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  Shadows of Love Shadows of...

  William T. Vollmann

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  In this landmark collection, William T. Vollmann offers a kaleidoscopic retrospective of the visual artwork he has produced over four decades, with new commentary from Vollmann on his process, inspiration, and the many intersections with his writing. 
   
   
   
  The celebrated author of over twenty-five books (among them the National Book Award–winning novel Europe Central; the seven-volume Rising Up and Rising Down, based on Vollmann's career as a war correspondent; and the two-volume climate change investigation Carbon Ideologies), Vollmann's equally ambitious and prolific career as a photographer, printmaker, and painter reflects the artist's deep interest in people existing on the margins, a profound empathy for his subjects, and the humility and generosity to meet them on their terms. 
   
   
   
  In Shadows of Love, Shadows of Loneliness, a series of essays commissioned especially for this book lays out Vollmann's views on what photographs can and should say, how he chooses what to represent (beauty, suffering, compassion, love, desire, ideology), thoughts on photographic consensuality, and any number of technical descriptions. Particularly useful for Vollmann fans and scholars are the cross-references between these artistic and photographic projects and his books.

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  Mutiny - A womans quest for...

  Dorothy Edwards

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  Dorothy Edwards, an only child, was born on the 18th August 1902 at Ogmore Vale in Glamorgan. 
   
  Her father was a headmaster and an early activist in the Independent Labour Party.  At age 9 Dorothy, dressed in red, welcomed Keir Hardy on to the stage at Tonypandy during the national coal strike of 1912. She was taught that revolution was at hand, that class barriers would be a thing of the past. 
    
  Dorothy won a scholarship and boarded at Howell's School for Girls in Llandaff before moving to University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire where she read Greek and philosophy. 
   
  Her early hopes to be an opera singer were set to one side after graduating and the death of her father. Instead she took on part-time work to supplement her mother’s pension with whom she now lived. 
   
  Dorothy managed to write a number of short stories which appeared in the literary journals of the day.  She spent several months with her mother in Vienna, all the time revising or writing before embarking on ‘Winter Sonata’, a short novel published in 1928. 
   
  Introductions to several members of the Bloomsbury Group meant a move to London and a division of her time between child-care for the family of Bloomsbury author David Garnett and the promise of an advance payment for her work on a new volume of stories. 
   
  However, Dorothy’s life was starting to spiral out of control; she was attracted to the Welsh nationalist movement but felt that her Welsh provincialism made her, in London at least, feel socially inferior. Leaving her mother dependent on a hired companion consumed her with guilt as did the end of an affair with a married musician. 
   
  On the 5th January 1934, having spent the morning burning her papers, Dorothy Edwards threw herself in front of a train near Caerphilly railway station.  
   
  Her suicide note read: "I am killing myself because I have never sincerely loved any human being all my life. I have accepted kindness and friendship and even love without gratitude, and given nothing in return."

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  Top 10 Short Stories The - The...

  Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins,...

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  Short stories have always been a sort of instant access into an author’s brain, their soul and heart.  A few pages can lift our lives into locations, people and experiences with a sweep of landscape, narration, feelings and emotions that is difficult to achieve elsewhere. 
   
  In this series we try to offer up tried and trusted ‘Top Tens’ across many different themes and authors. But any anthology will immediately throw up the questions – Why that story? Why that author?  
   
  The theme itself will form the boundaries for our stories which range from well-known classics, newly told, to stories that modern times have overlooked but perfectly exemplify the theme.  Throughout the volume our authors whether of instant recognition or new to you are all leviathans of literature. 
   
  Some you may disagree with but they will get you thinking; about our choices and about those you would have made.  If this volume takes you on a path to discover more of these miniature masterpieces then we have all gained something. 
   
  This mid-century decade reveals a journey traversing continents and genres as authors explore and revel in the tumultuous times of social upheaval as nations are divided by Civil War or expand with the brute force of Imperial Dreams.  Our writers also explore other genres including the absurd and ghostly with consummate ease. 
   
