![]() ![]() His sexual urges are becoming too much and he needs to change but is unsure how. It’s through our protagonist’s eyes, Alexander Portnoy, that we experience his hardships, his falls, and his weaknesses with little compromise.Īlexander has a problem and he knows it. Portnoy’s Complaint is: ‘A disorder in which strongly felt ethical and altruistic impulses are perpetually warring with extreme sexual longings, often of a perverse nature.’ Philip Roth, Portnoy’s Complaint Alexander Portnoy But I’m here to review the book and what I think makes it so great. ![]() Portnoy’s Complaint Book ReviewĬriticism of this book involves it’s over-sexualisation, its use of Jewish stereotypes, and its candid nature in general. I think it was the controversy surrounding the man who drew me in.Ĭould this book really be as grotesque as others were making out? Would it be ‘ worse’ than Sabbath’s Theatre? I had to find out. However, there was something about Roth that was different. Most of the time when I click on one of these they go straight in my ‘ to-read’ list and are forgotten about. I was scrolling through Goodreads and he was a suggested read. I’m not sure how I discovered Philip Roth. I feel it’s important to tell you this as reading Portnoy’s Complaint made me fall in love with Philip Roth the writer. ![]() Portnoy’s Complaint is the second Philip Roth book that I ever read, Sabbath’s Theatre being my first. ![]()
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![]() ![]() ![]() |a A "prequel" to Michael Shaara's The killer angels. |a New York : |b Ballantine Books, |c 1996. Profound in its insights into the minds and hearts of those who fought in the war, Gods and Generals creates a vivid portrait of the soldiers, the battlefields, and the tumultuous times that forever shaped the nation.īONUS: This edition includes an excerpt from Jeff Shaara's Blaze of Glory. Lee, never believing until too late that a civil war would ever truly come to pass. Here is Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, a hopelessly by-the-book military instructor and devout Christian who becomes the greatest commander of the Civil War Winfield Scott Hancock, a captain of quartermasters who quickly establishes himself as one of the finest leaders of the Union army Joshua Chamberlain, who gives up his promising academic career and goes on to become one of the most heroic soldiers in American history and Robert E. In this brilliantly written epic novel, Jeff Shaara traces the lives, passions, and careers of the great military leaders from the first gathering clouds of the Civil War. The New York Times bestselling prequel to the Pulitzer Prize–winning classic The Killer Angels ![]() ![]() Photograph: Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images ![]() Touring acts from the US “minstrel show” movement would occasionally include South Africa in their itinerary, performing to largely segregated white and Black audiences.įrom ‘ uyimbube’ to ‘wimoweh’ … Pete Seeger and the Weavers in 1954. Religious schools that conscripted Black South Africans frequently trained students to sing American spirituals in English. Three decades later the song would become a centrepiece of Disney’s animated classic The Lion King.īefore being known as mbube, the genre was known to some as ingoma mbusuke, or “night music”, a domestic musical style that was heavily affected by colonial influences: missionaries and white singing troupes are credited as the first to introduce four-part vocal harmony on the continent. After spreading deeper into the US, another set of musicians, doo wop group the Tokens, added English lyrics, creating the 1961 US No 1 hit The Lion Sleeps Tonight, although Linda’s name was absent from the credits. In the hands of four white voices from New York City, the looped chorus of “ uyimbube” (“You are a lion” in Zulu) became “wimoweh”, and the title of their cover. In 1951, US folk singer Pete Seeger was handed a copy and decided to record a version with his band, the Weavers. ![]() But the song’s long, complicated history was just beginning. In 40s South Africa, Linda became a star. ![]() ![]() The threat has shifted from a totalitarian "big brother" state to a universal global architecture of automatic sensors and smart capabilities: A "big other" that imposes a fundamentally new form of power and unprecedented concentrations of knowledge in private companies-free from democratic oversight and control". The consequences of surveillance capitalism for us as individuals and as a society vividly come to life in The Age of Surveillance Capitalism's pathbreaking analysis of power. ![]() It is not simply about tracking us and selling ads, it is the business model for an ominous new marketplace that aims at nothing less than predicting and modifying our everyday behavior-where we go, what we do, what we say, how we feel, who we're with. Zuboff tackles the social, political, business, personal, and technological meaning of "surveillance capitalism" as an unprecedented new market form. ![]() Now, three decades later she asks why the once-celebrated miracle of digital is turning into a nightmare. Her seminal book In the Age of the Smart Machine foresaw the consequences of a then-unfolding era of computer technology. ![]() ![]() "Shoshana Zuboff, named "the true prophet of the information age" by the Financial Times, has always been ahead of her time. ![]() ![]() Readers are in for a razor-stuffed treat. Shroff deals sharply with misogyny and abuse, describing the misery inflicted as well as its consequences in unflinching detail, and is equally unsparing in her depictions of mean-girl culture in the village. After Geeta adopts Bada-Bhai’s sickest dog, whom she names Bandit, she begins allowing others into her life, including Saloni, which helps after Ramesh resurfaces. ![]() Geeta also connects with widower Karem, a bootlegger, though not before costing him his livelihood by putting a stop to Karem’s biggest buyer, Bada-Bhai (Bada-Bhai was cutting the booze with methanol and testing it on dogs, and Geeta frees the dogs). The Barnes & Noble Exclusive Edition features a. As well, Geeta admires the legendary Bandit Queen, who exacted revenge on those who’d wronged her, and agrees to help a local named Farah kill her husband (Farah’s first attempt backfired because she mistook hair growth pills for sleeping pills). Readers are Invited to Attend a Free Live Virtual Book