The Old Weird Albion

The Old Weird Albion PDF Author: Justin Hopper
Publisher: Bright Sparks
ISBN: 9781908058379
Category : National characteristics, British
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
A woman stands at the edge of a cliff, looking out to sea and the horizon. Dancers welcome the sun in a circle of stones. A dowsing road turns without warning. A church bell. Footsteps. Old Weird Albion is America writer Justin Hopper's dark love song to the English South; a poetic essay interrogating the high, haunted landscape of the South Downs Way; the memories, myths and forgotten histories from Winchester to Beachy Head. When someone disappears, when someone leaps from a cliff and is all-but-erased from memory, what traces might we find in the crumbling chalk of the cliff face; in the wind that buffets the edge of this Albion? A skewed alternative to Bill Bryson, Hopper casts himself as the outsider as he wanders the English countryside in pursuit of mystical encounters. His journey sees him joining New Age eccentrics and accidental visionaries on the hunt for crop circles and druidic stones, discussing the power of nature with ecotherapists and pagans, tracing the ruins of abandoned settlements and walking the streets of eerie suburbs. Through a startling revelation of his own family history, Hopper turns part detective, part memoirist, tracking the footsteps of his grandfather's first wife, Doris; piecing together her forgotten history.

The Old Weird Albion

The Old Weird Albion PDF Author: Justin Hopper
Publisher: Bright Sparks
ISBN: 9781908058379
Category : National characteristics, British
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
A woman stands at the edge of a cliff, looking out to sea and the horizon. Dancers welcome the sun in a circle of stones. A dowsing road turns without warning. A church bell. Footsteps. Old Weird Albion is America writer Justin Hopper's dark love song to the English South; a poetic essay interrogating the high, haunted landscape of the South Downs Way; the memories, myths and forgotten histories from Winchester to Beachy Head. When someone disappears, when someone leaps from a cliff and is all-but-erased from memory, what traces might we find in the crumbling chalk of the cliff face; in the wind that buffets the edge of this Albion? A skewed alternative to Bill Bryson, Hopper casts himself as the outsider as he wanders the English countryside in pursuit of mystical encounters. His journey sees him joining New Age eccentrics and accidental visionaries on the hunt for crop circles and druidic stones, discussing the power of nature with ecotherapists and pagans, tracing the ruins of abandoned settlements and walking the streets of eerie suburbs. Through a startling revelation of his own family history, Hopper turns part detective, part memoirist, tracking the footsteps of his grandfather's first wife, Doris; piecing together her forgotten history.

Albion's Seed

Albion's Seed PDF Author: David Hackett Fischer
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019974369X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 981

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Book Description
This fascinating book is the first volume in a projected cultural history of the United States, from the earliest English settlements to our own time. It is a history of American folkways as they have changed through time, and it argues a thesis about the importance for the United States of having been British in its cultural origins. While most people in the United States today have no British ancestors, they have assimilated regional cultures which were created by British colonists, even while preserving ethnic identities at the same time. In this sense, nearly all Americans are "Albion's Seed," no matter what their ethnicity may be. The concluding section of this remarkable book explores the ways that regional cultures have continued to dominate national politics from 1789 to 1988, and still help to shape attitudes toward education, government, gender, and violence, on which differences between American regions are greater than between European nations.

Nigh-no-place

Nigh-no-place PDF Author: Jen Hadfield
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Poetry
Languages : en
Pages : 76

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Book Description
Jen Hadfield began this book on the hoof, travelling across Canada with an appetite for new landscapes. However, it is in Shetland that she becomes acutely aware of her own voice - her fluency and tongue-tiedness, repetition, hiatus and breath. Hadfield is also the author of 'Almanacs'.

Perfidious Albion

Perfidious Albion PDF Author: Sam Byers
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780571336302
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
A searing, satirical portrait of a divided England in a connected age - a 1984 for our times.

Santa Claus, Last of the Wild Men

Santa Claus, Last of the Wild Men PDF Author: Phyllis Siefker
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786429585
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 227

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Book Description
Much of the modern-day vision of Santa Claus is owed to the Clement Moore poem "The Night Before Christmas." His description of Saint Nicholas personified the "jolly old elf" known to millions of children throughout the world. However, far from being the offshoot of Saint Nicholas of Turkey, Santa Claus is the last of a long line of what scholars call "Wild Men" who were worshipped in ancient European fertility rites and came to America through Pennsylvania's Germans. This pagan creature is described from prehistoric times through his various forms--Robin Hood, The Fool, Harlequin, Satan and Robin Goodfellow--into today's carnival and Christmas scenes. In this thoroughly researched work, the origins of Santa Claus are found to stretch back over 50,000 years, jolting the foundation of Christian myths about the jolly old elf.

