Author: Mel Brooks
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 147358731X
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 328
Book Description
AVAILABLE NOW - THE PERFECT GIFT FOR FATHER'S DAY 'Delightful. A great, fun read.' DAVID JASON 'Mel Brooks is the king of comedy.' DAVID BADDIEL 'Riotous' DAILY MAIL 'A jaunty romp across Brooks's career' THE TIMES __________________________ At 95, the legendary Mel Brooks continues to set the standard for comedy across television, film, and the stage. Now, for the first time, this EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony) winner shares his story in his own words. Here are the never-before-told, behind-the-scenes anecdotes and remembrances from a master storyteller, filmmaker, and creator of all things funny. From The Producers to Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein to Anxiety and more, All About Me! offers fans fascinating and hilarious insight into Mel Brooks's outstanding collection of boundary-breaking work. Filled with tales of struggle, achievement and camaraderie, Brooks shares riveting details about his upbringing, his career and his many close friendships and collaborations including those with Gene Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, and the great love of his love, Anne Bancroft. 'Not since the Bible have I read anything so powerful and poignant. And to boot - it's a lot funnier!' M. Brooks
All About Me!
Author: Mel Brooks
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 147358731X
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 328
Book Description
AVAILABLE NOW - THE PERFECT GIFT FOR FATHER'S DAY 'Delightful. A great, fun read.' DAVID JASON 'Mel Brooks is the king of comedy.' DAVID BADDIEL 'Riotous' DAILY MAIL 'A jaunty romp across Brooks's career' THE TIMES __________________________ At 95, the legendary Mel Brooks continues to set the standard for comedy across television, film, and the stage. Now, for the first time, this EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony) winner shares his story in his own words. Here are the never-before-told, behind-the-scenes anecdotes and remembrances from a master storyteller, filmmaker, and creator of all things funny. From The Producers to Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein to Anxiety and more, All About Me! offers fans fascinating and hilarious insight into Mel Brooks's outstanding collection of boundary-breaking work. Filled with tales of struggle, achievement and camaraderie, Brooks shares riveting details about his upbringing, his career and his many close friendships and collaborations including those with Gene Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, and the great love of his love, Anne Bancroft. 'Not since the Bible have I read anything so powerful and poignant. And to boot - it's a lot funnier!' M. Brooks
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 147358731X
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 328
Book Description
AVAILABLE NOW - THE PERFECT GIFT FOR FATHER'S DAY 'Delightful. A great, fun read.' DAVID JASON 'Mel Brooks is the king of comedy.' DAVID BADDIEL 'Riotous' DAILY MAIL 'A jaunty romp across Brooks's career' THE TIMES __________________________ At 95, the legendary Mel Brooks continues to set the standard for comedy across television, film, and the stage. Now, for the first time, this EGOT (Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony) winner shares his story in his own words. Here are the never-before-told, behind-the-scenes anecdotes and remembrances from a master storyteller, filmmaker, and creator of all things funny. From The Producers to Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein to Anxiety and more, All About Me! offers fans fascinating and hilarious insight into Mel Brooks's outstanding collection of boundary-breaking work. Filled with tales of struggle, achievement and camaraderie, Brooks shares riveting details about his upbringing, his career and his many close friendships and collaborations including those with Gene Wilder, Alfred Hitchcock, and the great love of his love, Anne Bancroft. 'Not since the Bible have I read anything so powerful and poignant. And to boot - it's a lot funnier!' M. Brooks
Funny Man
Author: Patrick McGilligan
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062560964
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 772
Book Description
