As a child in Russia, Vladimir Nabokov enjoyed conjuring: "I loved doing simple tricks--turning water into wine, that kind of thing." In this engrossing book Michael Wood explores the blend of arrogance and mischief that makes Nabokov such a fascinating...

How did banking, borrowing, investing, and even losing money—in other words, participating in the modern financial system—come to seem likeroutine activities of everydaylife? Genres of the Credit Economy addressesthis question by examining the history of...

Of all the literary forms, the novel is arguably the most discussed . . . and fretted over. From Miguel de Cervantes's Don Quixote to the works of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and today's masters, the novel has grown with and...

"A provocative study that should be in every writer's library."―Washington Post In this modern classic, Carolyn G. Heilbrun builds an eloquent argument demonstrating that writers conform all too often to society's expectations of what women should be...

S/ZSous ce titre, ou ce monogramme, transparaît une nouvelle particulièrement énigmatique de Balzac : Sarrasine. Texte qui se trouve ici découpé en « lexies », stratifié comme une partition inscrite sur plusieurs registres, radiographié, « écouté » au...

Arguing that the Tintin books' characters are as strong and their plots as complex as any dreamed up by the great novelists, Tom McCarthy asks a simple question: Is Tintin literature? Taking a cue from Tintin himself — who spends much of his time...

Just as speech can be acquired, so can it be lost. Individuals can forget words, phrases, even entire languages, and over the course of time speaking communities, too, let go of the tongues that were once theirs, as languages grow obsolescent and give...

With literature waning in the interest of so many, is Shakespeare the only poet the public can still appreciate? John Milton, as this book makes clear, speaks more powerfully to the eternal questions and to the important concerns of our time. The Milton...

Continuum's Introductions to British Literature and Culture series provide practical guides to key literary periods. Guides in the series help to orientate students as they begin a new module or area of study, providing concise information on the...

A Stanford University Press classic.

This abridgement of The Oxford Companion to African American Literature will make the entries of the greatest general interest available to a wider audience, providing the same calibre of scholarship and information as the original volume. The Concise...

Now a major motion picture from Lionsgate starring Brie Larson, Woody Harrelson, and Naomi Watts. MORE THAN SEVEN YEARS ON THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER LIST The perennially bestselling, extraordinary, one-of-a-kind, “nothing short of spectacular”...

The discipline of rhetoric - adapted through a wide range of reformulations to the specific requirements of Greek, Roman, Medieval, and Renaissance societies - dominated European education and discourse, whether public or private, for more than two...

This reference volume makes available for convenient personal and classroom use nearly 200 entries selected from the New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, with primary emphasis on poetic and prosodic terms that are most common in literary...

G. K. Chesterton, the "Prince of Paradox," is at his witty best in this collection of twenty essays and articles from the turn of the twentieth century. Focusing on "heretics" — those who pride themselves on their superiority to...

Levels of the Game is John McPhee's astonishing account of a tennis match played by Arthur Ashe against Clark Graebner at Forest Hills in 1968.It begins with the ball rising into the air for the initial serve and ends with the final point. McPhee...

Renaissance Self-Fashioning is a study of sixteenth-century life and literature that spawned a new era of scholarly inquiry. Stephen Greenblatt examines the structure of selfhood as evidenced in major literary figures of the English Renaissance—More,...

The second volume of the legendary “Gonzo Papers” collects columns from Hunter S. Thompson’s 1980s tenure at the San Francisco Examiner—featuring a new introduction by musician and artist Alison Mosshart.Here, against a backdrop of late-night tattoo...

From the king of “Gonzo” journalism and bestselling author who brought you Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas comes another astonishing volume of letters by Hunter S. Thompson, featuring a new introduction from award-winning author and staff writer at The...

Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best nonfiction books of all timeIn this book, the author of Seven Gothic Tales gives a true account of her life on her plantation in Kenya. She tells with classic simplicity of the ways of the country and...