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Books > History > World history > From 1900
First published in 1990, Songs of the Doomed is back in print -- by popular demand! In this third and most extraordinary volume of the Gonzo Papers, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson recalls high and hideous moments in his thirty years in the Passing Lane -- and no one is safe from his hilarious, remarkably astute social commentary. With Thompson's trademark insight and passion about the state of American politics and culture, Songs of the Doomed charts the long, strange trip from Kennedy to Quayle in Thompson's freewheeling, inimitable style. Spanning four decades -- 1950 to 1990 -- Thompson is at the top of his form while fleeing New York for Puerto Rico, riding with the Hell's Angels, investigating Las Vegas sleaze, grappling with the "Dukakis problem," and finally, detailing his infamous lifestyle bust, trial documents, and Fourth Amendment battle with the Law. These tales -- often sleazy, brutal, and crude -- are only the tip of what Jack Nicholson called "the most baffling human iceberg of our time." Songs of the Doomed is vintage Thompson -- a brilliant, brazen, bawdy compilation of the greatest sound bites of Gonzo journalism from the past thirty years.
In 2016, Britain stunned itself and the world by voting to pull out
of the European Union, leaving financial markets reeling and global
politicians and citizens in shock. But was Brexit really a
surprise, or are there clues in Britain's history that pointed to
this moment? In A History of Britain: 1945 to the Brexit,
award-winning historian Jeremy Black reexamines modern British
history, considering the social changes, economic strains, and
cultural and political upheavals that brought Britain to Brexit.
This sweeping and engaging book traces Britain's path through the
destruction left behind by World War II, Thatcherism, the threats
of the IRA, the Scottish referendum, and on to the impact of waves
of immigration from the European Union. Black overturns many
conventional interpretations of significant historical events,
provides context for current developments, and encourages the
reader to question why we think the way we do about Britain's past.
In 1992, three hundred innocent Haitian men, women, and children
who had qualified for political asylum in the United States were
detained at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- and told they might never be
freed. Charismatic democracy activist Yvonne Pascal and her fellow
refugees had no contact with the outside world, no lawyers, and no
hope . . . until a group of inspired Yale Law School students vowed
to free them.
Pitting the students and their untested professor Harold Koh
against Kenneth Starr, the Justice Department, the Pentagon, and
Presidents George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton, this real-life legal
thriller takes the reader from the halls of Yale and the federal
courts of New York to the slums of Port-au-Prince and the windswept
hills of Guantanamo Bay and ultimately to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Written with grace and passion, "Storming the Court" captures the
emotional highs and despairing lows of a legal education like no
other -- a high-stakes courtroom campaign against the White House
in the name of the greatest of American values: freedom.
"How civil liberties triumphed over national insecurity"
Between the two major red scares of the twentieth century, a
police raid on a Communist Party bookstore in Oklahoma City marked
an important lesson in the history of American freedom.
In a raid on the Progressive Bookstore in 1940, local officials
seized thousands of books and pamphlets and arrested twenty
customers and proprietors. All were detained incommunicado and many
were held for months on unreasonably high bail. Four were tried for
violating Oklahoma's "criminal syndicalism" law, and their
convictions and ten-year sentences caused a nationwide furor. After
protests from labor unions, churches, publishers, academics,
librarians, the American Civil Liberties Union, members of the
literary world, and prominent individuals ranging from Woody
Guthrie to Eleanor Roosevelt, the convictions were overturned on
appeal.
Shirley A. Wiegand and Wayne A. Wiegand share the compelling
story of this important case for the first time. They reveal how
state power--with support from local media and businesses--was used
to trample individuals' civil rights during an era in which
citizens were gripped by fear of foreign subversion.
Richly detailed and colorfully told, "Books on Trial "is a
sobering story of innocent people swept up in the hysteria of their
times. It marks a fascinating and unnerving chapter in the history
of Oklahoma and of the First Amendment. In today's climate of
shadowy foreign threats--also full of unease about the way
government curtails freedom in the name of protecting its
citizens--the past speaks to the present.
Winston Churchill is a renowned historical figure, whose remarkable
political and military career continues to enthral. This book
consists of short, highly readable chapters on key aspects of
Churchill's career. Written by leading experts, the chapters draw
on documents from Churchill's extensive personal papers as well as
cutting-edge scholarship. Ranging from Churchill's youthful
statesmanship to the period of the Cold War, the volume considers
his military strategy during both World Wars as well as dealing
with the social, political and economic issues that helped define
the Churchillian era. Suitable for those coming to Churchill for
the first time, as well as providing new insights for those already
familiar with his life, this is a sparkling collection of essays
that provides an enlightening history of Churchill and his era.
Algeria: Nation, Culture and Transnationalism 1988-2015 offers new
insights into contemporary Algeria. Drawing on a range of different
approaches to the idea of Algeria and to its contemporary
realities, the chapters in this volume serve to open up any
discourse that would tie 'Algeria' to a fixed meaning or construct
it in ways that neglect the weft and warp of everyday cultural
production and political action. The configuration of these essays
invites us to read contemporary cultural production in Algeria not
as determined indices of a specific place and time (1988-2015) but
as interrogations and explorations of that period and of the
relationship between nation and culture. The intention of this
volume is to offer historical moments, multiple contexts, hybrid
forms, voices and experiences of the everyday that will prompt
nuance in how we move between frames of enquiry. These chapters -
written by specialists in Algerian history, politics, music, sport,
youth cultures, literature, cultural associations and art - offer
the granularity of microhistories, fieldwork interviews and studies
of the marginal in order to break up a synthetic overview and offer
keener insights into the ways in which the complexity of Algerian
nation-building are culturally negotiated, public spaces are
reclaimed, and Algeria reimagined through practices that draw upon
the country's past and its transnational present.
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