A deeply textured and compelling biography of comedy giant Mel Brooks, covering his rags-to-riches life and triumphant career in television, films, and theater, from Patrick McGilligan, the acclaimed author of Young Orson: The Years of Luck and Genius on the Path to Citizen Kane and Alfred Hitchcock: A Life in Darkness and Light. Oscar, Emmy, Tony, and Grammy award–winner Mel Brooks was behind (and sometimes in front the camera too) of some of the most influential comedy hits of our time, including The 2,000 Year Old Man, Get Smart, The Producers, Blazing Saddles, and Young Frankenstein. But before this actor, writer, director, comedian, and composer entertained the world, his first audience was his family. The fourth and last child of Max and Kitty Kaminsky, Mel Brooks was born on his family’s kitchen table in Brooklyn, New York, in 1926, and was not quite three-years-old when his father died of tuberculosis. Growing up in a household too poor to own a radio, Mel was short and homely, a mischievous child whose birth role was to make the family laugh. Beyond boyhood, after transforming himself into Mel Brooks, the laughs that came easily inside the Kaminsky family proved more elusive. His lifelong crusade to transform himself into a brand name of popular humor is at the center of master biographer Patrick McGilligan’s Funny Man. In this exhaustively researched and wonderfully novelistic look at Brooks’ personal and professional life, McGilligan lays bare the strengths and drawbacks that shaped Brooks’ psychology, his willpower, his persona, and his comedy. McGilligan insightfully navigates the epic ride that has been the famous funnyman’s life story, from Brooks’s childhood in Williamsburg tenements and breakthrough in early television—working alongside Sid Caesar and Carl Reiner—to Hollywood and Broadway peaks (and valleys). His book offers a meditation on the Jewish immigrant culture that influenced Brooks, snapshots of the golden age of comedy, behind the scenes revelations about the celebrated shows and films, and a telling look at the four-decade romantic partnership with actress Anne Bancroft that superseded Brooks’ troubled first marriage. Engrossing, nuanced and ultimately poignant, Funny Man delivers a great man’s unforgettable life story and an anatomy of the American dream of success. Funny Man includes a 16-page black-and-white photo insert.
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 0062560964
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 772
Book Description
A deeply textured and compelling biography of comedy giant Mel Brooks, covering his rags-to-riches life and triumphant career in television, films, and theater, from Patrick McGilligan, the acclaimed author of Young Orson: The Years of Luck and Genius on the Path to Citizen Kane and Alfred Hitchcock: A Life in Darkness and Light. Oscar, Emmy, Tony, and Grammy award–winner Mel Brooks was behind (and sometimes in front the camera too) of some of the most influential comedy hits of our time, including The 2,000 Year Old Man, Get Smart, The Producers, Blazing Saddles, and Young Frankenstein. But before this actor, writer, director, comedian, and composer entertained the world, his first audience was his family. The fourth and last child of Max and Kitty Kaminsky, Mel Brooks was born on his family’s kitchen table in Brooklyn, New York, in 1926, and was not quite three-years-old when his father died of tuberculosis. Growing up in a household too poor to own a radio, Mel was short and homely, a mischievous child whose birth role was to make the family laugh. Beyond boyhood, after transforming himself into Mel Brooks, the laughs that came easily inside the Kaminsky family proved more elusive. His lifelong crusade to transform himself into a brand name of popular humor is at the center of master biographer Patrick McGilligan’s Funny Man. In this exhaustively researched and wonderfully novelistic look at Brooks’ personal and professional life, McGilligan lays bare the strengths and drawbacks that shaped Brooks’ psychology, his willpower, his persona, and his comedy. McGilligan insightfully navigates the epic ride that has been the famous funnyman’s life story, from Brooks’s childhood in Williamsburg tenements and breakthrough in early television—working alongside Sid Caesar and Carl Reiner—to Hollywood and Broadway peaks (and valleys). His book offers a meditation on the Jewish immigrant culture that influenced Brooks, snapshots of the golden age of comedy, behind the scenes revelations about the celebrated shows and films, and a telling look at the four-decade romantic partnership with actress Anne Bancroft that superseded Brooks’ troubled first marriage. Engrossing, nuanced and ultimately poignant, Funny Man delivers a great man’s unforgettable life story and an anatomy of the American dream of success. Funny Man includes a 16-page black-and-white photo insert.
