"Conservative legend David Horowitz opens up about his storied personal life and remarkable family. Now 75 years old, Horowitz reflects on the good and bad fortune that has touched his life and muses philosophically about love, happiness, and his own mortality. "--

Screw Everyone is comedian Ophira Eisenberg’s wisecracking account of how she spent most of her life saying “yes” to everything—and everyone—and how that attitude ultimately helped her overcome her phobia of commitment. Skeptical about long-term relationships, Eisenberg approached dating as a sort of research experiment from early on: she spent her twenties traveling from futon to futon and gathering data, figuring that one day she’d put it all together somehow and build her own perfect Frankenmate. When she met a guy who didn’t fall for the emotionally cavalier facade she’d constructed (a guy who wanted marriage and monogamy), she knew it was time to reevaluate. From her first kiss to saying “I do,” Screw Everyone is an honest, hilarious chronicle of how one woman discovered herself, conquered her fears, and even found the “real thing”—one promiscuous encounter at a time.

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award in Biography and Finalist for the National Book Award. The definitive biography of America's greatest playwright from the celebrated drama critic of The New Yorker . John Lahr has produced a theater biography like no other. Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh gives intimate access to the mind of one of the most brilliant dramatists of his century, whose plays reshaped the American theater and the nation's sense of itself. This astute, deeply researched biography sheds a light on Tennessee Williams's warring family, his guilt, his creative triumphs and failures, his sexuality and numerous affairs, his misreported death, even the shenanigans surrounding his estate. With vivid cameos of the formative influences in Williams's life—his fierce, belittling father Cornelius; his puritanical, domineering mother Edwina; his demented sister Rose, who was lobotomized at the age of thirty-three; his beloved grandfather, the Reverend Walter Dakin— Tennessee Williams: Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh is as much a biography of the man who created A Streetcar Named Desire , The Glass Menagerie , and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof as it is a trenchant exploration of Williams’s plays and the tortured process of bringing them to stage and screen. The portrait of Williams himself is unforgettable: a virgin until he was twenty-six, he had serial homosexual affairs thereafter as well as long-time, bruising relationships with Pancho Gonzalez and Frank Merlo. With compassion and verve, Lahr explores how Williams's relationships informed his work and how the resulting success brought turmoil to his personal life. Lahr captures not just Williams's tempestuous public persona but also his backstage life, where his agent Audrey Wood and the director Elia Kazan play major roles, and Marlon Brando, Anna Magnani, Bette Davis, Maureen Stapleton, Diana Barrymore, and Tallulah Bankhead have scintillating walk-on parts. This is a biography of the highest order: a book about the major American playwright of his time written by the major American drama critic of his time. Winner of the 2015 Sheridan Morley Prize for Theatre Biography American Academy of Arts and Letters' Harold D. Vursell Memorial Award Chicago Tribune Best Books of 2014 USA Today 10 Books We Loved Reading Washington Post 10 Best Books of 2014

A celebration of the relationships that bring us strength, purpose, and joy Ties That Bind honors the people who nourish and strengthen us. StoryCorps founder Dave Isay draws from ten years of the revolutionary oral history project’s rich archives, collecting conversations that celebrate the power of the human bond and capture the moment at which individuals become family. Between blood relations, friends, coworkers, and neighbors, in the most trying circumstances and in the unlikeliest of places, enduring connections are formed and lives are forever changed. The stories shared in Ties That Bind reveal our need to reach out, to support, and to share life’s burdens and joys. We meet two brothers, separately cast out by their parents, who reconnect and rebuild a new family around each other. We encounter unexpected joy: A gay woman reveals to her beloved granddaughter that she grew up believing that family was a happiness she would never be able to experience. We witness lifechanging friendship: An Iraq war veteran recalls his wartime bond with two local children and how his relationship with his wife helped him overcome the trauma of losing them. Against unspeakable odds, at their most desperate moments, the individuals we meet in Ties That Bind find their way to one another, discovering hope and healing. Commemorating ten years of StoryCorps, the conversations collected in Ties That Bind are testament to the transformational power of listening.

