The Djinn in the Nightingale's Eye

Author: A. S. Byatt
Publisher: Vintage
ISBN: 0307483878
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 288

Book Description
The magnificent title story of this collection of fairy tales for adults describes the strange and uncanny relationship between its extravagantly intelligent heroine--a world renowned scholar of the art of story-telling--and the marvelous being that lives in a mysterious bottle, found in a dusty shop in an Istanbul bazaar. As A.S. Byatt renders this relationship with a powerful combination of erudition and passion, she makes the interaction of the natural and the supernatural seem not only convincing, but inevitable. The companion stories in this collection each display different facets of Byatt's remarkable gift for enchantment. They range from fables of sexual obsession to allegories of political tragedy; they draw us into narratives that are as mesmerizing as dreams and as bracing as philosophical meditations; and they all us to inhabit an imaginative universe astonishing in the precision of its detail, its intellectual consistency, and its splendor. "A dreamy treat.... It is not merely strange, it is wondrous." --Boston Globe "Alternatingly erudite and earthy, direct and playful.... If Scheherazade ever needs a break, Byatt can step in, indefinitely." --Chicago Tribune "Byatt's writing is crystalline and splendidly imaginative.... These [are] perfectly formed tales." --Washington Post Book World

The End and the Beginning

Author: Hermynia Zur Mühlen
Publisher: Open Book Publishers
ISBN: 1906924279
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 302

Book Description
First published in Germany in 1929, The End and the Beginning is a lively personal memoir of a vanished world and of a rebellious, high-spirited young woman's struggle to achieve independence. Born in 1883 into a distinguished and wealthy aristocratic family of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire, Hermynia Zur Muhlen spent much of her childhood travelling in Europe and North Africa with her diplomat father. After five years on her German husband's estate in czarist Russia she broke with both her family and her husband and set out on a precarious career as a professional writer committed to socialism. Besides translating many leading contemporary authors, notably Upton Sinclair, into German, she herself published an impressive number of politically engaged novels, detective stories, short stories, and children's fairy tales. Because of her outspoken opposition to National Socialism, she had to flee her native Austria in 1938 and seek refuge in England, where she died, virtually penniless, in 1951. This revised and corrected translation of Zur Muhlen's memoir - with extensive notes and an essay on the author by Lionel Gossman - will appeal especially to readers interested in women's history, the Central European aristocratic world that came to an end with the First World War, and the culture and politics of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

The Book on Fire

Author: Keith Miller
Publisher: Immanion Press/Magalithica Books
ISBN: 9781907737206
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 259

Book Description
Balthazar, book thief and bon vivant, arrives in Alexandria to steal from the famous library. But once inside, he becomes obsessed with the youngest librarian, Shireen, who was born in the library and is herself more than half book.

The Road to Oxiana

Author: Robert Byron
Publisher: Good Press
ISBN:
Category : Travel
Languages : en
Pages : 298

Book Description
Begin a voyage through Persia and Afghanistan with renowned explorer Robert Byron in 'The Road to Oxiana'.This travelog recounts Byron's ten-month adventure, immersing readers in the rich tapestry of the Middle East, from Venice to Peshawar. As Byron travels through vibrant landscapes and encounters diverse cultures, he showcases his extensive knowledge of the region's architectural wonders. From the awe-inspiring Mosque of Sheikh Lutfullah to the majestic ruins of Persepolis, his vivid descriptions transport readers to these timeless sites.

The Water Statues

Author: Fleur Jaeggy
Publisher: New Directions Publishing
ISBN: 0811229769
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 87

Book Description
Family, obsession, and privilege boiled down by the icy-hot Swiss-Italian master stylist Fleur Jaeggy Even among Fleur Jaeggy’s singular and intricate works, The Water Statues is a shiningly peculiar book. Concerned with loneliness and wealth’s odd emotional poverty, this early novel is in part structured as a play: the dramatis personae include the various relatives, friends, and servants of a man named Beeklam, a wealthy recluse who keeps statues in his villa’s flooded basement, where memories shiver in uncertain light and the waters run off to the sea. Dedicated to Ingeborg Bachmann and fleshed out with Jaeggy’s austere yet voluptuous style, The Water Statues—with its band of deracinated, loosely related souls (milling about as often in the distant past as in the mansion’s garden full of intoxicated snails)—delivers like a slap an indelible picture of the swampiness of family life.

