Full Hearts And Empty Bellies

Author: Winifred Foley
Publisher: Abacus
ISBN: 0748111417
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 196

Book Description
Winifred Foley grew up in the 1920s, a bright, determined miner's daughter - in a world of unspoilt beauty and desperate hardship, in which women were widowed at thirty and children died of starvation. Living hand-to-mouth in a tumbledown cottage in the Forest of Dean, Foley - 'our Poll' - had a loving family and the woods and streams of a forest 'better than heaven' as a playground. But a brother and sister were dead in infancy, bread had to be begged from kindly neighbours and she never had a new pair of shoes or a shop-bought doll. And most terrible of all, like her sister before her, at fourteen little Poll had to leave her beloved forest for the city, bound for a life in service among London's grey terraces.

Shiny Pennies And Grubby Pinafores

Author: Winifred Foley
Publisher: Abacus
ISBN: 0748118012
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 235

Book Description
After her years in domestic service, Winifred Foley married and started a family. But, while scraping a living as a charwoman in a rundown north London tenement, she continued to long for her home in the Forest of Dean and the cherished relatives she had left behind. Determined to give their children the rural upbringing she had enjoyed, the young couple moved to an isolated, crumbling cottage not far from the Forest. But even in the 1950s they lacked heating or running water, and money was tight. Food was begged, borrowed or home-grown, and their clothes were hand-me-downs. It was a primitive life of hard work on the land, struggling to make ends meet, and finding strength in the embrace of a loving family.

Sweet Hearts

Author: Melanie Rae Thon
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0743436792
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 260

Book Description
Fusing family myth with American history, award-winning author Melanie Rae Thon exposes the never-ending chain of wandering and abandonment, the disappearance of mothers, and the drowning of people through the adventures of Flint, a sixteen-year-old boy that is half child, half full-grown criminal, and his little sister, Cecile. After eight years in juvenile detention and an escape from the Landers School for Boys, Flint returns home to the one person he loves and trust, his sister Cecile. Together they rob and terrorize a local doctor, steal their mother’s car, and strike out alone on a desperate journey south to the Crow Indian Reservation their ancestors once lived upon. But is Cecile Flint’s accomplice or his hostage? No one knows. Only Marie Zimmer, the children’s deaf aunt, understands the strange logic of their crimes, desires, fears, and devotion to each other. Marie has stories to tell, and though she will not speak, she is the only one bold enough to share the tale of Flint and Cecile. In this devastatingly passionate story, the tales of a silent woman struggling to unravel the web of generational family violence are revealed through the celebration of life in the midst of sorrow. In the fierce light of her imagination, Marie interweaves the past and the present, inventing a language of signs subtle enough to illuminate the mysterious ways we are all connected.

Niveus

Author: Sharon Cramer
Publisher: Talking Bird Books
ISBN: 0990706133
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 427

Book Description

Servants

Author: Lucy Lethbridge
Publisher: A&C Black
ISBN: 140884270X
Category : Great Britain
Languages : en
Pages : 401

Book Description
Servants: A Downstairs View of Twentieth-century Britain is the social history of the last century through the eyes of those who served. From the butler, the footman, the maid and the cook of 1900 to the au pairs, cleaners and childminders who took their place seventy years later, a previously unheard class offers a fresh perspective on a dramatic century. Here, the voices of servants and domestic staff, largely ignored by history, are at last brought to life: their daily household routines, attitudes towards their employers, and to each other, throw into sharp and intimate relief the period of feverish social change through which they lived. Sweeping in its scope, extensively researched and brilliantly observed,Servants is an original and fascinating portrait of twentieth-century Britain; an authoritative history that will change and challenge the way we look at society.

