"It's likely that a book like this is the only way you might see many of these creatures for yourself." - Amateur Photographer This book of photographs puts the spotlight on a group of animals that is little-noticed, and undeservedly so: endemic species that exist only on their respective islands. Isolated from continents by the ocean, certain species have been able to evolve further and differently than their counterparts on the mainland, where they are subjected to far more threats such as predators and diseases. Over time, giants like the Indonesian Komodo dragon have evolved, which grows up to three metres long and weighs 70 kilos. The comet moth lives on Madagascar, and the odd King of Saxony bird-of-paradise flies around on New Guinea. The flightless cormorant on Galapagos, on the other hand, retracted its flight instruments over time because it had no need for them. Readers can expect a variety of animal beauty and extravagance. The following locations are included in the book: Island of Sainte Marie (Madagascar) Madagascar Philippines Lesser Sunda Islands (Indonesia) Aru Islands Regency (Indonesia) New Guinea Australia Tasmania (Australia) New Zealand Santa Catalina Island, Channel Islands (California, US) Cozumel (Mexico) Cuba Isla Escudo de Veraguas (Panama) Galapagos Islands (Ecuador) Falkland Islands Svalbard Archipelago Text in English and German.

"Nightshades is the record of one remarkable magician's exploration of the inverse regions of the Tree of Life. Aleister Crowley's Liber 231 provides the map and Kenneth Grant's Nightside of Eden a travelogue. "Liber 231, apparently started life as a text within the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, as an exercise to develop astral and trance abilities or perhaps in other more elaborate rites. The nightside aspect requires some care and alertness in case of accident. The correct attitude is said to be one of self or ego-less witness. Or maybe it's just one needs Or maybe it's just one needs the use of an all-embracing rather than a limited kind of identity and self-identification?" "The Nightside is always with us. It's so much older than the Dayside. Before the light began to shine, the night was there. Some assume that we are dealing with a simple polarity. On one hand the radiant world of colours and forms, more or less thinkable, reasonable and meaningful. Like the pretty picture of the Tree of Life it has its scenic cites, its hotels, restaurants, shopping opportunities and highways in between. On the other hand the chaotic world of uncertain and incomprehensible mysteries. Both of them connected by the voidness that makes them possible. It looks symmetrical. But when you reach the Nightside it doesn't work like that. The Nightside is not simply a reflection of the dayside with a few confusing and spooky bits thrown in. The Dayside is a tiny island of experience in a huge ocean, the Nightside, full of currents, island chains and continents of the possible and impossible. All and Nothing are present everywhere. Our island is not the opposite of the world-ocean, it is simply a tiny and comprehensible part of it." Jan Fries Nightshades comprises 72 intense drawings prefaced by an explanatory essay detailing the background and genesis of this ultimate magical adventure.

Quid est secretum? Visual Representation of Secrets in Early Modern Europe, 1500-1700 is the companion volume to Intersections 65.1, Quid est sacramentum? Visual Representation of Sacred Mysteries in Early Modern Europe, 1400-1700. Whereas the latter volume focused on sacramental mysteries, the current one examines a wider range of secret subjects. The book examines how secret knowledge was represented visually in ways that both revealed and concealed the true nature of that knowledge, giving and yet impeding access to it. In the early modern period, the discursive and symbolical sites for the representation of secrets were closely related to epistemic changes that transformed conceptions of the transmissibility of knowledge. Contributors: Monika Biel, Alicja Bielak, C. Jean Campbell, Tom Conley, Ralph Dekoninck, Peter G.F. Eversmann, Ingrid Falque, Agnes Guiderdoni, Koenraad Jonckheere, Suzanne Karr Schmidt, Stephanie Leitch, Carme Lopez Calderon, Mark A. Meadow, Walter S. Melion, Eelco Nagelsmit, Lars Cyril Norgaard, Alexandra Onuf, Bret L. Rothstein, Xavier Vert, Madeleine C. Viljoen, Mara R. Wade, Lee Palmer Wandel, and Caecilie Weissert.

At the turn of the sixteenth century, the notion of world was dramatically being reshaped, leaving no aspect of human experience untouched. The Nomadic Object: The Challenge of World for Early Modern Religious Art examines how sacred art and artefacts responded to the demands of a world stage in the age of reform. Essays by leading scholars explore how religious objects resulting from cross-cultural contact defied national and confessional categories and were re-contextualised in a global framework via their collection, exchange, production, management, and circulation. In dialogue with current discourses, papers address issues of idolatry, translation, materiality, value, and the agency of networks. The Nomadic Object demonstrates the significance of religious systems, from overseas logistics to philosophical underpinnings, for a global art history. Contributors are: Akira Akiyama, James Clifton, Jeffrey L. Collins, Ralph Dekoninck, Dagmar Eichberger, Beate Fricke, Christine Goettler, Christiane Hille, Margit Kern, Dipti Khera, Yoriko Kobayashi-Sato, Urte Krass, Evonne Levy, Meredith Martin, Walter S. Melion, Mia M. Mochizuki, Jeanette Favrot Peterson, Rose Marie San Juan, Denise-Marie Teece, Tristan Weddigen, and Ines G. Zupanov.

