** Chosen as a New Statesman, Financial Times, Observer and Sunday Times Book of the Year ** A riveting account of the making of T. S. Eliot's celebrated poem The Waste Land on its centenary. 'A rattling good story' Sunday Telegraph 'A work of art' Times Literary Supplement The Waste Land has been called the 'World's Greatest Poem'. It is said to describe the moral decay of a world after war, to find meaning in a meaningless era. It has been labelled the most truthful poem of its time; it has been branded a masterful fake. A century after its publication in 1922, T. S. Eliot's enigmatic masterpiece remains one of the most influential works ever written, and yet one of the most mysterious. In a remarkable feat of biography, Matthew Hollis reconstructs the intellectual creation of the poem and brings the material reality of its charged times vividly to life. Presenting a mosaic of historical fragments, diaries, dynamic literary criticism and illuminating new research, he reveals the cultural and personal trauma that forged The Waste Land through the lives of its protagonists - of Ezra Pound, who edited it; of Vivien Eliot, who sustained it; and of T. S. Eliot himself, whose private torment is woven into the seams of the work. The result is an unforgettable story of lives passing in opposing directions and the astounding literary legacy they would leave behind.

The goddaughter of Igor Stravinsky and a graduate of Hollywood High, Eve Babitz posed in 1963, at age twenty, playing chess with the French artist Marcel Duchamp. She was naked; he was not. The photograph made her an instant icon of art and sex. Babitz spent the rest of the decade rocking and rolling on the Sunset Strip, honing her notoriety. There were the album covers she designed: for Buffalo Springfield and the Byrds, to name but a few. There were the men she seduced: Jim Morrison, Ed Ruscha, Harrison Ford, to name but a very few. Then, at nearly thirty, her It girl days numbered, Babitz was discovered-as a writer-by Joan Didion. She would go on to produce seven books, usually billed as novels or short story collections, always autobiographies and confessionals. Under-known and under-read during her career, she's since experienced a breakthrough. Now in her mid-seventies, she's on the cusp of literary stardom and recognition as an essential-as the essential-LA writer. Her prose achieves that American ideal: art that stays loose, maintains its cool, and is so simply enjoyable as to be mistaken for simple entertainment. What Hollywood's Eve has going for it on every page is its subject's utter refusal to be dull... It sends you racing to read the work of Eve Babitz." The New York Times "Read Lili Anolik's book in the same spirit you'd read a new Eve Babitz, if there was one: for the gossip and for the writing. Both are extraordinary." Jonathan Lethem "There's no better way to look at Hollywood in that magic decade, the 1970s, than through Eve Babitz's eyes. Eve knew everyone, slept with everyone, used, amused, and abused everyone. And then there's Eve herself: a cult figure turned into a legend in Anolik's electrifying book. This is a portrait as mysterious, maddening-and seductive-as its subject." -Peter Biskind, author of Easy Riders, Raging Bulls For Babitz, life was slow days, fast company until a freak fire turned her into a recluse, living in a condo in West Hollywood, where author Lili Anolik tracked her down in 2012. Hollywood's Eve, equal parts biography and detective story "brings a ludicrously glamorous scene back to life, adding a few shadows along the way" (Vogue) and "sends you racing to read the work of Eve Babitz" (The New York Times).

Autofiction: A Female Francophone Aesthetic of Exile explores the multiple aspects of exile, displacement, mobility, and identity as expressed in contemporary autofictional work written in French by women writers from across the francophone world. Drawing on postcolonial theory, gender theory, and autobiographical theory, the book analyses narratives of exile by six authors who are shaped by their multiple locales of attachment: Kim Lefevre (Vietnam/France), Gisele Pineau (Guadeloupe/mainland France), Nina Bouraoui (Algeria/France), Michele Rakotoson (Madagascar/France), Veronique Tadjo (Cote d'Ivoire/France), and Abla Farhoud (Lebanon/Quebec). In this way, the book argues that the French colonial past continues to mould female articulations of mobility and identity in the postcolonial present. Responding to gaps in the critical discourse of exile, namely gender, this book brings genre in both its forms - gender and literary genre - to bear on narratives of exile, arguing that the reconceptualization of categories of mobility occurs specifically in women's autofictional writing. The six authors complicate discussions of exile as they are highly mobile, hybrid subjects. This rootless existence, however, often renders them alienated and 'out of place'. While ensuring not to trivialize the very real difficulties faced by those whose exile is not a matter of choice, the book argues that the six authors experience their hybridity as both a literal and a metaphorical exile, a source of both creativity and trauma.