Kiss Me Like A Stranger
Author: Gene Wilder
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1429909951
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 256
Book Description
In this personal book from the star of many beloved and classic film comedies -- from The Producers to Young Frankenstein, Blazing saddles to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory -- Gene Wilder writes about a side of his life the public hasn't seen on the screen. Kiss Me Like a Stranger is not an autobiography in the usual sense of the word, and it's certainly not another celebrity "tell-all." Instead, Wilder has chosen to write about resonant moments in his life, events that led him to an understanding of the art of acting, and -- more important -- to an understanding of how to give love to and receive love from a woman. Wilder writes compellingly about the creative process on stage and screen, and divulges moments from life on the sets of some of the most iconic movies of our time. In this book, he talks about everything from his experiences in psychoanalysis to why he got into acting and later comedy (his first goal was to be a Shakespearean actor), and how a Midwestern childhood with a sick mother changed him. Wilder explains why he became an actor and writer, and about the funny, wonderful movies he made with Mel Brooks, Woody Allen, Richard Pryor, and Harrison Ford, among many others. He candidly reveals his failures in love, and writes about the overwhelming experience of marrying comedienne Gilda Radner, as well as what finally had to happen for him to make a true and lasting commitment to another woman. A thoughtful, revealing, and winsome book about life, love, and the creative process, the New York Times bestseller Kiss Me Like A Stranger is one actor's life in his own words.
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 1429909951
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 256
Book Description
In this personal book from the star of many beloved and classic film comedies -- from The Producers to Young Frankenstein, Blazing saddles to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory -- Gene Wilder writes about a side of his life the public hasn't seen on the screen. Kiss Me Like a Stranger is not an autobiography in the usual sense of the word, and it's certainly not another celebrity "tell-all." Instead, Wilder has chosen to write about resonant moments in his life, events that led him to an understanding of the art of acting, and -- more important -- to an understanding of how to give love to and receive love from a woman. Wilder writes compellingly about the creative process on stage and screen, and divulges moments from life on the sets of some of the most iconic movies of our time. In this book, he talks about everything from his experiences in psychoanalysis to why he got into acting and later comedy (his first goal was to be a Shakespearean actor), and how a Midwestern childhood with a sick mother changed him. Wilder explains why he became an actor and writer, and about the funny, wonderful movies he made with Mel Brooks, Woody Allen, Richard Pryor, and Harrison Ford, among many others. He candidly reveals his failures in love, and writes about the overwhelming experience of marrying comedienne Gilda Radner, as well as what finally had to happen for him to make a true and lasting commitment to another woman. A thoughtful, revealing, and winsome book about life, love, and the creative process, the New York Times bestseller Kiss Me Like A Stranger is one actor's life in his own words.
It's Good to Be the King
Author: James Robert Parish
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0470225262
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 321
Book Description
Discusses the personal life and professional career of comedy writer/actor/filmmaker Mel Brooks.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0470225262
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 321
Book Description
Discusses the personal life and professional career of comedy writer/actor/filmmaker Mel Brooks.
Young Frankenstein: A Mel Brooks Book
Author: Mel Brooks
Publisher: Black Dog & Leventhal
ISBN: 031631546X
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 288
Book Description
Mel Brooks' own words telling all about the players, the filming, and studio antics during the production of this great comedy classic. The book is alive and teeming with hundreds of photos, original interviews, and hilarious commentary. Young Frankenstein was made with deep respect for the craft and history of cinema-and for the power of a good schwanzstucker joke. This picture-driven book, written by one of the greatest comedy geniuses of all time, takes readers inside the classic film's marvelous creation story via never-before-seen black and white and color photography from the set and contemporary interviews with the cast and crew, most notably, legendary writer-director Mel Brooks. With access to more than 225 behind-the-scenes photos and production stills, and with captions written by Brooks, this book will also rely on interviews with gifted director of photography Gerald Hirschfeld, Academy Award-winning actress Cloris Leachman and veteran producer Michael Gruskoff. Mel Brooks is an American film director, screenwriter, comedian, actor, producer, composer and songwriter. Brooks is best known as a creator of broad film farces and comic parodies including The Producers, The Twelve Chairs, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, Silent Movie, High Anxiety, History of the World, Part I, Spaceballs and Robin Hood: Men in Tights. More recently, he had a smash hit on Broadway with the musical adaptation of his first film, The Producers. An EGOT winner, he received a Kennedy Center Honor in 2009, the 41st AFI Life Achievement Award in June 2013, and a British Film Institute Fellowship in March 2015. Three of Brooks' classics have appeared on AFI's 100 Years . . . 100 Laughs list. Blazing Saddles at number 6, The Producers at number 11, and Young Frankenstein at number 13. Judd Apatow is one of the most important comic minds of his generation. He wrote and directed the films The 40-Year-Old Virgin (co-written with Steve Carell), Knocked Up, Funny People, and This Is 40, and his producing credits include Superbad, Bridesmaids, and Anchorman. Apatow is the executive producer of HBO's Girls.
