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On Royalty: A Very Polite Inquiry Into Some Strangely Related Families
The notable characteristic of the royal families of Europe is that they have so very little of anything remotely resembling true power. Increasingly, they tend towards the condition of pipsqueak principalities like Liechtenstein and Monaco—fancy-dress fodder for magazines that survive by telling us things we did not need to know about people we have hardly heard of. How then have kings and queens come to exercise the mesmeric hold they have upon our imaginations? In On Royalty renowned BBC journalist Jeremy Paxman examines the role of the British monarchy in an age when divine right no longer prevails and governing powers fall to the country's elected leaders. With intelligence and humor, he scrutinizes every aspect of the monarchy and how it has related to politics, religion, the military and the law. He takes us inside Buckingham Palace and illuminates the lives of the monarchs, at once mundane, absurd and magical. What Desmond Morris did for apes, Paxman has done for these primus inter primates: the royal families. Gilded history, weird anthropology and surreal reportage of the royals up close combine in On Royalty, a brilliant investigation into how an ancient institution struggles for meaning in a modern country. .
Price: $7.49
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Killed Strangely: The Death of Rebecca Cornell
"It was Rebecca's son, Thomas, who first realized the victim's identity His eyes were drawn to the victim's head, and aided by the flickering light of a candle, he 'clapt his hands and cryed out, Oh Lord, it is my mother.' James Moills, a servant of Cornell . . . described Rebecca 'lying on the floore, with fire about Her, from her Lower parts neare to the Armepits.' He recognized her only 'by her shoes.'"-from Killed Strangely On a winter's evening in 1673, tragedy descended on the respectable Rhode Island household of Thomas Cornell. His 73-year-old mother, Rebecca, was found close to her bedroom's large fireplace, dead and badly burned. The legal owner of the Cornells' hundred acres along Narragansett Bay, Rebecca shared her home with Thomas and his family, a servant, and a lodger. A coroner's panel initially declared her death "an Unhappie Accident," but before summer arrived, a dark web of events-rumors of domestic abuse, allusions to witchcraft, even the testimony of Rebecca's ghost through her brother-resulted in Thomas's trial for matricide. Such were the ambiguities of the case that others would be tried for the murder as well. Rebecca is a direct ancestor of Cornell University's founder, Ezra Cornell. Elaine Forman Crane tells the compelling story of Rebecca's death and its aftermath, vividly depicting the world in which she lived. That world included a legal system where jurors were expected to be familiar with the defendant and case before the trial even began. Rebecca's strange death was an event of cataclysmic proportions, affecting not only her own community, but neighboring towns as well. The documents from Thomas's trial provide a rare glimpse into seventeenth- century life. Crane writes, "Instead of the harmony and respect that sermon literature, laws, and a hierarchical/patriarchal society attempted to impose, evidence illustrates filial insolence, generational conflict, disrespect toward the elderly, power plays between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, [and] adult dependence on (and resentment of) aging parents who clung to purse strings." Yet even at a distance of more than three hundred years, Rebecca Cornell's story is poignantly familiar. Her complaints of domestic abuse, Crane says, went largely unheeded by friends and neighbors until, at last, their complacency was shattered by her terrible death..
Price: $15.38
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The Venetian's Wife: A Strangely Sensual Tale of a Renaissance Explorer, a Computer, and a Metamorphosis
Nick Bantock's illustrated novel, The Venetian's Wife, is part love story, part mystery, and part ghostly tale --and an altogether bewitching brew of sensuality and lost treasures Thoroughly bored with her job at the local museum, Sarah heads to the gallery to take another look at that new drawing, the one she can't stop thinking about, the one of the Hindu god Shiva, who dances...That's when it all begins. The next day, an e-mail message brings her a job offer: to find the few remaining pieces of a 15th-century adventurer's renowned collection of Indian sculptures. Her employer, curiously, wishes to communicate only by computer. She has no idea who he is or why he wants her. But other mysteries soon preoccupy her, such as the meaning of an enigmatic illuminated manuscript -- and the sensual transformation that seems to be overtaking her. Through her quirkily decorated diary and the artful e-mail exchanges between Sara and her mentor, Nick Bantock has conjured up a richly illustrated tale of a relentless quest, an amorous legacy, and the resonating power of art -- a lush, romantic adventure of the soul that tantalizes the reader to the last line.? Visit griffinandsabine.com!.
Price: $1.99
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Heart Strangely Warmed: The Life of John Wesley
Young Robert Upton peddled his father's wares on the streets of London. One day he met a fiery little preacher named John Wesley. Robert's life would never be the same again. At first he didn't know what to think of the people called Methodists he helped some other boys break up an evening meeting by beating loudly on old pots and pans. But Robert began to admire John Wesley. He saw how Wesley's preaching changed the lives of many people -- event some who tried to stop him. Robert heard people talk about being "converted." He wasn't sure what they meant. Robert and his father went to Wesley's meetings whenever they coud. They saw that Wesley took an interest in common people like themselves. He wrote booklets and talked to people about God. Gradually Robert began to understand what Wesley's preaching was all about. As he allowed God to work in his life, Robert found that his own heart, life Wesley's, was strangely warmed..
Price: $8.95
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Strangely Familiar
"In the past decade, designers have become increasingly engaged with the quotidian This shift away from more strictly formal and functional concerns has allowed them to freely explore design's contexts and effects. A light that responds to silence, a table that knows where it is, a pig farm the size of a skyscraper, a coat that becomes a tent, a house that fits in your pocket--these projects by innovators in the field of design question the habitual, transform the commonplace, alter our notions of dwelling and blur the boundaries between form and function. Strangely Familiar: Design and Everyday Life explores the paradox of design in our daily lives. Anonymous and conspicuous, familiar and strange, design surrounds us while fading from view, becoming second nature to us and yet remaining still somehow elusive. This exhibition catalogue includes more than 40 innovative projects drawn internationally from the fields of architecture, product, furniture, fashion and graphic design. Among the designers and architects featured are Shigeru Ban, MVRDV, LOT-EK, Atelier Bow-Wow, Dunne & Raby, Marcel Wanders, Michael Anastassiades, Constantin and Laurene Leon Boym, and Allan Wexler. This richly illustrated volume includes essays on the tactics of formlessness and its impact on everyday consumption, the potential of an endlessly transformable environment to extend product lifecycles, and ruminations on the strange and familiar worlds of design.".
Price: $17.97
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