Book Description
INTRODUCTION
It might seem surprising that Sydney, established in 1788, is not Australia's capital. Yet the creation of Canberra in 1927 - intended to stem the intense rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne - has not affected the view of many Sydneysiders that their city remains the true capital of Australia, and certainly in many ways it feels like it. The city has a tangible sense of history in the old stone walls and well-worn steps in the backstreets around The Rocks, while the sandstone cliffs, rocks and caves amongst the bushlined harbour still contain Aboriginal rock carvings, evocative reminders of a more ancient past.
Flying into Sydney provides a thrilling close-up snapshot of the city as the aeroplane swoops alongside sandstone cliffs and golden beaches, revealing toy-sized images of the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House tilting in a glittering expanse of blue water. Towards Mascot airport the red-tiled roofs of suburban bungalows stretch ever southwards, blue squares of swimming pools shimmering from grassy backyards. The night views are nearly as spectacular, skyscrapers topped with colourful neon lights while the illuminated white shells of the Opera House reflect on the dark water as ferries crisscross to Circular Quay.
Sydney has all the vigour of a world-class city, and a population approaching five million people; yet on the ground you'll find it still possesses a seductive, small-town, easy-going charm. The furious development in preparation for the year 2000 Olympics, heralded as being Sydney's coming-of-age ceremony, alarmed many locals, who love their city just the way it is. It was not so much the greatly improved transport infrastructure, or the $200 million budget which improved and beautified the city streets and parks, but the rash of luxury hotels and apartments still adding themselves, often contentiously, to the beloved harbour foreshore. It's a setting that perhaps only Rio de Janeiro can rival: the water is what makes the city so special, and no introduction to Sydney would be complete without paying tribute to one of the world's great harbours. Port Jackson is a sunken valley which twists inland to meet the fresh water of the Parramatta River; in the process it washes into! a hundred coves and bays, winds around rocky points, flows past the small harbour islands, slips under bridges and laps at the foot of the Opera House.
Taken together with its surrounds, Sydney is in many ways a microcosm of Australia as a whole - if only in its ability to defy your expectations and prejudices as often as it confirms them. A thrusting, high-rise business centre in the CBD, a high-profile gay community in Darlinghurst, inner-city deprivation of unexpected harshness, with the highest Aboriginal population of any Australian city, and the dreary traffic-fumed and flat suburban sprawl of the Western Suburbs, are as much part of the scene as the beaches, the bodies and the sparkling harbour. But all in all, Sydney seems to have the best of both worlds - if it's seen at its gleaming best from the deck of a harbour ferry, especially at weekends when the harbour's jagged jaws fill with a flotilla of small vessels, racing yachts and cabin cruisers, it's at its most varied in its neighbourhoods, not least for their lively café and restaurant scenes. Getting away from the city centre and exploring them is an essential part of Sydney's pleasures.
A short ferry trip across to the leafy and affluent North Shore accesses tracts of largely intact bushland, with bushwalking and native animals and birds right on the doorstep. In the summer the city's hot offices are abandoned for the remarkably unspoilt ocean and harbour beaches strung around the eastern and northern suburbs. Day-trips away offer a taste of virtually everything you'll find in the rest of Australia. There are magnificent national parks and native wildlife - Ku-Ring-Gai Chase and Royal being the best known of the parks, each a mere hour's drive from the centre of town. North of the centre the Central Coast is great for surfers, and has more enclosed waters for safer swimming and sailing. Inland, the Blue Mountains offer tea rooms, scenic viewpoints and isolated bushwalking. On the way, and along the Hawkesbury River, are historic colonial towns. Inland to the northwest is the Hunter Valley, Australia's oldest and possibly best-known wine-growing region, amongst pastoral scenery.
Customer Reviews:
Supplement to other travel guides.......2004-06-29
Its nice and tiny enough to put in your purse and it does have some nice maps at the end of the book. That said, the book is hard to follow with detailed descriptions (unless you have another travel guide to see as well)
It does have some nice recommendations for travellers especially those on a low budget and it is worth supplementing a book like "Eyewitness Travel Guides: Australia"
Book Description
The Los Angeles Times called Beverly Swerling's City of Dreams "a near-perfect historical novel." Now, in Shadowbrook, set against the backdrop of the famously bloody French and Indian War, Swerling once again tells a gripping, multilayered story of colonial America that will captivate both new readers and admirers of her critically acclaimed earlier novel.
