Shakespeare’s *Richard II* presents a momentous struggle between Richard II and his cousin Henry Bolingbroke. Richard is the legitimate king; he succeeded his grandfather, King Edward III, after the earlier death of his father Edward, the Black Prince. Yet Richard is also seen by many as a tyrant. He toys with his subjects, exiling Bolingbroke for six years.
When he seizes the title and property that should be Bolingbroke’s, Richard threatens the very structure of the kingdom. Bolingbroke returns with an army that is supported by nobles and commoners alike, both believing themselves oppressed by Richard. This sets the stage for a confrontation between his army and the tradition of sacred kingship supporting the isolated but now more sympathetic Richard.
The authoritative edition of *Richard II* from The Folger Shakespeare Library, the trusted and widely used Shakespeare series for students and general readers, includes:
-Freshly edited text based on the best early printed version of the play
-Full explanatory notes conveniently placed on pages facing the text of the play
-Scene-by-scene plot summaries
-A key to the play’s famous lines and phrases
-An introduction to reading Shakespeare’s language
-An essay by a leading Shakespeare scholar providing a modern perspective on the play
-Fresh images from the Folger Shakespeare Library’s vast holdings of rare books
-An annotated guide to further reading
Essay by Harry Berger, Jr.
The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, DC, is home to the world’s largest collection of Shakespeare’s printed works, and a magnet for Shakespeare scholars from around the globe. In addition to exhibitions open to the public throughout the year, the Folger offers a full calendar of performances and programs. For more information, visit Folger.edu.
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"A Japanese writer of genius."—Japan QuarterlySoseki Natsume is considered to be one of Japan's most beloved and respected authors. And Then is ranked as one of his most insightful and stirring novels.Daisuke, the protagonist, is a man in his twenties who is struggling with his personal purpose and identity as well as the changing social landscape of Meiji-era Japan. As Japan enters the Twentieth Century, ancient customs give way to western ideals, and Daisuke works to resolve his feelings of disconnection and abandonment during this time of change. Thanks to his father's wealth, Daisuke has the luxury of having time to develop his philosophies and ruminate on their meaning while remaining intellectually aloof from traditional Japanese culture and the demands of growing industrialization. Then Daisuke's life takes an unexpected turn when he is reunited with his college friend and his sickly wife. At first, Daisuke's stoicism allows him to act... Views: 887
The Coalition decides to trust their mysterious ally to help them in executing the largest assault they've ever attempted against the Faalcomana who oppress them; but with what result?An enemy vanquished over fifty years ago crafted the balloon bomb from streamers and paper. The weapon’s creators simply set the balloon adrift in the wind before praying fortune delivered destruction to their enemy’s homeland. Rural villagers decades later find one such balloon entangled in the swamp bordering their community. The bombs fastened to the balloon threaten peril, but no one wishes to contact the outside world for help, and thus remind the larger world of their aging community hoping to be forgotten. With new paper and paint, with new stitches and hydrogen, that rural community brings the balloon bomb back to life, never stopping their work to wonder if it might be best to let one weapon of a lost age simply fade into ruin. Views: 887
We find in Beckett's masterful, exquisite prose, the familiar themes from his earlier works here expressed in the anguished murmurings of the solitary human consciousness. Views: 887
The Merry Men" is a short story by Robert Louis Stevenson first published in 1882, this collection also includes a number of other stories and fables. Any profits generated from the sale of this book will go towards the Freeriver Community project, a project designed to promote harmonious community living and well-being in the world. To learn more about the Freeriver project please visit the website Views: 886
No career in modern American letters is at once so brilliant, varied, and controversial as that of Norman Mailer. In a span of more than six decades, Mailer has searched into subjects ranging from World War II to Ancient Egypt, from the march on the Pentagon to Marilyn Monroe, from Henry Miller and Mohammad Ali to Jesus Christ. Now, in The Castle in the Forest, his first major work of fiction in more than a decade, Mailer offers what may be his consummate literary endeavor: He has set out to explore the evil of Adolf Hitler.