The Weird

The Weird PDF Author: Jeff VanderMeer
Publisher: Tor Books
ISBN: 1466803193
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 2482

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Book Description
From Lovecraft to Borges to Gaiman, a century of intrepid literary experimentation has created a corpus of dark and strange stories that transcend all known genre boundaries. Together these stories form The Weird, and its practitioners include some of the greatest names in twentieth and twenty-first century literature. Exotic and esoteric, The Weird plunges you into dark domains and brings you face to face with surreal monstrosities. You won't find any elves or wizards here...but you will find the biggest, boldest, and downright most peculiar stories from the last hundred years bound together in the biggest Weird collection ever assembled. The Weird features 110 stories by an all-star cast, from literary legends to international bestsellers to Booker Prize winners: including William Gibson, George R. R. Martin, Stephen King, Angela Carter, Kelly Link, Franz Kafka, China Miéville, Clive Barker, Haruki Murakami, M. R. James, Neil Gaiman, Mervyn Peake, and Michael Chabon. The Weird is the winner of the 2012 World Fantasy Award for Best Anthology At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

Electric Eden

Electric Eden PDF Author: Rob Young
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 0865478562
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 674

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Book Description
While ostensibly purporting to be a history of that much derided four-letter word 'folk', 'Electric Eden' provides a survey of the visionary, topographic and esoteric impulses that have driven the margins of British visionary folk music from Vaughan Williams and Holst to The Incredible String Band, Nick Drake and John Martyn.

Marrying Winterborne

Marrying Winterborne PDF Author: Lisa Kleypas
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062371843
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 256

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Book Description
In this stunning novel from New York Times bestselling author Lisa Kleypas one of the realm’s most powerful men meets his match-in his lovely, innocent new wife. A ruthless tycoon Savage ambition has brought common-born Rhys Winterborne vast wealth and success. In business and beyond, Rhys gets exactly what he wants. And from the moment he meets the shy, aristocratic Lady Helen Ravenel, he is determined to possess her. If he must take her virtue to ensure she marries him, so much the better . . . A sheltered beauty Helen has had little contact with the glittering, cynical world of London society. Yet Rhys’s determined seduction awakens an intense mutual passion. Helen’s gentle upbringing belies a stubborn conviction that only she can tame her unruly husband. As Rhys’s enemies conspire against them, Helen must trust him with her darkest secret. The risks are unthinkable . . . the reward, a lifetime of incomparable bliss. And it all begins with… Marrying Mr. Winterborne

Lights Out for the Territory

Lights Out for the Territory PDF Author: Iain Sinclair
Publisher: Hamish Hamilton
ISBN: 9780241965504
Category : London (England)
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
'The notion was to cut a crude V into the sprawl of the city, to vandalize dormant energies by an act of ambulant signmaking.' Walking the streets of London, Iain Sinclair traces nine routes across the territory of the capital. Connecting people and places, redrawing boundaries both ancient and modern, reading obscure signs and finding hidden patterns, Sinclair creates a fluid snapshot of the city. In Lights Out for the Territory he gives us a daring, provocative, enlightening, disturbing and utterly unique picture of modern urban life. And in the process he reveals the dark underbelly of a London many of us did not know existed. 'Quite simply one of the finest books about London ever written.' SpectatorCover art by- Stephen Powers'whether the book addresses graffiti explicitly, evoke a city from the past, or are considered cult classics, the novels all share the quality - like street art - of speaking to their time.' Guardian Gallery

The Art of the Occult

The Art of the Occult PDF Author: S. Elizabeth
Publisher: Frances Lincoln
ISBN: 0711254168
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 243

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Book Description
A visual feast of eclectic artwork informed and inspired by spiritual beliefs, magical techniques, mythology and otherworldly experiences. Mystical beliefs and practices have existed for millennia, but why do we still chase the esoteric? From the beginning of human creativity itself, image-makers have been drawn to these unknown spheres and have created curious artworks that transcend time and place – but what is it that attracts artists to these magical realms? From theosophy and kabbalah, to the zodiac and alchemy; spiritualism and ceremonial magic, to the elements and sacred geometry – The Art of the Occult introduces major occult themes and showcases the artists who have been influenced and led by them. Discover the symbolic and mythical images of the Pre-Raphaelites; the automatic drawing of Hilma af Klint and Madge Gill; Leonora Carrington's surrealist interpretation of myth, alchemy and kabbalah; and much more. Featuring prominent, marginalised and little-known artists, The Art of the Occult crosses mystical spheres in a bid to inspire and delight. Divided into thematic chapters (The Cosmos, Higher Beings, Practitioners), the book acts as an entertaining introduction to the art of mysticism – with essays examining each practice and over 175 artworks to discover. The art of the occult has always existed in the margins but inspired the masses, and this book will spark curiosity in all fans of magic, mysticism and the mysterious.