1754. In a low-lying glen in the Ohio Country, where both the French and the English claim dominion, the first musket ball fired signals the start of the savage seven-year conflict destined to dismantle France's overreaching empire and pave the way for the American Revolution. It is here that Swerling introduces a cast of unforgettable characters: Quentin Hale, the fearless gentleman-turned-scout the Indians call Red Bear; Cormac Shea, the part-Irish, part-Indian woodsman with a foot in both worlds, sworn to drive every white man from Canada; and the beautiful Nicole Crane, who, struggling to reconcile her love for Hale and her calling to the convent, becomes a pawn in the British quest for territory.
Quentin and Cormac were raised as brothers on Shadowbrook, a prosperous plantation in the northern wilderness whose fertile land, worked by slaves, sits between Hudson's River and the Adirondack Mountains. Though fiercely devoted to each other, they often find themselves on opposite sides of a fight, but not in this war, or in the struggle to wrest control of Shadowbrook from Quentin's depraved older brother.
From Iroquois longhouses to the elegant rooms of Shadowbrook, from the virgin forests of the frontier to the cobbled streets of Québec, Swerling weaves a tale of passion and intrigue, faith and devotion, courage and betrayal.
Peopled by historical figures including a young George Washington, the fabled Ottawa chief Pontiac, and the legendary generals Wolfe and Montcalm, this richly textured novel vividly captures the conflict that ignited the eighteenth century and presaged our nation's quest for independence. But it is through Swerling's powerfully drawn characters -- the ordinary men and women living in a world on the brink of astonishing change -- that this novel comes searingly alive. A classic in the making, Shadowbrook is a page-turning tale of ambition, war, and the transforming power of both love and duty.
Customer Reviews:
AWESOME!.......2007-01-29
I just loved this, couldn't put it down until the end. I, like other reviewers, learned more about this time in American history, the French and Indian Wars, than I ever did in our public shool systems (which really didn't teach us very much history at all). This book has it all, true love, honor, politics, treachery and intrigue, battles and heartbreak.
Like other reviwers, most of the historical fiction I read is about England, Scotland and Wales and I had forgotten how fascinating all history is, even our own. Along with that, we had the tale of two men, Quent and Cormac who had the to wear the difficult roles of life between two different civilizations, the white man and the red.
All in all an outstanding tale of America. I look forward to reading more of this author's work. Highly recommended.
An Amazing Read.......2007-01-16
This book was truy wonderful. Swerling has done her research; America in this time period seemed to come to life, to be a place that I walked and breathed as I read. The characters of Quent and Corm stand out to me as lifelike and fascinating as they traveled between the white and "red" worlds. I reccomend this book to everyone. An interest in this period of American history is helpful, but not necessary-this book will sweep you off your feet either way.
The "Gone with the Wind" of the French and Indian war.......2006-08-15
I started reading this book thinking it could be no better than the author's previous work, "City of Dreams" but soon found out I was wrong. I had made that assumption initially because this novel is based around the lives of two men and a war I was totally unfamiliar with, the French and Indian war. Call me sexists, but as a woman I didn't really want to read a book about two guys in a war-I mean, it sounded a little boring, and I've never really been one from American History, especially historical fiction about American History.
I was wrong. This book is amazing and even better than "City of Dreams." The story is that these two men, Quentin Hale and Cormac Shea are brothers in spirit and fight to save the Indian nations from the British and French. Quentin (Quent) is the second son of a large land owner (the land is Shadowbrook) was partially raised by the Indian tribe of his father's Indian mistress. The mistress' son, Cormac Shea ( called Corm, whose father got eaten in "City of Dreams") is his best friend and blood brother, and they both believe that the only way for the Indian people to survive with the English and French moving into North America is for the Indian people to have the sole right to live in Canada. But, Canada is occupied by the French.