A charming and funny memoir about experiences Gina Gershon has had with cats throughout her life that are analogous to her relationships with men and her ongoing search for true love. Film and television icon Gina Gershon may be best known for her movie roles in "Bound "and "Showgirls" and television appearances on "Curb Your Enthusiasm" and "How to Make" "It in America," but deep down she is a self-described cat lady. "In Search of Cleo "follows Gina s desperation and despair when her assistant loses her beloved cat, Cleo. Gina spends two months roaming the back streets of Los Angeles at all hours of the night, searching for Cleo and meeting several quirky and outrageous characters who help or hinder her in different ways, including Ellen DeGeneres, who searches with Gina and recommends her pet psychic, Sonia; Arthur, the newspaper delivery man who gives her advice; and the mysterious fortune-teller, who appears from the shadows to give her a statue of Saint Gertrude, the protector of cats everywhere. Gina soon finds herself enmeshed in L.A. s strangest subcultures, doing everything she can to bring Cleo home, including chanting with a bunch of crystal-wielding hippies and being slapped with a chicken by a Santeria priest. Along the way, she reflects on the various cats that have been a part of her life and shares her travails as a single girl in search of both her cat and some sanity. "In Search of Cleo "will delight pet lovers and singletons alike as it introduces Cleo to the celebrated pantheon of literary cats that includes Dewey, Homer, and Oscar."

Draws on personal accounts and interviews to present a profile of John Lennon, examining his life, relationships, and involvement in the peace movement of the 1970s; and contains a DVD of the author's 1968 interview with Lennon and Paul McCartney.

The man behind "I Could Have Danced all Night" and "Almost Like Being in Love", lyricist Alan Jay Lerner (1918-1986) is widely regarded as one of the most important figures of the American musical stage. In penning the lyrics to some of the most well-known and beloved Broadway shows, including Brigadoon, Paint Your Wagon, My Fair Lady, and Camelot, Lerner worked and corresponded with some of the greatest luminaries of popular entertainment over a career which spanned four decades, from performers like Rex Harrison and Julie Andrews to composers like André Previn, Leonard Bernstein, Charles Strouse, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and especially Frederick Loewe. In this rich collection of correspondence, most of it published for the first time, author Dominic McHugh sheds new light on Lerner's working relationships with these legendary figures. McHugh's extensive commentary reveals Lerner's turbulent partnerships with Loewe and Lane, his affection for Harrison, and his reverence for Burton. Particular emphasis is placed on Lerner's aborted projects with composers like Richard Rodgers and Arthur Schwartz. Especially valuable is the correspondence from his final years, in which he worked on a movie version of The Merry Widow, a BBC TV series about musicals, and a musical version of My Man Godfrey, none of which came to fruition. The collection ends with a poignant final exchange between Lerner and Andrew Lloyd Webber, with whom he was to have written The Phantom of the Opera. Overall, this important and lively book reveals the highs and lows of the career of one of America's wittiest and most romantic lyricists.

In a candid, witty autobiography, the distinguished American composer recalls his Brooklyn childhood, his study with Nadia Boulanger in Paris, his music, and his relationships, and offers a portrait of the era in which he lived and worked

"This account of Philip Roth traces the psychological and artistic origins of his creative life. It examines the major events of his career, while identifying a series of personal themes in his writing, from his relationship with Judaism to family, marriage, Eastern Europe and America. It addresses his private challenges from romance and health, to surviving as a writer burdened with success. The book also reflects how living outside the United States, initially in Italy and then England, plus his visits to Eastern Europe and exposure to their oppressed writers affected his writing. In particular, it primed him for a new engagement with American political and social history, resulting in a renewed determination to re-write America through his American trilogy and The Plot Against America. Although chronology is the framework, this is a thematic reading of Roth's life and career with attention to family, self-identity and success. A set of contrasting angles form this approach, beginning with his prolonged sense of discontent, yet public image of success, his search for sustained relationships but then decision to end them, his idealization of his parents but persistent undercurrent of criticism. Three overlapping issues provide the impetus for this reading: the aesthetic, the emotional and the historical. The lasting importance of such themes as anger, betrayal and failure has a vital role in understanding Roth's character and work. So, too, does his sense of performance on and off the page. Location is also significant and there are extensive discussions of Newark, London, Iowa, Prague and rural Connecticut. Particular attention to writers of the Holocaust, notably Primo Levi and Aharon Appelfeld, and contemporaries such as Saul Bellow and Bernard Malamud, also frame the narrative along with discussions of John Updike, Cynthia Ozick, Norman Mailer, Nadine Gordimer and Nicole Krauss. Works receiving special attention are Portnoy's Complaint, The Ghost Writer, Sabbath's Theater and the American trilogy. The shifting patterns of Roth's writing style, often related to changes in his physical and psychological health, are also considered. But more importantly is Roth's character and how early incidents formed later behavior, especially his inability to forget the past, particularly an insult or criticism. Analysis of his life with his two wives, Margaret (Maggie) Williams and Claire Bloom also occurs, as well as his relationships with other women. Further commentary focuses on Roth's illnesses and his life after he publically announced that he had stopped writing"--

