Empfehlungen basierend auf "Melville: A Collection of Critical Essays. (20th Century Views)"

When Black Boy exploded onto the literary scene in 1945, it caused a sensation. Orville Prescott of the New York Times wrote that "if enough such books are written, if enough millions of people read them maybe, someday, in the fullness of time, there will be a greater understanding and a more true democracy." Opposing forces felt compelled to comment: addressing Congress, Senator Theodore Bilbo of Mississippi argued that the purpose of this book "was to plant seeds of hate and devilment in the minds of every American." From 1975 to 1978, Black Boy was banned in schools throughout the United States for "obscenity" and "instigating hatred between the races."This new edition of the once controversial, now classic American autobiography measures the brutality and rawness of the Jim Crow South against the sheer desperate will it took to survive as "black boy." Richard Wright grew up in the woods of Mississippi, with poverty, hunger, fear, and hatred. He lied, stole, and raged at those about him; at six he was "a drunkard," hanging about taverns. Surly, brutal, cold, suspicious, and self-pitying, he was surrounded on one side by whites who were either indifferent to him, pitying, or cruel, and on the other by blacks who resented anyone trying to rise above the common lot. At the end of Black Boy, Wright sits poised with pencil in hand, determined to "hurl words into this darkness and wait for an echo."Wright's eloquent account is at once a profound indictment and an unashamed confession -- a poignant and disturbing record of social injustice and human suffering.HarperCollins is proud to celebrate the sixtieth anniversary of the book's publication with this special hardcover edition, which utilizes the restored text established by The Library of America and features a new foreword by Edward P. Jones, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Known World.

A clear-eyed, uncompromising collection of essays from the "conscience of his generation" and the author of 1984 (V. S. Pritchett). One of the most thought-provoking and vivid essayists of the twentieth century, George Orwell fought the injustices of his time with singular vigor through pen and paper. In this selection of essays, he ranges from reflections on his boyhood schooling and the profession of writing to his views on the Spanish Civil War and British imperialism.The works collected here include “Such, Such Were the Joys,” “Shooting an Elephant,” “Politics and the English Language,” and “Why I Write.” Perfect for those new to Orwell’s work and a wonderful compilation for the experienced Orwell reader, A Collection of Essays is an invaluable anthology.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERMore than ONE MILLION copies soldA TODAY Show Read with Jenna Book Club PickA New York Times Notable Book, and Chosen by Oprah Daily, Time, NPR, The Washington Post, Bill Gates and Barack Obama as a Best Book of the Year“Wise and wildly entertaining . . . permeated with light, wit, youth.” —The New York Times Book Review“A classic that we will read for years to come.” —Jenna Bush Hager, Read with Jenna book club“Fantastic. Set in 1954, Towles uses the story of two brothers to show that our personal journeys are never as linear or predictable as we might hope.” —Bill Gates“A real joyride . . . elegantly constructed and compulsively readable.” —NPRThe bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow and Rules of Civility and master of absorbing, sophisticated fiction returns with a stylish and propulsive novel set in 1950s AmericaIn June, 1954, eighteen-year-old Emmett Watson is driven home to Nebraska by the warden of the juvenile work farm where he has just served fifteen months for involuntary manslaughter. His mother long gone, his father recently deceased, and the family farm foreclosed upon by the bank, Emmett's intention is to pick up his eight-year-old brother, Billy, and head to California where they can start their lives anew. But when the warden drives away, Emmett discovers that two friends from the work farm have hidden themselves in the trunk of the warden's car. Together, they have hatched an altogether different plan for Emmett's future, one that will take them all on a fateful journey in the opposite direction—to the City of New York.Spanning just ten days and told from multiple points of view, Towles's third novel will satisfy fans of his multi-layered literary styling while providing them an array of new and richly imagined settings, characters, and themes. “Once again, I was wowed by Towles’s writing—especially because The Lincoln Highway is so different from A Gentleman in Moscow in terms of setting, plot, and themes. Towles is not a one-trick pony. Like all the best storytellers, he has range. He takes inspiration from famous hero’s journeys, including The Iliad, The Odyssey, Hamlet, Huckleberry Finn, and Of Mice and Men. He seems to be saying that our personal journeys are never as linear or predictable as an interstate highway. But, he suggests, when something (or someone) tries to steer us off course, it is possible to take the wheel.” – Bill Gates

This biography draws on a range of new sources, from a very candid letter giving evidence of Orwell's romantic attachments to other boys at Eton, to records in the India Office Library which alter the conventional view of his service in Burma.

The American film industry transformed itself during the 1970s: a new order emerged out of the chaos of the former studio system. A new rating system freed directors to explore serious subjects but allowed for the expansion of exploitation films as well. So while unprecedented social and political commentary emanated from the film-school-trained "New Hollywood" auteurs, the bigger change was the major studios' embrace of sensationalist content, mass advertising, and saturation booking. The methods of fringe exploitation producers became the norm.Some of the films discussed in this book include: Five Easy Pieces, Chinatown, Carnal Knowledge, Straw Dogs, A Clockwork Orange, Mean Streets, The Conversation, Nashville, Shampoo, Taxi Driver, and Apocalypse Now.

