The Peasants: Autumn

The Peasants: Autumn PDF Author: Władysław Stanisław Reymont
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Polish literature
Languages : en
Pages : 368

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The Peasants: Autumn

The Peasants: Autumn PDF Author: Władysław Stanisław Reymont
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Polish literature
Languages : en
Pages : 368

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Book Description


The Fireflies of Autumn

The Fireflies of Autumn PDF Author: Moreno Giovannoni
Publisher: Black Inc.
ISBN: 1743820542
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
San Ginese is a village where God lingers in people’s minds and many dream of California, Argentina or Australia. Some leave only to return feeling disheartened, wishing they had never come back, some never leave and forever wish they had. The Fireflies of Autumn takes us to the olive groves and piazzas of this little-known Tuscan village. There we meet Bucchione, who was haunted by the Angel of Sadness; Lo Zena, his neighbour, with whom he feuded for forty years; Tommaso the Killer, the Adulteress, the Dead Boy and many others. These are tales of war and migration, feasts and misfortunes – of a people and their place over the course of the twentieth century. ‘I have never read a migrant tale so original, so breathtaking in scope, or so magical. I have not since stopped thinking about the characters in San Ginese.’ ALICE PUNG ‘Astonishing in the seductiveness and uniqueness of its storytelling. I read it greedily, not wanting to leave San Ginese and return to the real world.’ CHRISTOS TSIOLKAS

Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom

Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom PDF Author: Stephen R. Platt
Publisher: Knopf
ISBN: 0307271730
Category : Americans
Languages : en
Pages : 514

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Book Description
A gripping account of China's nineteenth-century Taiping Rebellion, one of the largest civil wars in history. Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom brims with unforgettable characters and vivid re-creations of massive and often gruesome battles--a sweeping yet intimate portrait of the conflict that shaped the fate of modern China. The story begins in the early 1850s, the waning years of the Qing dynasty, when word spread of a major revolution brewing in the provinces, led by a failed civil servant who claimed to be the son of God and brother of Jesus. The Taiping rebels drew their power from the poor and the disenfranchised, unleashing the ethnic rage of millions of Chinese against their Manchu rulers. This homegrown movement seemed all but unstoppable until Britain and the United States stepped in and threw their support behind the Manchus: after years of massive carnage, all opposition to Qing rule was effectively snuffed out for generations. Stephen R. Platt recounts these events in spellbinding detail, building his story on two fascinating characters with opposing visions for China's future: the conservative Confucian scholar Zeng Guofan, an accidental general who emerged as the most influential military strategist in China's modern history; and Hong Rengan, a brilliant Taiping leader whose grand vision of building a modern, industrial, and pro-Western Chinese state ended in tragic failure. This is an essential and enthralling history of the rise and fall of the movement that, a century and a half ago, might have launched China on an entirely different path into the modern world.

The Comedienne

The Comedienne PDF Author: Władysław Stanisław Reymont
Publisher: Good Press
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 267

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Book Description
"The Comedienne" by Władysław Stanisław Reymont draws on the author's own experiences as an actor in a struggling provincial theatre at the turn of the century. Reymont tells the story of a young provincial Janina, the titular comédienne who joins a Warsaw theatre company and struggles toward what was then a very modern notion of personal freedom at the time of its publication.

Rereading Huizinga

Rereading Huizinga PDF Author: Peter Arnade
Publisher: Amsterdam University Press
ISBN: 9048534097
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 365

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Book Description
This edited volume is a reappraisal of the legacy and historiographical impact of Johan Huizinga's 1919 masterwork for the centenary of its publication in the field of medieval history, art history, and cultural studies.

The Salt of the Earth

The Salt of the Earth PDF Author: Jozef Wittlin
Publisher: Pushkin Press
ISBN: 1782274723
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 353

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Book Description
The classic pacifist novel by a major Polish writer, who was nominated for the Nobel Prize At the beginning of the twentieth century the villagers of the Carpathian mountains lead a simple life, much as they have always done. Among them is Piotr, a bandy-legged peasant, who wants nothing more from life than an official railway cap, a cottage, and a bride with a dowry. But then the First World War reaches the mountains and Piotr is drafted into the army. All the weight of imperial authority is used to mould him into an unthinking fighting machine, forced to fight a war he does not understand, for interests other than his own. The Salt of the Earth is a classic war novel and a powerfully pacifist tale about the consequences of war for ordinary men.

