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Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet are arguably the most famous and beloved letters of the twentieth century. Written when the poet was himself still a young man, with most of his greatest work before him, they were addressed to a student who had sent Rilke some of his own writing, asking for advice on becoming a writer. The two never met, but over a period of several years Rilke wrote him these ten letters, cherished by readers for what translator Mitchell...
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Rebecca Mead was a young woman in an English coastal town when she first read George Eliot's Middlemarch, regarded by many as the greatest English novel. After gaining admission to Oxford, and moving to the United States to become a journalist, through several love affairs, then marriage and family, Mead read and reread Middlemarch. The novel, which Virginia Woolf famously described as "one of the few English novels written for grown-up people," offered...
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Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind: A Bestseller's Odyssey from Atlanta to Hollywood presents the first comprehensive overview of how this iconic novel became an international phenomenon that has managed to sustain the public's interest for seventy-five years. Various Mitchell biographies and several compilations of her letters tell part of the story, but, until now, no single source has revealed the full saga. This entertaining account of a literary...
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In this uproarious exploration of the joys of reading, a long-time teacher, lifelong reader and The New Yorker contributor shares surprising stories from her life and the poignant ways in which books have impacted her students and shows us how literature can transform us for the better.
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The Greek myths are among the world's most important cultural building blocks and they have been retold many times, but rarely do they focus on the remarkable women at the heart of these ancient stories. Stories of gods and monsters are the mainstay of epic poetry and Greek tragedy, from Homer to Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, from the Trojan War to Jason and the Argonauts. And still, today, a wealth of novels, plays and films draw their inspiration...
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In June 1942, Anne Frank received a red-and-white-checked diary for her thirteenth birthday, just weeks before she and her family went into hiding in an Amsterdam attic to escape the Nazis. For two years, with ever-increasing maturity, Anne crafted a memoir that has become one of the most compelling documents of modern history. But Anne Frank's diary, argues Francine Prose, is as much a work of art as a historical record. Through close reading, she...
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The perfect gift for Shakespeare fans, Y Is for Yorick is full of witty references to the Bard's unforgettable plots and characters. Readers will love perusing the cheeky illustrations and reading such entries as "J is for Juliet. Juliet teaches all young girls that if you truly love someone, wholly and completely, it will be the death of you."
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Humans live in landscapes of make believe. We spin fantasies. We devour novels, films, and plays. Even sporting events and criminal trials unfold as narratives. Yet the world of story has long remained an undiscovered and unmapped country. It's easy to say that humans are "wired" for story, but why? In this delightful and original book, Jonathan Gottschall offers the first unified theory of storytelling. We know we are master shapers of story. The...
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Candlewick Press
Pub. Date
2012
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Two of the most trusted reviewers in the field join with top authors, illustrators, and critics in a definitive guide to choosing books for children—and nurturing their love of reading.
A FAMILY OF READERS is the definitive resource for parents interested in enriching the reading lives of their children. It's divided into four sections:
1. Reading to Them:
Choosing and sharing board books and picture books with babies
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In 2007, Mary Anne Schwalbe returned from a humanitarian trip to Pakistan and Afghanistan suffering from what her doctors believed was a rare type of hepatitis. Months later she was diagnosed with a form of advanced pancreatic cancer, which is almost always fatal, often in six months or less. This is the inspiring true story of a son and his mother, who start a ?book club? that brings them together as her life comes to a close.
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Broken Wheel, Iowa, has never seen anyone like Sara, who traveled all the way from Sweden just to meet her pen pal, Amy. When she arrives, however, she finds that Amy's funeral has just ended. Luckily, the townspeople are happy to look after their bewildered tourist--even if they don't understand her peculiar need for books. Marooned in a farm town that's almost beyond repair, Sara starts a bookstore in honor of her friend's memory. All she wants...
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Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Pub. Date
2013
Description
From one of the most brilliant writers and thinkers of the twentieth century comes a collection of "passionate, probing, controversial" essays (The Atlantic) on topics ranging from race relations in the United States to the role of the writer in society.
Told with Baldwin's characteristically unflinching honesty, this “splendid book” (The New York Times) offers illuminating, deeply felt essays along with personal...
Told with Baldwin's characteristically unflinching honesty, this “splendid book” (The New York Times) offers illuminating, deeply felt essays along with personal...
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Two years after the death of enigmatic and celebrated author Scott Landon, his wife Lisey fields inquiries from academics and private collectors requesting his personal letters and unpublished works--if any exist. Then another interested party makes contact by leaving a dead cat in her mailbox. And then the terrifying phone calls begin. Lisey's only escape comes in the strange fantasy world where her husband found his inspiration. Now she must struggle...
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"UberFacts is one of the Internet's most widely followed and successful Twitter accounts, boasting fun and surprising facts, statistics and graphics about everything from art and science to history and popular culture. Dubbed "the most unimportant things you'll never need to know" Cats Are Capable of Mind Control will anthologize the most shocking, delightful and educational facts and figures. Entertaining, topical or downright bizarre (who would...
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Publisher
Candlewick Press
Pub. Date
2014
Description
Secret lives, scandalous turns, and some very funny surprises — these essays by leading kids’ lit bloggers take us behind the scenes of many much-loved children’s books. Told in lively and affectionate prose, this treasure trove of information for a student, librarian, parent, or anyone wondering about the post–Harry Potter children’s book biz brings contemporary illumination to the warm-and-fuzzy bunny world we think we know.
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Few punctuation marks elicit quite as much love or hate as the exclamation mark. It's bubbly and exuberant, an emotional amplifier whose flamboyantly dramatic gesture lets the reader know: here be feelings! Scott Fitzgerald famously stated exclamation marks are like laughing at your own joke; Terry Pratchett had a character say that multiple!!! are a 'sure sign of a diseased mind'. So what's the deal with! ?
Whether you think it's over-used, or enthusiastically...
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William Shakespeare, the most celebrated poet in the English language, left behind nearly a million words of text, but his biography has long been a thicket of supposition arranged around scant facts. With his trademark wit, Bill Bryson sorts through this colorful muddle to reveal the man himself. Bryson documents the efforts of earlier scholars, and, emulating the style of his travelogues, records episodes in his own research. He celebrates Shakespeare...
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Sasquatch Books
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What to read next is every book lover's greatest dilemma. Nancy Pearl comes to the rescue with this wide-ranging and fun guide to the best reading new and old. Pearl, who inspired legions of litterateurs with "What If All (name the city) Read the Same Book," has devised reading lists that cater to every mood, occasion, and personality. These annotated lists cover such topics as mother-daughter relationships, science for nonscientists, mysteries...
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-- The Ingenious Language In times of peace and prosperity, one can turn to Homer to learn valuable life lessons, to experience the thrills and terrors of war, and to read about hair-raising adventures in distant lands. But when things do not go as planned, when we unexpectedly find ourselves at the center of an epoch-defining upheaval, then, writes Andrea Marcolongo, we must look to Virgil’s Aeneas for an example of adaptability and resilience....