Michael Dirda
Author
Language
English
Formats
Description
Hailed as "the best-read person in America" (The Paris Review) and "the best book critic in America" (The New York Observer), Michael Dirda's latest volume collects fifty of his witty and wide-ranging reflections on literary journalism, book collecting, and the writers he loves. As fans of his earlier books will expect, there are annotated lists galore -- and a revealing peek at the titles on Michael's nightstand. Funny and erudite, occasionally poignant...
Author
Publisher
Henry Holt
Pub. Date
2006.
Language
English
Description
Once out of school, most of us read for pleasure. Yet there is another equally important, though often overlooked, reason that we read: to learn how to live. Though books have always been understood as life-teachers, the exact way in which they instruct, cajole, and convince remains a subject of some mystery. Drawing on sources as diverse as Dr. Seuss and Simone Weil, P. G. Wodehouse and Isaiah Berlin, Pulitzer prize-winning critic Michael Dirda shows...
Author
Series
Publisher
National Endowment for the Arts
Pub. Date
2008.
Language
English
Description
Ursula K. Le Guin's A Wizard of Earthsea (1968) is arguably the most widely admired American fantasy novel of the past fifty years. The book's elegant diction, geographical sweep, and mounting suspense are quite irresistible. Earthsea, composed of an archipelago of many islands, is a land of the imagination, like Oz, Faerie, or the dream-like realm of our unconscious. Earthsea may not be a "real" world but it is one that our souls recognize as meaningful...
Author
Series
Publisher
Gollancz
Pub. Date
2016.
Language
English
Description
Seven hundred years after Nazism has permanently come to power Adolf Hitler is worshipped as a god. Christians have been marginalized, Jews have been eliminated, and women have been deprived of all rights. Europe is ruled by the Reich and the Japanese rule other parts of the world. Alfred, an Englishman, is on pilgrimage to Germany to visit sites related to Hitler and the rise of the Reich. Loathed as an Englishman, Alfred is murdered by the SS, but...