Author: Ronald Searle
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Antiques & Collectibles
Languages : en
Pages : 136
Book Description
As any, even vaguely addicted book collector will have swiftly learned, most booksellers' catalogues are written in a parallel language that can fool anyone but the 'cognoscenti' and which makes the mysteries of the Rosetta stone, or Linear B, look like something out of Enid Blython. Without a smattering of inside information, the baffled but hopelessly-bitten book buyer is drifting unarmed and unprepared into a minefield whose perilous complexities will usually only be made plain when an eagerly awaited parcel of dream volumes arrives and mangled contents are revealed in all their deceptive glory.... But all is not lost. Help is at hand! After a lifetime of avidly scanning the frequently poisonously-tinted pages of innumerable book catalogues, Ronald Searle has become expert in the art of decoding those esoteric, poetic and usually approximate, descriptions of literary come-ons. Now, licking his wounds, he publishes his hard-earned findings in this fully illustrated pioneer guide, designed to foil the devious machinations of scheming and wicked booksellers for ever more. No longer will the innocent book collector need to puzzle over the finer meaning of 'old half road', 'good working copy', blind tooled', or 'tail-edged shaved'. The unvarnished truth is here exposed at last, both in the shocking explicit drawings and in the devastatingly frank glossary whose revelations will startle even the most battle-scarred of bibliophiles. The result is one of the funniest, most entertaining books to have emerged from the brilliantly perceptive pen of the master. No book collector, and certainly no bookseller, can afford to be without it - even the wicked ones.
Slightly Foxed - But Still Desirable
Author: Ronald Searle
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Antiques & Collectibles
Languages : en
Pages : 136
Book Description
As any, even vaguely addicted book collector will have swiftly learned, most booksellers' catalogues are written in a parallel language that can fool anyone but the 'cognoscenti' and which makes the mysteries of the Rosetta stone, or Linear B, look like something out of Enid Blython. Without a smattering of inside information, the baffled but hopelessly-bitten book buyer is drifting unarmed and unprepared into a minefield whose perilous complexities will usually only be made plain when an eagerly awaited parcel of dream volumes arrives and mangled contents are revealed in all their deceptive glory.... But all is not lost. Help is at hand! After a lifetime of avidly scanning the frequently poisonously-tinted pages of innumerable book catalogues, Ronald Searle has become expert in the art of decoding those esoteric, poetic and usually approximate, descriptions of literary come-ons. Now, licking his wounds, he publishes his hard-earned findings in this fully illustrated pioneer guide, designed to foil the devious machinations of scheming and wicked booksellers for ever more. No longer will the innocent book collector need to puzzle over the finer meaning of 'old half road', 'good working copy', blind tooled', or 'tail-edged shaved'. The unvarnished truth is here exposed at last, both in the shocking explicit drawings and in the devastatingly frank glossary whose revelations will startle even the most battle-scarred of bibliophiles. The result is one of the funniest, most entertaining books to have emerged from the brilliantly perceptive pen of the master. No book collector, and certainly no bookseller, can afford to be without it - even the wicked ones.
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Antiques & Collectibles
Languages : en
Pages : 136
Book Description
As any, even vaguely addicted book collector will have swiftly learned, most booksellers' catalogues are written in a parallel language that can fool anyone but the 'cognoscenti' and which makes the mysteries of the Rosetta stone, or Linear B, look like something out of Enid Blython. Without a smattering of inside information, the baffled but hopelessly-bitten book buyer is drifting unarmed and unprepared into a minefield whose perilous complexities will usually only be made plain when an eagerly awaited parcel of dream volumes arrives and mangled contents are revealed in all their deceptive glory.... But all is not lost. Help is at hand! After a lifetime of avidly scanning the frequently poisonously-tinted pages of innumerable book catalogues, Ronald Searle has become expert in the art of decoding those esoteric, poetic and usually approximate, descriptions of literary come-ons. Now, licking his wounds, he publishes his hard-earned findings in this fully illustrated pioneer guide, designed to foil the devious machinations of scheming and wicked booksellers for ever more. No longer will the innocent book collector need to puzzle over the finer meaning of 'old half road', 'good working copy', blind tooled', or 'tail-edged shaved'. The unvarnished truth is here exposed at last, both in the shocking explicit drawings and in the devastatingly frank glossary whose revelations will startle even the most battle-scarred of bibliophiles. The result is one of the funniest, most entertaining books to have emerged from the brilliantly perceptive pen of the master. No book collector, and certainly no bookseller, can afford to be without it - even the wicked ones.
