1644 results for "Biography"

Edward Kennedy: an intimate biography

Hersh, Burton
In this groundbreaking biography of Edward Kennedy, historian and journalist Burton Hersh combines a lifetime of research and reporting with a lively mixture of never–before–told anecdotes (including the definitive version of the incident at Chappaquiddick, the details of which Kennedy himself filled in for Hersh shortly after it occurred) to create a broad yet unfailingly intimate portrait of the politician who would be universally acknowledged as one of the twentieth century's greatest American legislators. Hersh was acquainted with Kennedy since his college days, and the result here is a unique series of revelations that serve to reinterpret the senator's public and private personas. Conditioned by deep–seated fears that he was an afterthought within his own powerful family, Kennedy developed a genius for conciliation and strategizing that made him a dramatically more effective political figure than either of his older brothers. In addition to this biography's account of the Chappaquiddick incident, Hersh also delivers the first full report of the vendetta between Kennedy and Richard Nixon, exposing the behind–the–scenes manipulations to which Kennedy resorted to drive Nixon from office during the Watergate scandal.
Counterpoint 2010 654 pages

Just win, baby: the Al Davis story

Olderman, Murray
Revealing how an obscure young assistant coach, in less than a decade, progressed to become a head coach, general manager, league commissioner, and controlling partner of the Oakland Raiders franchise, this biography pays tribute to the late Al Davis. Contrary to Davis's notoriously quirky and reclusive reputation, this account is based on the inside scoop he personally gave the author, lending his full cooperation to relate the account of his life and career. With a treasure trove of previously untold anecdotes, personal reminiscences, and highlights of Davis's leadership of the Raiders as professional football became America's premier spectator sport, this chronicle details the major impact this maverick owner had--not only on professional football but also on America's sports scene as a whole. The subject's influence on the merger of the American and National Football Leagues into the greater NFL is also reviewed as is his election to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Triumph Books 2012 203 pages

Andrea Dworkin: the feminist as revolutionary

Duberman, Martin B.
"Fifteen years after her death, Andrea Dworkin remains one of the most important and challenging figures in second-wave feminism. Although frequently relegated to its more radical fringes, Dworkin was without doubt a formidable and influential writer, a philosopher, and an activist-a brilliant figure who inspired and infuriated in equal measure. Her many detractors were eager to reduce her to the caricature of the angry, man-hating feminist who believed that all sex was rape, and as a result, her work has long been misunderstood. It is in recent years, especially with the rise of the #MeToo movement, that there has been a resurgence of interest in her ideas. This biography is the perfect complement to the widely reviewed anthology of her writing, Last Days at Hot Slit, published in 2019, providing much-needed context to her work. Given exclusive access to never-before-published photographs and archives, including her letters to many of the major figures of second-wave feminism, award-winning biographer Martin Duberman traces Dworkin's life, from her abusive first marriage through her central role in the sex and pornography wars of the following decades. This is a vital, complex, and long overdue reassessment of the life and work of one of the towering figures of second-wave feminism"--
The New Press 2020 350 pages

The monkey and the dragon: a true story about friendship, music, politics and life on the edge

Jaivin, Linda
Memoir, biography and travel book, The Monkey and the Dragon is a story about the personal and political tumult of a changing China. Linda Jaivin traces this transformation through the life of Hou Dejian: Taiwan pop star, defector to communist China, hunger-striker at Tiananmen Square, political activist, celebrity fengshui master and friend.
Text Pub 2001 438 pages

