Vladimir Horowitz (1903-1989) was the measure of pianistic prowess for most of the twentieth century. Not since Liszt and Paderewski has any pianist created such a legend. When Horowitz condescended to perform, lines formed days in advance. His recordings, the most listened-to discography in history, are unique documents in the art of piano playing. Horowitz, the incomparable colorist, conjured in the mind's ear the spectrum of an orchestra with the expressive beauty of the greatest singing.

Using pagan prose fiction produced in Greek and Latin during the early Christian era, Bowersock investigates the complex relationship among perceived and presented 'historical' and 'fictional' truths. Bowersock's superb lecturing style is successfully transferred into writing with force and eloquence, as he weaves accounts from a wide range of sources into his text, illuminating social attitudes of the period and persuasively arguing that fiction of the period was influenced by the emerging Christian Gospel narratives. In the second half of the first century emerges a new kind of fiction including outlandish tales of travel, romance and comic novels. Bowersock concentrates on secular literature, illuminating not only its literary motifs, but also reconstructing the societal context as one engrossed in fabrications and all kinds of revisions or rewriting. Using these less familiar materials as his points of reference, he reads into familiar Christian material, making linkages and casting new light on familiar subjects, as well as providing some provocative interpretations of familiar Christian texts. Bowersock uses close historical and literary analyses of specific passages of works, and pays attention to larger and more general issues and questions around the relationship between fiction and history and how we read them. This book will be of basic intellectual concern to all raised in the environment of Christian belief.

Jacob Rader Marcus (1896-1995), scholar, professor, and rabbi, was called the Dean of American Jewish historians by students and colleagues alike. A seminal force in the evolution of the academic study of American Jewish history, Marcus was the first to apply modern critical methodology to this field. In the course of his long life, he published more than 300 books and articles on the history of American Jews. In 1947 he founded the American Jewish Archives, which he directed for almost fifty years. A beloved teacher and mentor for several generations of Hebrew Union College (HUC) students, Dr. Marcus remains a very significant figure in the history of American Jewry during the twentieth century. Marcus, raised in West Virginia, was the child of East European immigrants. At the age of 15, he moved to Cincinnati to matriculate at HUC, America's oldest rabbinical seminary. After serving in the U.S. Army during World War I, Marcus became a member of the HUC faculty upon his rabbinical ordination in 1920. He subsequently moved to Europe to pursue doctoral studies and, upon returning to Cincinnati, Marcus taught courses in Jewish history. During the late 1930s and early 1940s, Marcus realized that the i American Jewry was fast becoming the most influential Jewish community in the world. In the aftermath of the brutal destruction of European Jewry during World War II, Marcus's keen interest in the history of American Jewry burgeoned. Marcus left the pulpit for a career of scholarship and teaching, he nevertheless maintained a close connection to his students and, through them, to the American rabbinate. A mentor to generations of HUC students and graduates, Marcus was an active participant in the Central Conference of American Rabbis (the organizational arm of the American Reform rabbinate), serving as its president from 1949-1951. In this volume, Gary Philip Zola brings together a unique assortment of Marcus's most important unpublished essays, written for a more popular audience between 1916 and 1989. Read collectively, these essays bring the key themes of Marcus's work into bold relief. In the early "America: The Spiritual Center of Jewry" (1916), as in the much later "Three Hundred Years in America" (1955), Marcus calls upon American Jewry to study its heritage, arguing that this knowledge will kindle a renaissance in American Jewish life. In "Lost: Judaism in the American Expeditionary Forces, the Urgent Need for Welfare Work" (1919), he insists that the Jewish experience in America consists of a symbiotic relationship between individual Jews and the larger Jewish community. A focus on the individual in relation to the whole guided many of Marcus's essays, as did his emphasis on Jews studying their own past, strong echoes of both can be found in "New Literary Responsibilities (1941-1942) as well as works for specific occasions, such as "The Program of the American Jewish Archives" (1947) and Genesis: College Beginnings (1989). Another leitmotif linking these diverse topics is Marcus's view that American Judaism will thrive and distinguish itself as long as Jewish education and Jewish cultural life become a high priority on the Jewish communal agenda. This collection enhances our understanding of how the ideas of one of American Jewry's pioneering historians evolved, while preserving historical documents that trace the development of American Jewish life over the course of the twentieth century.