The Architect's Apprentice

Author: Elif Shafak
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 0143108301
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 434

Book Description
A colorful, magical tale set during the height of the Ottoman Empire, from the acclaimed author of The Island of Missing Trees (a Reese's Book Club Pick) Chosen for Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall’s “Reading Room” Book Club In this novel, Turkey’s preeminent female writer spins an epic tale spanning nearly a century in the life of the Ottoman Empire. In 1540, twelve-year-old Jahan arrives in Istanbul. As an animal tamer in the sultan’s menagerie, he looks after the exceptionally smart elephant Chota and befriends (and falls for) the sultan’s beautiful daughter, Princess Mihrimah. A palace education leads Jahan to Mimar Sinan, the empire’s chief architect, who takes Jahan under his wing as they construct (with Chota’s help) some of the most magnificent buildings in history. Yet even as they build Sinan’s triumphant masterpieces—the incredible Suleymaniye and Selimiye mosques—dangerous undercurrents begin to emerge, with jealousy erupting among Sinan’s four apprentices. A memorable story of artistic freedom, creativity, and the clash between science and fundamentalism, Shafak’s intricate novel brims with vibrant characters, intriguing adventure, and the lavish backdrop of the Ottoman court, where love and loyalty are no match for raw power.

Seven Gothic Tales

Author: Isak Dinesen
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780394604961
Category : Danish fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 420

Book Description
Originally published in 1934, Seven Gothic Tales, the first book by "one of the finest and most singular artists of our time" (The Atlantic), is a modern classic. Here are seven exquisite tales combining the keen psychological insight characteristic of the modern short story with the haunting mystery of the nineteenth-century Gothic tale, in the tradition of writers such as Goethe, Hoffmann, and Poe. Copyright © Libri GmbH. All rights reserved.

Tristes Tropiques

Author: Claude Levi-Strauss
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101575603
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 626

Book Description
"A magical masterpiece."—Robert Ardrey. A chronicle of the author's search for a civilization "reduced to its most basic expression."

Summon Up Remembrance

Author: Marzieh Gail
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 328

Book Description
The fascinating story of a pleasure-seeking Persian boy who became one of 'Abdu'l-Baha's leading English translators and united East and West in the first Persian-American Baha'i marriage. Here is the colourful story of Ali-Kuli Khan, the first to translate into English such important works as the 'Seven Valleys', the 'Kitab-i-Iqan', and the Glad-Tidings. Told by his daughter, herself a well-known author and translator, Khan's story is based on his memoirs and personal papers. Through them we are given a unique and detailed picture of life in Persia at the end of the century, complete with an explanation of that oft-met protocol 'ta'aruf'. We follow the young Khan, dressed as a dervish, on his adventurous walk to 'Akka and note his transformation from a frivolous youth to a skilled translator for 'Abdu'l-Baha. In his nearly two years as a member of 'Abdu'l-Baha's household, Khan both translated for those first groups of American pilgrims to visit the Holy Land and rendered 'Abdu'l-Baha's Tablets into English. In 1901 Khan was sent to America to assist Mirza Abu'l-Fadl and to translate the great teacher's book, The Baha'i Proofs, into English. It was in America that Khan met and fell in love with a Boston society girl, Florence Breed. Their Victorian romance unfolds in the delicate love-letters written by Florence to Khan. Their marriage, the first between a Persian and an American Baha'i, not only symbolized but portrayed the unity between East and West taught by the Baha'i Faith. 'Summon Up Remembrance' is peopled with such familiar figures as Mirza Abu'l-Fadl, Laura Barney, Edward and Lua Getsinger, Mary Hanford Ford and the Atabak. But this is a book dedicated to 'Abdu'l-Baha, and it is His wisdom and teaching that characterizes it. A unique feature is the inclusion of the Tablet of Cremation revealed by 'Abdu'l-Baha, here published for the first time in English in a new translation by the Research Department of the Universal House of Justice. The story continues in Arches of the Years.

A Pushcart at the Curb

Author: John Dos Passos
Publisher: Legare Street Press
ISBN: 9781019967393
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Book Description
A collection of short stories by John Dos Passos, including both fiction and nonfiction pieces. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.