The narrator, a mysterious SS man who is later revealed to be an exceptional presence, gives us young Adolf from birth, as well as Hitler’s father and mother, his sisters and brothers, and the intimate details of his childhood and adolescence.
A tapestry of unforgettable characters, The Castle in the Forest delivers its playful twists and surprises with astonishing insight into the nature of the struggle between good and evil that exists in us all. At its core is a hypothesis that propels this novel and makes it a work of stunning originality. Now, on the eve of his eighty-fourth birthday, Norman Mailer may well be saying more than he ever has before.
From the Hardcover edition. Views: 886
MILLY KAUFMAN IS an ordinary American teenager living in Vermont—until she meets Pablo, a new student at her high school. His exotic accent, strange fashion sense, and intense interest in Milly force her to confront her identity as an adopted child from Pablo’s native country. As their relationship grows, Milly decides to undertake a courageous journey to her homeland and along the way discovers the story of her birth is intertwined with the story of a country recovering from a brutal history.
Beautifully written by reknowned author Julia Alvarez, Finding Miracles examines the emotional complexity of familial relationships and the miracles of everyday life. Views: 886
An undisputed classic of epic fantasy, Mervyn Peake’s Gormenghast novels represent one of the most brilliantly sustained flights of Gothic imagination.
As the novel opens, Titus, heir to Lord Sepulchrave, has just been born. He stands to inherit the miles of rambling stone and mortar that form Gormenghast Castle. Inside, all events are predetermined by a complex ritual whose origins are lost in history and the castle is peopled by dark characters in half-lit corridors. Dreamlike and macabre, Peake's extraordinary novel is one of the most astonishing and fantastic works in modern English fiction. Views: 885
When Jason learns that his seemingly normal accountant boyfriend is really cooking books for the mob he runs as fast and as far as he can. When he arrives in Albuquerque he never imagined he might find what he had always been looking for: true love.This story was written as a part of the Goodreads M/M Romance Group's 'Love is Always Write' event.The prompt was:Albuquerque during Balloon Week was insane- like Mardi Gras on laughing gas, I heard someone say. Easy to hide in the crowd. But how to get away? Once I left the festival grounds, my leg would slow me down.He was alone, trying to get his balloon off the ground. You needed at least two people to get one of these monsters in the air. Bad day, between pissed off and heartbroken written all over his face. He stared down at my leg, and I grabbed the edge of the basket for support. "Need some help?"He laughed, then looked behind me at the trail of bloody footprints I'd left. "Whoever you're running from, you just led them here, bud."I stared at the footprints, then up at him. He dropped the fuel gauge, reached out and lifted me into the basket like I was a sack of groceries. "Stay down before you fall down. I need six more minutes to get this balloon out of here. Have you got six minutes?"I shook my head. "I don't know." Views: 884
Ray Morris is a tech journalist with a forgettable face, a tiresome manner, a small but dedicated group of friends, and a wife, Garthene, who is pregnant. He is a man who has never been punched above the neck. He has never committed adultery with his actual body. He has never been caught up in a riot, nor arrested, nor tagged by the state, nor become an international hate-figure. Not until the summer of 2011, when discontent is rising on the streets and within his marriage. Ray has noticed none of this. Not yet.
The Adulterants would be a coming-of-age story if its protagonist could only forget that he is thirty-three years old. Throughout a series of escalating catastrophes, our deadpan antihero keeps up a merciless mental commentary on the foibles and failings of those around him, and the vicissitudes of modern urban life: internet trolls, buy-to-let landlords, open marriages, and the threat posed by more sensitive men. But the wonder of The Adulterants is how we feel ourselves rooting for Ray even as we acknowledge that he deserves everything he gets. Views: 883
Unmasks the tough, street-smart persona of Charles Bukowski—America's "Ultimate Outsider"
Amazing letters filled with passionate, literary, and personal observation
Insights into the author of Tales of Ordinary Madness, Notes of a Dirty Old Man, and Run with the Hunted
Insights into Sheri Martinelli: the protege of Anais Nin, an accomplished painter, and the mistress of Ezra Pound Charels Bukowski's persona as the Dirty Old Man of American Literature is just that: a persona, a mask beneath which there was a man better read and more cultured than most people realize.
