A MIRROR FOR NARCISSUS

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A MIRROR FOR NARCISSUS
Negley. Farson
Manufacturer: Victor Gollancz.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000P8V67S

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A MIRROR FOR NARCISSUS
NEGLEY FARSON
Manufacturer: QUALITY BOOK CLUB
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000SC1946

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A Mirror for Narcissus
Negley Farson
Manufacturer: Victor Gollancz Ltd
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000PX5MOG

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A mirror for Narcissus
Negley Farson
Manufacturer: DoubleDay
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding

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ASIN: B0007DENDK

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A Mirror for Narcissus Twenty Years of Adventure on Five Continents
Negley Farson
Manufacturer: Doubleday
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000R3CFUI

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A MIRROR FOR NARCISSUS.
Negley Farson
Manufacturer: Victor Gollancz
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Unknown Binding
ASIN: B0000CJFCZ

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The Mirror of Narcissus in the Courtly Love Lyric
Frederick Goldin
Manufacturer: Cornell Univ. Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: 0801401550

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Guy tries to go straight at college

mirrors of narcissus

BRILLIANT, EROTIC, & TORRID

A Wonderful Follow-up to Foolish Fire

What a Guy!

Mirrors of Narcissus
Guy Willard
Manufacturer: Gay Men's Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Movies | Entertainment | Subjects | Books
Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books
Gay | Fiction | Literature & Fiction | Gay & Lesbian | Subjects | Books
ASIN: 1902852079

Book Description

In this sequel to Foolish Fire, our protagonist, Guy Willard is now a Freshman at college. Desperately trying to suppress his homosexual desires, he has settled down with a girlfriend, Christina. All is going well until he finds a restroom in a secluded part of the campus that offers some intense night time actionâ€¦

Customer Reviews:

Guy tries to go straight at college.......2006-12-01

The second part of Guy's "memoirs" is a very readable tale of the young teen Guy and his time at college. Not admitting to his sexual preference he has a steady relationship with a fellow girl student Christina. But he is has a surreptitious encounter with another boy, which leads to further secret assignations. Then when a new room mate, Scott moves in things become even more complicated, a complication which becomes three-way involving Christina. Through these confused relationships Guy comes to accept his own true leanings, and finally makes a drastic decision.
This is a warm and very enjoyable read that is quite involving as we see Guy really coming to terms with himself.

mirrors of narcissus.......2006-10-02

guy, the antagonist of 'foolish fire', returns here, of college age. he continues his concerned descent into homosexuality, taking with him his girlfriend and the over-done-in-fiction straight roommate.
is this meant to read as an actual memoir? or is it truly fiction? either way doesn't work. every member of the dull cast sounds like they're at least in their fifties. the sex scenes, for what they are, are bland and cliched. even the title seems overworked and pretentious. all in all, this comes across as nothing more than an older gentleman's porno fantasy.

BRILLIANT, EROTIC, & TORRID.......2003-06-16

This book is brilliant! Willard has captured the essence of what it means to be gay and seeking social, as well as self-validation. Very real, very touching, and very familiar. DON'T MISS THIS ONE!

A Wonderful Follow-up to Foolish Fire.......2002-11-23

In `Mirrors of Narcissus', we follow Guy Willard through part of his freshman year of college. He's got a girlfriend now, a convenient cover for his continued denial that he's gay. In this continuation of `Foolish Fire', we watch the machinations of our anti-hero as he works his magic on those around him: his girlfriend Christine, his roommate Scott (there's a scene with him toward the end that is amazing), the men he meets anonymously to have sex with, and the professor who's in love with him. Gripped by his fear that he'll never be `normal', Guy continues to flirt with disaster at every step of the way. Guy is still athletic, straight-acting, good looking and turns everyone's heads even more. For all practical purposes, he's as straight as they come. Yet, he's not. He's totally gay, but continues to push the inevitable back further and further.

Why do I like this odd dark tale? It's hard to say, really. Perhaps I find it fascinating that such a strong-willed character willingly continues to push love away. Perhaps it's because I loved watching how Guy pulls off his strange acts of trying to get close to the boys he can't have by being with the girls who have-to somehow draw the essence of the boys from the girls who've had them. Actually, it's most likely because I find that the author has such a presence to his writing that it's impossible to stop reading! Tom Boggs (the author) is incredibly skilled at his craft. He's a true expert at creating a train wreck of a main character who's totally believable!