This volume examines the image-based methods of interpretation that pictorial and literary landscapists employed between 1500 and 1700. The seventeen essays ask how landscape, construed as the description of place in image and/or text, more than merely inviting close viewing, was often seen to call for interpretation or, better, for the application of a method or principle of interpretation. Contributors: Boudewijn Bakker, William M. Barton, Stijn Bussels, Reindert Falkenburg, Margaret Goehring, Andrew Hui, Sarah McPhee, Luke Morgan, Shelley Perlove, Kathleen P. Long, Lukas Reddemann, Denis Ribouillault, Paul J. Smith, Troy Tower, and Michel Weemans.

More and more in our modern and postmodern culture the twin concepts of beauty and truth have been separated both from each other and from their individual connection to the divine source of Beauty and Truth. Even as our public schools move further and further away from their connection to the universal moral code, the world of art (both high and low) embraces an aesthetic that privileges ugliness over beauty, nihilism over form, and radical self-expression over the pursuit of higher truth. As both an effective apologist for truth-based education and as a sub-creator of his own beauty-enhancing fiction, C.S. Lewis is the ideal guide for those who would seek to restore truth and beauty to their proper place and role in our modern world. Sections one and two analyze Lewis' eleven novels, showing how Lewis counters the growing cult of the ugly and helps restore a clearer understanding of the nature of good and evil. Sections three and four turn to Lewis' nonfiction works to assess what advice Lewis can give educators at all levels who would steer their students away from chronological snobbery and values-free education toward a true re-engagement with the past. The book concludes with a commentary onScrewtape Letters that exposes what Satan's main temptation tactics have been since the 1960s and a detailed bibliographical essay of books by and about Lewis.

"The true poet bares not only his mind and heart but reveals the depths of hissoul. After reading Dave Dowd's current collection, I am fi rmly convinced that he is, indeed, a true poet. Dave's poetry is teeming with stories, teachings, and truisms thatmake us all stop to think, to refl ect and ultimately, to examine our own humanity.From poetry that celebrates the victory and defeat of his beloved Boston Red Sox, toheartfelt love poems, to a selection of work inspired by the epic battle for human life, Dave does not disappoint. This poetry acts as a beacon of light in a time so mired indarkness that its inspired words must be read and its message lived."Host of EWTN Radio's Open Line & The Good FightGod keep you, Dave! Great job!B A R B A R A M C G U I G A N

These essays on late antiquity traverse a territory in which Christian and pagan imagery and practices compete, coexist, and intermingle. The iconography of the most significant late antique ceramic, African Red Slip Ware, is an important and relatively unexploited vehicle for documenting the diversity and interpenetration of late antique cultures. Literary texts and art in other media, particularly mosaics, provide imagery that complement and enhance the messages of the ceramics. Popular entertainments, pagan cults, mythic heroes, beasts, monsters, and biblical visions are themes dealt with on the patrician and popular levels. With interpretive supplements from these diverse realms, it is possible to achieve greater insight into the life, attitudes, and thought of Late Antiquity.

Kids and adults alike love Pixar's movies. We come out of the theater not just entertained or amused, but inspired. Everybody agrees: Pixar makes fun, clean, terrific movies. But what makes these movies so appealing is not merely amazing CGI animation, clever humor or fantastic imagination. These movies are not just great. Pixar's movies are good. Robert Velarde unpacks the movies of Pixar and shows how they display the best of classic Christian virtues. Pixar's films resonate with us because of their moral character. Their virtuous themes of hope and courage, friendship and love connect with our deepest human longings. Whether we identify with the plight of a lost fish or the adventures of toys, bugs or cars, Pixar's characters help us build our own character, with the kind of virtue that we want for ourselves and those around us. Insightfully exploring each of Pixar's movies, this book is a friendly companion for fans, parents and church leaders. Discover how the imagination of Pixar can awaken in you a Christian vision for a moral life and a better society.

Here is the book that converted C. S. Lewis from atheism to Christianity. This history of mankind, Christ, and Christianity is to some extent a conscious rebuttal of H. G. Wells' Outline of History, which embraced both the evolutionary origins of humanity and the mortal humanity of Jesus. Whereas Orthodoxy detailed Chesterton's own spiritual journey, this book illustrates the spiritual journey of humanity, or at least of Western civilization. A book for both mind and spirit.