Publisher: Black Dog & Leventhal
ISBN: 031631546X
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 288
Book Description
Mel Brooks' own words telling all about the players, the filming, and studio antics during the production of this great comedy classic. The book is alive and teeming with hundreds of photos, original interviews, and hilarious commentary. Young Frankenstein was made with deep respect for the craft and history of cinema-and for the power of a good schwanzstucker joke. This picture-driven book, written by one of the greatest comedy geniuses of all time, takes readers inside the classic film's marvelous creation story via never-before-seen black and white and color photography from the set and contemporary interviews with the cast and crew, most notably, legendary writer-director Mel Brooks. With access to more than 225 behind-the-scenes photos and production stills, and with captions written by Brooks, this book will also rely on interviews with gifted director of photography Gerald Hirschfeld, Academy Award-winning actress Cloris Leachman and veteran producer Michael Gruskoff. Mel Brooks is an American film director, screenwriter, comedian, actor, producer, composer and songwriter. Brooks is best known as a creator of broad film farces and comic parodies including The Producers, The Twelve Chairs, Blazing Saddles, Young Frankenstein, Silent Movie, High Anxiety, History of the World, Part I, Spaceballs and Robin Hood: Men in Tights. More recently, he had a smash hit on Broadway with the musical adaptation of his first film, The Producers. An EGOT winner, he received a Kennedy Center Honor in 2009, the 41st AFI Life Achievement Award in June 2013, and a British Film Institute Fellowship in March 2015. Three of Brooks' classics have appeared on AFI's 100 Years . . . 100 Laughs list. Blazing Saddles at number 6, The Producers at number 11, and Young Frankenstein at number 13. Judd Apatow is one of the most important comic minds of his generation. He wrote and directed the films The 40-Year-Old Virgin (co-written with Steve Carell), Knocked Up, Funny People, and This Is 40, and his producing credits include Superbad, Bridesmaids, and Anchorman. Apatow is the executive producer of HBO's Girls.
Kydd
Author: Julian Stockwin
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0743216679
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 257
Book Description
From internationally bestselling author Julian Stockwell comes a dramatic story closely based on real events following one man’s journey as he becomes a true sailor and defender of Britain. Europe is ablaze with war. The British prime minister is under pressure to intimidate the French and dispatches a Navy squadron to appear off the French coast. To man the ships, ordinary citizens must be press-ganged. Thomas Paine Kydd, a young wig-maker from Guildford, is seized and taken across the country to be part of the crew of the ninety-eight-gun line-of-battle ship Duke William. The ship sails immediately and Kydd has to learn the harsh realities of shipboard life fast. Despite all he goes through, amid dangers of tempest and battle, he comes to admire the skills and courage of his fellow seamen, taking up the challenge himself to become a true sailor and defender of Britain at war. Kydd launches a masterly writing talent and is the first installment of a thrilling new series. Based on dramatic real events, it is classic storytelling at its best, rich with action, exceptional characters, and a page-turning narrative.
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0743216679
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 257
Book Description
From internationally bestselling author Julian Stockwell comes a dramatic story closely based on real events following one man’s journey as he becomes a true sailor and defender of Britain. Europe is ablaze with war. The British prime minister is under pressure to intimidate the French and dispatches a Navy squadron to appear off the French coast. To man the ships, ordinary citizens must be press-ganged. Thomas Paine Kydd, a young wig-maker from Guildford, is seized and taken across the country to be part of the crew of the ninety-eight-gun line-of-battle ship Duke William. The ship sails immediately and Kydd has to learn the harsh realities of shipboard life fast. Despite all he goes through, amid dangers of tempest and battle, he comes to admire the skills and courage of his fellow seamen, taking up the challenge himself to become a true sailor and defender of Britain at war. Kydd launches a masterly writing talent and is the first installment of a thrilling new series. Based on dramatic real events, it is classic storytelling at its best, rich with action, exceptional characters, and a page-turning narrative.