Club Discussion Featuring Parini Shroff on Tuesday, February 7 New York, NY Janu Barnes & Noble is delighted to announce The Bandit Queens, the debut novel by Parini Shroff, as their first National Book Club pick of 2023. ![]() It’s a fortuitous development for Geeta, who’s become socially isolated after a fight with her lifelong friend Saloni, who’s part of the microloan group that funds Geeta’s jewelry business. Geeta’s unearned reputation for having killed her physically abusive husband, Ramesh (he’s not dead, he just ran off), prompts women to approach her for help. In Shroff’s acerbic debut, a woman helps other women escape their abusive marriages in their small village in India, often through murder. ![]() ![]() ![]() I first read Shogun in 1977 and have read it at least three times since then, maybe four. This what I applaud the book for, its action. I will also say that the main love story is a good one(but I have problems with it, if you read it you will find out). ![]() You would think after awhile it would get boring but surprisingly the author keeps you entertained most of the time. The novel for it’s size wasn’t a hard or slow read. How is that civilized? It’s just me complaining here, don’t pay no attention to me.Įnough of the complaining from me, the good parts. You have to take in account that Samurai were allowed to murder or rape anyone below their class. I would say that the author did put effort into it but its only prevalent theme was that “We are more civilized than we seem, actually no! We are way more civilized than you. It’s nothing more than adventure story and it has no literary merit. I don’t get that feeling at all from the book. To be honest I don’t think it made me want to go study or see more Japanese culture. ![]() This had supposedly a big affect on the Western part of the world and made us interested in Japanese culture. Everybody is saying they loved it? Well.I didn't. ![]() ![]() ![]() Some ministers, politicians, and police fled their constituents, while prostitutes and the poor risked their lives to nurse the sick. The story that Jeanette Keith uncovered is a profound-and never more relevant-account of how a catastrophe inspired reactions both heroic and cowardly. Fever Season chronicles the drama in Memphis from the outbreak in August until the disease ran its course in late October. ![]() The city of Memphis, Tennessee, was particularly hard hit: Of the approximately twenty thousand who didn't flee the city, seventeen thousand contracted the fever, and more than five thousand died-the equivalent of a million New Yorkers dying in an epidemic today. Moving up the Mississippi River in the late summer, in the span of just a few months the fever killed more than eighteen thousand people. While the American South had grown to expect a yellow fever breakout almost annually, the 1878 epidemic was without question the worst ever. ![]() ![]() ![]() He frequently speaks about issues related to Florida, climate change, and storytelling, including at DePaul, MIT, and the Guggenheim. ![]() For eleven years, VanderMeer served as the co-director of Shared Worlds, a unique teen SF/fantasy writing camp he helped found, located at Wofford College in South Carolina.Ĭalled “the weird Thoreau” by The New Yorker, VanderMeer has lived in Florida since he was in middle school, attending the University of Florida in Gainesville before moving to Tallahassee in 1992. Over a 35-year career, VanderMeer has been a four-time World Fantasy Award winner and 19-time nominee. ![]() Clarke Award), The Strange Bird, set in the Borne universe, are being developed for TV by AMC and continue to explore themes related to the environment, animals, and our future. Dead Astronauts, Borne (a finalist for the Arthur C. Recent works include Hummingbird Salamander and A Peculiar Peril, in addition to Theo Ellsworth’s graphic novel adaptation of his short story Secret Life. The first novel, Annihilation, won the Nebula Award and Shirley Jackson Award, and was made into a movie by Paramount in 2018. ![]() Jeff VanderMeer’s NYT-bestselling Southern Reach trilogy has been translated into over 35 languages. ![]() ![]() When Frederick grew into adulthood, he discovered more complicated set of writings that would help shape his moral being. Frederick learned the basics of reading and writing, which would be cornerstones to his future livelihood. While he was not permitted to attend school, Frederick paid some of the white children to teach him, usually presenting fresh baked goods to earn his keep. Still, young Frederick tried always to see the best in people and sought to better understand what was going on and his place in the larger picture. His being born in the middle of America’s love affair with the slave trade is not lost on the reader who pays attention to the early portion of Blight’s book. While he was a curious child, Frederick was also subjected to deplorable abuse towards those around him. Blight, I tried my best to understand how the man, his writings and outward sentiments shaped America, with views that still resonate today.įrederick Augustus Washington Bailey was born in a small shed on a plantation in Maryland, around 1817, the mulatto son of a slave and slaveholder. ![]() ![]() It also being Black History Month, I thought to educate myself a little more about the man and the impact he made on US history. ![]() At a time when race relations are strained, the name of Frederick Douglass is tossed around with great regularity. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() have collaborated and written what is effectively a prospective programme for the global women's movement, a feminist manifesto for the 99%. Cornel WestĬinzia Arruzza, Tithi Bhattacharya, and Nancy Fraser. Nancy Fraser is one of the most creative social philosophers and critical theorists of her generation. Analyzing an imaginary aimed at eradicating exploitation as well as subjugation, she offers a rousing conclusion as to how we might mobilize feminism’s best energies against the perils of the neoliberal present. Nancy Fraser challenges us to reactivate the audacious spirit of second-wave feminism. ![]() Axel Honnethįor more than a decade, Nancy Fraser's thought has helped to reframe the agenda of critical theory. Nancy Fraser is among the very few thinkers in the tradition of critical theory who are capable of redeeming its legacy in the twenty-first century. ![]() |