The daring life and dangerous times of Eve Adams

Katz, Jonathan
"Historian Jonathan Ned Katz uncovers the forgotten story of radical lesbian feminist Eve Adams, and her long-lost book Lesbian Love. Born Chawa Zloczewer into a Jewish family in Poland, Eve Adams emigrated to the United States in 1912, took a new name, befriended anarchists, sold radical publications, and ran lesbian-and-gay-friendly speakeasies in Chicago and New York. Then, in 1925, Adams risked all to write and publish a book titled Lesbian Love. Adams's bold activism caught the attention of the young J. Edgar Hoover and the US Bureau of Investigation, leading to her surveillance and arrest. Adams was convicted of publishing an obscene book and of attempted sex with a policewoman sent to entrap her. Adams was jailed and then deported back to Europe, and ultimately murdered by Nazis in Auschwitz. In The Daring Life and Dangerous Times of Eve Adams, acclaimed historian Jonathan Ned Katz has recovered the extraordinary story of an early, daring activist. Carefully distinguishing fact from fiction, Katz presents the first biography of Adams, and the publisher reprints the long-lost text of Adams's rare, unique book Lesbian Love."--Publisher's website.
Chicago Review Press 2021 285 pages

Mozart: the man revealed

Suchet, John
Yet only that last point is actually true. In this comprehensive biography, John Suchet examines the many myths and misunderstandings surrounding the world's best-loved composer. From his early days as a child prodigy performing for the imperial royal family in Vienna to the last months of his short life, driven to exhaustion by a punitive workload, one thing remained constant: his happy disposition Through trials and tribulations, grand successes and disheartening setbacks, Suchet shows us the real Mozart--blessed with an abundance of talent yet sometimes struggling to earn a living. His mischievous nature and earthy sense of humor, his ease and confidence in his own incredible abilities; these were traits that never left him. His music has brought comfort to countless generations; his life, though brief, is no less fascinating
Elliott and Thompson Limited 2016 275 pages

Lady Pamela: my mother's extraordinary years as daughter to the Viceroy of India, lady-in-waiting to the Queen, and wife of David Hicks

Hicks, India
This new visual biography is an extraordinary chronicle of Lady Pamela's life. Daughter of the 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma, the last viceroy of India, Lady Pamela was a first cousin to Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and served as a bridesmaid and lady-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth II, before marrying legendary interior designer David Hicks. Sifting through her parents' archives, India has uncovered a trove of material about her mother. This beautifully illustrated personal history includes ephemera such as letters from the Queen; images of the houses and gardens where she grew up and made her wonderfully elegant home; details of her extraordinary work during Indian independence, her marriage to David Hicks and the homes he designed for them, the assassination of her father in Ireland, and later life in the country, as well as the lessons India has learned from her mother having had a front-row seat at so many historical events --
Rizzoli 2024-09-03 255 pages

Life in a Jewish family: her unfinished autobiographical account

Stein, Edith Saint
This initial volume of the Collected Works of Edith Stein offers, for the first time in English, the unabridged biography of Edith Stein (Teresa Benedicta of the Cross), depicting her life as a child and young adult. Her text ends abruptly because the Nazi SS arrested, then deported, her to the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1942. Edith Stein is one of the most significant German women of the 20th century. At the age of twenty-five she became the first assistant to Edmund Husserl, the founder of Phenomenology. She was much in demand as a writer and lecturer after her conversion from atheism to Catholicism. Later, as a Discalced Carmelite nun, she maintained her intellectual pursuits until she, like so many others, became a victim of the Nazi persecution that raged across Eastern Europe. By making this landmark work available in English, the Institute of Carmelite Studies provides an eye-witness account of persons and activities on the scene at the time when psychology and philosophy became separate disciplines. In addition to photographs and a map, this volume is enhanced with a preface, the foreword and afterword, notes, and a list of places associated with Edith Stein’s life. It is our aim that these, together with Edith Stein’s text, may help bring into relief the many background details of the rich autobiographical work she has left us.
ICS Publications 1986-09 548 pages