  01 - Top Ten - The 1860's - An Introduction 
  02 - The Signalman by Charles Dickens 
  03 - The Crocodile. An Extraordinary Incident - Part 1 by Fyodor Dostoyevsky 
  04 - The Crocodile. An Extraordinary Incident - Part 2 by Fyodor Dostoyevsky 
  05 - The Romance of Certain Old Clothes by Henry James 
  06 - Malachi's Cove by Anthony Trollope 
  07 - The Luck of Roaring Camp by Bret Harte 
  08 - The Brothers by Louisa May Alcott 
  09 - The Father by Bjornstjerne Bjornson 
  10 - The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calveras Country by Mark Twain 
  11 - The Phantom Coach by Amelia Edwards 
  12 - The Dream Woman by Wilkie Collins

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  Oz: The Complete Collection

  L. Frank Baum

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  Here you will find the complete OZ Collection:1. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz Starts at Chapter 1 2. The Marvelous Land of Oz Starts at Chapter 253. Ozma of Oz Starts at Chapter 494. Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz Starts at Chapter 705. The Road to Oz Starts at Chapter 906. The Emerald City of Oz Starts at Chapter 1147. The Patchwork Girl of Oz Starts at Chapter 1448. Tik-Tok of Oz Starts at Chapter 1729. The Scarecrow of Oz Starts at Chapter 19710. Rinkitink in Oz Starts at Chapter 22111. The Lost Princess of Oz Starts at Chapter 24512. The Tin Woodman of Oz Starts at Chapter 27113. The Magic of Oz Starts at Chapter 29514. Glinda of Oz Starts at Chapter 318

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  Little Matsue and other tales

  Larry Boyd

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  Little Matsue and Other Tales encompasses a magnificent thread of entangled journeys of acceptance and resignation, but also longing, and resolution. The uniqueness of each story comes from Larry Boyd’s intricate and vivid storytelling, which allows the reader to effortlessly step into the point of view of the characters and connect to their most nuanced emotions. From the graphic, imaginative way a little girl interprets the world around her, to the surprisingly relatable dynamics displayed by a family of fish, Little Matsue and Other Tales brings about the perfect blend between realistic and fictional narratives.  
  ‘Boyd boldly dances through that liminal space between child and adult until your eyes leak and your body aches. Fiercely imaginative, Little Matsue, will have you whizzing through kingdoms and time, writhing with rage, seduced by new love and building with dinosaur bones. You will laugh at the Oceanic Olympics as much as you will mourn for the strong woman you’ve just met lying in the grave. This book is insightful, a little mad and deeply enjoyable.’ Kate Liston-Mills, Dear Ibis  
  ‘A gifted storyteller with a wry, original view, Larry Boyd is equally at ease in the worlds of 12th century China or the hip-hop community. His wonderfully diverse stories are full of sly humour and unexpected twists. There’s the tragedy of a daughter of a Polish migrant navigating Australian Christmas at its ugliest, the misadventure of a servant in feudal Japan and even an ironic take on fishy tales. Boyd gets inside his characters; a child fantasising to escape feuding parents, a father struggling with his role as his baby son’s primary carer, a teenage music student inspired by his first sexual experience. This is story telling at its traditional best.’ 
  Sally Blakeney, journalist 

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  A Scene from the Ghetto of...

  Rainer Maria Rilke

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  René Karl Wilhelm Johann Josef Maria Rilke was born into a troubled marriage on the 4th December 1875 in Prague, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.  His mother, having previously lost a baby girl, would dress the young boy up in girl’s clothing.   
  Later his father dispatched him to a military academy at age 10 but after a miserable 5 years the young Rilke left due to illness and instead entered first Prague and then Munich and finally Berlin university to study art history, philosophy and literature. 
  His initial forays into literature was in poetry.  His intense, mystical and lyrical style was much admired and over time inspired many in succeeding generations.    
  His short prose collection ‘Stories of God’, written in an impassioned burst over several nights was published in 1900 and offers a beguiling view of much of Rilke’s influences and outlook.  
  The following year he married the pioneering sculptor and artist Clara Westhoff.  The union produced one child, a daughter Ruth.   
  He lived in Paris for most of the Century’s first decade where he mixed with many great minds of the time.  Although he continued to write he also worked as a secretary to the sculptor, Rodin.   
  It was only after they settled in Switzerland in 1919 that his writing output was in full flow.  Here he wrote profusely in both German and French, which included much on his previous travels, his left-wing sympathies, his religious and existential thoughts, all part of a unique and consummate style. 
  From 1923 on, Rilke increasingly struggled with his health which was now in constant decline and often spent time rehabilitating at a sanatorium.   
  Rainer Maria Rilke died of leukaemia on the 29th December 1926 in Montreux, Switzerland.  He was 51.

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