A Pilgrimage to Jasna Góra (English Translation)

A Pilgrimage to Jasna Góra (English Translation) PDF Author: Wladyslaw Stanislaw Reymont
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781989905159
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 138

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Book Description
In 1894, Wladyslaw Reymont, one of Poland's most important writers, went on a walking pilgrimage from the right bank of Warsaw to Jasna Góra, Poland's most important Marian shrine in Czestochowa. He went as a journalist to cover the pilgrimage for the press rather than out of piety. Quickly, however, he was won over by the simple but deep faith of the pilgrims, mostly simple peasants among whom he felt like an outsider. Available in English for the first time, A Pilgrimage to Jasna Góra is a masterpiece of late-nineteenth century journalism filled with astute sociological observations of the Poles and their faith under Russian domination and richly sensuous descriptions of the beauty of the Polish countryside.

The Wars of the Roses

The Wars of the Roses PDF Author: Dan Jones
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0698170326
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 416

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Book Description
The author of the New York Times bestseller The Plantagenets and The Templars chronicles the next chapter in British history—the historical backdrop for Game of Thrones The inspiration for the Channel 5 series Britain's Bloody Crown The crown of England changed hands five times over the course of the fifteenth century, as two branches of the Plantagenet dynasty fought to the death for the right to rule. In this riveting follow-up to The Plantagenets, celebrated historian Dan Jones describes how the longest-reigning British royal family tore itself apart until it was finally replaced by the Tudors. Some of the greatest heroes and villains of history were thrown together in these turbulent times, from Joan of Arc to Henry V, whose victory at Agincourt marked the high point of the medieval monarchy, and Richard III, who murdered his own nephews in a desperate bid to secure his stolen crown. This was a period when headstrong queens and consorts seized power and bent men to their will. With vivid descriptions of the battles of Towton and Bosworth, where the last Plantagenet king was slain, this dramatic narrative history revels in bedlam and intrigue. It also offers a long-overdue corrective to Tudor propaganda, dismantling their self-serving account of what they called the Wars of the Roses.

Natasha's Dance

Natasha's Dance PDF Author: Orlando Figes
Publisher: Metropolitan Books
ISBN: 1466862890
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 544

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Book Description
History on a grand scale--an enchanting masterpiece that explores the making of one of the world's most vibrant civilizations A People's Tragedy, wrote Eric Hobsbawm, did "more to help us understand the Russian Revolution than any other book I know." Now, in Natasha's Dance, internationally renowned historian Orlando Figes does the same for Russian culture, summoning the myriad elements that formed a nation and held it together. Beginning in the eighteenth century with the building of St. Petersburg--a "window on the West"--and culminating with the challenges posed to Russian identity by the Soviet regime, Figes examines how writers, artists, and musicians grappled with the idea of Russia itself--its character, spiritual essence, and destiny. He skillfully interweaves the great works--by Dostoevsky, Stravinsky, and Chagall--with folk embroidery, peasant songs, religious icons, and all the customs of daily life, from food and drink to bathing habits to beliefs about the spirit world. Figes's characters range high and low: the revered Tolstoy, who left his deathbed to search for the Kingdom of God, as well as the serf girl Praskovya, who became Russian opera's first superstar and shocked society by becoming her owner's wife. Like the European-schooled countess Natasha performing an impromptu folk dance in Tolstoy's War and Peace, the spirit of "Russianness" is revealed by Figes as rich and uplifting, complex and contradictory--a powerful force that unified a vast country and proved more lasting than any Russian ruler or state.

Fall of a Kingdom

Fall of a Kingdom PDF Author: Hilari Bell
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 141691434X
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 437

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Book Description
Who was Sorahb? Stories are told of a hero who will come to Farsala's aid when the need is greatest. But for thousands of years the prosperous land of Farsala has felt no such need, as it has enjoyed the peace that comes from being both feared and respected. Now a new enemy approaches Farsala's borders, one that neither fears nor respects its name and legend. But the rulers of Farsala still believe that they can beat any opponent. Three young people are less sure of Farsala's invincibility. Jiaan, Soraya, and Kavi see Time's Wheel turning, with Farsala headed toward the Flames of Destruction. What they cannot see is how inextricably their lives are linked to Farsala's fate -- until it's too late. In Fall of a Kingdom, the first volume of the Farsala Trilogy, Hilari Bell introduces readers to a world of honor, danger, and magic in this spellbinding tale of self-discovery.