Other books that might interest you

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  Bold Ventures - Thirteen Tales...

  Charlotte Van den Broeck

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  A prize-winning Belgian poet explores the nature of creative endeavor—the godlike ambition, the crushing defeat of failure—through the stories of thirteen tragic architects.In thirteen fascinating chapters, Charlotte Van den Broeck goes in search of buildings that were fatal to their architects—architects who either killed themselves or are rumored to have done so. They range across time and space from a church with a twisted spire in seventeenth-century France to a theater that collapsed mid-performance in 1920s Washington, DC, and an eerily sinking swimming pool in the author's hometown. Drawing on a vast range of material, from Hegel and Darwin to art history, stories from her own life, and popular culture, Van den Broeck brings patterns into focus as she asks, What is that strange, life-or-death connection between a creation and its creator?Threaded through each story is the author's meditation on the question of suicide—what Albert Camus called the "one truly serious philosophical problem"—in relation to creativity and public disgrace. The result is a profoundly idiosyncratic book, breaking ground in literary nonfiction, as well as providing solace and consolation to anyone who has ever attempted a creative act.

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  Extinction

  Hannie Rayson

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  A zoologist in Australia gets funding to save an endangered species from the very company that threatens its existence. Will this deal with the devil allow her to save the species, or will it  destroy her entire life's work?Includes an interview with playwright Hannie Rayson and director Martin Jarvis.Recorded at The Invisible Studios, West Hollywood, in September 2020.Extinction is part of L.A. Theatre Works’ Relativity Series of science-themed plays. Lead funding for the Relativity Seriesis provided by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, bridging science and the arts in the modern world.Directed by Martin JarvisProducing Director: Susan Albert LoewenbergSeamus Dever as Harry JewellSarah Drew as Dr. Piper RossDarren Richardson as Andy DixonJoanne Whalley as Prof. Heather Dixon-BrownProducer: Anna Lyse EriksonRecording Engineer, Editor, Sound Designer: Neil WogensenSenior Radio Producer: Ronn LipkinFoley Artist: Jeff GardnerMixed by Charles Carroll for The Invisible Studios, West Hollywood

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  Just around Midnight - Rock and...

  Jack Hamilton

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  Rooted in rhythm-and-blues pioneered by black musicians, 1950s rock and roll was racially inclusive and attracted listeners and performers across the color line. In the 1960s, however, rock and roll gave way to rock: a new musical ideal regarded as more serious, more artistic-and the province of white musicians. Decoding the racial discourses that have distorted standard histories of rock music, Jack Hamilton underscores how ideas of "authenticity" have blinded us to rock's inextricably interracial artistic enterprise.According to the standard storyline, the authentic white musician was guided by an individual creative vision, whereas black musicians were deemed authentic only when they stayed true to black tradition. Serious rock became white because only white musicians could be original without being accused of betraying their race. Juxtaposing Sam Cooke and Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin and Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and the Rolling Stones, and many others, Hamilton challenges the racial categories that oversimplified the sixties revolution and provides a deeper appreciation of the twists and turns that kept the music alive.

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  Duke Ellington

  Peter Gammond

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  Though first published in 1987, the Duke's music is timeless, and this excellent book, written by musicologist Peter Gammond, is now available as a modestly priced ebook. With numerous black & white historic photos, the readable narrative provides a chronological history of Duke Ellington's musical career starting as a part time pianist at Washington's Poodle Dog Cafe up to his death in 1974. But with its alphabetic list of all the sideman who ever worked with the Duke together with a detailed discography this book should be particularly prized as an essential reference work by all dedicated jazz enthusiasts: it lists all the Duke's recorded work from East St Louis Toodle-oo in 1926 to the live recording of the Eastbourne Concert in 1973, faithfully detailing all the supporting sidemen on each recording date.

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  Alphonse Mucha and artworks

  Patrick Bade

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  Born in 1860 in a small Czech town, Alphonse Mucha (1860-1939) was an artist on the forefront of Art Nouveau, the modernist movement that swept Paris in the 1910s, marking a return to the simplicity of natural forms, and changing the world of art and design forever. In fact, Art Nouveau was known to insiders as the “Mucha style” for the legions of imitators who adapted the master’s celebrated tableaux. Today, his distinctive depictions of lithe young women in classical dress have become a pop cultural touchstone, inspiring album covers, comic books, and everything in between. Patrick Bade and Victoria Charles offer readers an inspiring survey of Mucha’s career, illustrated with over one hundred lustrous images, from early Parisian advertisements and posters for Sandra Bernhardt, to the famous historical murals painted just before his death, at the age of 78, in 1939.

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  Martin Luther King Jr - A King...

  Angela Farris Watkins

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  In this “handsome photo-essay . . . family members across generations and a few close friends remember the man they knew as ‘M. L.’” (Booklist). 
   
  Martin Luther King Jr.’s family comes together for the first time to share their reflections and memories of the great civil rights leader in this touching and intimate volume. Included are contributions from his sister (the only surviving member of his immediate family), his children, his in-laws, his nieces and nephews, and even his grandchildren, who, although they never met him, explain what his legacy means to them.  
   
  Unlike the iconic persona of statues and portraits, the book presents a loving view of the man who used to sneaking naps during holiday meals and playing games with his nieces and nephews. Alongside these tributes are never-before-published family photos of Dr. King, as well as new photographs of the memorial dedicated to him in August 2011 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

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