"The story of the friendship between a Jewish-American conductor and Pope John Paul II This book offers the inspirational story of an unlikely friendship and the two men who collaborated in an extraordinary way to begin to help heal centuries-old wounds. For two decades Sir Gilbert Levine and Pope John Paul II collaborated on symbolic acts of reconciliation: a series of internationally broadcast concerts designed to bring together people from all religious backgrounds under the auspices of the Vatican. These concerts broke new ground and demonstrated the Vatican's desire for rapprochement and even atonement in its relationships with Jews around the world. And it resulted in Sir Gilbert recovering his own Jewish faith in a deeper and more meaningful way. Details the extraordinary collaboration between a world-renowned musical maestro and an innovative Pope. Shows how music can act as a bridge between people of different faiths. A moving, inspirational, and personal story that appeals to music lovers and to people of all faith traditions. This is a compelling tale of faith, friendship, and the healing power of music to bring people together."--

In the heavily forested foothills of the Andes Mountains in Ecuador, a Shuar healer named Alejandro Tsakimp leads many lives. He is a peasant who sells cattle and lumber, a member of the Shuar Federation, a son and a brother, a husband and a father, a student and a worker, and, finally, a troubled shaman. Being a healer has long been both a burden and a resource, for the power to cure is also the power to kill, and shamans like Tsakimp are frequently in danger from accusations of witchcraft. But the situation of the Shuar today is especially perilous, and Tsakimp must constantly negotiate relations of power not only with rival shamans and his patients, but with the better-educated and richer officials of the Shuar Federation and his own siblings as well. In his own words, Alejandro Tsakimp tells of his lives and relationships, the practice of shamanism, and the many challenges and triumphs he has encountered since childhood. He was born at the time when Shuar were first confronting the impact of Ecuadorian colonialism, which had triggered devastating intertribal conflict over the production and trade of shrunken heads and intratribal feuding fueled by accusations of witchcraft. Tsakimp was first exposed to healing practices when he was cured in the womb by a shaman. Later he actively pursued this knowledge in the hopes of curing his father, another shaman, who was ill from witchcraft. His father's death in 1990 created conflict among his heirs, who were the first generation of Shuar to inherit property. Tsakimp's family fiercely competed for the property and eventually accused one another of witchcraft and parricide. Anthropologist Steven Rubenstein, who began working with Tsakimp in 1989, has skillfully edited Tsakimp's stories and provides essential background information. Ruben-stein argues that although these stories reveal tensions between individual and collective autonomy on the colonial frontier, they also resist simplistic dichotomies such as state versus indigene and modern versus traditional. Alejandro Tsakimp provides a revealing look at the relationship between anthropologist and shaman and an insightful glimpse into the complicated lives of South American Indians today.

"Judy Chicago is America's most dynamic living artist. Her works comprise a dizzying array of media from performance and installation to the glittering table laid for thirty-nine iconic women in The Dinner Party (now permanently housed at the Brooklyn Museum), the groundbreaking Birth Project, and the meticulously researched Holocaust Project. She designed the monumental installation for Dior's 2020 Paris couture show and, in 2019, established the Judy Chicago Portal, which will help to accomplish her lifelong goal of overcoming the erasure that has eclipsed the achievements of so many women. The Flowering is her vivid and revealing autobiography, fully illustrated with photographs of her work, as well as never-before-published personal images and a foreword by Gloria Steinem. Chicago has revised and updated her earlier, classic works with previously untold stories, fresh insights, and an extensive afterword covering the last twenty years. This powerful narrative weaves together the stories behind some of Chicago's most significant artworks and her journey as a woman artist with the chronicles of her personal relationships and her understanding, from decades of experience and extensive research, of how misogyny, racism, and other prejudices intersect to erase the legacies of artists who are not white and male while dismissing the suffering of millions of creatures who share the planet. With the first career retrospective of her work forthcoming at the de Young Museum in 2021, Chicago reinforces her message of resilience for a new generation of artists and activists. The Flowering is an essential read for anyone interested in making change."--Publisher's description.