Benjamin Disraeli

Kirsch, Adam
Part of the Jewish Encounter series A dandy, a best-selling novelist, and a man of political and sexual intrigue, Benjamin Disraeli was one of the most captivating figures of the nineteenth century. His flirtation with proto-Zionism, his ideas about power and empire, and his fantasies about the Middle East remain prophetically relevant today. How a man who was born a Jew--and who remained in the eyes of his countrymen a member of a despised minority--managed to become prime minister of England seems even today nothing short of miraculous. In this compelling biography, renowned poet and critic Adam Kirsch looks at Disraeli as a novelist as well as a statesman, recognizing that the outsider Jew who became one of the world's most powerful men was his own greatest character. Though baptized by his father at the age of twelve, Disraeli was seen--and saw himself--as a Jew. But her created an idea of Jewishness to rival the British notion of aristocracy. Disraeli was a figure of fascinating contradictions: an archconservative who benefited from England's liberal attitudes, a baptized Christian who saw Jewishness as a matter of racial superiority, a perennial outsider who dreamed of glory for England, which, in the words of one contemporary, became for Disraeli "the Israel of his imagination."
Nextbook 2008-09-02 257 pages

Blood, sweat, and my rock 'n' roll years: is Steve Katz a rock star?

Katz, Steve
On paper Steve Katz's career rivals anyone's except the 1960s' and '70's biggest stars: the Monterey Pop Festival with the legendary Blues Project, Woodstock with Blood, Sweat & Tears, and even producing rock's most celebrated speed addict, Lou Reed. There were world tours, and his résumé screams "Hall of Fame" -- it won't be long before BS&T are on that ballot. He has three Grammies (ten nominations), three Downbeat Reader's Poll Awards, three gold records, one platinum record, and one quadruple platinum platter (the second Blood, Sweat & Tears album), not to mention three gold singles with BS&T. All together, he's sold close to 29 million records. He had affairs with famous female folk singers, made love to Jim Morrison's girlfriend Pam when Jim was drunk and abusive, partied with Elizabeth Taylor and Groucho Marx, dined with Rudolf Nureyev, conversed with Martin Luther King, Jr. and Tennessee Williams, hung out with Andy Warhol, jammed with everyone from Mose Allison to Jimi Hendrix, and was told to get a haircut by both Mickey Spillane and Danny Thomas. But his memoir is more Portnoy's Complaint than the lurid party-with-your-pants-down memoir that has become the norm for rock 'n' roll books. It's an honest and personal account of a life at the edge of the spotlight--a privileged vantage point that earned him a bit more objectivity and earnest outrage than a lot of his colleagues, who were too far into the scene to lay any honest witness to it. Set during the Greenwich Village folk/rock scene, the Sixties' most celebrated venues and concerts, and behind closed doors on international tours and grueling studio sessions, this is the unlikely story of a rock star as nerd, nerd as rock star, a nice Jewish boy who got to sit at the cool kid's table and score the hot chicks.
Lyons Press 2015 244 pages

Inside Obama's brain

Abramsky, Sasha
'Never has the world needed strong and wise American leadership more than it does now. Abramsky's eminently readable description of Obama's personal gifts makes it clear that he is remarkably suited to be the president the moment requires.' -Former New York Governor Mario M. Cuomo From the moment he burst onto the national political scene, Barack Obama has fascinated people more than any politician in decades. Many biographers have already retold his story, but no previous book truly explains how his mind works, what passions drive him, or what makes him such an effective leader. This concise profile explores the ideas, inspirations, and experiences that have shaped the president. It quotes a wide network of sources, including many who broke long-standing vows of silence to offer their candid and surprising observations. Award-winning journalist Sasha Abramsky interviewed close to one hundred of Obama's current and former friends, colleagues, classmates, teachers, staff, mentors, basketball buddies, fellow Chicago activists, media consultants, editors, and even his next-door neighbors from Hyde Park. These people each know a part of Obama's life and career, which the author blends the pieces into a uniquely detailed analysis. Abramsky explains the origins of Obama's extraordinary poise, focus, and self-confidence; his powerful storytelling and speaking skills; and his empathetic listening style. He shows why Obama's experiences as a community organizer are widely misunderstood and more influential than many people realize. And he explores how Obama found a unique way to bridge America's racial divides. No previous book has delved so deeply into the events and people that helped make Barack Obama the man he is today.
Portfolio 2009 278 pages