Download or read book Pyrrhus written by Mark Merlis and published by . This book was released on 1998 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pyrrhus is a male stripper in a bar in Ancient Greece. However, destiny has scheduled him for a career change. For Pyrrhus is the son of Achilles, and the oracle has proclaimed that he will lead the Myrmidons to victory.
Download or read book An Arrow s Flight written by Mark Merlis and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 1999-09-24 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this tour-de-force, the author of the award-winning "American Studies" tells the story of the Trojan War and Pyrrhus, the son of the fallen Achilles, now working as a go-go boy and hustler in the big city.
Download or read book American Studies written by Mark Merlis and published by HarperCollins UK. This book was released on 2008-06 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mark Merlis' exceptional first novel. Dark humour, biting wit and dazzling prose infuse this story of desire and betrayal, history and healing. Reeve thinks his life is over. His career is at a dead end, his face is a mess, and his landlord is evicting him from his aprartment because he made too much noise when a hustler beat him up. As he lies in his hospital bed, figuring our what to do next. he finds himself brooding about the parallel ruin of his old college mentor Tom Slater, a famous American literary scholar who was betrayed and driven to suicide during the McCarthy era. Offering a welcome distraction is the patient in the next bed, a slient youth who arouses feelings Reeve vowed he would renounce, the dangerous longing for the sweetness and menace of straight men. Never at a loss for the tellling of caustic aside, Reeve reconstructs the troubled worlds of Tom Slater and his own insouciant youth, and horny old age. American Studies is an ambitiously achieved sweep of twentieth-century experience, a novel which triumphantly succeeds as both tragedy and farce.
Download or read book No Logo written by Naomi Klein and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2000-01-15 with total page 520 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "What corporations fear most are consumers who ask questions. Naomi Klein offers us the arguments with which to take on the superbrands." Billy Bragg from the bookjacket.
Download or read book JD written by Mark Merlis and published by University of Wisconsin Pres. This book was released on 2015-03-24 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Dashingly told and meticulously researched, this double biography of D. H. Lawrence and his wife Frieda von Richthofen is the first to draw fully on Frieda s unpublished letters and on interviews with people who knew her well. It explores their collision with an industrial world they hated and chronicles the stormy relationship between husband and wife. The strong sexual vitality that inspired Lawrence s art brought both joy and anguish to his marriage. Here, the Lawrences emerge as proud but not conceited in their unconventional lives, staunch in the face of fierce opposition from a conformist society. Living at the Edge follows the separate lives of Lawrence and Frieda up to their first meeting in 1912. Tracing their new life together, it depicts their grateful escape from the English Midlands; their discovery of exotic places where they made temporary homes Italy, Cornwall, Australia, New Mexico, and Mexico; Lawrence s courageous battle against illness; and, after his death in 1930, Frieda s success in recreating the simple life on ranches near Taos, New Mexico, where she died in 1956. At the center of their story is Lawrence s literary career. Biographers Squires and Talbot see Lawrence s major novels The Rainbow, Women in Love, Lady Chatterley s Lover as a fresh way to understand his turbulent and conflicted life. They reveal the extreme care with which he rewrote his personal experience to satisfy his deepest needs, and they introduce the many influential people who entered the Lawrences lives and work. The rich materials from Frieda s letters reveal a different Lawrence more difficult as a man but more interesting as an artist; they also reveal a different Frieda more vibrant as a woman, more substantial as a companion. This superb biography gives both Lawrence and Frieda striking new dimensions."
Download or read book Of Merchants Heroes written by Paul Waters and published by Pan Macmillan. This book was released on 2008 with total page 484 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Antiquity Now written by Thomas E. Jenkins and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2015-05-14 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written in a lively and accessible style, Antiquity Now opens our gaze to the myriad uses and abuses of classical antiquity in contemporary fiction, film, comics, drama, television - and even internet forums. With every chapter focusing on a different aspect of classical reception - including sexuality, politics, gender and ethnicity - this book explores the ideological motivations behind contemporary American allusions to the classical world. Ultimately, this kaleidoscope of receptions - from calls for marriage equality to examinations of gang violence to passionate pleas for peace (or war) - reveals a 'classical antiquity' that reconfigures itself daily, as modernity explains itself to itself through ever-expanding technologies and media. Antiquity Now thus examines the often-surprising redeployment of the art and literature of the ancient world, a geography charged with especial value in the contemporary imagination.
Download or read book As They See Em written by Bruce Weber and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-03-17 with total page 355 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Named One of the Best Baseball Books Ever Written by Esquire An insider’s look at the largely unknown world of professional umpires, the small group of men (and the very occasional woman) who make sure America’s favorite pastime is conducted in a manner that is clean, crisp, and true. Millions of American baseball fans know, with absolute certainty, that umpires are simply overpaid galoots who are doing an easy job badly. Millions of American baseball fans are wrong. Bruce Weber, a New York Times reporter, not only interviewed dozens of professional umpires but entered their world, trained to become an umpire, then spent a season working games from Little League to big league spring training. As They See ’Em is Weber’s entertaining account of this experience as well as a lively exploration of what amounts to an eccentric secret society, with its own customs, its own rituals, its own colorful vocabulary. Writing with deep knowledge of and affection for baseball, he delves into such questions as: Why isn’t every strike created equal? Is the ump part of the game or outside of it? Why doesn’t a tie go to the runner? And what do umps and managers say to each other during an argument, really? Packed with fascinating reportage that reveals the game as never before and answers the kinds of questions that fans, exasperated by the clichés of conventional sports commentary, pose to themselves around the television set, Bruce Weber’s As They See ’Em is a towering grand slam.
