Autobiography A Very Short Introduction

Author : Laura Marcus
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0191647047
Total Pages : 144 pages
Book Rating : 4.48/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Autobiography: A Very Short Introduction written by Laura Marcus and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-05-31 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Autobiography is one of the most popular of written forms. From Casanova to Benjamin Franklin to the Kardashians, individuals throughout history have recorded their own lives and experiences. These personal writings are central to the work of literary critics, philosophers, historians and psychologists, who have found in autobiographies from across the centuries not only an understanding of the ways in which lives have been lived, but the most fundamental accounts of what it means to be a self in the world. In this Very Short Introduction Laura Marcus defines what we mean by 'autobiography', and considers its relationship with similar literary forms such as memoirs, journals, letters, diaries, and essays. Analysing the core themes in autobiographical writing, such as confession, conversion and testimony; romanticism and the journeying self; Marcus discusses the autobiographical consciousness (and the roles played by time, memory and identity), and considers the relationship between psychoanalysis and autobiography. Exploring the themes of self-portraiture and performance, Marcus also discusses the ways in which fiction and autobiography have shaped each other. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

Author : Laura Marcus
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0191647055
Total Pages : 176 pages
Book Rating : 4.55/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Autobiography: A Very Short Introduction written by Laura Marcus and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2018-07-19 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Autobiography is one of the most popular of written forms. From Casanova to Benjamin Franklin to the Kardashians, individuals throughout history have recorded their own lives and experiences. These personal writings are central to the work of literary critics, philosophers, historians and psychologists, who have found in autobiographies from across the centuries not only an understanding of the ways in which lives have been lived, but the most fundamental accounts of what it means to be a self in the world. In this Very Short Introduction Laura Marcus defines what we mean by 'autobiography', and considers its relationship with similar literary forms such as memoirs, journals, letters, diaries, and essays. Analysing the core themes in autobiographical writing, such as confession, conversion and testimony; romanticism and the journeying self; Marcus discusses the autobiographical consciousness (and the roles played by time, memory and identity), and considers the relationship between psychoanalysis and autobiography. Exploring the themes of self-portraiture and performance, Marcus also discusses the ways in which fiction and autobiography have shaped each other. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

Author : Hermione Lee
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0199533547
Total Pages : 185 pages
Book Rating : 4.41/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Biography: A Very Short Introduction written by Hermione Lee and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2009-07-09 with total page 185 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Biographies are one of the most popular and best-selling of the literary genres. Why do people like them? What does a biography do and how does it work? This Very Short Introduction examines different types of biographies, why certain people and historical events arouse so much interest, and how they are compared with history and fiction.

Author : Ritchie Robertson
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0192804553
Total Pages : 150 pages
Book Rating : 4.56/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Kafka: A Very Short Introduction written by Ritchie Robertson and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2004-10-28 with total page 150 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Franz Kafka is one of the most intriguing writers of the 20th century. In this text the author provides an up-to-date introduction to Kafka, beginning with an examination of his life and then discussing some of the major themes that emerge in Kafka's work.

Author : Michael Tanner
Publisher : OUP Oxford
ISBN 13 : 0191540404
Total Pages : 127 pages
Book Rating : 4.00/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Nietzsche: A Very Short Introduction written by Michael Tanner and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2000-10-19 with total page 127 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) was almost wholly neglected during his sane life, which came to an abrupt end in 1889. Since then he has been appropriated as an icon by an astonishingly diverse spectrum of people, whose interpretations of his thought range from the highly irrational to the firmly analytical. Thus Spoke Zarathustra introduced the 'superman' and The Twilight of the Idols developed the 'Will to Power' concept; these term, together with 'Sklavenmoral' and 'Herrenmoral', became confused with the rise of nationalism in Germany. Idiosyncratic and aphoristic, Nietzsche is always bracing and provocative, and temptingly easy to dip into. Michael Tanner's readable introduction to the philosopher's life and work examines the numerous ambiguities inherent in his writings. It also explodes the many misconceptions fostered in the hundred years since Nietzsche wrote, prophetically: 'Do not, above all, confound me with what I am not!' ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

Author : Peter Hainsworth
Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 0199684774
Total Pages : 145 pages
Book Rating : 4.79/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Dante written by Peter Hainsworth and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2015 with total page 145 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this Very Short Introduction, Peter Hainsworth and David Robey take a different approach to Dante, by examining the main themes and issues that run through all of his work, ranging from autobiography, to understanding God and the order of the universe. In doing so, they highlight what has made Dante a vital point of reference for modern writers and readers, both inside and outside Italy. They emphasize the distinctive and dynamic interplay in Dante's writing between argument, ideas, and analysis on the one hand, and poetic imagination on the other. Dante was highly concerned with the political and intellectual issues of his time, demonstrated most powerfully in his notorious work,The Divine Comedy. Tracing the tension between the medieval and modern aspects, Hainsworth and Robey provide a clear insight into the meaning of this masterpiece of world literature. They highlight key figures and episodes in the poem, bringing out the originality and power of Dante's writing to help readers understand the problems that Dante wanted his audience to confront but often left up to the reader to resolve. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.

