Other books that might interest you

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  China and the Chinese

  Herbert Allen Giles

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  Herbert Allen Giles (1845-1935) spent several years as a diplomat in China and in 1897 was appointed Cambridge University’s second professor of Chinese. His published works cover Chinese language and literature, history and philosophy. 
  This series of lectures, published as “China and the Chinese”, was given at Columbia University in 1902, to mark the establishment of a Chinese professorship there. The lectures were not intended for the specialist, more to urge a wider and more systematic study of China and its culture, and to encourage new students into the field. 
  While many of the observations are just as relevant today, others will remind us how much China has changed since the period of the Manchu Qing dynasty in which he wrote.(summary by David Barnes)

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  Anticipations

  H. G. Wells

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  Wells considered this book one of his most important, a natural follow-up to such works as his Man of the Year Million and The Time Machine. His goal was to get people to think and act in new ways. The book starts with a look at how humans get along socially and how they carry out their business ventures. It then discusses how these elements influence others, such as politics, the world of work, and education. H. G. tried to make clear how the current social order was disintegrating without preparing another to take its place. He then traced the roots of democracy, which in its present state he saw as unworkable. Instead, he proposed a new republic. He also critiqued modern warfare. (Summary by Bill Boerst)

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  The Pink Dress - A Memoir of a...

  Jane Little Botkin

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  Growing up in West Texas, Jane Little Botkin didn't have designs on becoming a beauty queen. But not long after joining a pageant on a whim in college, she became the first protégé of El Paso's Richard Guy and Rex Holt, known as the "Kings of Beauty"—just as the 1970's counterculture movement began to take off.A pink, rose-covered gown—a Guyrex creation—symbolizes the fairy tale life that young women in Jane's time imagined beauty queens had. Its near destruction exposes reality: the author's failed relationship with her mother, and her parents' failed relationship with one another. Weaving these narrative threads together is the Wild West notion that anything is possible, especially do-overs.The Pink Dress awakens nostalgia for the 1960s and 1970s, the era's conflicts and growth pains. A common expectation that women went to college to get "MRS" degrees—to find a husband and become a stay-at-home wife and mother—often prevailed. How does one swim upstream against this notion among feminist voices that protest "If You Want Meat, Go to a Butcher!" at beauty pageants, two flamboyant showmen, and a developing awareness of self? Torn between women's traditional roles and what women could be, Guyrex Girls evolved, as did the author.

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  The Courtier and the Heretic -...

  Matthew Stewart

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  Once upon a time, philosophy was a dangerous business—and for no one more so than for Baruch Spinoza, the seventeenth-century philosopher vilified by theologians and political authorities everywhere as "the atheist Jew." As his inflammatory manuscripts circulated underground, Spinoza lived a humble existence in The Hague, grinding optical lenses to make ends meet. Meanwhile, in the glittering salons of Paris, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was climbing the ladder of courtly success. In between trips to the opera and groundbreaking work in mathematics, philosophy, and jurisprudence, he took every opportunity to denounce Spinoza, relishing his self-appointed role as "God's attorney." 
   
   
   
  In this exquisitely written philosophical romance of attraction and repulsion, greed and virtue, religion and heresy, Matthew Stewart gives narrative form to an epic contest of ideas that shook the seventeenth century—and continues today.

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  History Hiding Around Broadway -...

  Teale Dvornik, James Monroe...

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  Go behind the scenes of the Great White Way with this illustrated guide to the Theater District’s hidden history--an essential book for your explorations of the district from a seasoned Broadway guide. Broadway is one of New York’s greatest treasures, and where there is treasure, there is a backstory. When it comes to Broadway, that backstory is fittingly juicy, dramatic, and unexpected. And no one knows these hidden histories like Teale Dvornik, who has been leading Broadway fans on tours of the theater district since 2017. With her immense knowledge and passion for the theater, Dvornik now takes readers on her one-of-a-kind tour of Broadway, “stopping” at each of the 41 theaters to tell us fun facts, lesser-known history, ghost tales, and interesting stories about actors, performances, stage flukes, blunders, and more, involving the biggest names and productions in theater history.  Learn about the Tiffany chandeliers of the Belasco Theater, the trove of hidden jewels at the Gershwin (which houses years of history from the beloved musical Wicked), and the impresarios and players who influenced Broadway. Readers will also learn the fascinating back stories of theater myths, legends, and traditions. Where did the stage ghost light come from? What started the tradition of intermissions? Which theaters have secret connecting hallways? And much, much more!  Along the way, Teale takes detours to explain stage lingo and dives into some of Broadways most popular shows, including CATS, Hello, Dolly!, and Rent. 

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  Black Evidence - A History and a...

  Candis Watts Smith

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  A fierce exposé of American resistance to believing Black people and its devastating effects throughout history. 
   
  From Reconstruction to redemption, civil rights to the Southern strategy, the multiracial protests of 2020 for social justice to the swift elimination of policies etching out a more inclusive, equitable society, Americans regularly experience periods of racial reckoning followed by walloping retrenchment. This pattern is a result of an American pastime: creating and implementing tactics to deny Black truth. Candis Watts Smith explores how Black voices have been prevented from contributing ideas to break these cycles. Distilling four centuries of critical moments in US history, this careful curation of vignettes provides a warning of what happens when Black testimony is subject to exclusion, when Black communities are terrorized, when Black children are transformed into adults, and when Black resistance is pathologized. Black Evidence shows how the ugly legacy of the past continues into our present and prescribes a cure—listen to the veracity of Black voices and amplify it.

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