Straw Dogs

Author : John Gray
Publisher : Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ISBN 13 : 1466895756
Total Pages : 272 pages
Book Rating : 4.51/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Straw Dogs written by John Gray and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2016-03-29 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The British bestseller Straw Dogs is an exciting, radical work of philosophy, which sets out to challenge our most cherished assumptions about what it means to be human. From Plato to Christianity, from the Enlightenment to Nietzsche and Marx, the Western tradition has been based on arrogant and erroneous beliefs about human beings and their place in the world. Philosophies such as liberalism and Marxism think of humankind as a species whose destiny is to transcend natural limits and conquer the Earth. John Gray argues that this belief in human difference is a dangerous illusion and explores how the world and human life look once humanism has been finally abandoned. The result is an exhilarating, sometimes disturbing book that leads the reader to question our deepest-held beliefs. Will Self, in the New Statesman, called Straw Dogs his book of the year: "I read it once, I read it twice and took notes . . . I thought it that good." "Nothing will get you thinking as much as this brilliant book" (Sunday Telegraph).

Author : Stevie Simkin
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1350306487
Total Pages : 194 pages
Book Rating : 4.86/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Straw Dogs written by Stevie Simkin and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2011-09-12 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sam Peckinpah's Straw Dogs ignited fierce debate among censors, critics and audiences on both sides of the Atlantic on its release in 1971. When Amy (Susan George) returns to her home village with her American peacenik husband David (Dustin Hoffman), the residents of this tight-knit Cornish community slowly turn on them. The sexual tension and latent violence finally erupt in an explosion of violence that includes a rape scene that has remained controversial to this day. The film was heavily cut for theatrical release in the US, and the pressinspired furore in the UK led to several local councils cutting or banning it outright. Later, caught in the wake of the 'video nasties' panic of the 1980s, Straw Dogs was refused a home-video certificate in the UK for nearly twenty years. Stevie Simkin's study sheds light on the film's treatment by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) and tracks its subsequent tortuous journey towards home-video release, buffeted by various shifts in the BBFC's policy on representations of sexual violence. But, equally importantly, Simkin provides a highly original accountof themaking of the film, drawing on extensive research in Peckinpah's archive, including analysis of draft scripts, notes, memos and contemporary press items, as well as insights from a number of Peckinpah's associates, and key figures at the BBFC. 'A swift, compelling read. Thorough and scholarly without the faintest whiff of academic stuffiness, Stevie Simkin's study of Straw Dogs summons up the turmoil of the 1960s and 70s and illuminates the highly charged subject of sexual violence on film.' Stephen Farber, Film Critic, The Hollywood Reporter Stevie Simkin is Reader in Drama and Film at the University of Winchester, UK. He is the author of, among other works, Revenge Tragedy: A New Casebook (2001), Early Modern Tragedy and the Cinema of Violence (2005), and, also in the Controversies series, a volume on Basic Instinct (forthcoming, 2013).

Author : Bolaji Olatunde
Publisher : AuthorHouse
ISBN 13 : 145677607X
Total Pages : 570 pages
Book Rating : 4.77/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Straw Dogs written by Bolaji Olatunde and published by AuthorHouse. This book was released on 2011-04-19 with total page 570 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Olatundes lively imagination and wicked sense of humour maintain suspense and keep the plotline from tiring in this international, supernatural, semi-farcical thriller. Kirkus Reviews Shola Dina, son of a wealthy Nigerian socialite, is forced to flee from Nigeria to New York after the Abacha regime assassinates his father and threatens his life. As an migr in New York, he struggles to make ends meet. In May 1998, while employed as a waiter at an upscale restaurant, he has a chance encounter with Carol Moore, a notable Hollywood director, who casts him as a lead in her new movie. Things take an unexpected turn when Moore is murdered in her apartment midway into the movie production after she stumbles upon a telltale video recording of a covert plot to break into the White House to harm President Bill Clinton. Shola is implicated in her murder. The break in is sponsored by the Rose flower Committee, a secret Chinese hard-line communist organization which was founded during Chinas Cultural Revolution by Madame Mao and a young Chinese army officer, Tung Yuk-Kai, who had become a major general by 1998. Two weeks before China Summit II in June 1998, a Chinese secret agent contracted to execute the break in accidentally plunges to his death from the presidential bedroom of the White House. The Committee feeds American intelligence evidence linking Chinas President, Jiang Zemin, with the botched break in. Intensive investigations are quietly launched separately by the American and Chinese governments. Desperate to cover its tracks, the Rose flower Committee attempts its most daring mission a poison gas attack on a state dinner held in honour of Clinton in Beijing, a dinner scheduled to have Chinas top leaders in attendance. Straw Dogs is an account of the events surrounding the break in and the bomb plot. The novel has a cast of celebrities, disgruntled angels, secret service agents and members of the American Autosexual Society (AAS), an organisation which defends the rights of autosexuals; autosexual is a term which refers to an individual whose sexual preference is masturbation. The interactions of these odd characters results in a tale that is comic, action-packed and full of suspense.