I found this installment of the series (there is another one coming very soon!) to be highly sexually charged, beautiful in its imagery, and with a passionate depth of characterization that kept my attention at every page-especially toward the end, as the climax of the story built toward a crescendo.

I'm generally a slow reader, but I read this 193-page tome in two days. It was my companion at every spare moment for those two days, too. I wish it hadn't ended so fast!

What a Guy!.......2002-01-02

I enjoyed this sequel to "Foolish Fire" and find Guy Willard an intriguing character that I can definitely relate to. Not great literature and not purely erotica, the novel floats along on under its own steam, leading the reader into some interesting plot twists and sexual adventures. A good read that seems to suggest that there will be more adventures for Guy and his fan club in the future. I can hardly wait!

The Nigger of the 'Narcissus' -The Mirror of the Sea

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The Nigger of the 'Narcissus' -The Mirror of the Sea
Joseph, Conrad
Manufacturer: Hesperides Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Classics | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Book Description

Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce and increasingly expensive. Hesperides Press are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

10 Volume Set:Typhoon, Amy Foster, Falk: A Reminiscence, To-morrow, Under Western Eyes, A Set of Six, Youth, Heart of Darkness, The End of the Tether, Victory, The Nigger of Narcissus, Chance, The Secret Agent, The Mirror of the Sea, Lord Jim

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10 Volume Set:Typhoon, Amy Foster, Falk: A Reminiscence, To-morrow, Under Western Eyes, A Set of Six, Youth, Heart of Darkness, The End of the Tether, Victory, The Nigger of Narcissus, Chance, The Secret Agent, The Mirror of the Sea, Lord Jim
Joseph Conrad
Manufacturer: Doubleday, Doran & Co.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Leather Bound

Book Description

First published in 1966, this celebrated book--Sontag's first collection of essays--quickly became a modern classic, and has had an enormous influence in America and abroad on thinking about the arts and contemporary culture. As well as the title essay and the famous "Notes on Camp," Against Interpretation includes original and provocative discussions of Sartre, Simone Weil, Godard, Beckett, science-fiction movies, psychoanalysis, and contemporary religious thinking. This edition features a new afterword by Sontag.

Customer Reviews:

Praise and Forgive.......2007-07-22

America has very few independent intellectuals, that is, intellectuals free of academic responsibilities and tenure. Most grub for life-long jobs and then throw away their careers on campus duties and teaching. Gore Vidal, Richard Rodriguez, Susan Sontag...there are others, I'm sure, but not many. It's nearly impossible to make a living now in journalism, so the call to academic prostitution is great. Sontag got through and deserves our praise. God knows, like other free-lance intellectuals she lacked manners and never learned to grovel the way our teachers do, trained as they are to please the young. Much like Sartre, she could be dumb and silly and arrogant, but in the end she survived the culture wars, praising excellence for its own sake and refusing to bestow the title of greatness on to every bestselling author reviewed in the NY Times. She was great and her genius lay in one small area, as far as I can see. She introduced American readers to some very exciting European film makers, theorists, and writers. She herself is a forgettable author of fiction. She had limited talent as an artist, if any, but like Edmund Wilson she brought the latest European thinkers to the attention of American readers of the New York Review of Books and other periodicals. She wrote breathlessly and exhaustively on authors of all sorts. She was capable of passion and insight. She made you fall in love with writers as diverse as Sartre, Barthes, and Canetti. For this we should be grateful. I am.

The wisdom of Susan Sontag.......2007-03-18

Critical writing serves to introduce a reader to non-mainstream writers when it is well done. This is well done. Sontag was a writer and thinker of high caliber. Her special interests in French literature, film, and psychoanalysis are highlighted in this collection of essays.
Discussions of form and content in art recall the art theory of the Greeks of art as representation. Interpretation is a conscious state of mind interpreting a code. Interpretation is a radical strategy conserving an old text. It is the modern way of understanding something. Flight from interpretation seems to be a feature of modern painting. Films may have a liberating anti-symbolic quality. To be able to experience art on several levels is a matter of redundancy. Unfortunately, the author contends, redundancy is a principal affliction of modern life.

All agree that style and content are indissoluble. The duality persists, nevertheless, particularly in criticism. Style necessarily persists. Even realism is in truth a stylistic convention. Stylization reflects ambivalence. Morality is a code of acts. Art performs a moral task. Genet's books are both works of art and works about art. Great art overrides everything else. Nietzsche held that art is a metaphysical supplement to nature. Art exists at a distance from reality. An artist's style is a particular idiom.