The sequel to Thomas Wolfe's remarkable first novel, Look Homeward, Angel, Of Time and the River is one of the great classics of American literature. The book chronicles the maturing of Wolfe's autobiographical character, Eugene Gant, in his desperate search for fulfillment, making his way from small-town North Carolina to the wider world of Harvard University, New York City, and Europe. In a massive, ambitious, and boldly passionate novel, Wolfe examines the passing of time and the nature of the creative process, as Gant slowly but ecstatically embraces the urban life, recognizing it as a necessary ordeal for the birth of his creative genius as a writer.The work of an exceptionally expressive writer of fertile imagination and startling emotional intensity, Of Time and the River illuminates universal truths about art and life, city and country, past and present. It is a novel that is majestic and enduring. As P. M. Jack observed in The New York Times, "It is a triumphant demonstration that Thomas Wolfe has the stamina to produce a magnificent epic of American life."This edition, published in celebration of Wolfe's centennial anniversary, contains a new introduction by Pat Conroy.

Find out how a journalist and sportsman became one of the most famous American novelists of the twentieth century in this new addition to the #1 New York Times bestselling series!Ernest Hemingway wasn't just a novelist. He was a hunter and a fisherman; he became an ambulance officer in Paris, France, during World War I; and he worked as a reporter during the civil war in Spain in the 1930s. All of these experiences had such an important impact on Ernest's life that he used them as inspiration for some of his most notable works of fiction, including The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, and For Whom the Bell Tolls.He wrote short stories, novels, and articles in an understated, direct style, that is still beloved by readers today. Hemingway is remembered as much for his fiction as he is for his adventurous lifestyle.

Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Ron Chernow illuminates the full, fascinating, and complex life of the writer long celebrated as the father of American literature, Mark TwainRon Chernow, the highly lauded biographer of Alexander Hamilton, George Washington, and Ulysses S. Grant, brings his considerable powers to bear on America’s first, and most influential, literary celebrity, Mark Twain. Born Samuel Langhorne Clemens in 1835, under Halley’s Comet, the rambunctious Twain was an early teller of tall tales. He left his home in Missouri at an early age, piloted steamboats on the Mississippi, and arrived in the Nevada Territory during the silver-mining boom. Before long, he had accepted a job at the local newspaper, where he barged into vigorous discourse and debate, hoaxes and hijinks. After moving to San Francisco, he published stories that attracted national attention for their brashness and humor, writing under a pen name soon to be immortalized.Chernow draws a richly nuanced portrait of the man who shamelessly sought fame and fortune and crafted his celebrity persona with meticulous care. Twain eventually settled with his wife and three daughters in Hartford, where he wrote some of his most well-known works, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi,and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, earning him further acclaim. He threw himself into American politics, emerging as the nation’s most notable pundit. While his talents as a writer and speaker flourished, his madcap business ventures eventually forced him into bankruptcy; to economize, Twain and his family spent nine eventful years in exile in Europe. He suffered the death of his wife and two daughters, and the last stage of his life was marked by heartache, political crusades, and eccentric behavior that sometimes obscured darker forces at play.Drawing on Twain’s bountiful archives, including his fifty notebooks, thousands of letters, and hundreds of unpublished manuscripts, Chernow masterfully captures a man whose career reflected the country’s westward expansion, industrialization, and foreign wars. No other white author of his generation grappled so fully with the legacy of slavery after the Civil War or showed such keen interest in African American culture. Today, more than one hundred years after his death, Twain’s writing continues to be read, debated, and quoted. In this brilliant work of scholarship, a moving tribute to the writer’s talent and humanity, Chernow reveals the magnificent and often maddening life of one of the most original characters in American history.

This monograph illuminates the life and work of one of America's most celebrated yet enigmatic artists. Through a close study of the themes, emotions and imagery that preoccupied Hopper (1882 - 1967) throughout his life, Walter Wells presents many new insights, especially into the haunting silence and loneliness at the heart of the artist's vision. In particular, Silent Theater explores the psychological tensions underlying the world of Hopper and his wife, Josephine Nivison. Using literature and other sources, the author reveals how Hopper created complex pictorial dramas about the human condition. The book's expansive design allows the superb reproductions of Hopper's paintings, watercolours and etchings--including his most memorable images that have indeed become American icons-- to register with an impact that matches the eloquence of its text.

"A masterpiece. . . . Two months after the publication of The Grapes of Wrath, Little, Brown issued the second controversial California documentary of 1939, Factories in the Field. . . . If John Steinbeck was a novelist seeking documentation, Carey McWilliams was a documentary journalist seeking the moral and imaginative intensity of art."—Kevin Starr, author of Endangered Dreams: The Great Depression in California"Factories in the Field is a true classic of the 'other California' that one rarely hears about. McWilliams chronicles the modern saga of industrial capitalism's transformation of would-be yeoman farmers into a low-paid, multi-racial army of farmworkers toiling on huge factory farms. From the start, McWilliams called for the abolition of the artificial distinction between factory and farm as the necessary first step in guaranteeing farmworkers the right to collective bargaining. His work is still relevant to the ongoing migrations of peoples around the world in search of a better life."—Neil Foley, author of The White Scourge"Indispensable to the study of California history."—Jules Tygiel, author of The Great Los Angeles Swindle