The Nowhere City
Author: Alison Lurie
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780380002306
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 335
Book Description
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780380002306
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 335
Book Description
Red Comet
Author: Heather Clark
Publisher: Knopf
ISBN: 0307961168
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 1185
Book Description
PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • The highly anticipated biography of Sylvia Plath that focuses on her remarkable literary and intellectual achievements, while restoring the woman behind the long-held myths about her life and art. “One of the most beautiful biographies I've ever read." —Glennon Doyle, author of #1 New York Times Bestseller, Untamed With a wealth of never-before-accessed materials, Heather Clark brings to life the brilliant Sylvia Plath, who had precocious poetic ambition and was an accomplished published writer even before she became a star at Smith College. Refusing to read Plath’s work as if her every act was a harbinger of her tragic fate, Clark considers the sociopolitical context as she thoroughly explores Plath’s world: her early relationships and determination not to become a conventional woman and wife; her troubles with an unenlightened mental health industry; her Cambridge years and thunderclap meeting with Ted Hughes; and much more. Clark’s clear-eyed portraits of Hughes, his lover Assia Wevill, and other demonized players in the arena of Plath’s suicide promote a deeper understanding of her final days. Along with illuminating readings of the poems themselves, Clark’s meticulous, compassionate research brings us closer than ever to the spirited woman and visionary artist who blazed a trail that still lights the way for women poets the world over.
Publisher: Knopf
ISBN: 0307961168
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 1185
Book Description
PULITZER PRIZE FINALIST • The highly anticipated biography of Sylvia Plath that focuses on her remarkable literary and intellectual achievements, while restoring the woman behind the long-held myths about her life and art. “One of the most beautiful biographies I've ever read." —Glennon Doyle, author of #1 New York Times Bestseller, Untamed With a wealth of never-before-accessed materials, Heather Clark brings to life the brilliant Sylvia Plath, who had precocious poetic ambition and was an accomplished published writer even before she became a star at Smith College. Refusing to read Plath’s work as if her every act was a harbinger of her tragic fate, Clark considers the sociopolitical context as she thoroughly explores Plath’s world: her early relationships and determination not to become a conventional woman and wife; her troubles with an unenlightened mental health industry; her Cambridge years and thunderclap meeting with Ted Hughes; and much more. Clark’s clear-eyed portraits of Hughes, his lover Assia Wevill, and other demonized players in the arena of Plath’s suicide promote a deeper understanding of her final days. Along with illuminating readings of the poems themselves, Clark’s meticulous, compassionate research brings us closer than ever to the spirited woman and visionary artist who blazed a trail that still lights the way for women poets the world over.
The Blue Field
Author: John Moore
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1448203473
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 182
Book Description
Old friends and new faces join the scholars, rogues and countrymen of Brensham with its crooked village street and crooked church spire. Among its rare individuals who share an obstinacy for making life a romantic and hilarious adventure are those lively landgirls, The Frolick Virgins, Dai, the hymn-singing postman, and William Hart who claimed to be descended from William Shakespeare and loved Pheemy, the young gypsy, not wisely but too well.
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 1448203473
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 182
Book Description
Old friends and new faces join the scholars, rogues and countrymen of Brensham with its crooked village street and crooked church spire. Among its rare individuals who share an obstinacy for making life a romantic and hilarious adventure are those lively landgirls, The Frolick Virgins, Dai, the hymn-singing postman, and William Hart who claimed to be descended from William Shakespeare and loved Pheemy, the young gypsy, not wisely but too well.