Cesare Pavese showed delicacy, economy, and control. Sontag deems Pavese to have been more gifted than Silone and Moravia. Pavese felt literature was a defense against the attacks of life. The writings of Camus embody moral beauty, not artistic or intellectual beauty. To Claude Lewvi-Strauss being an anthropologist is a total occupation. Anthropologists exploit their own intellectual alienation.

The critic Georg Lukacs had a free-wheeling specualtive view of Marxism. He concentrated on nineteenth century authors and for the most part wrote in German, not Hungarian. Sartre practiced criticism as immersion. There are no guidelines. In SAINT GENET he tries to impose commitment on action. Genet's task is self-transfiguration. Ionesco discovered the poetry of cliche and language-as-thing to use in his work. Ionesco's development was the reverse of Brecht's.

Sontag identifies the supreme tragic event of the twentieth century as the murder of six million Jews. She remarks that tragedy is not an art form, but a form of history. It is appropriate to compare Rolf Hochhuth's THE DEPUTY with the Eichmann trial. Among other things, trial is a theatrical form. THE DEPUTY has a documentary intention. In her piece on Miller's AFTER THE FALL Sontag opines that Miller writes on the level of a left-wing newspaper cartoon. The classics of Broadway liberalism were too optimistic. The playwrights thought that problems could be solved. Weiss's MARAT/SADE is a play of ideas. The characters debate in it the meaning of the French Revolution.

Robert Bresson's films have a common theme, liberty and confinement. Godard's films focus on proof, not analysis. Camp, (defined by Christopher Isherwood), is something to which Sontag was drawn. It is a sensibility, a matter of subjective preferences. Taste governs every human response. Camp is a certain mode of aestheticism and it is mannerist.

In this review I have tried to give the prospective reader an impression of some of the excellent writings in this collection.

Outstanding Effort.......2006-06-12

This may be Sontag's most rigorous and important collection of essays, complete with topics ranging from Levi-Strauss to Godard. In it is her famous essay "On Camp," which would later make her a superstar in the New York artistic community.

Sontag is worried about intellectual interpretation, the erudite and narrow approach to understanding a work of art. She calls on us to "show how it is what it is, even that it is what it is, rather than to show what it means." Her approach is far reaching and yet acute and highly attuned to the intellectual aspects of the fine arts.

This collection includes fabulous essays on Sartre, Bresson, Beckett, Lukacs, Resnais, and many others. It is evidence of her astonishing ability to think seriously and with tremendous beauty about that which is most important.

Interesting and inspirational.......2005-12-05

I went to this collection after recently purchasing Camille Paglia's latest critical reading of forty-three poems in Break, Blow, Burn. In the dust cover notes, Paglia is described as "America's premier intellectual provocateur." I had always thought that honor belonged to Sontag.

Sontag's collection contains some of her most famous essays and some rather obscure ones. Instead of the most famous, I found myself re-reading the less widely discussed ones, like the essay "Godard's Vivre Sa Vie" and "Happenings: an art of radical juxtaposition" and "A note on novels and films." These essays gave me something new to think about and re-introduced me to Sontag's renowned intellect. They inspired me to buy a few Godard DVDs from Amazon, to attend the Festival of New French Cinema here in Chicago this past weekend and they caused me to ruminate on the contemporary examples of "happenings."

Whether you agree with Sontag's opinions or not, you will probably agree after reading this selection that the depth and breadth of her interests and knowledge is impressive. And she thought and wrote about things that most, even academics, had not been willing to take on. For that, we should be appreciative. For her willingness to be a true public intellectual, we should be grateful. For her legacy to the realm of critical theory, we are indebted.

A classic collection.......2005-07-04

Susan Sontag has the reputation of being infinitely pretentious and self-important, which is probably true. Ordinarily I hate these qualities, but somehow I'm able to overlook them because her thought - in this collection particularly - is just that good.

"Against Interpretation" compiles nearly 30 essays dealing with works of art (literary, cinematic, theatrical, etc.). Some deal with obscure topics - "Spiritual Style In the Films of Robert Bresson", "Psychoanalysis and Norman O. Brown's 'Life Against Death'" - others have practically become household names, as is the case with the standout piece "Notes On Camp".

