The Literary Life and Other Curiosities PDF Download
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Author: Robert Hendrickson
Publisher: Harvest Books
ISBN: 9780156527873
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 498
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Book Description
Presents a collection of unusual and entertaining facts and myths about writers, books, word origins, publishers, critics, grammar, and other aspects of the world of literature
Author: John Sutherland
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1446409015
Category : Games & Activities
Languages : en
Pages : 306
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Book Description
How much heavier was Thackeray's brain than Walt Whitman's? Which novels do American soldiers read? When did cigarettes start making an appearance in English literature? And, while we're about it, who wrote the first Western, is there any link between asthma and literary genius, and what really happened on Dorothea's wedding night in Middlemarch? In Curiosities of Literature, John Sutherland contemplates the full import of questions such as these, and attempts a few answers in a series of essays that are both witty and eclectic. His approach is also unashamedly discursive. An account of the fast-working Mickey Spillane, for example, leads to a consideration of the substances, both legal and illegal, that authors have employed to boost their creative energies. An essay on good and bad handwriting points out in passing that Thackeray could write the Lord's Prayer on the back of a stamp. As for Mary Shelley, a brief recital of the circumstances in which she wrote Frankenstein stops off to consider what impact the miserable summer weather of 1816 had on the future path of English literature. Of course, it is debatable whether knowledge of these arcane topics adds to the wisdom of nations, but it does highlight the random pleasures to be found in reading literature and reading about it. As John Sutherland rightly asks, 'Why else read?'
Author: Kevin Jackson
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1466888547
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 303
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Book Description
Dedications, Titles, Epigraphs, Footnotes, Prefaces, Afterwords, Indexes... These and other "invisible" literary necessities form the skeletons of many a book, yet these unacknowledged and unexamined forms abound in wisdom, curiosities, or eccentricities. With both erudition and wit, and drawing on examples from every part of literature's history, ranging from the greats such as Shakespeare, Beckett, and T. S. Eliot to lesser known writers such as Fernando Pessoa. Jackson's mixture of serious literary analysis and jovial wit means Invisible Forms will appeal to anyone who is interested in books and in the art of writing. It is the perfect companion for literature lovers everywhere.
Author: Edward Brooke-Hitching
Publisher: Chronicle Books
ISBN: 1797212052
Category : Reference
Languages : en
Pages : 258
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Book Description
This fascinating and bizarre collection compiles the most unusual, obscure books from the far reaches of the human imagination throughout history. From the author of the critically acclaimed bestsellers The Phantom Atlas and The Sky Atlas comes a unique and beautifully illustrated journey through the history of literature. The Madman's Library delves into its darkest territories to hunt down the oddest books and manuscripts ever written, uncovering the intriguing stories behind their creation. From the Qur'an written in the blood of Saddam Hussein, to the gorgeously decorated fifteenth-century lawsuit filed by the Devil against Jesus, to the most enormous book ever created, The Madman's Library features many long forgotten, eccentric, and extraordinary volumes gathered from around the world. Books written in blood and books that kill, books of the insane and books that hoaxed the globe, books invisible to the naked eye and books so long they could destroy the Universe, books worn into battle and books of code and cypher whose secrets remain undiscovered. Spell books, alchemist scrolls, wearable books, edible books, books to summon demons, books written by ghosts, and more all come together in the most curiously strange library imaginable. Featuring hundreds of remarkable images and packed with entertaining facts and stories to discover, The Madman’s Library is a captivating compendium perfect for bibliophiles, literature enthusiasts, and collectors intrigued by bizarre oddities, obscure history, and the macabre. • MUST-HAVE FOR BOOKLOVERS: Anyone who appreciates a good read will love delving into this weird world of books and adding this collection to their own bookshelf. • DISCOVER SOMETHING TRULY UNIQUE: The Madman's Library will let you in on the secret and obscure histories of the strangest books ever made. • EXPERT AUTHOR: Edward Brooke-Hitching is the son of an antiquarian book dealer, a lifelong rare book collector, and a master of taking visual deep dives into unusual historical subjects, such as the maps of imaginary geography in The Phantom Atlas or ancient pathways through the stars in The Sky Atlas.