Super-Infinite
Author: Katherine Rundell
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ISBN: 0374607419
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 181
Book Description
Winner of the 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction Winner of the 2022 Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize Shortlisted for the 2023 Plutarch Award A Wall Street Journal Top 10 Best Book of 2022 A New York Times Notable Book of the Year Named a Best Book of the Year by The New Yorker, Times Literary Supplement, and Literary Hub From the standout scholar Katherine Rundell, Super-Infinite presents a sparkling and very modern biography of John Donne: the poet of love, sex, and death. Sometime religious outsider and social disaster, sometime celebrity preacher and establishment darling, John Donne was incapable of being just one thing. He was a scholar of law, a sea adventurer, a priest, a member of Parliament—and perhaps the greatest love poet in the history of the English language. He converted from Catholicism to Protestantism, was imprisoned for marrying a sixteen-year-old girl without her father’s consent, struggled to feed a family of ten children, and was often ill and in pain. He was a man who suffered from surges of misery, yet expressed in his verse many breathtaking impressions of electric joy and love. In Super-Infinite, Katherine Rundell embarks on a fleet-footed act of evangelism, showing us the many sides of Donne’s extraordinary life, his obsessions, his blazing words, and his tempestuous Elizabethan times—unveiling Donne as the most remarkable mind and as a lesson in living.
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ISBN: 0374607419
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 181
Book Description
Winner of the 2022 Baillie Gifford Prize for Non-Fiction Winner of the 2022 Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize Shortlisted for the 2023 Plutarch Award A Wall Street Journal Top 10 Best Book of 2022 A New York Times Notable Book of the Year Named a Best Book of the Year by The New Yorker, Times Literary Supplement, and Literary Hub From the standout scholar Katherine Rundell, Super-Infinite presents a sparkling and very modern biography of John Donne: the poet of love, sex, and death. Sometime religious outsider and social disaster, sometime celebrity preacher and establishment darling, John Donne was incapable of being just one thing. He was a scholar of law, a sea adventurer, a priest, a member of Parliament—and perhaps the greatest love poet in the history of the English language. He converted from Catholicism to Protestantism, was imprisoned for marrying a sixteen-year-old girl without her father’s consent, struggled to feed a family of ten children, and was often ill and in pain. He was a man who suffered from surges of misery, yet expressed in his verse many breathtaking impressions of electric joy and love. In Super-Infinite, Katherine Rundell embarks on a fleet-footed act of evangelism, showing us the many sides of Donne’s extraordinary life, his obsessions, his blazing words, and his tempestuous Elizabethan times—unveiling Donne as the most remarkable mind and as a lesson in living.
Sword of Bone
Author: Anthony Rhodes
Publisher: Imperial War Museum
ISBN: 191242360X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 257
Book Description
It is September 1939. Shortly after war is declared, Anthony Rhodes is sent to France, serving with the British Army. His days are filled with the minutiae and mundanities of Army life friendships, billeting, administration as the months of the Phoney War quickly pass and the conflict seems a distant prospect. It is only in the spring of 1940 that the true situation becomes clear; the men are ordered to retreat to the coast and the beaches of Dunkirk, where they face a desperate and terrifying wait for evacuation.
Publisher: Imperial War Museum
ISBN: 191242360X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 257
Book Description
It is September 1939. Shortly after war is declared, Anthony Rhodes is sent to France, serving with the British Army. His days are filled with the minutiae and mundanities of Army life friendships, billeting, administration as the months of the Phoney War quickly pass and the conflict seems a distant prospect. It is only in the spring of 1940 that the true situation becomes clear; the men are ordered to retreat to the coast and the beaches of Dunkirk, where they face a desperate and terrifying wait for evacuation.