The Romanian historian Nicolae Iorga played a critical role in the history of his country for more than fifty years until his tragic death in 1940. The author of more than 1,200 books and 20,000 articles, Iorga was one of the most prolific scholars of all time. In recognition of his academic achievements, Iorga received honorary doctorates from universities around the world. Nicolae Iorga is the first comprehensive biography of one of the most important European cultural and political personalities of the first half of the twentieth century. It considers Iorga not only as a historian, politician, journalist, literary critic, playwright, writer, poet, and linguist, but also as an orator, teacher, and a human being. Written by Nicholas M. Nagy-Talavera, a leading American scholar, and based on archival sources and family documents, this book is the first biography to present a complete portrait of the world-renowned historian Nicolae Iorga.

Book by Porter, Jack Nusan

Ask an old-timer what life was like in rural upstate New York during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and you will hear about the dances and bees that brought villagers and farmers together. You will hear of favorite fiddlers who held center stage with dance tunes taken from early British and American sources. You will hear of old-time music and its significance to a people making the transition from a rural, agricultural life to an urban, industrial one. Old-Time Music Makers of New York State is the first book published on this rich legacy of traditional Anglo-American music and dance. It traces the development of old-time music beginning with its movement into New York State from New England in the early nineteenth century and to its combination with commercial country music in the twentieth century. Exploring the regional character of the music and its meaning co the people who enjoy it, Bronner introduces memorable figures from the major periods in the development of old-time music, and he places their stories, their lives, and their music in the context of the region's cultural and historical changes. This is much more than a regional study, however. Bronner brings to the fore issues of national scope and interest. He discusses the relationship of old-time music to the commercial country music with which it has been closely aligned, and he challenges the prevailing wisdom that the origins of country music are in the South. Musician, fan, folklorist, and historian alike will benefit from and enjoy this book. The many musical transcriptions, annotations, photographs, and appendixes provide a valuable reference to be used again and again.

"First published in 1987, and encompassing texts from almost four decades, Kleist, moss, pheasants brings together autobiographical pieces, diary entries and reflections on fellow authors by Ilse Aichinger. As Richard Reichensperger remarks, the volume demonstrates the complex interconnections between historical events and Aichinger's life, thought and writing. The style, tone, and force of Kleist, moss, pheasants foreshadow the major achievements of Aichinger's late productive period around the turn of the millennium, which are evidenced in Film and fate and Improbable journeys."--Back cover.

Arguing that all human beings are incorrigibly autobiographical and that the most common mode of autobiography is oral and partial, this book maps out the diversity of autobiographical practices and seeks to introduce them to teachers and educators.

Albert Meltzer (1920-whenever) has been involved actively in class struggles since the age of 15; exceptionally for his generation in having been a convinced Anarchist from the start, without any family background in such activity. I Couldn't Paint Golden Angels is a lively, witty account of what he claims would have been the commonplace life of a worker but for the fact that he spent sixty years in anarchist activism. As a result it is a unique recounting of many struggles otherwise distorted or unrecorded, including the history of the contemporary development of anarchism in Britain and other countries where he was involved, notably Spain. His story tells of many struggles, including for the first time, the Anglo-Spanish cooperation in the post-War anti-Franco resistance and provides interesting sidelights on, amongst others, the printers' and miners' strikes, fighting Blackshirts and the battle of Cable Street, the so-called Angry Brigade activities, the Anarchist Black Cross, the Cairo Mutiny and wartime German anti-Nazi resistance, the New Left of the 60s, the rise of squatting - and through individuals as varied as Kenyata, Emma Goldman, George Orwell, Guy Aldred and Frank Ridley - all of which have crowded out not only his story, but his life too.