Writing Without Bullshit
Author: Josh Bernoff
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 006247717X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 216
Book Description
Joining the ranks of classics like The Elements of Style and On Writing Well, Writing Without Bullshit helps professionals get to the point to get ahead. It’s time for Writing Without Bullshit. Writing Without Bullshit is the first comprehensive guide to writing for today’s world: a noisy environment where everyone reads what you write on a screen. The average news story now gets only 36 seconds of attention. Unless you change how you write, your emails, reports, and Web copy don’t stand a chance. In this practical and witty book, you’ll learn to front-load your writing with pithy titles, subject lines, and opening sentences. You’ll acquire the courage and skill to purge weak and meaningless jargon, wimpy passive voice, and cowardly weasel words. And you’ll get used to writing directly to the reader to make every word count. At the center of it all is the Iron Imperative: treat the reader’s time as more valuable than your own. Embrace that, and your customers, your boss, and your colleagues will recognize the power and boldness of your thinking. Transcend the fear that makes your writing weak. Plan and execute writing projects with confidence. Manage edits and reviews flawlessly. And master every modern format from emails and social media to reports and press releases. Stop writing to fit in. Start writing to stand out. Boost your career by writing without bullshit.
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 006247717X
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 216
Book Description
Joining the ranks of classics like The Elements of Style and On Writing Well, Writing Without Bullshit helps professionals get to the point to get ahead. It’s time for Writing Without Bullshit. Writing Without Bullshit is the first comprehensive guide to writing for today’s world: a noisy environment where everyone reads what you write on a screen. The average news story now gets only 36 seconds of attention. Unless you change how you write, your emails, reports, and Web copy don’t stand a chance. In this practical and witty book, you’ll learn to front-load your writing with pithy titles, subject lines, and opening sentences. You’ll acquire the courage and skill to purge weak and meaningless jargon, wimpy passive voice, and cowardly weasel words. And you’ll get used to writing directly to the reader to make every word count. At the center of it all is the Iron Imperative: treat the reader’s time as more valuable than your own. Embrace that, and your customers, your boss, and your colleagues will recognize the power and boldness of your thinking. Transcend the fear that makes your writing weak. Plan and execute writing projects with confidence. Manage edits and reviews flawlessly. And master every modern format from emails and social media to reports and press releases. Stop writing to fit in. Start writing to stand out. Boost your career by writing without bullshit.
Kenneth Strickfaden, Dr. Frankenstein's Electrician
Author: Harry Goldman
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786483555
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 225
Book Description
Kenneth Strickfaden, innovative genius of illusionary special effects from silent films to the age of television, set the standard for Hollywood's mad scientists. Strickfaden created the science fiction apparatus in more than 100 motion picture films and television programs, from 1931's Frankenstein to the Wizard of Oz and The Mask of Fu Manchu to television's The Munsters. The skilled technician, known around Hollywood's back lots as "Mr. Electric," once doubled for Boris Karloff in a dangerous scene and was nearly electrocuted. From his birth in 1896 to his death in 1984, Strickfaden's life was filled with adventure. He spent his early years working the amusement parks on both coasts, served overseas as a Marine during World War I, took a 1919 cross-country trip in a dilapidated Model T, and favored risky pursuits like automobile and speedboat racing. He worked as an aeronautical mechanic, constructing airplanes for an historic around-the-world flight. A science teacher at heart, he gave 1,500 traveling science demonstration lectures across the U.S. and Canada. Besides covering Strickfaden's entire personal and professional life, this book discusses how later films show his influence. It reveals the fate of his collection of equipment, and is richly illustrated with numerous rare and previously unpublished photographs. Appendices provide a selection of notes, doodles, and scribbles from Strickfaden's notebooks, informal sketches, correspondence, documents, a chronology of his film and television contributions, a bibliography, a film index, and a complete subject index.
