"Without Contraries is no progression." - William BlakeBertram and Eustace are brothers. Bertram is extroverted, practical, a celebrity and a social success. Eustace is introverted, scholarly and shyly oblique. They understand neither themselves nor one another. Instead, they tell one another stories.Only two people see through their defences: their cousin Mimi, a retired violinist who lives in 'Tartini's Rest', and Kariba, a literary genius from Africa, Bertram's ...

The poet George Barker was convinced that his biography could never be written. 'I've stirred the facts around too much,' he told Robert Fraser. 'It simply can't be done.' Eliot wrote of his 'genius'. Yeats thought him the most interesting poet of his generation. Dylan Thomas envied his power over women. War trapped him in Japan. In America he conducted one of the most celebrated love affairs of the century. He fathered fifteen children in several countries, three during one battle-torn su...

This book focuses on the twin arts of literature and music, supporting the notion that cosmopolitanism is the natural condition of all the arts, and that all culture - without exception - is migrant culture. It draws on examples ranging from the first to the twenty-first centuries AD, on locations as remote as Alexandria and Australia, on writers as different as Virgil and V.S.Naipaul, Arnold and Achebe, and on musicians as diverse as Bach and Bartok, Purcell and Steve Reich. Across thirte...

Since the first world's fair in London in 1851, at the dawn of the era of industrialization, international expositions served as ideal platforms for rival nations to showcase their advancements in design, architecture, science and technology, industry, and politics. Before the outbreak of World War II, countries competing for leadership on the world stage waged a different kind of war—with cultural achievements and propaganda—appealing to their own national strengths and versions of modern...

Marrying life-writing with classical reception, this book examines ancient biography and its impact on subsequent ages. Close readings of ancient texts are framed by an assessment of their influence on the age of the French Revolution and Napoleon, and on the nineteenth, twentieth, and twenty-first centuries, of responses to ancient biography of modern critics, and of its visible legacy in art and film. Crucially it asks what modern biographers can learn from their ancient predecessors. Ar...

Autumn in London, Thatcher's Britain. As the rooms of the National Gallery echo to strange footsteps, and a bomb explodes in distant Brighton, a young painter receives a bizarre commission from his ailing and obsessive uncle. Gradually the past returns to engulf him, freighted by scenes and personalities he has long hoped to forget. In the year of the creation of the Turner prize, competing schools wrangle over the future of art. Demonstrations disturb the nocturnal city. A royal palace bu...

The Battle of the Somme is one of the most famous, and earliest, films of war ever made. The film records the most disastrous day in the history of the British army—1 July 1916—and it had a huge impact when it was shown in Britain during the war. Since then images from it have been repeated so often in books and documentaries that it has profoundly influenced our view of the battle and of the Great War itself. Yet this book is the first in-depth study of this historic film, and it is the f...

'This well-written and highly readable book makes a major contribution to advancing our understanding of the contribution that economics can make to analysing the impact of international trade policies for environmental risks … Regardless of the likelihood that the current WTO dispute settlement procedures can be changed in the way suggested by the authors of this book, it is essential reading for those interested in the contribution that economics can make to advancing our understanding o...

This surprising study draws together the disparate fields of postcolonial theory and book history in a challenging and illuminating way.Robert Fraser proposes that we now look beyond the traditional methods of the Anglo-European bibliographic paradigm, and learn to appreciate instead the diversity of shapes that verbal expression has assumed across different societies. This change of attitude will encourage students and researchers to question developmentally conceived models of co...

Includes an AUDIOBOOK SUPPLEMENT with all the charts in the print book!The greatest days of planet earth are on the horizon. Contrary to popular belief, we actually have a bright future on planet earth. Yes, there are plenty of challenges to tackle, no question. But history and the Bible tell a very different story You may be surprised to learn how much the earth has changes in the 2000 years since Jesus' birth -- for the better!Discover some eye-popping charts and facts on...

A classic study of the beliefs and institutions of mankind, and the progress through magic and religion to scientific thought, The Golden Bough has a unique status in modern anthropology and literature. First published in 1890, The Golden Bough was eventually issued in a twelve-volume edition (1906-15) which was abridged in 1922 by the author and his wife. That abridgement has never been reconsidered for a modern audience. In it some of the more controversial passages wer...

Marxism and Urban Culture is the first volume to reconcile social science and humanities perspectives on culture. Covering a range of global cities—Bologna, Buenos Aires, Guatemala City, Liverpool, London, Los Angeles, Madrid, Mahalla al-Kubra, Mexico City, Montreal, Osaka, Strasbourg, Vienna—the contributions fuse political and theoretical concerns with analyses of urban cultural practices and historical movements, as well as urban-themed literary and filmic art. Conceived as a response t...