A year of intensive close reading and personal reflection led to this uniquely entertaining collection of essays about poetry in general and one remarkable poem in particular: 'In the dream of the cold restaurant' by Abigail Parry.Whether you're a seasoned poetry reader or a curious newcomer, this engaging and constantly surprising book offers a generous, idiosyncratic take on what poetry is, what it does, and what it's for.From the author of Multiple Joyce: 100 essays ...

In one hundred short essays David Collard navigates James Joyce's astonishing cultural legacy in the century since the publication of Ulysses in 1922.Holding up a funhouse mirror to our times, Collard finds a multitude of Joyces, in often ludicrous disguises, wherever he looks—whether at Ally Sloper, Borsalino hats, Anthony Burgess, Cher, first editions, Flann O'Brien, Guinness, Hattie Jacques, John Cage, Kim Kardashian, Lego, Moby-Dick, numismatics, perfume, pian...

Although Alfred Russel Wallace (1823–1913) was one of the most famous scientists in the world at the time of his death at the age of ninety, today he is known to many as a kind of "almost-Darwin," a secondary figure relegated to the footnotes of Darwin's prodigious insights. But this diminution could hardly be less justified. Research into the life of this brilliant naturalist and social critic continues to produce new insights into his significance to history and his role in helping to sh...

This book focuses on the interaction between practising economists and previous generations of economists. Because economic problems, such as crashes, tend to recur and are only partially understood, it may be profitable read the work of previous generations in a collaborative spirit. Sometimes this can offer a different perspective on current preoccupations and cause us to reconsider the scope of our much criticised subject. The book gathers together earlier work by the author which appea...

For a whole year on his train to work, Stig Abell read books from across genres and time periods. Then he wrote about them, and their impact on our culture and his own life.The result is a work of many things: a brisk guide to the canon of Western literature; an intimate engagement with writers from Shakespeare to JK Rowling, Marcel Proust to Zora Neale Hurston; a wise and funny celebration of the power of words; and a meditation on mental unrest and how to tackle it. It will help ...

How do you write a novel?Practising novelists and teachers of creative writing reveal their working methods and offer practical advice. Subjects covered range from magic realism to characterisation, surrealism to historical fiction, via perspective, plot twists and avoiding being boring, among many others.This book is forcreative writing studentswriters and readers of novelsteachers of creative writingWith co...

In any 24 hours there might be sleeping, eating, kids, parents, friends, lovers, work, school, travel, deadlines, emails, phone calls, Facebook, Twitter, the news, the TV, Playstation, music, movies, sport, responsibilities, passions, desires, dreams.Why should you stop what you're doing and read a book?Reading is not an innate human ability. Many people can't read. Many people would rather read a newspaper, a magazine, a blog, a cereal packet, than a novel.But peop...

A working father whose life no longer feels like his own discovers the transforming powers of great (and downright terrible) literature in this laugh-out-loud memoir.Andy Miller had a job he quite liked, a family he loved and no time at all for reading. Or so he kept telling himself. But, no matter how busy or tired he was, something kept niggling at him. Books. Books he’d always wanted to read. Books he’d said he’d read, when he hadn’t. Books that whispered the promise of escape f...

This critical study of the development of systematic economic ideas explores them in both historical and contemporary contexts.Many of the issues that faced economists in the past are still with us. The theories and methods of such men as Adam Smith, T. R. Malthus, David Ricardo, J.S. Mill, Karl Marx, Alfred Marshall, and J. M. Keynes are often relevant to us today. As the Great Recession taught us in the first decade of the twenty-first century, the history of econ...

A brilliant, ambitious, insightful inquiry into the art of writing from the legendary Margaret Atwood.What do we mean when we say that someone is a writer? Is he or she an entertainer? A high priest of the god of Art? An improver of readers' minds and morals? Looking back on her own childhood and the development of her writing career, Margaret Atwood addresses the riddle of her own art.Her wide-ranging reference to other writers, living and dead, is accompa...

"The ultimate literary bucket list. . . . 948 pages later, you still want more!" —The Washington PostCelebrate the thrill of discovering new titles in an extraordinary book that's as compulsively readable, entertaining, surprising, and enlightening as the one,zero-plus titles it recommends.Covering fiction, poetry, science and science fiction, memoir, travel writing, biography, children's books, history, and more, one,zero Books to Read Bef...

The first volume of Marx's Capital was published 150 years ago. It continues to entice readers eager to grapple with the author's account of the 'laws of motion' of capitalism. Yet for many, Capital can seem a forbidding work. This book, by Joseph Choonara, author of Unravelling Capitalism, is aimed at both individual readers and Capital reading groups. It takes each chapter of the first volume of Capital in turn, leading the reader through Marx's key arguments and offering insights and co...