Download or read book Hiddensee written by Gregory Maguire and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2017-10-31 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The author of the beloved New York Times bestseller Wicked returns with an inventive novel inspired by a timeless holiday legend, intertwining the story of the famous Nutcracker with the life of the mysterious toy maker named Drosselmeier who carves him. Hiddensee: An island of white sandy beaches, salt marshes, steep cliffs, and pine forests north of Berlin in the Baltic Sea, an island that is an enchanting bohemian retreat and home to a large artists' colony-- a wellspring of inspiration for the Romantic imagination . . . Having brought his legions of devoted readers to Oz in Wicked and to Wonderland in After Alice, Maguire now takes us to the realms of the Brothers Grimm and E. T. A. Hoffmann-- the enchanted Black Forest of Bavaria and the salons of Munich. Hiddensee imagines the backstory of the Nutcracker, revealing how this entrancing creature came to be carved and how he guided an ailing girl named Klara through a dreamy paradise on a Christmas Eve. At the heart of Hoffmann's mysterious tale hovers Godfather Drosselmeier-- the ominous, canny, one-eyed toy maker made immortal by Petipa and Tchaikovsky's fairy tale ballet-- who presents the once and future Nutcracker to Klara, his goddaughter. But Hiddensee is not just a retelling of a classic story. Maguire discovers in the flowering of German Romanticism ties to Hellenic mystery-cults-- a fascination with death and the afterlife-- and ponders a profound question: How can a person who is abused by life, shortchanged and challenged, nevertheless access secrets that benefit the disadvantaged and powerless? Ultimately, Hiddensee offers a message of hope. If the compromised Godfather Drosselmeier can bring an enchanted Nutcracker to a young girl in distress on a dark winter evening, perhaps everyone, however lonely or marginalized, has something precious to share.
Download or read book Greek Myths written by Charlotte Higgins and published by Pantheon. This book was released on 2022-01-11 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A brilliantly original, landmark retelling of Greek myths, recounted as if they were actual scenes being woven into textiles by the women who feature prominently in them—including Athena, Helen, Circe and Penelope “Greek myths were full of powerful witches, unpredictable gods and sword-wielding slayers. They were also extreme: about families who turn murderously on each other; impossible tasks set by cruel kings; love that goes wrong; wars and journeys and terrible loss. There was magic, there was shape-shifting, there were monsters, there were descents to the land of the dead. Humans and immortals inhabited the same world, which was sometimes perilous, sometimes exciting. “The stories were obviously fantastical. All the same, brothers really do war with each other. People tell the truth but aren’t believed. Wars destroy the innocent. Lovers are parted. Parents endure the grief of losing children. Women suffer violence at the hands of men. The cleverest of people can be blind to what is really going on. The law of the land can contradict what you know to be just. Mysterious diseases devastate cities. Floods and fire tear lives apart. “For the Greeks, the word muthos simply meant a traditional tale. In the twenty-first century, we have long left behind the political and religious framework in which these stories first circulated—but their power endures. Greek myths remain true for us because they excavate the very extremes of human experience: sudden, inexplicable catastrophe; radical reversals of fortune; and seemingly arbitrary events that transform lives. They deal, in short, in the hard, basic facts of the human condition.” —from the Introduction
Download or read book The Folding Star written by Alan Hollinghurst and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2008-12-17 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The 1995 Booker Prize finalist. Alan Hollinghurst's hypnotic and exquisitely written novel tells the story of Edward Manners, a disaffected 33-year-old who leaves England to earn his living as a language tutor in a Flemish city. Almost immediately he falls in love with one of his pupils, but can only console himself with other, illicit affairs. With this novel, Hollinghurst exposes us fearlessly to the consequences of unfulfillable, annihilating desire.
Download or read book The Spell written by Alan Hollinghurst and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2000-05-01 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The "spell" of the title is both the power of drugs, at the heart of the book, and the "sex-magic" that variously possesses - but then deserts - each of its main characters." -- The Guardian Discover this ‘sparkling celebration of sexual intrigue’ (Telegraph, London) from the Booker Prize-winning author of The Line of Beauty. The Spell is a comedy of sexual manners that follows the interlocking affairs of four men: Robin, an architect in his late forties, who is trying to build an idyllic life in Dorset with his younger lover, Justin; Robin's 22 year old son Danny, a volatile beauty who lives for clubbing and casual sex; and the shy Alex, who is Justin's ex-boyfriend. As each in turn falls under the spell of romance or drugs, country living or rough trade, a richly ironic picture emerges of the clashing imperatives of modern gay life. At once lyrical, sceptical and romantic, The Spell confirms Alan Hollinghurst as one of Britain's most important novelists.
