3040 results for "Biography"

A year of revolutions: Fanny Lewald's recollections of 1848

Lewald, Fanny
Lewald (1811-1889), the best-selling German woman writer in the nineteenth century, proved a keen and perceptive observer of the social, artistic, and political life of her times, of which these Recollections offer an excellent example. Written from a woman's perspective, this firsthand account of the revolutions in both Germany and France must be considered a unique document. It is further enhanced by her detailed description of the Frankfurt Parliament and her relationships with many of the prominent politicians and thinkers of that eventful period.
Berghahn Books 1997 164 pages

The man who would marry Susan Sontag and other intimate literary portraits of the Bohemian era

Field, Edward
Long before Stonewall, young Air Force veteran Edward Field, fresh from combat in WWII, threw himself into New York’s literary bohemia, searching for fulfillment as a gay man and poet. In this vivid account of his avant-garde years in Greenwich Village and the bohemian outposts of Paris’s Left Bank and Tangier—where you could write poetry, be radical, and be openly gay—Field opens the closet door to reveal, as never been seen before, some of the most important writers of his time. Here are young, beautiful Susan Sontag sitting at the feet of her idol Alfred Chester, who shrewdly plotted to marry her; May Swenson and her two loves; Paul and Jane Bowles in their ambiguous marriage; Frank O’Hara in and out of bed; Fritz Peters, the anointed son of Gurdjieff; and James Baldwin, Isabel Miller (Patience and Sarah), Tobias Schneebaum, Robert Friend, and many others. With its intimate portraits, Field’s memoir brings back a forgotten era—postwar bohemia—bawdy, comical, romantic, sad, and heroic.
University of Wisconsin Press 2005-12-09 284 pages

Rutherford and the nature of the atom

Andrade, E. N. da C.
Born in New Zealand in 1871, Rutherford came to Cambridge in 1895, where he did notable research on the electrical properties of gases. This lead to his appointment as Professor at McGill University in Montreal, where he carried out fundamental investigations on radioactivity, which he continued at the University of Manchester. Here he first put forward the nuclear structure of the atom with which his name is inseparably connected. At Cambridge, as head of the Cavendish Laboratory from 1919 to his death in 1937, he conducted and inspired work on the properties and disruption of the atomic nucleus which ushered in a new era in physics.
Heinemann 1965 218 pages

Vogue on Hubert De Givenchy

Beyfus, Drusilla
The handsome, aristocratic Hubert de Givenchy blended the hallowed traditions of haute couture with a modern sensibility. For 40 years he focused always on purity of line, but combined an artist's eye with a keen entrepreneurial mind. His innovative 1952 debut collection made its mark by presenting separates, then a little-known approach to fashion. This book examines his career.
Quadrille Publishing 2013 160 pages

California Red: a life in the American Communist Party

Healey, Dorothy
Dorothy Ray Healey joined the Communist party at age fourteen, in 1928, and was leader of the Los Angeles district--the second largest in the country--for over twenty years. As a strike leader, opponent of McCarthyism, Vietnam war protestor, candidate for public office, and mentor to Angela Davis, she won fame as "a tough lady red," one of the few women to rise to Communist party leadership.
University of Illinois Press 1993 263 pages

Clips from a life

Norden, Denis
Classic stills from the life of one of Britain's most cherished entertainers. This is the extraordinary life story of comic legend Denis Norden, told in momentary snapshots by the master British comedian himself. Containing reminiscences of a career stretching back to the golden age of the radio, through the heyday of cinema and the early pioneering days of television comedy, 'Clips From a Life' showcases Denis Norden's creative genius at its very best. Told with Denis' hallmark flashes of brilliant humour and sharp observation, the extraordinary life of this enduring humorist is unravelled through his private recollections of the ways things used to be, back then. Denis' school-day musings, dry witticisms, and old-time sayings unearthed from days gone by, combined with remembrances of collaborations with famous figures of the day, from Eric Sykes to Bill Fraser, will sweep you back instantaneously to the magical gags, lively characters and laughter of the past. Flitting between Denis' East End childhood and early career in Variety as a cinema manager for the Hyams Brothers, to his post-war work as a scriptwriter on the groundbreaking radio shows 'Take It From Here' and 'In All Directions', to the phenomenally successful television comedy 'Whack-O!' (all written with long-term collaborator Frank Muir), to his years as a solo writer, performer, and presenter on programmes such as the much-loved 'It'll Be Alright on the Night', it is easy to see how Denis' comic appeal has endured for decades, to make him one of the greatest British writers and performers to date. Brimming with Denis's unique wit and personal warmth, this is a rich and compelling mix of anecdote and autobiography from a very special entertainer.
Harper Perennial 2009 358 pages

Why did you do that? the autobiography of a human rights advocate

Matas, David
Why Did You Do That? is an autobiography of David Matas, an international human rights advocate. The book sets out his human rights activities and then attempts to explain why he did them. People are focused on their immediate environment, their family, their friends, their work or their neighbourhood. Why should they go to the bother of trying to address a seemingly intractable situation in order to try help those with whom superficially they have nothing in common, who may be living in a country far away to which they have never been, speaking in a language they do not understand and part of a culture which is both foreign and strange? The reason for the autobiography is an attempt to answer that question. By trying to explain why he did what he did, the author hopes to mobilize others, not to do what he did or is now doing, but rather just to do something, to shed feelings of indifference and impotence, to join the international human rights cause.
Seraphim Editions 2015 302 pages

The Jewish past revisited: reflections on modern Jewish historians

David G. Myers,David N. Myers,Sady and Ludwig Kahn Professor of Jewish History David N Myers,David B. Ruderman,Rabbi David B Ruderman, PhD
In this new collection of essays, contemporary historians examine the ways earlier historians have framed, written, and "made" the Jewish past. Probing the ideology and methodology of their professional predecessors, American and Israeli historians offer new perspectives on some of the central figures of twentieth-century Jewish historiography, including Gershom Scholem, S. D. Goitein, Yitzhak Baer, Elias Bickerman, and Cecil Roth, as well as the Israeli "New Historians." Through their critical examinations of the construction of the Jewish past, the contributors to this volume develop important insights into current attitudes toward the dominant canons and ideals of historical scholarship and the future of historiography. They shine new light on the formation of a historical worldview and the "making" of history.
Yale University Press 1998 244 pages

Open secret: gay Hollywood, 1928-2000

Ehrenstein, David
Part social history and part exposé, this revealing, entertaining, and provocative book spans nearly seventy years as it explores the lives and careers of some of the silver screen's foremost gays and lesbians and the effect of their high-profile lifestyles on the general public. From Charles Laughton and Greta Garbo to Nathan Lane and Ellen DeGeneres, David Ehrenstein traces the gradual transformation of Hollywood from a time when it was box-office poison to be publicly gay to the modern era when many top entertainment figures are celebrating their gay sexuality--and are in turn celebrated for it. Updated, Open Secret reveals what has happened to the key players in gay Hollywood since the original hardcover publication.
Perennial 2000-05-16 399 pages