And so starts political wealing and dealing, mystical dreams that foretell the future, and a love story of epic scope. While Quent and Corm fight to achieve their goal, the English and French governments begin to fight over the Ohio territory and soon come to war blows. Mixed up in all of this are two priests, one a Franciscan and one a Jesuit, who work behind the scenes, sometimes in ways that murder and damage people horribly, to insure the future they want for New France. And there is a woman named Nicole, who wants to be a nun despite the love she bears for Quent ever since meeting him in Ohio country and traveling with for a time.
This is an amazing novel, with not one boring page in the whole thing. I am really shocked that this author is not better known. I was never one much for American history, it always seemed like little too much focused on wars and less like the fabulous lives of kings back in old Europe, but this novel has, along with "City of Dreams" made me realize that American history can be just as amazing and exciting and wonderful as European-if it is well written. And this novel literally could not have been written any better. It's exciting, romantic, and mysterious and chopped full of real history about the beginning of the end for Native Americans, and the French and Indian war, which I can now say I understand a little bit. This also contains a ton of information about the state of the Catholic Church in Quebec, and the history of the rivalry between the Jesuits and the Franciscans. If I was a history teacher, I would have all my students read this book to get them excited about learning about this period in history.
Five stars and I can't wait for this author's next book. I recommend this novel to everyone. It is the "Gone with the Wind" of the French and Indian war.
Superb Saga - straight to the top of my favorites.......2006-01-28
This book has it all - history, politics, religion, love, family fueds and bonds, war... all described in come-alive detail. Beverly Swerling clearly did extensive research - I learned more from this book about the cultures of the Native American peoples who lived on the land where I was raised than I ever did in school, and more about the "birth of our nation" as well. Swerling has great talent for storytelling - I read this book in about 3 days. The people, places, smells, everything... it all sprang to life.
I could not put Shadowbrook down. I hope she continues to author entrancing books such as this; I will be a lifelong reader if she does. She has managed to turn my eye away from historical fiction set in Europe toward that set in America.
Spectacular!.......2005-08-04
It seems the better the book, the less I have to say, so this will likely be my shortest review. But I must begin by saying that words can't do justice to how grand this book is. The characters were endearing and memorable and the attention to every nuance of sight and smell and even emotion was superbly effective. Swerling is a most talented author and it is easy to detect that she delves into research to make the feel of the historic time come alive.
Now the reader of this review may be asking why is there a 4 star rating and not a 5? Well, the one thing that was deterring me in the reading of this book was the amount of people you are introduced to throughout the book. I got confused many times as to who was who. Thankfully, there's a guide as to the character's and their background in the first pages before the actual story begins, so I found myself looking there many a time. Reading the book was a little slower than normal because I had to refer to that guide a lot, but the book was still enjoyable. My recommendation for this book would be not to read a little and put it down for a few days and pick it up again like I did because you forget a little of the details about the characters ... but it was a facinating read nonetheless!
My Rating: Solid 4 Stars.
My Reccomendations: Gone With the Wind; and Push Not the River
Great Epics and my favorite books!
Book Description
Tired from a grim war in America, Ross Poldark returns to his land and his family. But the joy he has anticipated turns sour, for his father is dead, his estate is derelict and the girl he loves is engaged to his cousin. But his sympathy for the destitute miners and farmers of the district leads him to rescue a half-starved urchin girl; from a fairground brawl and take her home-an act which alters the whole course of his life.
Customer Reviews:
A 5,000-Page Story Begins.......2006-10-24
In 1783, Ross Poldark, the title character to the opening volume (published in 1945) of the magnificent Poldark series, the great undertaking of Cornish writer Winston Graham's ninety-three-year life, is first introduced to us as a young man in his early twenties, a de-commissioned infantry officer, recently returned from the brutality of the War of Rebellion in Colonial America. Given up for dead and in fact wounded almost to the point of death, Poldark returns to his native Cornwall, a scarred, limping figure, still spirited but aged and hardened by the horrors of war. Grimly, the adventurous risk-taker Poldark discovers his father, the local squire and something of a lothario, is dead, his fiancée, Elizabeth, believing Ross killed in combat, is now engaged to wed Ross' cousin, Francis, and that an ambitious family of rising commercial entrepreneurs, the Warleggans, are in the process of trying to persuade Ross's uncle to sell them the mines that would have been Ross's has his father's will been penned without the apparent tragedy of his son's death foremost in his mind. The story spreads like the branches of a massive tree and before the conclusion of this, volume one, we come to meet the sort of characters that will never be forgotten, and find ourselves witness to scenes and situations that stir the imagination.