Obelisk

Author: Neil Pearson
Publisher: Liverpool University Press
ISBN: 1781387834
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 540

Book Description
This remarkable book details the work of one of the most extraordinary publishing enterprises in history. Censor-baiting, provocative, simultaneous publisher of the literary elite and of ‘dirty books’, Jack Kahane’s Obelisk Press published Henry Miller, Anaïs Nin, Lawrence Durrell, D. H. Lawrence, and James Joyce among others. At the same time Kahane subsidised his literary endeavours with cheap erotica and trash fiction from long-forgotten eccentrics such as New York Daily News’ Rome correspondent and self-styled ‘Marco Polo of Sex’ N. Reynolds Packard. Kahane’s business model was simple: if a book was banned in the UK and US it could be profitably published in Paris. Here, for the first time, Neil Pearson has pulled together the incendiary story of Obelisk, including biographies of Kahane and his major and minor authors, and a bibliography of Obelisk books. This beautifully written volume – part cultural history, part reference book – will be required reading for anyone interested in controversial writing, censorship, 1920s Paris, publishing history and authors such as Miller, Joyce and Nin.

The Book of Christmas

Author: Jane Struthers
Publisher: Random House
ISBN: 1448148936
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 292

Book Description
- What is the significance of holly at Christmas? - When should you make your figgy pudding? - Why was the Old Lad's Passing Bell rung on Christmas Eve? - And who was Good King Wenceslas? Did you know that, long before turkey arrived on our shores, it was traditional to serve a roasted wild boar's head at Christmas? Or that our Christmases were once so cold that Frost Fairs were held on the River Thames? Christmas Day was first celebrated on 25 December in the fourth century CE. But when should our Christmas decorations come down - Twelfth Day, Twelfth Night ... or Candlemas? And why? Packed with fascinating facts about ancient religious customs and traditional feasts, instructions for Victorian parlour games and the stories behind our favourite carols, The Book of Christmas is a captivating volume about our Christmas past.

The Child in Society

Author: Hazel R Wright
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 1473911664
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 241

Book Description
The child has a very special place in society, and society defines and shapes childhood. Understanding childhood is essential to early years students and this book offers a great introduction. Taking a thematic approach, chapters cover: Historical and Cultural Perspectives Policy and Economic Perspectives Psychological and Biological Perspectives Contemporary Views. Each chapter prompts you to reflect on core issues and interrogate your practice and attitudes towards children in your care. This fantastic foundation will help you to begin to understand the relationship between the child and society.

Harlequin's Riddle

Author: Rachel Nightingale
Publisher: Odyssey Books
ISBN: 1925652009
Category : Young Adult Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 281

Book Description
When Mina joins a troupe of travelling actors, her aim is to find her missing brother, but her search unlocks a series of secrets that will change the world she knows forever. Tarya, the mystical realm spoken of in tales, is real, and her gift for story telling opens a way to it. But Tarya has a shadow side, and someone in the troupe of actors is using it to harm people. Mina soon realises she may be the only one with the power to stop them. Harlequin’s Riddle is the first book in a Young Adult fantasy trilogy about the gift of creativity and where it can take you.

Christmas and the British: A Modern History

Author: Martin Johnes
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1474255388
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 315

Book Description
The modern Christmas was made by the Victorians and rooted in their belief in commerce, family and religion. Their rituals and traditions persist to the present day but the festival has also been changed by growing affluence, shifting family structures, greater expectations of happiness and material comfort, technological developments and falling religious belief. Christmas became a battleground for arguments over consumerism, holiday entitlements, social obligations, communal behaviour and the influence of church, state and media. Even in private, it encouraged reflection on social change and the march of time. Amongst those unhappy at the state of the world or their own lives, Christmas could induce much cynicism and even loathing but for a quieter majority it was a happy time, a moment of a joy in a sometimes difficult world that made the festival more than just an integral feature of the calendar: Christmas was one of British culture's emotional high points. Moreover, it was also a testimony to the enduring importance of family, shared values and a common culture in the UK. Martin Johnes shows how Christmas and its traditions have been lived, adapted and thought about in Britain since 1914. Christmas and the British is about the festival's social, cultural and economic functions, and its often forgotten status as both the most unusual and important day of the year