Download or read book Memoirs of a Spiritual Outsider written by Suzanne Clores and published by Conari Press. This book was released on 2000-10-11 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cultivating a spiritual practice among hip, urbane Generation Next-ers is "as unpopular as letter writing," muses author Suzanne Clores. Yet her exploration of nontraditional religions and her conversations with other seekers offer a fascinating glimpse into the hearts and minds of young women searching for meaning in a secular world. Fed up with a life that is comfortable yet lacking in substance, Clores sets out to find "authentic spirituality." By examining her own and other women's postcollege longing for spirituality, she attempts to unravel the dilemma of a generation that didn't grow up with a religious emphasis. The result is one of the first books to mirror young women's yearning for a spiritual path they can fully and wholeheartedly embrace.
Download or read book In My Own Words written by Elizabeth Clare Prophet and published by Summit University Press. This book was released on 2009-01-01 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From modest beginnings, Elizabeth Clare Prophet rose to become one of the world's most compelling, charismatic and controversial spiritual leaders. Her life and accomoplishments have been chronicled by others. But never, until now, has there been a firsthand account. In this book, Elizabeth Clare Prophet tells the story of the search for her life's mission during her first twenty-two years. It provides an unflinching view of the struggles and triumphs that helped define her life. This memoir is a glimpse into the life and character of an extraordinary figure in new Age spirituality. It offers an intimate look into what it means to be a mystic in today's world.
Download or read book The Saddest Music Ever Written written by Thomas Larson and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-09-15 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exploration of the cultural impact of Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, the Pieta of music, and its enigmatic composer. "Whenever the American dream suffers a catastrophic setback, Barber’s Adagio plays on the radio.” —Alex Ross, author of The Rest is Noise In the first book ever to explore Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings, music and literary critic Thomas Larson tells the story of the prodigal composer and his seminal masterpiece: from its composition in 1936, when Barber was just twenty-six, to its orchestral premiere two years later, led by the great Arturo Toscanini, and its fascinating history as America’s secular hymn for grieving our dead. Older Americans know Adagio from the funerals and memorials for Presidents Roosevelt and Kennedy, Albert Einstein, and Grace Kelly. Younger Americans recall the work as the antiwar theme of the movie Platoon. Still others treasure the piece in its choral version under the name Agnus Dei. More recently, mourners heard Adagio played as a memorial to the victims of the 9/11 attacks. Barber’s Adagio is truly the saddest music ever written, enrapturing listeners with its lyric beauty as few laments have. The Adagio’s sonorous intensity also speaks of the turbulent inner life of its composer, Samuel Barber (1910-1981), a melancholic who, in later years, descended into alcoholism and severe depression. Part biography, part cultural history, part memoir, The Saddest Music ever Written captures the deep emotion Barber’s great elegy has stirred throughout the world during its seventy-five-year history, becoming an icon of our national soul.
Download or read book The Measure of a Man written by Sidney Poitier and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2009-10-13 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "I have no wish to play the pontificating fool, pretending that I've suddenly come up with the answers to all life's questions. Quite the contrary, I began this book as an exploration, an exercise in selfquestioning. In other words, I wanted to find out, as I looked back at a long and complicated life, with many twists and turns, how well I've done at measuring up to the values I myself have set." In this luminous memoir, a true American icon looks back on his celebrated life and career. His body of work is arguably the most morally significant in cinematic history, and the power and influence of that work are indicative of the character of the man behind the many storied roles. Sidney Poitier here explores these elements of character and personal values to take his own measure--as a man, as a husband and father, and as an actor. Poitier credits his parents and his childhood on tiny Cat Island in the Bahamas for equipping him with the unflinching sense of right and wrong and of selfworth that he has never surrendered and that have dramatically shaped his world. "In the kind of place where I grew up," recalls Poitier, "what's coming at you is the sound of the sea and the smell of the wind and momma's voice and the voice of your dad and the craziness of your brothers and sisters ... and that's it." Without television, radio, and material distractions to obscure what matters most, he could enjoy the simple things, endure the long commitments, and find true meaning in his life. Poitier was uncompromising as he pursued a personal and public life that would honor his upbringing and the invaluable legacy of his parents just a few years after his introduction to indoor plumbing and the automobile, Poitier broke racial barrier after racial barrier to launch a pioneering acting career. Committed to the notion that what one does for a living articulates who one is, Poitier played only forceful and affecting characters who said something positive, useful, and lasting about the human condition. Here, finally, is Poitier's own introspective look at what has informed his performances and his life. Poitier explores the nature of sacrifice and commitment, pride and humility, rage and forgiveness, and paying the price for artistic integrity, What emerges is a picture of a man seeking truth, passion, and balance in the face of limits--his own and the world's. A triumph of the spirit, The Measure of a Man captures the essential Poitier.
