Austria experienced remarkable economic and social growth in the years following World War II, especially considering the troubled nature of its politics. A small, land-locked country, Austria has emerged as the European Union's fourth richest state, yet it still wrestles with old decisions and demons. Merging personal observation with rich historical scholarship, a renowned journalist and award-winning memoirist tracks Austria's unique trajectory, beginning the origins of its peoples and following through to the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian empire in 1918. Paul Lendvai investigates whether Austrians have come to terms with Hitler s Anschluss and the Waldheim affair and how they have met the challenge of Jorg Haider s radical right-wing ascendancy. Lendvai identifies a positive moral toughness, internal cohesion, and social discipline within Austria, especially during the years of occupation and subsequent crises, such as the Hungarian Revolution, the Prague Spring, and the Yugoslav wars. A probing study of Austria's long quest for nationhood, this volume offers a firsthand look at the factors and players that have influenced an evolving power.Praise for the German edition: Daring, exciting, unmasking...Lendvai presents hitherto hardly known facts and] incredible details.& mdash; NEWS (Vienna Weekly)Lendvai seeks to explain what Austria is like. He has succeeded exactly in this endeavor.& mdash; Die Wel

Otto Frisch took part in some of the most momentous developments in modern physics, notably the discovery of nuclear fission (a term which he coined). His work on the first atom bomb, which he saw explode in the desert 'like the light of a thousand suns', brought him into contact with figures such as Robert Oppenheimer, Edward Teller, Richard Feynman and the father of electronic computers, John von Neumann. He also encountered the physicists who had made the great discoveries of recent generations: Einstein, Rutherford and Niels Bohr. This characterful book of reminiscences sheds an engagingly personal light on the people and events behind some of the greatest scientific discoveries of this century, illustrated with a series of fascinating photographs and witty sketches by the author himself.

'Of all the sleep a man can have, the fisherman's sleep is the sweetest. It is the greatest of luxuries - sleep and fishing.' Through tender, vivid, and often humorous recollections - from magical fishing trips to the rivers and ponds of Bustehrad to his charismatic father's eccentric business ventures - this bittersweet memoir tells the story of a childhood in Czechoslovakia, against the backdrop of World War II.

A world-class pianist, composer, television and film personality, Levant seemed to know everyone who was anyone. His career took him from the concert hall to Broadway and Hollywood, to radio and television, to drug addiction and the psychiatric ward of Mt. Sinai hospital. Through a collection of anecdotal vignettes, Levant offers the reader a roller-coaster ride through the ups and downs of an often troubled, often brilliant artist and critic of the human condition, let loose on the uneasy ground where art and commerce overlap.

What are the conditions that foster true novelty and allow visionaries to set their eyes on unknown horizons? What have been the challenges that have spawned new innovations, and how have they shaped modern biology? In Dreamers, Visionaries, and Revolutionaries in the Life Sciences , editors Oren Harman and Michael R. Dietrich explore these questions through the lives of eighteen exemplary biologists who had grand and often radical ideas that went far beyond the run-of-the-mill science of their peers. From the Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, who coined the word “biology” in the early nineteenth century, to the American James Lovelock, for whom the Earth is a living, breathing organism, these dreamers innovated in ways that forced their contemporaries to reexamine comfortable truths. With this collection readers will follow Jane Goodall into the hidden world of apes in African jungles and Francis Crick as he attacks the problem of consciousness. Join Mary Lasker on her campaign to conquer cancer and follow geneticist George Church as he dreams of bringing back woolly mammoths and Neanderthals. In these lives and the many others featured in these pages, we discover visions that were sometimes fantastical, quixotic, and even threatening and destabilizing, but always a challenge to the status quo.

What are the conditions that foster true novelty and allow visionaries to set their eyes on unknown horizons? What have been the challenges that have spawned new innovations, and how have they shaped modern biology? In Dreamers, Visionaries, and Revolutionaries in the Life Sciences , editors Oren Harman and Michael R. Dietrich explore these questions through the lives of eighteen exemplary biologists who had grand and often radical ideas that went far beyond the run-of-the-mill science of their peers. From the Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, who coined the word “biology” in the early nineteenth century, to the American James Lovelock, for whom the Earth is a living, breathing organism, these dreamers innovated in ways that forced their contemporaries to reexamine comfortable truths. With this collection readers will follow Jane Goodall into the hidden world of apes in African jungles and Francis Crick as he attacks the problem of consciousness. Join Mary Lasker on her campaign to conquer cancer and follow geneticist George Church as he dreams of bringing back woolly mammoths and Neanderthals. In these lives and the many others featured in these pages, we discover visions that were sometimes fantastical, quixotic, and even threatening and destabilizing, but always a challenge to the status quo.