The only country in the world with a line in its national anthem as desperate as “this people has already suffered for its past and its future,” Hungary is a nation defined by poverty, despair, and conflict. Its history, of course, took an even darker and more tragic turn during the Holocaust. But the story of the Jews in Hungary is also one of survival, heroism, and even humor—and that is the one acclaimed author Adam Biro sets out to recover in One Must Also Be Hungarian , an inspiring and altogether poignant look back at the lives of his family members over the past two hundred years. A Hungarian refugee and celebrated novelist working in Paris, Biro recognizes the enormous sacrifices that his ancestors made to pave the way for his successes and the envious position he occupies as a writer in postwar Europe. Inspired, therefore, to share the story of his family members with his grandson, Biro draws some moving pictures of them here: witty and whimsical vignettes that convey not only their courageous sides, but also their inner fears, angers, jealousies, and weaknesses—traits that lend an indelible humanity to their portraiture. Spanning the turn of the nineteenth century, two destructive world wars, the dramatic rise of communism, and its equally astonishing fall, the stories here convey a particularly Jewish sense of humor and irony throughout—one that made possible their survival amid such enormous adversity possible. Already published to much acclaim in France, One Must Also Be Hungarian is a wry and compulsively readable book that rescues from oblivion the stories of a long-suffering but likewise remarkable and deservedly proud people.

Sitting in Judgement 1913-63 An Interpretation of History

In the summer of 2000 a young Irish journalist returned from New York to launch a magazine about life in boomtown Dublin. The Dubliner was an instant failure, and within a few months it was close to bankruptcy. For the next seven years Trevor White struggled to keep the magazine afloat. Along the way he managed to alienate nearly everyone in Ireland. The Dubliner Diaries is an awkward history of the Celtic Tiger by a man who tried to capture it, and ended up being mauled.

The Blackwell Dictionary of Judaica contains more than 7,000 concise entries and nearly half a million words on every aspect of Jewish history, civilization and religion. It will prove invaluable not only for students and teachers, but also for everyone who is interested in the fascinating richness of the Jewish tradition. In a single volume, the wealth of the Jewish heritage is uncovered in direct and simple words. This is a vital reference work for everyone who wishes to know about the development of Judaism from ancient times to the present day, and it deserves a place in every library and every Jewish home.

'Bill Freund, the late social historian and leading analyst of African history, passed away in 2020 soon after finishing his autobiography. Often described as the academy's 'outsider insider', he was an eminent South African historian who published prodigiously in the areas of labour, capital and economic history. What influenced this American-educated academic to become such an astute and trusted observer of the political economy in Africa? We follow Bill's intellectual journey from a modest Jewish home in Chicago in the 1950s to the Universities of Chicago, Yale, Ahmadu Bello University in Nigeria and Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania, and finally to a permanent teaching position at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban, South Africa. Peppered in between the commentaries on academic life are stories of his travels, poems he wrote for loved ones, and endearing anecdotes of friendships that shaped his life. As an 'outsider', both in the United States and abroad, he is able to offer rich insights into the world of Africanists and their scholarship on different continents. His thoughtful and balanced observations on late- and post-apartheid South Africa are especially interesting and refreshing. This posthumously published autobiography will give deeper insight into this unusual man and the world that shaped him - and which he in turn influenced through a deep commitment to rigorous scholarship. It includes a select bibliography of Bill Freund's many publications as well as a foreword by Robert Morrell on the making of this autobiography."--Amazon description.

This milestone extensive work combines the essentials of history – biography, chronology, political and economic background – with the observations, theories, principles, laws and equations that constitute the specifics of science. The 5800-page Encyclopedia arises from the conviction that the optimal perspective on science is through the lens of history, setting aside traditional divisions of discipline and specialty, and rising above geopolitical boundaries. Reaching from 4,200 BCE to the 21st century CE, the Encyclopedia tells (as the author himself puts it) "not only who did it and when it was done but also precisely what was done." The author, Ari Ben-Menahem, surveys 100 generations of great thinkers, offering 2070 detailed biographies of scientists, engineers, explorers and inventors, who left their mark on the history of science and technology. The span of coverage is all-encompassing: mathematics, philosophy, logic, physical and environmental sciences (including physics, chemistry, astronomy, earth and space sciences and cosmology), life sciences (biology, medicine, physiology, botany, zoology and biochemistry), associated engineering disciplines, and the social sciences (among them economics, psychology, sociology, anthropology, linguistics and more). The six-volume Encyclopedia also includes 380 articles summarizing the time-line of ideas in the leading fields of science, technology, mathematics and philosophy, plus useful tables, figures and photos, and 20 ‘Science Progress Reports’ detailing scientific setbacks. Interspersed throughout are quotations, gathered from the wit and wisdom of sages, savants and scholars throughout the ages from antiquity to modern times.