Download or read book I Kinda See Dead People written by Skylar Hoffman and published by . This book was released on 2017-10-17 with total page 63 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "I Kinda See Dead People: A Spiritual Memoir" is an autobiography by Skylar Hoffman, a college student with ties to a world beyond. Growing up, he realized he was a little different; he saw, heard, and felt things that others did not. In this book Skylar recounts his run-ins with the paranormal, from reporting an apparition to his elementary school principal, to how he was changed by a near death experience, to a chance encounter with a man who would become a catalyst for the author's own spiritual awakening. Now a college senior, Skylar is being pushed towards normalcy but is unwilling to give up on following his bliss. The spirits say that he will drop out of school to follow his dreams. Only time will tell and the clock is ticking! This true story is one that is sure to entertain, enlighten, and frighten. We are all here for a reason and Skylar wants to tell you his.
Download or read book Leaving Church written by Barbara Brown Taylor and published by Canterbury Press. This book was released on 2013-01-25 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tells how a renowned preacher left her ministry to rediscover the authentic heart of her faith. A moving reflection on keeping faith amidst the relentless demands of modern life.
Download or read book Walking with the Ineffable written by Stephani Nur Colby and published by Green Place Books. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Have you been touched by the Mystery? You may not remember it but we have all been touched in some mysterious way by the divine. Though we know that traumatic memories are often suppressed, the fact that we all, particularly as children, are likely to have had significant spiritual experiences of great goodness and importance to us is generally rejected, its remembrance discouraged. But these experiences remain within us, ready to re-awaken, when the right catalyst enters our lives. Walking with the Ineffable is a memoir of one woman's walk through the mystery of spiritual experiences. It is about the changing weather of belief: what we believe, why we believe, and when we believe. Steeped in the mysticism of Christian, Sufic, and other spiritual transmissions and pilgrimages, the author, aided by a vibrant company of a host of wise-eyed, mischievous cats, brings a broad spiritual perspective to the perennial quest of the human soul to know itself and its Maker, and to the discovery of that hidden splendor, waiting to shine, in the depths of us all.
Download or read book Radiance written by Evelyn Underhill and published by Paraclete Press (MA). This book was released on 2004 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Evelyn Underhill is widely regarded as one of the greatest Christian mystics. This compilation of published writings and private journals offers a candid glimpse of her inner life, from the rare spiritual awareness that she possessed as a child, to the intense curiosity and intelligence that made her one of the most respected writers and thinkers of her day. Possibly most moving, this volume also reveals Underhill's profound mid-life spiritual struggle. For the many admirers of Evelyn Underhill, and for anyone who enjoys reading accounts of the spiritual lives of others, this book presents a vivid portrait of a life that was truly radiant.
Download or read book Memoirs of the Spirit written by Edwin Scott Gaustad and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company. This book was released on 1999 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of twenty-six chronologically arranged spiritual autobiographies.
Download or read book Overseas American written by Gene H. Bell-Villada and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2005 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A moving exploration of what it means to be an American born and reared abroad
Download or read book The History of Bones written by John Lurie and published by Random House Trade Paperbacks. This book was released on 2023-10-24 with total page 481 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The quintessential depiction of 1980s New York and the downtown scene from the artist, actor, musician, and composer John Lurie “A picaresque roller coaster of a story, with staggering amounts of sex and drugs and the perpetual quest to retain some kind of artistic integrity.”—The New York Times In the tornado that was downtown New York in the 1980s, John Lurie stood at the vortex. After founding the band The Lounge Lizards with his brother, Evan, in 1979, Lurie quickly became a centrifugal figure in the world of outsider artists, cutting-edge filmmakers, and cultural rebels. Now Lurie vibrantly brings to life the whole wash of 1980s New York as he developed his artistic soul over the course of the decade and came into orbit with all the prominent artists of that time and place, including Andy Warhol, Debbie Harry, Boris Policeband, and, especially, Jean-Michel Basquiat, the enigmatic prodigy who spent a year sleeping on the floor of Lurie’s East Third Street apartment. It may feel like Disney World now, but in The History of Bones, the East Village, through Lurie’s clear-eyed reminiscence, comes to teeming, gritty life. The book is full of grime and frank humor—Lurie holds nothing back in this journey to one of the most significant moments in our cultural history, one whose reverberations are still strongly felt today. History may repeat itself, but the way downtown New York happened in the 1980s will never happen again. Luckily, through this beautiful memoir, we all have a front-row seat.
Download or read book The Book of Help written by Megan Griswold and published by Rodale Books. This book was released on 2020-05-19 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: LOS ANGELES TIMES BESTSLLER • WINNER OF THE NAUTILUS BOOK AWARD • “In a world full of spiritual seekers, Megan Griswold is an undisputed all-star. What a delightful journey!”—Elizabeth Gilbert, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Big Magic and Eat, Pray, Love The Book of Help traces one woman’s life-long quest for love, connection, and peace of mind. A heartbreakingly vulnerable and tragically funny memoir-in-remedies, Megan Griswold’s narrative spans four decades and six continents—from the glaciers of Patagonia and the psycho-tropics of Brazil, to academia, the Ivy League, and the study of Eastern medicine. Megan was born into a family who enthusiastically embraced the offerings of New Age California culture—at seven she asked Santa for her first mantra and by twelve she was taking weekend workshops on personal growth. But later, when her newly-wedded husband calls in the middle of the night to say he’s landed in jail, Megan must accept that her many certificates, degrees and licenses had not been the finish line she’d once imagined them to be, but instead the preliminary training for what would prove to be the wildest, most growth-insisting journey of her life.