Autobiography of this notable peace campaigner, focusing on his political and social activities. Discusses his work to foster peace in the Middle East and his involvement with many organisations working in the interests of peace and social justice, such as the Jewish Council to Combat Fascism and Anti-Semitism. Gives an account of his interactions with many political leaders and also provides a record of post-war left-wing political movements in Australia. Includes index. The author is the founder of the journal 'Paths to Peace'.

Tells the story of how wealthy businessman Julius Rosenwald came to financially support the building of 5,300 schools in rural African-American communities that desperately needed them over the course of twenty years.

"The revealing memoir of one of Israeli's most respected statesmen. Moshe Arens is one of the last surviving members of the founding generation of Israelis. He is a political insider who has worked with every Israeli prime minister from Menachem Begin to Benjamin Netanyahu, serving in a variety of important positions, including foreign minister and defense minister. He has also enjoyed an exceptionally close life-long relationship with the United States: he attended high school in New York and colleges in Massachusetts and California, married an American, and served as Israel's ambassador to the United States. In this memoir, Arens recounts his early role in the birth of Israel and developing Israel's aerospace industry, followed by a long and distinguished political career that included service at the very top of Israel's government for the better part of three decades. Arens advocated relentlessly throughout his political career for his vision of an Israel strong enough to withstand all challenges in its volatile neighborhood. In Defense of Israel vividly recounts the many battles Arens fought in the political arena, sometimes successfully, sometimes not. The latter included his strong opposition to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's withdrawal from Gaza and parts of the West Bank--an action that led to the takeover of Gaza by Hamas. Anyone interested in Israel's place within the contemporary Middle East, including Israel's relationship with the United States, will find this memoir informative, even eye-opening, and often provocative."--

Poppy, newly recruited cub reporter at the Downingham Post, is determined to prove to the editor that he's wrong in his belief that 'Women are a nuisance in the office'. He certainly doesn't think she's a nuisance when it's time for the tea round - a job which never fails to fall to the only female reporter. What Poppy lacks in experience, she makes up for in spirit and ambition. She'll make the Downingham Post the best regional newspaper there is - even if she occasionally gets the names wrong in court hearings. Life, for a single professional woman in the post-war years, certainly has its challenges - from finding a room, when the tyrannical landlady doesn't consider Poppy to be quite respectable, to changing her editor's deeply entrenched ways. This semi-autobiographical novel, recounted with Monica Dickens's wit, warmth and wry observation, will charm all who read it.

This is an eloquent and deeply felt memoir exploring the author's complex relationship with his Jewish identity. "If I Am Not Myself" is a passionate, thought-provoking exploration of what it means to be Jewish in the twenty-first century. It traces the author's upbringing in 1960s Jewish-American suburbia, his anti-war and pro-Palestinian activism on the British Left, and life as a Jew among Muslims in Pakistan, Morocco, and Britain. Interwoven with this are the experiences of his grandfather's life in Jewish New York of the 1930s and '40s, his struggles with anti-Semitism and the twists and turns that led him from anti-Fascism to Militant Zionism. In the course of this deeply personal story, Marqusee refutes the claims of Israel and Zionism on Jewish loyalty and laments their impact on the Jewish Diaspora. Rather, he argues for a richer, more multi-dimensional understanding of Jewish history and identity, and reclaims vital political and personal space for those castigated as self-haters by the Jewish establishment.

It begins with a child's hunger for love and acceptance and continues through years of withering criticism, perverse expectations, and unfounded competition from a narcissistic father who couldn't tolerate his son's happiness and libertine spirit. In the end, the author unravels a relationship that could never be fixed -- but perhaps didn't need to be.

A collection of lectures delivered in May 2002 under the auspices of the Samuel and Althea Stroum Lectures in Jewish Studies at the University of Washington. Analyzes autobiographical works of seven Jews from antiquity to the 20th century. Two of these reflect despair in the midst and in the wake of World War II. Ch. 4 (pp. 103-138), "Autobiography as Farewell I: Stefan Zweig, " discusses the Austrian Jewish writer, who committed suicide in 1942, as a non-Zionist universalist even in the face of Nazism. Pp. 131-136 deal with the persecution of the Jews. Ch. 5 (pp. 139-174), "Autobiography as Farewell II: Sarah Kofman, " discusses the life and works of Kofman, who committed suicide in 1994. Focuses on her "Rue Ordoner, Rue Labat" and her Holocaust experiences as a child in Paris. Her father was killed in Auschwitz, and Kofman was looked after by a Christian woman to whom she felt closer than her mother. Deals with the conflicts in Kofman's sexual and religious identities.

A memoir written from the viewpoint of veteran film, television and stage actor, Melvyn Douglas. This actor's performance career spanned 60 years in Hollywood and New York and brought him two academy awards, a Tony and an Emmy) the film, Broadway and television 'Grand Slam' of the acting world.