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 0786483555
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 225
Book Description
Kenneth Strickfaden, innovative genius of illusionary special effects from silent films to the age of television, set the standard for Hollywood's mad scientists. Strickfaden created the science fiction apparatus in more than 100 motion picture films and television programs, from 1931's Frankenstein to the Wizard of Oz and The Mask of Fu Manchu to television's The Munsters. The skilled technician, known around Hollywood's back lots as "Mr. Electric," once doubled for Boris Karloff in a dangerous scene and was nearly electrocuted. From his birth in 1896 to his death in 1984, Strickfaden's life was filled with adventure. He spent his early years working the amusement parks on both coasts, served overseas as a Marine during World War I, took a 1919 cross-country trip in a dilapidated Model T, and favored risky pursuits like automobile and speedboat racing. He worked as an aeronautical mechanic, constructing airplanes for an historic around-the-world flight. A science teacher at heart, he gave 1,500 traveling science demonstration lectures across the U.S. and Canada. Besides covering Strickfaden's entire personal and professional life, this book discusses how later films show his influence. It reveals the fate of his collection of equipment, and is richly illustrated with numerous rare and previously unpublished photographs. Appendices provide a selection of notes, doodles, and scribbles from Strickfaden's notebooks, informal sketches, correspondence, documents, a chronology of his film and television contributions, a bibliography, a film index, and a complete subject index.
The Endurance of Frankenstein
Author: George Levine
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520046405
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 368
Book Description
MARY SHELLEY's Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus grew out of a parlor game and a nightmare vision. The story of the book's origin is a famous one, first told in the introduction Mary Shelley wrote for the 1831 edition of the novel. The two Shelleys, Byron, Mary's stepsister Claire Clairmont, and John William Polidori (Byron's physician) spent a "wet, ungenial summer in the Swiss Alps." Byron suggested that "each write a ghost story." If one is to trust Mary Shelley's account (and James Rieger has shown the untrustworthiness of its chronology and particulars), only she and "poor Polidori" took the contest seriously. The two "illustrious poets," according to her, "annoyed by the platitude of prose, speedily relinquished their uncongenial task." Polidori, too, is made to seem careless, unable to handle his story of a "skull-headed lady." Though Mary Shelley is just as deprecating when she speaks of her own "tiresome unlucky ghost story," she also suggests that its sources went deeper. Her truant muse became active as soon as she fastened on the "idea" of "making only a transcript of the grim terrors of my waking dream": "'I have found it! What terrified me will terrify others."' The twelve essays in this collection attest to the endurance of Mary Shelley's "waking dream." Appropriately, though less romantically, this book also grew out of a playful conversation at a party. When several of the contributors to this book discovered that they were all closet aficionados of Mary Shelley's novel, they decided that a book might be written in which each contributor-contestant might try to account for the persistent hold that Frankenstein continues to exercise on the popular imagination. Within a few months, two films--Warhol's Frankenstein and Mel Brooks's Young Frankenstein--and the Hall-Landau and Isherwood-Bachardy television versions of the novel appeared to remind us of our blunted purpose. These manifestations were an auspicious sign and resulted in the book Endurance of Frankenstein.
