Empire of Enchantment

Empire of Enchantment PDF Author: John Zubrzycki
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0190914394
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 408

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Book Description
India's association with magicians goes back thousands of years. Conjurors and illusionists dazzled the courts of Hindu maharajas and Mughal emperors. As British dominion spread over the subcontinent, such wonder-workers became synonymous with India. Western magicians appropriated Indian attire, tricks and stage names; switching their turbans for top hats, Indian jugglers fought back and earned their grudging respect. This book tells the extraordinary story of how Indian magic descended from the realm of the gods to become part of daily ritual and popular entertainment across the globe. Recounting tales of levitating Brahmins, resurrections, prophesying monkeys and "the most famous trick never performed," Empire of Enchantment vividly charts Indian magic's epic journey from street to the stage. This heavily illustrated book tells the extraordinary, untold story of how Indian magic descended from the realm of the gods to become part of daily ritual and popular entertainment across the globe. Drawing on ancient religious texts, early travelers' accounts, colonial records, modern visual sources, and magicians' own testimony, Empire of Enchantment is a vibrant narrative of India's magical traditions, from Vedic times to the present day.

Empire of Enchantment

Empire of Enchantment PDF Author: John Zubrzycki
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0190914394
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 408

Get Book Here

Book Description
India's association with magicians goes back thousands of years. Conjurors and illusionists dazzled the courts of Hindu maharajas and Mughal emperors. As British dominion spread over the subcontinent, such wonder-workers became synonymous with India. Western magicians appropriated Indian attire, tricks and stage names; switching their turbans for top hats, Indian jugglers fought back and earned their grudging respect. This book tells the extraordinary story of how Indian magic descended from the realm of the gods to become part of daily ritual and popular entertainment across the globe. Recounting tales of levitating Brahmins, resurrections, prophesying monkeys and "the most famous trick never performed," Empire of Enchantment vividly charts Indian magic's epic journey from street to the stage. This heavily illustrated book tells the extraordinary, untold story of how Indian magic descended from the realm of the gods to become part of daily ritual and popular entertainment across the globe. Drawing on ancient religious texts, early travelers' accounts, colonial records, modern visual sources, and magicians' own testimony, Empire of Enchantment is a vibrant narrative of India's magical traditions, from Vedic times to the present day.

Tolkien, Enchantment, and Loss

Tolkien, Enchantment, and Loss PDF Author: John Rosegrant
Publisher: Kent State University Press
ISBN: 9781606354353
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
Tolkien's enchanted worldview as literary form and as psychological struggle Focusing on the themes of enchantment and loss in the fiction of J. R. R. Tolkien, this unique study incorporates elements of developmental psychology to explore both Tolkien's life and art, deepening our understanding of the interrelationship between his biography and writing. As John Rosegrant relates, Tolkien's early years saw a good deal of trauma: the loss of both parents, serious illness, poverty, and battlefield action during World War I, including the loss of close friends. Yet he presents an enchanted worldview in the stories of Middle-earth, and that tension between enchantment and disenchantment--as it results from significant trauma and loss--lies at the very heart of Tolkien's creative endeavors. In short, Tolkien's creative effort can be understood, especially from the perspective of his own psychological development, as a way to maintain a sense of enchantment in the face of great personal loss. Throughout our lives, at several stages we must surrender earlier forms of enchantment and develop more mature forms so that life does not become barren, drab, or dismal. As Rosegrant argues, Tolkien found ways to use his personal losses and struggles to address universal psychological issues in his art, giving his work great emotional sophistication and complexity. Tolkien, Enchantment, and Loss both deepens our understanding of Tolkien and helps us to recognize how Tolkien widens and enriches our understanding of life.

Modern Enchantments

Modern Enchantments PDF Author: Simon During
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674013711
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 358

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Book Description
Magic, During suggests, has helped shape modern culture. Devoted to this deceptively simple proposition, During's work gets at the aesthetic questions at the very heart of the study of culture. How can the most ordinary arts—and by “magic,” During means not the supernatural, but the special effects and conjurings of magic shows—affect people?

The Uses of Enchantment

The Uses of Enchantment PDF Author: Bruno Bettelheim
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307739635
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 343

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Book Description
Winner of the National Book Award and National Book Critics Circle Award "A charming book about enchantment, a profound book about fairy tales."—John Updike, The New York Times Book Review Bruno Bettelheim was one of the great child psychologists of the twentieth century and perhaps none of his books has been more influential than this revelatory study of fairy tales and their universal importance in understanding childhood development. Analyzing a wide range of traditional stories, from the tales of Sindbad to “The Three Little Pigs,” “Hansel and Gretel,” and “The Sleeping Beauty,” Bettelheim shows how the fantastical, sometimes cruel, but always deeply significant narrative strands of the classic fairy tales can aid in our greatest human task, that of finding meaning for one’s life.

Enchantment

Enchantment PDF Author: Jean Starobinski
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231140904
Category : Music
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
"This book examines some figures of seduction as they have appeared over the course of opera's history." --introd.