All the essays address aesthetic problems - often minor, but nonetheless engaging. Each essay draws you in, causing you to mull over a topic thoroughly: for example, I'd never seen Eugene Ionesco as self-absorbed and aphoristic before, but Sontag's argument about his work is so quietly persuasive, with subtle touches of mockery driving the argument further home. Same goes for her thoughts on Simone Weil.

Sontag spent her professional life making people angry and uncomfortable with her political stances, which sounded infuriating taken out of context, and surprisingly sensible when heard with an open mind. These essays show a very different side of this great thinker - but regardless of her subject, it's her quiet wit and passion that keep her work so compelling, and which make this one of my favorite books despite its obscure topics.

Henry James Against the Aesthetic Movement: Essays on the Middle And Late Fiction

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Henry James Against the Aesthetic Movement: Essays on the Middle And Late Fiction

Manufacturer: McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Essays | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0786425784

Book Description

Writer Henry James (1843-1916) was born in America but preferred to live in Europe; he finally become a British subject near the end of his life. His status as a permanent outsider is responsible for the recurring themes in his writing dealing with European sophistication (decadence) compared to American lack of sophistication (or innocence). He is respected in modern times for his psychological insight, for being able to reveal his characters' deepest motivations. These 11 essays, along with an introduction and an afterword, examine James's work through the prism of the author's latest style. Topics the contributing authors address include the Henry James revival of the 1930s, three of James's male aesthetics, women in his works, literary forgery, and parallels with the career and views of Margaret Oliphant. Three essays delve into issues of representation in art and fiction, then three more explore decadence, identity and homosexuality.

Against Sainte-Beuve and Other Essay (Classics)

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Contre Sainte-Beuve

Against Sainte-Beuve and Other Essay (Classics)
Marcel Proust
Manufacturer: Viking Pr
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Contre Sainte-Beuve.......2002-03-17

Contre Sainte-Beuve is an accumulation of Proust's crtical writings prior to and during the time he was writing his novel.

It's so long since I read my own Gallimard version which I lost long ago in a move. I had hoped to find it in Amazon's list and am pleased to know that there is at least an English version.

I forget now whther Proust's intriguing "Pastiches et Mélanges" is included in "Contre Sainte-Beuve", obviously it doesn't make sense to read that in English - his pastiches of influential late 19th century writers formed an important part of his preparation for the novel.

There are so many great joys in the essays - I remember best the little piece on Classicism and Romanticism which lyrically encapsulates much critical ground covered later by many of the most important modernists.

His essays on Nerval are absorbing too as I recall ("Sylvie") but most of all the general theme of the book is so cogent, a relentless rebuttal of Sainte-Beuve's impoverished positivist critical ideology.

Product Description

Charles Bukowski (1920 1994), poet laureate of the drunk and downtrodden, was an authentic folk-genius of the American vernacular. For Russell Harrison, he was also a "social lyricist" a proletarian poet who saw life-on-the-job in the United States as deadening, demoralizing, yet also the stuff of art. In this collection of essays on Bukowski's poetry and fiction, Harrison is at his most original when tracing influences on the artist's work (from the Surrealists to Jackie Gleason) and when offering us Buk as the anti-Ben Franklin (that is, as the man who defined success as refusing the American Dream).

Customer Reviews:

Sorry...Buk was NOT a lefty!.......2003-11-11

Despite the efforts of liberals,and the left
to claim bukowski as thier own,the simple fact is..he wasnt.
Buk was apolitical.

In FACT,he made several comment's on
how the left was so consumed with thier
own self importance,they *lose* credibility.

You want proof?
Of course you do.

Read "The captain is out to lunch....'
It's right there in plain buk english.

That of course doesn't mean buk didn't
understand the poor,and the suffering,
because he was one of them.

It just means he was aware of the elite left's ability
to pimp these kind of issues for thier own agendas.

If you read his books,
you will see his opinion varied from issue to issue.

The "author" of this "book",is out to lunch,buk would have vomited on it,and wasted no time in throwing her confused carcass out the door.

I'm sure if she really knew bukowski as well as she claims,she is already aware of it...and probably loves the thought!