What separates the dozen Poldark novels from so many other historical works is firstly the intricate, good-natured, involving plotline Graham sustained throughout the sixty years he was writing about these characters, but above that, there is within each Poldark work a sense that one is entering a past time, not merely reading of it. Life as Graham writes in any of these books is a near three-dimensional voyage two hundred years backward, and he leaves few stones unturned. When one reads these novels one learns about the mining industry of the era, the banking industry, social customs, warfare, and contemporary attitudes on an encyclopedic range of subjects. One witnesses the rise of Methodism, and grasps its role as an outlet to quell ill-will among the English lower classes, as nothing did among the violent-minded masses of 1780's France. Graham tells us what people in those times wore, ate, drank, what they would have felt, witnessed, heard, smelled, thought, and feared. He takes a modern person into what might very well be described as a psychological/sociological time machine. These books boil with the gamut of human emotion and passion, from hate to lust, to love, to desire for all manner of possessions.
Ross Poldark and the eleven other novels that follow it are storytelling at its old-fashioned greatest, and this book launches what I truly feel is the greatest historical saga in the English language.
Poldark Series - First Novel.......2006-06-25
I have recently been introduced to this series and started reading books which were originals from the 40's. It is a wonderful series and I have now read 10 of the novels and wish it would never end. Great piece of history and family. It is so nice to be able to read "new" books, even though I enjoyed the yellowed pages of the old ones I have. Don't miss it! Also have the BBC Video set which is in black in white, but interesting, none-the-less.
Magnificent series, especially on audiotape..........2005-03-09
This is the first Poldark novel introducing Ross Poldark, Cornwall mining owner/farmer/squire and his extended family.
I especially enjoyed listening to the audiotapes narrated by
Tony Britton; his chararcters' accents are humorous and entertaining. I love the Poldark series and after I read or
listen to all the novels I'd like to see the videos.
Wonderful stories and characters, highly enjoyable. Hard to
put down.
Brace Yourself.......2004-01-21
I am glad to see the Poldark novels are back in print. I had to beg, borrow and seek out a complete set in used bookstores.
I won't take time to give a plot synopsis or even much of a review, but let me say this: The Poldark series is the most powerful reading experience I have ever had. I read all 11 books (this was before the 12th came out) in just under two months. I did nothing but read, day and night. I am a "literary professional" and very demanding of high standards in the books I read; I don't read a lot of popular fiction. But I could not put these books down. I can't quantify or analyze or explain why the Poldarks are so magnificent. They just are. And everyone I have recommended the books to has had the same experience. They will take over your life. You will dream about these people and catch yourself thinking about them as if they were real. If you treasure such reading experiences, brace yourself and dive in. I envy anyone who gets to read the Poldarks for the first time.
The Poldark Series is the Best!.......2004-01-01
I first encountered the Poldark story on PBS Masterpiece Theatre 25 years ago. This series is written over four decades by a master craftsman of history and character detail. Set in Cornwall just after the American Revolutionary War, it opens with the return of Ross Poldark to England after being wounded and thought dead in that war. He returns to find his father dead, his finances in disarray, his fiance now engaged to his cousin, the Warleggans have taken over much of Cornwall, and his house full of livestock and drunken servants. Books 1-4 are found in the video series Poldark. Books 5-7 are covered in the video series Poldark 2. I did not know Graham had written additional books in this series until a search on Amazon turned up the others. Books 8-12 cover the children of Ross and Demelza, and they are amazing. Most writers get into a rut and create the same novel over and over again. Winston Graham keeps finding fresh things to say and innovative things for his characters to do in these books. This picture of Cornwall at the turn of the 19th century rings true from beginning to end. The love, passion, struggles, and lives of this family are so engaging that I could read these books over and over again. The perils and joys of mining and seamanship, farming, religion, banking, courting, medicine, justice, war, all form a backdrop for the day-to-day details as this time and place come to life.