Author : Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky
Publisher : New York Review of Books
ISBN 13 : 1590176960
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.62/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Autobiography of a Corpse written by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky and published by New York Review of Books. This book was released on 2013-12-03 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An NYRB Classics Original Winner of the 2014 PEN Translation Prize Winner of the 2014 Read Russia Prize The stakes are wildly high in Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky’s fantastic and blackly comic philosophical fables, which abound in nested narratives and wild paradoxes. This new collection of eleven mind-bending and spellbinding tales includes some of Krzhizhanovsky’s most dazzling conceits: a provincial journalist who moves to Moscow finds his existence consumed by the autobiography of his room’s previous occupant; the fingers of a celebrated pianist’s right hand run away to spend a night alone on the city streets; a man’s lifelong quest to bite his own elbow inspires both a hugely popular circus act and a new refutation of Kant. Ordinary reality cracks open before our eyes in the pages of Autobiography of a Corpse, and the extraordinary spills out.

Author : Dan Stone
Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0198790708
Total Pages : 170 pages
Book Rating : 4.09/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Concentration Camps written by Dan Stone and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2017 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Concentration camps are a relatively new invention, a recurring feature of twentieth century warfare, and one that is important to the modern global consciousness and identity. Although the most famous concentration camps are those under the Nazis, the use of concentration camps originated several decades before the Third Reich, in the Philippines and in the Boer War, and they have been used again in numerous locations, not least during the genocides in Bosnia. They have become defining symbols of humankind's lowest point and basest acts. In this book, Dan Stone gives a global history of concentration camps, and shows that it is not only mad dictators who have set up camps, but instead all varieties of states, including liberal democracies, that have made use of them. Setting concentration camps against the longer history of incarceration, he explains how the ability of the modern state to control populations led to the creation of this extreme institution. Looking at their emergence and spread around the world, Stone argues that concentration camps serve the purpose, from the point of view of the state in crisis, of removing a section of the population that is perceived to be threatening, traitorous, or diseased. Drawing on contemporary accounts of camps, as well as the philosophical literature surrounding them, Stone considers the story camps tell us about the nature of the modern world as well as about specific regimes.

Author : Akira Kurosawa
Publisher : Vintage
ISBN 13 : 030780321X
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.14/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Something Like An Autobiography written by Akira Kurosawa and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2011-07-27 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Translated by Audie E. Bock. "A first rate book and a joy to read.... It's doubtful that a complete understanding of the director's artistry can be obtained without reading this book.... Also indispensable for budding directors are the addenda, in which Kurosawa lays out his beliefs on the primacy of a good script, on scriptwriting as an essential tool for directors, on directing actors, on camera placement, and on the value of steeping oneself in literature, from great novels to detective fiction." --Variety "For the lover of Kurosawa's movies...this is nothing short of must reading...a fitting companion piece to his many dynamic and absorbing screen entertainments." --Washington Post Book World

Author : Max Saunders
Publisher : OUP Oxford
ISBN 13 : 0191614734
Total Pages : 608 pages
Book Rating : 4.36/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Self Impression written by Max Saunders and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2010-04-22 with total page 608 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: I am aware that, once my pen intervenes, I can make whatever I like out of what I was.' Paul Valéry, Moi. Modernism is often characterized as a movement of impersonality; a rejection of auto/biography. But most of the major works of European modernism and postmodernism engage in very profound and central ways with questions about life-writing. Max Saunders explores the ways in which modern writers from the 1870s to the 1930s experimented with forms of life-writing - biography, autobiography, memoir, diary, journal - increasingly for the purposes of fiction. He identifies a wave of new hybrid forms from the late nineteenth century and uses the term 'autobiografiction' - discovered in a surprisingly early essay of 1906 - to provide a fresh perspective on turn-of-the-century literature, and to propose a radically new literary history of Modernism. Saunders offers a taxonomy of the extraordinary variety of experiments with life-writing, demonstrating how they arose in the nineteenth century as the pressures of secularization and psychological theory disturbed the categories of biography and autobiography, in works by authors such as Pater, Ruskin, Proust, 'Mark Rutherford', George Gissing, and A. C. Benson. He goes on to look at writers experimenting further with autobiografiction as Impressionism turns into Modernism, juxtaposing detailed and vivacious readings of key Modernist texts by Joyce, Stein, Pound, and Woolf, with explorations of the work of other authors - including H. G. Wells, Henry James, Joseph Conrad, Ford Madox Ford, and Wyndham Lewis - whose experiments with life-writing forms are no less striking. The book concludes with a consideration of the afterlife of these fascinating experiments in the postmodern literature of Nabokov, Lessing, and Byatt. Self Impression sheds light on a number of significant but under-theorized issues; the meanings of 'autobiographical', the generic implications of literary autobiography, and the intriguing relation between autobiography and fiction in the period.