relics, fought over them, passed them surreptitiously from hand to hand. The answer lies in Descartes’ famous phrase: Cogito ergo sum—"I think, therefore I am." In his deceptively simple 78-page essay, Discourse on the Method, this small, vain, vindictive, peripatetic, ambitious Frenchman destroyed 2000 years of received wisdom & laid the foundations of the modern world. At the root of Descartes’ method was skepticism: "What can I know for certain?" Like-minded thinkers around Europe passionately embraced the book--the method was applied to medicine, nature, politics & society. The notion that one could find truth in facts that could be proved, & not in reliance on tradition & the Church's teachings, would become a turning point in human history. In an age of faith, what Descartes was proposing seemed like heresy. Yet Descartes himself was a good Catholic, who was spurred to write his incendiary book for the most personal of reasons: He'd devoted himself to medicine & the study of nature, but when his beloved daughter died aged 5, he took his ideas deeper. To understand the natural world one needed to question everything. Thus the scientific method was created & religion overthrown. If the natural world could be understood, knowledge could be advanced, & others might not suffer as his child did. The great controversy Descartes ignited continues to our era: where Islamic terrorists spurn the modern world & pine for a culture based on unquestioning faith; where scientists write bestsellers that passionately make the case for atheism; where others struggle to find a balance between faith & reason. Descartes’ Bonesis a historical detective story about the creation of the modern mind, with twists & turns leading up to the present day—to the science museum in Paris where the philosopher’s skull now resides & to the church a few kilometers away where, not long ago, a philosopher-priest said a mass for his bones.

    Get the nuts-and-bolts information you need to survive and thrive wherever you go. "Culture Shock " country guides are easy-to-read, accurate, and entertaining crash courses in local customs and etiquette. "Culture Shock " practical guides offer the inside information you need whether you're a student, a parent, a globetrotter, or a working traveler. "Culture Shock " at your Door guides equip you for daily life in some of the world's most cosmopolitan cities. And "Culture Shock " Success Secrets guides offer relevant, practical information with the real-life insights and cultural know-how that can make the difference between business success and failure.Each "Culture Shock " title is written by someone who's lived and worked in the country, and each book is packed with practical, accurate, and enjoyable information to help you find your way and feel at home.

    Instead, today's schools promote the false "gods" of economic utility, consumerism, or ethnic separatism and resentment. What alternative strategies can we use to instill our children with a sense of global citizenship, healthy intellectual skepticism, respect of America's traditions, and appreciation of its diversity? In answering this question, The End of Education restores meaning and common sense to the arena in which they are most urgently needed."Informal and clear...Postman's ideas about education are appealingly fresh."--New York Times Book Review

    It provides a comprehensive introduction to visual thinking and picture reading in Indian art and thought. Ultimately, the book shows that profound Hindu and Buddhist intuitions on the riddles of life and death are universally recognizable.