Sheri Martinelli was one of the favored few for whom Bukowski dropped the mask and engaged in serious discussion of literature and art, and for that reason the discovery and publication of his letters to her give us a more complete picture of this complicated man. Views: 882
In "sharp, elegant prose" (Publishers Weekly, starred review), With Your Crooked Heart introduces Louise, a tough and introspective Londoner trapped in a subtle battle between two brothers. Paul and Johnnie were born twelve years apart, in a one-bedroom flat in a dingy London suburb. Their ascent to money and power looks easy from a distance, but the seductive brothers burn those who get too close. When Paul marries Louise, Johnnie is part of the contract, and their daughter, Anna, is tangled in it from birth. Paul deals in the development of contaminated land; self-destructive Johnnie deals in crime. When Johnnie has to flee the country, Louise goes with him. Their trip sets in motion inevitabilities that have smoldered beneath the surface from the beginning, a dire and redemptive chain of events that devastates every branch of this crooked family tree. With Your Crooked Heart's sensuous, daring prose brilliantly exhibits Dunmore's "poet's ear for language and photographer's eye for images" (Newsday) and confirms The Guardian's claim that Dunmore is "an electrifying and original talent." Views: 878
Nadine, a sixteen-year-old runaway new to London, is set up in a decaying Georgian house by her Finnish lover, Kai. Slowly, she begins to suspect that Kai's plans for her have little to do with love.
'Be careful,' warns Enid, the elderly sitting tenant in the house, who knows all about survival and secrets. And when Nadine discovers Kai's true intentions, Enid's warning takes on a terrible and prophetic quality. Views: 878
What happens in the woods, stays in the woods. . .
Carey is keeping a terrible secret. If she tells, it could destroy her future. If she doesn't, will she ever be free?
For almost as long as she can remember, Carey has lived in a camper van in the heart of the woods with her drug-addicted mother and six-year-old sister, Jenessa. Her mother routinely disappears for weeks at a time, leaving the girls to cope alone. Survival is Carey's only priority - until strangers arrive and everything changes . . .
Jenny Downham, author of BEFORE I DIE, says that IF YOU FIND ME is "a beautiful book about survival, identity, family, love and so much more." Views: 876
Holidays are extreme in Parkerville; everything is extreme there. Old-fashioned sleigh rides with horses that talk back. Valentines day gone wrong with unexpected partners, and an unexpected kiss. And then there are the uninvited guests at a birthday party. Last but not least, a chase to end all chases.For some, the holidays are rough enough when a loved one is missing. For Cassie Evans and Skye Mackenna who are both missing their parents, the approaching holidays seem unbearable. Then, just past midnight on December 1st, splat! Skye awoke to paint splattering her bedroom windows. She got out of bed to see what was going on, but all through the house the windows were covered with paint. Skye awakened Cassie who was spending the night, but, neither one could find a window that had not been painted. Up to the cold, icy rooftop they went to the only window that had not yet been painted. What they saw from the rooftop was both breathtaking and amazing. The holidays had begun. And there was so much more to Parkerville than they could have ever imagined, both wonderful and extremely frightening.Harriet Trevathan and Nancy C. Wilson were friends in their teen years in the 60's and decided to write a fictional story of those years and some of their memories. I'm not saying that they lived in a town like Parkerville, that's another story altogether, but the adventures and fun are a part of these books. Harriet writes for her character Cassie and for Cassie's friends and family. Nancy writes for Skye and Skye's friends and family. Views: 876