These people love and hate and dispise each other, they forgive each other, and sometimes learn to live with each other. Through each book the cast is expanded with wonderful characters full of quirks and individual personalities. But the Poldarks remain: Ross and Demelza, his cousin Francis and Elizabeth; his arch-enemy George Warleggan and their children: Jeremy, Clowance, Bella, Geoffrey Charles, Valentine and Ursula. Each grows and develops, matures and becomes seasoned as the story moves through rebellion, lost love, marriage, business, sickness, death, war, success, and tragedy.
The series books in order are:
1. Ross Poldark (1951, original title The Renegade)
2. Demelza (1953, original title Elizabeth's Story)
3. Jeremy Poldark (1954, original title Venture Once More)
4. Warleggan (1955, original title The Last Gamble)
5. The Black Moon (1973)
6. The Four Swans (1976)
7. The Angry Tide (1977)
8. The Stranger from the Sea (1981)
9. The Miller's Dance (1982)
10. The Loving Cup (1984)
11. The Twisted Sword (1990)
12. Bella Poldark (subtitled The Final Poldark Novel!)
I hope that you will have the opportunity to enjoy them as much as I have.
Average customer rating:
- Finding Oneself in a Foreign Land
- In far off Vietnam during the time of the guillotine
- Tragic prose-poem concerning the long forgotten --
- thoughtful, historical yet not lacking development
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Annam
Christophe Bataille
Manufacturer: New Directions Publishing Corporation
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ASIN: 0811213307 |
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"The soldiers had not sought to understand Vietnam," intones the narrator of Annam. "This was not forgiven them." This simple statement could serve as the epigram for the experience of both France and the United States in Vietnam in the 20th century, although in this case, Christophe Bataille is describing the agonizing end of a band of soldiers that arrived in the country in 1788. Annam was a 1993 prizewinner in France. At the time Bataille was just 21 years old. The very short book (fewer than 100 pages) tells the tale of French missionaries who sail to Vietnam escorted by the French military. Told in an austere, reductive style, the novel is a moral fable that lays out the historical context for two centuries of foreign invaders' misunderstanding of a country they could never really hope to conquer.
Customer Reviews:
Finding Oneself in a Foreign Land.......2007-04-15
Bataille's slim debut novel opens in the great halls of the Palace of Versailles in the year 1787 when the young Emperor of Vietnam comes to Louis XVI's court. The young emperor has been sent by his father to seek the help of France to aid his father the Prince Regent Nguyen Anh in a battle with the revolting provinces. Yet during this time Louis XVI is having his own troubles and is unwilling to help the young Emperor and his country.
Lonely and unable to speak French, the young emperor befriends Bishop Pierre Pigneau de Bréhaine who teaches him the way of God. Unfortunately, the young emperor dies a few months after his arrival, but Bréhaine, because he had loved the boy, decides that it is his duty to send missionaries to Vietnam so that they can come to know God. Believing himself to be close to death, Bréhaine does not go on the trip himself, but instead sends a number of Dominican monks and nuns, led by a Brother Dominic. And so opens the first couple of chapters of an eighty-seven page novella that will encompass several years.
As with his novella Absinthe, Annam is written in such a style that the reader can feel him or herself sink into the sands of history and experience the verdant greenery of Vietnam, the horrendous humidity that bore down on the heavily clothed monks and nuns, and the liberation that they feel being in a completely foreign land away from the strictures of their former society.
With almost no dialogue, Bataille paints a portrait of men and women casting aside everything of their former lives to discover the things that are truly essential within their beings and with each other.