'The Conscience of Lebanon: A Political Biography of Etienne Sakr' combines an account of a Lebanese personality with a penetrating analysis of the historical and religious contours of Lebanon. His life is part of the national epic with elements of Christian faith and Maronite sophistication, interconfessional modes of partnership, and violence tearing apart the fabric of social and economic life. Integral to the narrative and incisively unconventional interpretation is the complex politics of Lebanon intermixed with the war that erupted in 1975." "Personal testimonies from Lebanese residents and conversations with others outside Lebanon, who knew Abu-Arz, in addition to interviews with Israelis acquainted with him, provide a dimension of authenticity to the portrait drawn of this remarkable man. Etienne Sakr, with a steadfast ideological commitment to a non-Arab Lebanese identity and political independence, fought the Syrian and Palestinian intruders, and with his Guardians of the Cedars Party cooperated with Israel. While ineluctably embroiled in the inter-Christian power struggles, Abu-Arz acquired a reputation as the conscience of Lebanon, but without achieving a position of power ascendancy. But he was present in the Lebanese Forces decision-making councils, and his own revelatory evidence contributes to an understanding of the agony and divisiveness that characterized the Christian leadership in the turmoil of war. His moral stance was clear and his political judgment filled with foresight, but hispatriots often preferred to ignore his message and marginalize his role.

This sweeping, eighty-year memoir is the last work of veteran journalist Israel Epstein (1915-2005), one of the very few Western writers to experience the Chinese Communist Revolution firsthand. Born in Poland and raised in China, Epstein served as a war correspondent from the front lines of the Chinese War of Resistance against Japan, as well as during the Communist-Nationalist struggle. Inspired by the immense social revolution taking place, Epstein took Chinese citizenship, only to be imprisoned during the Cultural Revolution. During this dark period, Epstein found his ideals challenged in ways he never imagined, yet his lifelong struggle for social equality has never wavered. This powerful memoir resonates with some of the twentieth century's most turbulent years and is a fascinating read for anyone interested in Chinese history.

Dollars for Scholars, Dr. Irving A. Fradkin, with Michael J. Vieira, Branden Books, Paperback ISBN 9780828319744 $19.95; E-Book ISBN 9780828319744, $9.99 It all started when Dr. Fradkin received the first donation: “Here’s a buck!” His organization, Citizens’ Scholarship Foundation of America , however, took hold when another donor said, “Here’s a million!” This book tells the story of Dr. Fradkin’s crusade to raise money so that thousands of needy students would have access to institutions of higher learning through his scholar-ship grants. When people say, only in America” they include the feats of Dr. Fradkin. He started with a dollar and grew it to tens of millions of dollars now administered by a national headquarters with hundreds of chapters located in every state, and counting benefactors by the tens of thousands. Dollars for Scholars is a tribute to Dr. Irving Fradkin whose vision and efforts have become emblematic in the concrete reality rooted in the phrase, “only in America.”

"In Film and Fate: Camera Flashes Illuminating a Life, Ilse Aichinger describes her past and her present largely from the viewpoint of her abiding passion for the cinema, and for still photography. She reflects on her life by discussing directors ranging from Luchino Visconti to Leni Riefenstahl, actors ranging from Orson Welles to Stan Laurel, and photographs by Bill Brandt depicting subjects as diverse as the Brontës’ Haworth Parsonage and London’s East End. Though Aichinger’s recollections are detailed, intriguing and vivid, they are pervaded by her sense of the contingency and fragility of existence – of how the presence of pictures and people in her life presages their disappearance, and of how 'memory shatters easily when you try to master it'" --