Love and War in the Apennines
Author: Eric Newby
Publisher: HarperCollins UK
ISBN: 0007367899
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 322
Book Description
In 1943, Eric Newby escaped from the Italian prison camp in which he had been held for a year. Evading the advancing German army, he was sheltered by an informal network of Italian peasants. Love and War in the Apennines is Newby's tribute to these selfless and courageous people and their bleak and unchanging way of life. Of the cast of idiosyncratic characters, most notable was the beautiful local girl on a bike who would teach him the language, and eventually help him escape. Two years later they were married and would spend the rest of their lives as co-adventurers. Part travelogue, part escape story and part romance, this is a mesmerising account of wisdom, courage, humour, adventure and above all, love from the man who would become one of Britain's best-loved literary adventurers.
Publisher: HarperCollins UK
ISBN: 0007367899
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 322
Book Description
In 1943, Eric Newby escaped from the Italian prison camp in which he had been held for a year. Evading the advancing German army, he was sheltered by an informal network of Italian peasants. Love and War in the Apennines is Newby's tribute to these selfless and courageous people and their bleak and unchanging way of life. Of the cast of idiosyncratic characters, most notable was the beautiful local girl on a bike who would teach him the language, and eventually help him escape. Two years later they were married and would spend the rest of their lives as co-adventurers. Part travelogue, part escape story and part romance, this is a mesmerising account of wisdom, courage, humour, adventure and above all, love from the man who would become one of Britain's best-loved literary adventurers.
Portrait of Elmbury
Author: John Moore
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780753154328
Category : Elmbury (England)
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
Portrait of Elmbury is the first book of the famous trilogy of country life, The Brensham trilogy. It is a wonderful and exuberant chronicle of an English market town between the wars, distinguished with an historic abbey, a winding river and bustling pubs and with a cast of characters that could have stepped out of Hogarth or Shakespeare, as seen through the eyes of the narrator as a child. He brings to life a world of mutual dependence and tolerant acceptance of people's foibles.
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780753154328
Category : Elmbury (England)
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
Portrait of Elmbury is the first book of the famous trilogy of country life, The Brensham trilogy. It is a wonderful and exuberant chronicle of an English market town between the wars, distinguished with an historic abbey, a winding river and bustling pubs and with a cast of characters that could have stepped out of Hogarth or Shakespeare, as seen through the eyes of the narrator as a child. He brings to life a world of mutual dependence and tolerant acceptance of people's foibles.
Blue Remembered Hills
Author: Rosemary Sutcliff
Publisher: Sunburst
ISBN: 9780374407148
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 169
Book Description
The historical novelist recalls her childhood and struggle with rheumatoid arthritis that made her unable to walk as a child and describes the family and friends who encouraged her to become a writer
Publisher: Sunburst
ISBN: 9780374407148
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 169
Book Description
The historical novelist recalls her childhood and struggle with rheumatoid arthritis that made her unable to walk as a child and describes the family and friends who encouraged her to become a writer
Something in the Cellar
Author: Ronald Searle
Publisher: Souvenir Press
ISBN: 9780285643499
Category : English wit and humor, Pictorial
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
Illustrated in Searle's inimitable style are the ancient noble ceremony of slashing the trockenbeerenauslese, the inauguration of the first authentic denominazione di origine controllata e garantita, and the vinolympics. For wine lovers who have never tasted ptolemy nouveau or watched the uncorking of the kangarouge, these experiences are related with warmth and humor. The many ways to open a bottle of wine are illustrated, and the rituals and delights of wine around the world are described.
Publisher: Souvenir Press
ISBN: 9780285643499
Category : English wit and humor, Pictorial
Languages : en
Pages : 0
Book Description
Illustrated in Searle's inimitable style are the ancient noble ceremony of slashing the trockenbeerenauslese, the inauguration of the first authentic denominazione di origine controllata e garantita, and the vinolympics. For wine lovers who have never tasted ptolemy nouveau or watched the uncorking of the kangarouge, these experiences are related with warmth and humor. The many ways to open a bottle of wine are illustrated, and the rituals and delights of wine around the world are described.