In far off Vietnam during the time of the guillotine.......2006-12-15
There is a dreamy otherworldly quality in the work of Christophe Bataille, the kind of quality that intrigues and seduces our sensibilities. Here the story is about some monks and nuns who leave France just before the revolution to travel by ship to Vietnam. Ultimately this is a love story, a sweet and tender tale of the spirit becoming flesh in a far off land where creepers creep and the rain is incessant and where everywhere there is greenery. There is a lyrical quality in Bataille's prose, something like poetry that pleases the eye and the ear even in translation. Perhaps some of that is due to the sensitive work of translator Richard Howard.
Bataille tells a story with simplicity. He tells it chronologically but tersely with just a stroke of color here and there, a bit of dialogue, a snatch of inner monologue, and from time to time a little catching up of details not previously mentioned. He begins with a child emperor from Vietnam who has come to France to implore Henry XVI to help his father the Prince Regent regain his position of power taken from him by a peasant's revolt. But the strange child, who became a toy of "bored courtiers hungry for novelty" is ineffectual and dies of pneumonia.
And then we have the former Bishop of Adran, who had been taken with the child, commission two ships to sail to Vietnam to bring salvation to the heathens there; and so we have our main set of characters, a small group of Dominican clergy and nuns who brave the long and tortuous voyage to eventually arrive at the city of Saigon in the Mekong Delta. And after some long years we have Brother Dominic and Sister Catherine living in utter simplicity as peasants in the highlands of Vietnam in a place called Annam.
This is a tale that emphasizes the earthy quality of life, the spirituality that comes with living a life of Zen-like simplicity in contrast to the world of affairs of church and state and war and trade. It is a search for a return to the Garden of Eden. On another level this tale hints of a world to come with France as a colonial power in Vietnam and then as France removed.
The book is short, 87 pages. Temporally speaking it is like a novel as each paragraph and the space between consume so much of time, and yet it is like a short story in its compression of the lives and times of its characters. Bataille is a fine talent and I will read more of his work.
Tragic prose-poem concerning the long forgotten -- .......2005-01-12
A love story told so dispassionately it is as if it the events described were witnessed by some extraterrestrial species. A beautiful, tragic, succinct, but potent tale of the voyage, settlement, and eventual demise of the first French mission to Vietnam by Dominican nuns & friars circa 1787-1797. Forgotten by the world as the Terror overcomes the French government and Church, the last two survivors, a nun and a monk, make their way into the rainy forests of the hinterlands to take shelter among an obscure tribe of Montagnards. Forgetting all the superficial cultural baggage they have acquired in their past life, they cling desperately to one another, fall into 'sin,' and eventually die of unknown tropical diseases. The pair are remembered only by the locals, who erect a wooden cross in their memory, which fifty some years later is discovered and destroyed by an incredulous band of French explorers unwilling not to have been the 'first'. A touching and memorable little fable about the transitory and illusory nature of Western culture and religion in an alien tropic land.
thoughtful, historical yet not lacking development.......1998-11-28
Bataille's writing is simple, the words succinct, and the message is clear. Witnessing the transformation of the missionaries as they spent years away from their home country was impressive. Still, I felt as though there was a lack of character development which made it difficult for me to fully appreciate this transformation. Perhaps if I would have read this book as a long poem vs. a novel I would have felt a greater connection.
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1787: A Novel
Joan Anderson
Manufacturer: Harcourt
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Binding: Hardcover
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ASIN: 015200582X |
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- The best book on Race and Early American Literature. Period.
- A conventional critic's humdrum attempt.
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Master Plots: Race and the Founding of an American Literature, 1787-1845
Jared Gardner
Manufacturer: The Johns Hopkins University Press
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Revolution and the Word: The Rise of the Novel in America
ASIN: 0801865387 |
Book Description
While it is well known that American writers of the early national period were preoccupied with differentiating their work from European models, Jared Gardner argues that the national literature of the United States was equally motivated by the desire to differentiate white Americans from blacks and Indians. Early American writers were drawn to fantasies of an "American race," and an American literature came to be defined not only by its desire for cultural uniqueness but also by its defense of racial purity. Gardner follows the shifts in American narrative's engagement with race, from Royall Tyler's Algerine Captive through the novels of Brockden Brown and Cooper, to Poe's tales and Douglass's autobiographies, narratives that differently sought to rewrite the intersections of racial and national identity the first generation had plotted.