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 9780520046405
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 368
Book Description
MARY SHELLEY's Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus grew out of a parlor game and a nightmare vision. The story of the book's origin is a famous one, first told in the introduction Mary Shelley wrote for the 1831 edition of the novel. The two Shelleys, Byron, Mary's stepsister Claire Clairmont, and John William Polidori (Byron's physician) spent a "wet, ungenial summer in the Swiss Alps." Byron suggested that "each write a ghost story." If one is to trust Mary Shelley's account (and James Rieger has shown the untrustworthiness of its chronology and particulars), only she and "poor Polidori" took the contest seriously. The two "illustrious poets," according to her, "annoyed by the platitude of prose, speedily relinquished their uncongenial task." Polidori, too, is made to seem careless, unable to handle his story of a "skull-headed lady." Though Mary Shelley is just as deprecating when she speaks of her own "tiresome unlucky ghost story," she also suggests that its sources went deeper. Her truant muse became active as soon as she fastened on the "idea" of "making only a transcript of the grim terrors of my waking dream": "'I have found it! What terrified me will terrify others."' The twelve essays in this collection attest to the endurance of Mary Shelley's "waking dream." Appropriately, though less romantically, this book also grew out of a playful conversation at a party. When several of the contributors to this book discovered that they were all closet aficionados of Mary Shelley's novel, they decided that a book might be written in which each contributor-contestant might try to account for the persistent hold that Frankenstein continues to exercise on the popular imagination. Within a few months, two films--Warhol's Frankenstein and Mel Brooks's Young Frankenstein--and the Hall-Landau and Isherwood-Bachardy television versions of the novel appeared to remind us of our blunted purpose. These manifestations were an auspicious sign and resulted in the book Endurance of Frankenstein.
Villa America
Author: Liza Klaussmann
Publisher: Hachette+ORM
ISBN: 0316211370
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 420
Book Description
A dazzling novel set in the French Riviera based on the real-life inspirations for F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender is The Night. When Sara Wiborg and Gerald Murphy met and married, they set forth to create a beautiful world together-one that they couldn't find within the confines of society life in New York City. They packed up their children and moved to the South of France, where they immediately fell in with a group of expats, including Hemingway, Picasso, and Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald. On the coast of Antibes they built Villa America, a fragrant paradise where they invented summer on the Riviera for a group of bohemian artists and writers who became deeply entwined in each other's affairs. There, in their oasis by the sea, the Murphys regaled their guests and their children with flamboyant beach parties, fiery debates over the newest ideas, and dinners beneath the stars. It was, for a while, a charmed life, but these were people who kept secrets, and who beneath the sparkling veneer were heartbreakingly human. When a tragic accident brings Owen, a young American aviator who fought in the Great War, to the south of France, he finds himself drawn into this flamboyant circle, and the Murphys find their world irrevocably, unexpectedly transformed. A handsome, private man, Owen intrigues and unsettles the Murphys, testing the strength of their union and encouraging a hidden side of Gerald to emerge. Suddenly a life in which everything has been considered and exquisitely planned becomes volatile, its safeties breached, the stakes incalculably high. Nothing will remain as it once was. Liza Klaussman expertly evokes the 1920s cultural scene of the so-called "Lost Generation." Ravishing and affecting, and written with infinite tenderness, Villa America is at once the poignant story of a marriage and of a golden age that could not last.
Publisher: Hachette+ORM
ISBN: 0316211370
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 420
Book Description
A dazzling novel set in the French Riviera based on the real-life inspirations for F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender is The Night. When Sara Wiborg and Gerald Murphy met and married, they set forth to create a beautiful world together-one that they couldn't find within the confines of society life in New York City. They packed up their children and moved to the South of France, where they immediately fell in with a group of expats, including Hemingway, Picasso, and Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald. On the coast of Antibes they built Villa America, a fragrant paradise where they invented summer on the Riviera for a group of bohemian artists and writers who became deeply entwined in each other's affairs. There, in their oasis by the sea, the Murphys regaled their guests and their children with flamboyant beach parties, fiery debates over the newest ideas, and dinners beneath the stars. It was, for a while, a charmed life, but these were people who kept secrets, and who beneath the sparkling veneer were heartbreakingly human. When a tragic accident brings Owen, a young American aviator who fought in the Great War, to the south of France, he finds himself drawn into this flamboyant circle, and the Murphys find their world irrevocably, unexpectedly transformed. A handsome, private man, Owen intrigues and unsettles the Murphys, testing the strength of their union and encouraging a hidden side of Gerald to emerge. Suddenly a life in which everything has been considered and exquisitely planned becomes volatile, its safeties breached, the stakes incalculably high. Nothing will remain as it once was. Liza Klaussman expertly evokes the 1920s cultural scene of the so-called "Lost Generation." Ravishing and affecting, and written with infinite tenderness, Villa America is at once the poignant story of a marriage and of a golden age that could not last.