Witchcraft, astrology, divination and every kind of popular magic flourished in England during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, from the belief that a blessed amulet could prevent the assaults of the Devil to the use of the same charms to recover stolen goods. At the same time the Protestant Reformation attempted to take the magic out of religion, and scientists were developing new explanations of the universe. Keith Thomas's classic analysis of beliefs held on every level of Engli...

An erotic novella. Renee is having the worst day ever. Stress at work and away from the job has sent her irritation level skyrocketing. Her husband has the power to relieve her tension, but James is reluctant to play with her tonight. Renee knows he'll eventually give in. He just needs the right kind of encouragement...

'Man and the Natural World, an encyclopaedic study of man's relationship to animals and plants, is completely engrossing ... It explains everything - why we eat what we do, why we plant this and not that, why we keep pets, why we like some animals and not others, why we kill the things we kill and love the things we love ... It is often a funny book and one to read again and again' Paul Theroux, Sunday Times'The English historian Keith Thomas has revealed modes of...

Shocks and Rivalries in the Middle East and North Africa is the first book to examine issue-driven antagonisms within groups of Middle East and North Africa (MENA) states and their impact on relations within the region. The volume also considers how shock events, such as internal revolts and regional wars, can alter interstate tensions and the trajectory of conflict.MENA has experienced more internal rivalries than any other region, making a detailed analysis vital to understanding...

Representing some of the most talented writers at work today, the 26 original essays in Love, Christopher Street encompass revealing, intense, profound, funny, personal, and queer reflections that span forty years of gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender life in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. Together these essays create an LGBT love letter to New York City from native New Yorkers, American transplants, and international writers. This book continues the Lambda...

‘Flak’ Houses were the rest homes set up in England during the Second World War by the American Red Cross to provide centers of rest and recuperation for combat-weary airmen. These were usually situated in large country houses where flyers were permitted to wear civilian clothes and partake in a variety of sporting and recreational activities. All told, some 87,000 men passed through the R&R system before it disbanded in 1945. Keith Thomas covers the history of more than 20 Flak Houses in ...

How should we live? That question was no less urgent for English men and women who lived between the early sixteenth and late eighteenth centuries than for this book's readers. Keith Thomas's masterly exploration of the ways in which people sought to lead fulfilling lives in those centuries between the beginning of the Reformation and the heyday of the Enlightenment illuminates the central values of the period, while casting incidental light on some of the perennial problems of human exist...

A Texan by birth, Galen has traveled extensively throughout North America, Europe, and parts of Asia, experiencing various peoples and cultures, observing their ways of life and their search for God along the way. His own search for the truth has spanned across this journey and the various denominations within the American Christian community. After much reflection, study, and frustration, he asked God to reveal Himself. Much to Galen’s surprise, God began to do so. The poems in this work ...

Early Stories by Tennessee Williams is an edited collection of thirty-one previously unpublished short stories written in the 1930s, when Tennessee Williams was living in the Midwest during a tumultuous period for the nation and himself. The stories highlight aspects of the writer’s biography relative to his young adult years in St. Louis, Columbia, and the Missouri Ozarks, offering insight into the relationships between the author, his family, and close friends. The influence of ...

Masculinity at the Movies takes a deep dive into masculinity in film and how Hollywood movies continue to produce and promote masculine stereotypes that place boys and men in constraining identities and dysfunctional patterns of behaviour.From classic film stars to those of the present day, this textbook unpacks the development of the main male stereotypes in film – villains, heroes and oafs – and how movies can develop healthy new male representations. Alongside Hollywood...

Extending from the belief that masculinities are multiple, consisting of complexities and constructions that make up the traits associated with each, this book explores the various ways in which boys and men are conditioned to view women as inferior to themselves and predominantly sexual objects—and the deleterious effects this has on both women and men, society, and culture at large.Beginning in childhood, the book provides a critical framework to understand one form of masculinit...

Keith Thomas’s earlier studies in the ethnography of early modern England, Religion and the Decline of Magic, Man and the Natural World, and The Ends of Life, were all attempts to explore beliefs, values, and social practices in the centuries from 1500 to 1800. In Pursuit of Civility continues this quest by examining what English people thought it meant to be “civilized” and how that condition differed from being “barbarous” or “savage.” Thomas shows that the upper ranks of society sought ...