The larger story Master Plots describes is how the racial language of "slavery" and "savagery" helped nationalist writers plot a unique identity for the new nation and the cost this "master plot" exacted when the empty rhetoric of one generation confronted the historical facts of slavery and Native American Removal in the next. The question of what it meant to be an American had lost none of its severity and the desire for an answer none of its urgency. As early nationalist writers wrestled with the question, they proved how hard a question it is to answer and how great are the dangers in scripting its answers too easily.
Customer Reviews:
The best book on Race and Early American Literature. Period........2007-03-24
Jared Gardner's book has become a legend in its own time among American literature scholars in both the US and worldwide. And for good reason. Its witty prose, its rigorous scholarship, and its trendsetting, counterintuitive argument about the centrality of racial alterity to early American nation-formation have made MASTER PLOTS a model for scholars to follow and for students, both in and out of the university setting, to learn from. If you care about American literature at all, this book is a must-have on your bookshelf. It offers clever and compelling readings of American writers both canonical (Cooper, Poe) and not so much so (Brockden Brown). Gardner's book illuminates these writers as much as it illuminates a whole culture, history, and way of life that remain very much with us to this day. The writing is both really sophisticated and very accessible--so even readers not necessarily familiar with academic writing will get a lot out of it.
A conventional critic's humdrum attempt. .......2007-03-14
It's hard to imagine that a book containing only 185 pages of actual text could be so tiresome to navigate. Congrats - Jared Gardner. The subject matter seems interesting enough & the notes section is well prepeared. Unfortunately for the reader, this paperback isn't worth the paper it's printed on. Here's one example the author gives to prove his point:
In Poe's Berenice, Poe describes how his cousin/lover contracts a fatal disease which leaves her disfigured and unrecognizable. Poe becomes obsessed with Berenice's teeth & after she dies he breaks into her tomb & retrieves them. The author equates Poe's obsession with the teeth to Poe's desire to uncover the perfect white race - basically that he is racist.
Obviously, Poe was an incestuous [...]by today's standards & given the time in which he lived - I don't doubt that he had racist views. However, the author's attempts to prove this are laughable at best. He offers regurgitated conjecture in place of thoughtful originality.
Jean Sibelius once said ""Pay no attention to what critics say. No statue has ever been put up to a critic." In Master Plots, Jared Gardner gives the reader a good example for why this is so true.
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New England in Fiction 1787-1990: An Annotated Bibliography
Robert Boak Slocum
Manufacturer: Locust Hill Press
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ASIN: 093395154X |
Books:
- The Way of Chinese Painting: Its Ideas and Technique
- The Xeriscape Flower Gardener: A Waterwise Guide for the Rocky Mountain Region
- Tree: A Life Story
- Trees and Shrubs Hardy in the British Isles
- Up Above and Down Below
- Viva Mallorca!: One Mallorcan Autumn
- Warehouse Distribution and Operations Handbook (McGraw-Hill Handbooks)
- Wide Open: Inspiration & Techniques for Art Journaling on the Edge (Book & Card Kit)
- Wildflowers of the Central South
- Yeast Physiology and Biotechnology
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
- eBoys: The First Inside Account of Venture Capitalists at Work
- A Living Lens: Photographs of Jewish Life from the Pages of the Forward
- The Artist as Monster: The Cinema of David Cronenberg
- The Best of Business Card Design 7
- The Red Dragon Cast Down: A Redemptive Approach to the Occult and Satanism
- A Necessary Evil
- Wild Edible & Medicinal Plants: Alaska, Canada & Pacific Northwest Rainforest, Vol 2
- Valuing Accounting Practices
- Principles of Internal Control: Incorporating the Learning Outcomes and Content of National Accounti
- Hearing Voices - Collected Stories & Drawings
The Rough Guide to Melbourne 3 (Rough Guide Travel Guides)
The Rough Guide to Australia Map (Rough Guide Country/Region Map)
Streetwise Sydney (Streetwise)
Lonely Planet Sydney (Lonely Planet Encounter Series)
Sydney (Eyewitness Travel Guides)