Author : Gordon M. Williams
Publisher : Harvill Secker
ISBN 13 : 9780436571039
Total Pages : 221 pages
Book Rating : 4.3X/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Siege of Trencher's Farm written by Gordon M. Williams and published by Harvill Secker. This book was released on 1969 with total page 221 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Ye Chun
Publisher : Catapult
ISBN 13 : 1646220625
Total Pages : 337 pages
Book Rating : 4.25/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Straw Dogs of the Universe written by Ye Chun and published by Catapult. This book was released on 2023-10-17 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medals of Excellence A harrowing and redemptive immigrant story for readers of Pachinko A Chinese railroad worker and his young daughter—sold into servitude—in 19th century California search for family, fulfillment, and belonging in a violent new land "Heaven and earth do not pick and choose. They see everything as straw dogs." A sweeping historical novel of the American West from the little-seen perspective of those who helped to build it, Straw Dogs of the Universe traces the story of one Chinese father and his young daughter, desperate to find him against all odds. After her village is devastated by famine, 10-year-old Sixiang is sold to a human trafficker for a bag of rice and six silver coins. Her mother is reluctant to let her go, but the promise of a better life for her beloved daughter ultimately sways her. Arriving in America with the profits from her sale and a single photograph of Guifeng, her absent father, Sixiang journeys across an unfamiliar American landscape in the hopes of reuniting her family. As she makes her way through an unforgiving new world, her father, a railroad worker in California, finds his attempts to build a life for himself both upended and defined by along-lost love and the seemingly inescapable violence of the American West. A generational saga ranging from the villages of China to the establishment of the transcontinental railroad and the anti-Chinese movement in California, Straw Dogs of the Universe considers the tenacity of family ties and the courage it takes to survive in a country that rejects you, even as it relies upon your labor.

Author : John Gray
Publisher : Macmillan
ISBN 13 : 0374229171
Total Pages : 242 pages
Book Rating : 4.77/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Silence of Animals written by John Gray and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2013-06-04 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "An exploration of the failures of reason in human life and the enduring role of myth in science, politics, and morality"--

Author : Bernard F. Dukore
Publisher : University of Illinois Press
ISBN 13 : 9780252068027
Total Pages : 278 pages
Book Rating : 4.25/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Sam Peckinpah's Feature Films written by Bernard F. Dukore and published by University of Illinois Press. This book was released on 1999 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the greatest film directors America has produced, Sam Peckinpah revolutionized the way movies were made. In this detailed and insightful study, Bernard F. Dukore examines Peckinpah's fourteen feature films as a coherent body of work. He investigates the director's virtuosic editing techniques, thematic preoccupations that persist from his earliest to his last films, and the structure of his dramatic depiction of violence. He also addresses Peckinpah's cognizance of existentialism and the substantial traces this interest has left in the films. At the heart of Dukore's study is an extensive and detailed examination of Peckinpah's distinctive editing techniques. Focusing on representative sequences--including the breakout from the bank and the final battle in The Wild Bunch, the half-hour siege that concludes Straw Dogs, the killing of the title characters of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, and combat sequences in Cross of Iron--Dukore provides a shot-by-shot analysis that illuminates Peckinpah's mastery of pacing and mood. Sam Peckinpah's Feature Films demonstrates that Peckinpah's genius as a director and editor marks not only The Wild Bunch, Straw Dogs, and other classics but also his lesser-known feature films, even those that suffered substantial cuts at the hands of studio producers. Dukore's organic approach to the feature films reveals a highly unified body of work that remains a pointed commentary on power, violence, affection, and moral values.

Author : Kevin J. Hayes
Publisher : Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN 13 : 9781934110645
Total Pages : 220 pages
Book Rating : 4.47/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Sam Peckinpah written by Kevin J. Hayes and published by Univ. Press of Mississippi. This book was released on 2008 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Collected interviews with the combustible director of The Wild Bunch, Ride the High Country, Straw Dogs, The Getaway, and other films

Author : Neil Fulwood
Publisher : Batsford Books
ISBN 13 : 1849942544
Total Pages : 401 pages
Book Rating : 4.46/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Films of Sam Peckinpah written by Neil Fulwood and published by Batsford Books. This book was released on 2014-11-12 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A detailed look at the work of one of America's great film directors. Sam Peckinpah helped to redefine the Western, clearing the board of genre cliches in order to present an intelligent examination of the motivation behind, and effects of, violence. The accusations against Peckinpah for making violent films, both Westerns and non-Westerns, for the sake of it as well as misogyny have become cliches themselves. Like their creator, the men who walk or ride through Peckinpah's films are deep, complex and often flawed. Technical accomplishment and the ability to draw out great preformances from his actors are only part of what sets Peckinpah's Films apart. It is their depth and intensity that make them unique. This book takes an in-depth look at the man, his early work for television, and all his films. It covers the critical reception of his films, Peckinpah's approach to film direction, his on-set behaviour, and studio interference during editing. An Appraisal of the iconography of his films plus an analysis of recurring themes and pre-occupations show that his best work was the most personal.

Author : John Gray
Publisher : Farrar, Straus and Giroux
ISBN 13 : 9781429922982
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.82/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Black Mass written by John Gray and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2008-09-30 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For the decade that followed the end of the cold war, the world was lulled into a sense that a consumerist, globalized, peaceful future beckoned. The beginning of the twenty-first century has rudely disposed of such ideas—most obviously through 9/11and its aftermath. But just as damaging has been the rise in the West of a belief that a single model of political behavior will become a worldwide norm and that, if necessary, it will be enforced at gunpoint. In Black Mass, celebrated philosopher and critic John Gray explains how utopian ideals have taken on a dangerous significance in the hands of right-wing conservatives and religious zealots. He charts the history of utopianism, from the Reformation through the French Revolution and into the present. And most urgently, he describes how utopian politics have moved from the extremes of the political spectrum into mainstream politics, dominating the administrations of both George W. Bush and Tony Blair, and indeed coming to define the political center. Far from having shaken off discredited ideology, Gray suggests, we are more than ever in its clutches. Black Mass is a truly frightening and challenging work by one of Britain's leading political thinkers.