A personal memoir traces the "New York Times" sportswriter's journey through his unpromising educational years to become a writer, describing his father's influence on his character, his discovery of his writing passion, and his relationships with such individuals as columnist Red Smith, Hall of Fame coach Red Holzman, and Michael Jordan.

The world's major religions-Judaism, Christianity, and Islam-find a common root in one man: Abraham. Yet Abraham looms so large in the realm of world religions that he has remained a ward of the Divine rather than a flesh-and-blood citizen of Humanity. In his monumental new book, David Rosenberg provides a long-overdue history of the patriarch; while revealing that the original story embedded in the Bible is actually our oldest historical biography. We also discover that the wandering ascetic of tradition cannot explain our deep-seated feelings for Abraham and his God. The road that Abraham traveled was marked by signs of civilization that we still recognize: libraries, museums, hotels, and houses of worship. He is a sophisticated, educated Sumerian; an artisan who became the first Jew. Moreover, through Rosenberg's audacious translation of the Abraham story from Genesis, we learn that many of the core tenets of the monotheistic tradition-the idea of God's covenant and the soul-are Sumerian in origin. Rosenberg first finds Abraham at his father's workshop in the cosmopolitan city of ancient Ur and follows his journey through what is today the Middle East. What kind of baggage-emotional, material, and spiritual-would Abraham have taken with him on his migration to a new land? Abraham does more than present a founding spiritual figure and his dynamic relationships with father, wife, and son. We witness this man as he transforms his heritage into an anxious embrace of religion with secular culture-the human condition in which we are still enfolded today.

Chronicles the life of Leo Castelli, a prominent American art dealer, describing his first New York City gallery and the success of his enterprise throughout the twentieth century, and discussing his Italian-Jewish heritage, personal relationships, and related topics.

Gingold recalls her eventful life from her first appearance on the stage, at the age of eight. She tells of her marriages to Michael Joseph, to Eric Maschwitz, her exploits on the London cabaret scene, and her relationships with Noel Coward, Maurice Chevalier and Hermione Baddeley.

Antiblack racism avows reason is white while emotion, and thus supposedly unreason, is black. Challenging academic adherence to this notion, Lewis R. Gordon offers a portrait of Martinican-turned-Algerian revolutionary psychiatrist and philosopher Frantz Fanon as an exemplar of "living thought" against forms of reason marked by colonialism and racism. Working from his own translations of the original French texts, Gordon critically engages everything in Fanon from dialectics, ethics, existentialism, and humanism to philosophical anthropology, phenomenology, and political theory as well as psychiatry and psychoanalysis. Gordon takes into account scholars from across the Global South to address controversies around Fanon's writings on gender and sexuality as well as political violence and the social underclass. In doing so, he confronts the replication of a colonial and racist geography of reason, allowing theorists from the Global South to emerge as interlocutors alongside northern ones in a move that exemplifies what, Gordon argues, Fanon represented in his plea to establish newer and healthier human relationships beyond colonial paradigms.

When Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha married his cousin, the young Queen Victoria, in 1840, it was not only a match whose fertility and personal devotion provided a model for the queen's subjects, it was also a triumph of dynastic politics. It drew the couple deeply into European politics, where their personal and family relationships with many of the rulers often had repercussions at home. Despite the death of Albert in 1861, the marriage of Victoria's children into Europe's royal houses continued the dynastic theme. It was a tragedy for Germany and Europe that Vicky, Victoria's eldest daughter, and her husband, the heir to the German throne were unable to master Bismarck. Albert and Victoria is a portrait of a marriage. It also traces Albert to his unhappy family roots in Coburg and shows how important his attitudes, most of them shared by Victoria, were in their joint dynastic enterprise. >

This is the story of Elizabeth I's inner circle and the crucial human relationships which lay at the heart of her personal and political life. Using a wide range of original sources--including private letters, portraits, verse, drama, and state papers--Susan Doran provides a vivid and often dramatic account of political life in Elizabethan England and the queen at its center, offering a deeper insight into Elizabeth's emotional and political conduct--and challenging many of the popular myths that have grown up around her.