Author: Isaac Disraeli
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English literature
Languages : en
Pages : 342
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Book Description
Author: Ian Sansom
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780712352543
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 320
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Book Description
Author:
Publisher: David R. Godine Publisher
ISBN: 9781567922950
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 212
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Book Description
What is the origin of the word "book"? What is the oldest working library still in existence? What is an "enchiridion"? An "amphigory"? A "duodecimo"? Which two Nobel laureates refused the prize in literature? How many trees must sacrifice their lives to produce a thousand copies of a 96-page volume of verse? These are some of the questions posed (and answered) in this fascinating farrago of literary trivia, a treasure trove of obscure and irresistible facts, definitions, lists, and quotations that touch on every aspect of books, including their authors, publishers, printers, collectors, critics, readers, and enemies. Under headings that explore the entire history of bibliomania from "The Invention of Paper" to "Some Horror Writers' Offcial Websites," the entries in Bibliotopia provide the insatiably curious reader a delightfully desultory literary education, the kind one might pick up at a cocktail party on Parnassus.
Author: Julie Koh
Publisher: Univ. of Queensland Press
ISBN: 0702257214
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 178
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Book Description
A biting collection of stories from a bold new voice. A young girl sees ghosts from her third eye, located where her belly button should be. A corporate lawyer feels increasingly disconnected from his job in a soulless 1200-storey skyscraper. And a one-dimensional yellow man steps out from a cinema screen in the hope of leading a three-dimensional life, but everyone around him is fixated only on the color of his skin. Welcome to Portable Curiosities. In these dark and often fantastical stories, Julie Koh combines absurd humour with searing critiques on modern society, proving herself to be one of Australia's most original and daring young writers.
Author: Alex Palmer
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1628732210
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 224
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Book Description
Wouldn’t it be great to be a fly on the wall as the great writers took pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard)? While reading this work, you’ll be just that. Here are behind-the-book stories and facts about authors, publishing and everything literary that will entertain both casual and serious readers. Among the questions asked and answered: • When Did Literature Finally Get Sexy? • Is Coffee or Opium Better for Literary Creativity? • Why Are the Best Autobiographies so Embarrassing? • Why Do Some Detectives Use Their Minds and Others Their Fists? Who knew that bestseller lists and children’s books could be the source of intense controversy? Or that even the biggest writers had to scrape by, with odd jobs and inventions like the Mark Twain Self-Pasting Scrapbook? In Literary Miscellany, examine the trend of “fake memoirs,” with a list of who lied about what, and a rogues’ gallery of hoaxers dating back centuries. From epic poetry and Homer to pulp fiction and Harry Potter, Literary Miscellany is a breezy tour through the literature of today and yesterday, packed with enough interesting facts to entertain both the erudite professor and pleasure reader.
Author: John Gross
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199543410
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 400
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Book Description
In The New Oxford Book of Literary Anecdotes, master anthologist John Gross brings together a delectable smorgasbord of literary tales, offering striking new insight into some of the most important writers in history. Many of the anecdotes here are funny, others are touching, outrageous, sinister, inspiring, or downright weird. They show writers from Chaucer to Bob Dylan acting both unpredictably and deeply in character. The range is wide--this is a book which finds room for Milton and Shakespeare, Mark Twain and Walt Whitman, Kurt Vonnegut and P. G. Wodehouse, Chinua Achebe and Salman Rushdie, James Baldwin and Tom Wolfe. It is also a book in which you can find out which great historian's face was once mistaken for a baby's bottom, which film star experienced a haunting encounter with Virginia Woolf not long before her death, and what Agatha Christie really thought of her popular character Hercule Poirot. It is in short an unrivalled collection of literary gossip offering intimate glimpses into the lives of authors ranging from Shakespeare to Philip Roth--a book not just for lovers of literature, but for anyone with a taste for the curiosities of human nature.
Author: Janell Watson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 113942663X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 242
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Book Description
This book addresses the issues of collecting, consuming, classifying and describing the curiosities, antiques and objets d'art that proliferated in French literary texts during the last decades of the nineteenth century. After Balzac made such issues significant in canonical literature, the Goncourt brothers, Huysmans, Mallarmé and Maupassant celebrated their golden age. Flaubert and Zola scorned them. Rachilde and Lorrain perverted them. Proust commemorated their last moments of glory. Focusing on the bibelot (the modern French term for knick-knack, curiosity or other collectible), Janell Watson shows how the sudden prominence given to curiosities and collecting in nineteenth-century literature signals a massive change in attitudes to the world of goods, which in turn restructured the literary text according to the practical logic of daily life, calling into question established scholarly notions of order. Her study makes an important contribution to the literary history of material culture.