The Work of Enchantment

The Work of Enchantment PDF Author: Matthew Del Nevo
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 135147250X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 181

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Book Description
The Work of Enchantment suggests that it is a lack of "enchantment" in rich, developed countries that causes soul-starved Westerners to experience mental (and sometimes physical) illness. Del Nevo argues that this "enchantment" is most often experienced in childhood, but can also be found in adulthood, particularly through art. However, adults must cultivate within themselves the ability to appreciate art by reading, listening, and gazing-activities often misconceived in advanced industrial societies. Del Nevo describes the framework of enchantment and its philosophical and historical roots. He then concentrates on the work of enchantment within literature, considering what enchantment might entail taking the works of Proust, Rilke, and Goethe as examples. Del Nevo shows how a sense of enchantment forms within and between art works, using his literary examples, as well as between the work and the audience. The reader will learn along the way that enchantment may be found in the power of words, as an expression of the desire of the soul, a compliment of melancholy, and in art that points to something beyond itself. Enchantment may be found in many places, ranging from philosophy, religion, and psychology to sociology and culture, but here Del Nevo focuses on literature. His audience is people who are searching for something beyond money or glamour-perhaps the meaning of art and culture. His focus on literary masterpieces such as the Duino Elegies, Remembrance of Things Past, Wilhelm Meister's Journeyman Years, and others will make it of interest to those in cultural studies. Well written and engaging, and accessible to non-specialist readers, this unusual work in philosophy and aesthetics is free of jargon and complicated verbiage. Inspiring and enlivening, it is, in the author's words, "a stirring call to idleness."

Enchantment

Enchantment PDF Author: Orson Scott Card
Publisher: Del Rey
ISBN: 0345484509
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 434

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Book Description
In Enchantment, Orson Scott Card works his magic as never before, transforming the timeless story of Sleeping Beauty into an original fantasy brimming with romance and adventure. The moment Ivan stumbled upon a clearing in the dense Carpathian forest, his life was forever changed. Atop a pedestal encircled by fallen leaves, the beautiful princess Katerina lay still as death. But beneath the foliage a malevolent presence stirred and sent the ten-year-old Ivan scrambling for the safety of Cousin Marek's farm. Now, years later, Ivan is an American graduate student, engaged to be married. Yet he cannot forget that long-ago day in the forest—or convince himself it was merely a frightened boy’s fantasy. Compelled to return to his native land, Ivan finds the clearing just as he left it. This time he does not run. This time he awakens the beauty with a kiss . . . and steps into a world that vanished a thousand years ago. A rich tapestry of clashing worlds and cultures, Enchantment is a powerfully original novel of a love and destiny that transcend centuries . . . and the dark force that stalks them across the ages.

Drawn to Enchant

Drawn to Enchant PDF Author: Timothy Garrett Young
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 9780300126730
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 280

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Book Description
This volume presents over 200 selected original artworks from the collection of Betsy Beinecke Shirley, one of the great collectors of American children's literature. Shirley gathered an authoritative collection of books, original illustrations, manuscripts, as well as drawings and paintings from such children's classics as ''Treasure Island'' and ''Eloise.'' The artwork in Shirley's collection guides the reader on a tour through the stages of childhood reading, this volume begins with ABC's and nursery books. It continues through adventure stories, magazines, and more, then concludes with a miscellany section of odds and ends. The images demonstrate how children's books evolved, from the nation's first days of independence to modern times. Artists whose works are represented include many of the favorites, among them Ludwig Bemelmans, Maurice Sendak, A.B. Frost, Wanda Gag, Peter Newell, N.C. Wyeth, Tony Sarg, Robert Lawson, and Johnny Gruelle.

Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins

Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins PDF Author: Annette Simmons
Publisher: AMACOM
ISBN: 0814400841
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 241

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Book Description
Stories have tremendous power. They can persuade, promote empathy, and provoke action. Better than any other communication tool, stories explain who you are, what you want...and why it matters. In presentations, department meetings, over lunch-any place you make a case for new customers, more business, or your next big idea-you'll have greater impact if you have a compelling story to relate. Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins will teach you to narrate personal experiences as well as borrowed stories in a way that demonstrates authenticity, builds emotional connections, inspires perseverance, and stimulates the imagination. Fully updated and more practical than ever, the second edition reveals how to use storytelling to: Capture attention * Motivate listeners * Gain trust * Strengthen your argument * Sway decisions * Demonstrate authenticity and encourage transparency * Spark innovation * Manage uncertainty * And more Complete with examples, a proven storytelling process and techniques, innovative applications, and a new appendix on teaching storytelling, Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins hands you the tools you need to get your message across-and connect successfully with any audience.

Reality Check

Reality Check PDF Author: Guy Kawasaki
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 9781591842231
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 504

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Book Description
"Reality Check is Guy Kawasaki's all-In-one guide for starting and operating great organizations - ones that stand the test of time and ignore any passing fads in business theory. This volume collects, updates, and expands the best entries from his popular blog and features his inimitable take on everything from effective e-mailing to sucking up to preventing "bozo explosions.""--BOOK JACKET.