A Silly Academic's Posturing Prattle.......2000-05-07

If any author didn't need an academic introduction, Bukowski was it. Bukowski's works are carefree, honest and simple snatches of everyday life. This book tries to dissect and categorize the Bukster and this is the book's biggest fault. Bukowski was into immediate sensations and reactions. This book is a dry-as-dust and 'reflective' leftist tirade that has nothing of the spontaneity, guts and life affirming vision that Bukowski is all about. If you enjoy dry parchment and cliched leftist ramblings, then this book is for you.

Those of us who enjoy and appreciate Buk usually do so with a grain of salt. This book turns him into some sort of class representative which he most assuredly was not. Buk was a bum, plain and simple. He wrote well and simply, but he was still a bum. Anything else is the work of an overstimulated and grasping academic sensibility that has no place in the Buk universe. I would recommend Buk's biography by Sounes as an antidote to this sleep-inducing drivel.

A suitable tool for the serious Bukowski fan........1998-09-30

The logic is clear. The examples are numerous. The only such work of its kind to my knowledge. There is plenty of academic jargon, but the ideas are recognizable. Only the complete Bukowski nut will not find something new worth considering. Readers will find the sheer volume of quotes useful, but some literary background helps, there is a chapter on 'Metonymy'. Probably too specialized for those unfamiliar with the author's work, unless they happen to be preoccupied with the American Labor Movement.

HARRISON vs BUKOWSKI.......1998-09-03

Harrison's collection of essays attempt to bend Bukowski and his work over to a leftist perspective. Looking a little closely at Bukowski, his writings (poetry, prose, stories) tend to shift in an apolitical pattern. There is no leftist consistency with his work, though I'll give three stars for Harrison's effort and my own leftist sympathies.

-- Brad Evans --

Bukowski the Anarchist?.......1998-02-01

Interesting effort attempts to place Buk in the left-wing anarchist tradition.

American philosophical quarterly: vol. 41, no. 3, July 2004.(Philosophical Abstracts)(Critical Essay): An article from: The Review of Metaphysics

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American philosophical quarterly: vol. 41, no. 3, July 2004.(Philosophical Abstracts)(Critical Essay): An article from: The Review of Metaphysics

Manufacturer: Philosophy Education Society, Inc.
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital

General | Philosophy | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Book Description

This digital document is an article from The Review of Metaphysics, published by Philosophy Education Society, Inc. on June 1, 2004. The length of the article is 486 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: American philosophical quarterly: vol. 41, no. 3, July 2004.(Philosophical Abstracts)(Critical Essay)
Publication: The Review of Metaphysics (Refereed)
Date: June 1, 2004
Publisher: Philosophy Education Society, Inc.
Volume: 57 Issue: 4 Page: 897(2)

Article Type: Critical Essay

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Designs against Tara: Frances Gaither's The Red Cock Crows and other counternarratives to Gone with the Wind.(Critical essay): An article from: The Mississippi Quarterly

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Designs against Tara: Frances Gaither's The Red Cock Crows and other counternarratives to Gone with the Wind.(Critical essay): An article from: The Mississippi Quarterly
Tim A. Ryan
Manufacturer: Thomson Gale
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Digital
ASIN: B000WH7KH2
Release Date: 2007-09-26

Book Description

This digital document is an article from The Mississippi Quarterly, published by Thomson Gale on December 22, 2005. The length of the article is 10799 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Designs against Tara: Frances Gaither's The Red Cock Crows and other counternarratives to Gone with the Wind.(Critical essay)
Author: Tim A. Ryan
Publication: The Mississippi Quarterly (Magazine/Journal)
Date: December 22, 2005
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 59 Issue: 1-2 Page: 243(27)

Article Type: Critical essay

Distributed by Thomson Gale

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Against Interpretation and Other Essays

Manufacturer: Farrar, Straus & Giroux
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
ASIN: B000EOEV8Y

Product Description

A selection of Susan Sontag's critical writings between 1961 and 1965. The title essay, "Against Interpretation," written in 1964, "argues that interpretive criticism in our day is largely reactionary and stifling, and that the critic's task should be not to show the 'meaning' of a work of art, but to demonstrate how it is what it is."

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Against Interpretation and Other Essays
Susan Sontag
Manufacturer: Dell
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
ASIN: B000J2UOZK

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AGAINST INTERPRETATION AND OTHER ESSAYS

Manufacturer: Delta Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000GQEB5I

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Against Interpretation and Other Essays
Susan Sontag
Manufacturer: Laurel
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
ASIN: B000GRP566

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