Download or read book The Art of Memoir written by Mary Karr and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2015-09-15 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Credited with sparking the current memoir explosion, Mary Karr’s The Liars’ Club spent more than a year at the top of the New York Times list. She followed with two other smash bestsellers: Cherry and Lit, which were critical hits as well. For thirty years Karr has also taught the form, winning teaching prizes at Syracuse. (The writing program there produced such acclaimed authors as Cheryl Strayed, Keith Gessen, and Koren Zailckas.) In The Art of Memoir, she synthesizes her expertise as professor and therapy patient, writer and spiritual seeker, recovered alcoholic and “black belt sinner,” providing a unique window into the mechanics and art of the form that is as irreverent, insightful, and entertaining as her own work in the genre. Anchored by excerpts from her favorite memoirs and anecdotes from fellow writers’ experience, The Art of Memoir lays bare Karr’s own process. (Plus all those inside stories about how she dealt with family and friends get told— and the dark spaces in her own skull probed in depth.) As she breaks down the key elements of great literary memoir, she breaks open our concepts of memory and identity, and illuminates the cathartic power of reflecting on the past; anybody with an inner life or complicated history, whether writer or reader, will relate. Joining such classics as Stephen King’s On Writing and Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird, The Art of Memoir is an elegant and accessible exploration of one of today’s most popular literary forms—a tour de force from an accomplished master pulling back the curtain on her craft.
Download or read book Cherry written by Mary Karr and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2001-09-01 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Mary Karr comes this gorgeously written, often hilarious story of her tumultuous teens and sexual coming-of-age. Picking up where the bestselling The Liars' Club left off, Karr dashes down the trail of her teen years with customary sass, only to run up against the paralyzing self-doubt of a girl in bloom. Fleeing the thrills and terrors of adolescence, she clashes against authority in all its forms and hooks up with an unforgettable band of heads and bona-fide geniuses. Parts of Cherry will leave you gasping with laughter. Karr assembles a self from the smokiest beginnings, delivering a long-awaited sequel that is both "bawdy and wise" (San Francisco Chronicle).
Download or read book Sometimes There Is a Void written by Zakes Mda and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2012-01-03 with total page 692 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Notable Book of the Year South African novelist and playwright Zakes Mda's remarkable life story of growing up in South Africa, Lesotho, and America, told with style and gusto. Zakes Mda is the most acclaimed South African writer of the independence era. His novels tell stories that venture far beyond the conventional narratives of a people's struggle against apartheid. In this memoir, he tells the story of a life that intersects with the political life of his country but that at its heart is the classic adventure story of an artist, lover, father, teacher, and bon vivant. Zanemvula Mda was born in 1948 into a family of lawyers and grew up in Soweto's ambitious educated black class. At age fifteen he crossed the Telle River from South Africa into Basutoland (Lesotho), exiled like his father, a "founding spirit" of the Pan Africanist Congress. Exile was hard, but it was just another chapter in Mda's coming-of-age. He served as an altar boy (and was preyed on by priests), flirted with shebeen girls, feared the racist Boers, read comic books alongside the literature of the PAC, fell for the music of Dvorák and Coltrane, wrote his first stories—and felt the void at the heart of things that makes him an outsider wherever he goes. The Soweto uprisings called him to politics; playwriting brought him back to South Africa, where he became writer in residence at the famed Market Theatre; three marriages led him hither and yon; acclaim brought him to America, where he began writing the novels that are so thick with the life of his country. In all this, Mda struggled to remain his own man, and with Sometimes There Is a Void he shows that independence opened the way for the stories of individual South Africans in all their variety.
Download or read book Autobiography of an Outsider written by Autobiography and published by . This book was released on 1962* with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Nearest Thing to Life written by James Wood and published by Brandeis University Press. This book was released on 2015-04-28 with total page 94 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this remarkable blend of memoir and criticism, James Wood, noted contributor to the New Yorker, has written a master class on the connections between fiction and life. He argues that, of all the arts, fiction has a unique ability to describe the shape of our lives and to rescue the texture of those lives from death and historical oblivion. The act of reading is understood here as the most sacred and personal of activities, and there are brilliant discussions of individual works - among others, Chekhov's story "The Kiss," W.G. Sebald's The Emigrants, and Penelope Fitzgerald's The Blue Flower. Wood reveals his own intimate relationship with the written word: we see the development of a provincial boy growing up in a charged Christian environment, the secret joy of his childhood reading, the links he makes between reading and blasphemy, or between literature and music. The final section discusses fiction in the context of exile and homelessness. The Nearest Thing to LifeÊis not simply a brief, tightly argued book by a man commonly regarded as our finest living critic - it is also an exhilarating personal account that reflects on, and embodies, the fruitful conspiracy between reader and writer (and critic), and asks us to reconsider everything that is at stake when we read and write fiction.