Download or read book The Sponsored Life written by Leslie Savan and published by Temple University Press. This book was released on 2010-06-17 with total page 367 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How does a blatant lying in TV commercials—like Joe Isuzu's manic claims—create public trust in a product or a company? How does a company associated with a disaster, Exxon or Du Pont for example, restore its reputation? What is the real story behind the rendering of the now infamous Joe Camel? And what is the deeper meaning of living in an ad, ad, ad world? For a decade, journalist Leslie Savan has been exposing the techniques used by advertisers to push products and pump up corporate images. In the lively essays in this collection, Savan penetrates beneath the slick surfaces of specific ads and marketing campaigns to show how they reflect and shape consumer desires. Savan's interviews with ad agencies and corporate clients—along with her insightful analyses of influential TV sports—reveal how successful advertising works. Ads do more than command attention. They are signposts to the political, cultural, and social trends that infiltrate the individual consumer's psyche. Think of the products associated with corporate mascots—the drum-beating bunny, the cereal-pushing tiger, the doughboy—that have become pop culture icons. Think cool. Think of the clothing manufacturer that uses multiracial imagery. Think progressive. Buy their worldview, buy their product. When virtually every product can be associate with some positive self-image, we are subtly refashioned into the advertiser's concept of a good citizen. Like it or not, we lead "the sponsored life."
Download or read book The Swimming Pool Library written by Alan Hollinghurst and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2011-09-21 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The dazzling first novel from the best-selling, Booker Prize-Winning author of The Line of Beauty and The Sparsholt Affair. An enthralling, darkly erotic novel of homosexuality before the scourge of AIDS; an elegy, possessed of chilling clarity, for ways of life that can no longer be lived with impunity. The Swimming-Pool Library focuses on the friendship of two men: William Beckwith, a young gay aristocrat who leads a life of privilege and promiscuity, and Lord Nantwich, an elderly man searching for someone to write his biography and inherit his traditions.
Download or read book Man About Town written by Mark Merlis and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2010-09-14 with total page 499 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A congressional adviser and habitué of a cozy circuit of bars inside the Beltway, Joel Lingeman never quite felt middle-aged. At least not until he was abandoned by his partner of fifteen years and suddenly thrust into a dating scene with men half his age and no discernible trace of love handles. But this unexpected hole in his life inspires Joel's search for a 1964 edition ofan Esquire-like magazine that contained a swimsuit ad that obsessed and haunted him throughout his youth. Determined to find out what happened to the model shown in the ad, Joel slowly begins to understand what has happened to his own life. Sexy, smart, and deftly observed, Man About Town is a new twist on the idea that the personal is political and a must read for anyone who's ever wondered what happened to that first crush.
Download or read book Lies With Man written by Michael Nava and published by Bywater Books. This book was released on 2021-04-27 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lies With Man is a finalist for the 2022 Lambda Literary Award in LGBTQ Mystery Los Angeles, 1986. A group of right-wing Christians has put an initiative on the November ballot to allow health officials to force people with HIV into quarantine camps—and it looks like it’s going to pass. Rios, now living in LA, agrees to be counsel for a group of young activists who call themselves QUEER [Queers United to End Erasure and Repression]. QUEER claims to be committed to peaceful civil disobedience. But when one of its members is implicated in the bombing of an evangelical church that kills its pastor, who publicly supported the quarantine initiative, Rios finds himself with a client suddenly facing the death penalty.
Download or read book The Greek Myths written by Robin Waterfield and published by Quercus. This book was released on 2013-10-01 with total page 485 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A highly readable and beautifully illustrated re-telling of the most famous stories from Greek mythology. The Greek Myths contains some of the most thrilling, romantic, and unforgettable stories in all human history. From Achilles rampant on the fields of Troy, to the gods at sport on Mount Olympus; from Icarus flying too close to the sun, to the superhuman feats of Heracles, Theseus, and the wily Odysseus, these timeless tales exert an eternal fascination and inspiration that have endured for millennia and influenced cultures from ancient to modern. Beginning at the dawn of human civilization, when the Titan Prometheus stole fire from Zeus and offered mankind hope, the reader is immediately immersed in the majestic, magical, and mythical world of the Greek gods and heroes. As the tales unfold, renowned classicist Robin Waterfield, joined by his wife, writer Kathryn Waterfield, creates a sweeping panorama of the romance, intrigues, heroism, humour, sensuality, and brutality of the Greek myths and legends. The terrible curse that plagued the royal houses of Mycenae and Thebes, Jason and the golden fleece, Perseus and the dread Gorgon, the wooden horse and the sack of Troy--these amazing stories have influenced art and literature from the Iron Age to the present day. And far from being just a treasure trove of amazing tales, The Greek Myths is a catalogue of Greek myth in art through the ages, and a notable work of literature in its own right.