Forrest J Ackerman (1916-2008) was an author, archivist, agent, actor, promoter, and editor of the iconic fan magazine Famous Monsters of Filmland; a founder of science fiction fandom; and one of the world's foremost collectors of sci-fi, horror and fantasy films, literature, and memorabilia. This biography begins with a foreword by Joe Moe, Ackerman's caregiver and close friend since 1982. It documents Ackerman's lifelong dedication to his work in both literature and film; his interests, travels, relationships and associations with famous personalities; and his lasting impact on popular culture. Primary research material includes letters given by Ackerman to the author during their long friendship, and numerous reminiscences from Ackerman's friends, fans and colleagues.

Ten Days in a Mad-House (1887) is a book by American investigative journalist Nellie Bly. For her first assignment for Joseph Pulitzer's famed New York World newspaper, Bly went undercover as a patient at a notorious insane asylum on Blackwell's Island. Spending ten days there, she recorded the abuses and neglect she witnessed, turning her research into a sensational two-part story for the New York World later published as Ten Days in a Mad-House. Checking into a New York boardinghouse under a false identity, Bly began acting in a disturbed, unsettling manner, prompting the police to be summoned. In a courtroom the next morning, she claimed to be suffering from amnesia, leading to her diagnosis as insane from several doctors. Sent to the Women's Lunatic Asylum, Bly spent ten days witnessing and experiencing rampant abuse and neglect. There, she noticed that many of the patients, who were constantly beaten and belittled by violent nurses and staff members, seemed perfectly sane or showed signs of having their conditions severely worsened during their time at the asylum. Served spoiled food, forced to live in squalor, and given ice-cold baths by unsympathetic attendants, the patients she met during her stay seemed as though abandoned by a city that had sent them there for the supposed purpose of healing. Showcasing her skill as a reporter and true pioneer of investigative journalism, Bly published her story to a captivated and inspired audience, setting in motion a process of reform that would change the city's approach to its asylums for the better. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Nellie Bly's Ten Days in a Mad-House is a classic work of American investigative journalism reimagined for modern readers.

Inspired by a vivid dream, Stephenie Meyer, a stay-at-home mom, wrote a manuscript that started a worldwide sensation that has yet to abate. In 2005 her debut novel, Twilight, crashed onto the shore of teen literature like a literary tsunami. Four books later, she had become the top-selling author in the world. When the final book in the Twilight series, Breaking Dawn, was released in 2008, more than a million copies were sold on the first day alone. The popular culture phenomenon of Stephenie Meyer and her writing is much more than the sum total of her weeks on the bestseller list, however. Stephenie Meyer: In the Twilight looks at the life and work of this author, beginning with her childhood and covering her teen years and life before stardom. This volume also profiles Meyer's world since becoming a cultural icon. In addition to discussing Meyer's writing style, the chapters also explore each of her books, with a final chapter focusing on her presence in social media and public events. As young and old continue to devour her every word, this volume puts into perspective the work and impact that Meyer has around the world. Stephenie Meyer: In the Twilight will be of interest to teachers and librarians, as well as to middle and high school students-not to mention adults-who are interested in learning more about their favorite author.

Letty's mother was intelligent, down-to-earth, outspoken and clear-headed-a loving mother to her five children and a hardworking, successful schoolteacher. However, after her mother suffered several small, debilitating strokes, Letty, a senior citizen, found herself in the position of having to parent her own mother. But in the midst of the heartache, frustrations, misunderstandings and emotional exhaustion, Letty began to recognize and accept the challenge of her new role. Instead of just heartaches, she discovered the blessings of her unchartered role-reversal, including a new understanding of herself and her world as well as the opportunity for self-growth. In touching diary entries chronicling her experience intertwined with accounts of her mother's life from the 1930s through the present day, Heartaches and Blessings while Parenting My Mom is an engaging, humorous tribute that provides support, empowerment and encouragement to adult caretakers.

Originally published in English in 1951, this biography of one of Germany's foremost mystical poets dis-proves many of the myths surrounding Rainer Maria Rilke and examines his life and work from social, historical and psychological perspectives, while all the time referencing Rilke's works to his complex personality. The legacy of his work on younger generations is also examined. All German prose quotations have been translated into English for this edition, existing translations used for the German poetry.

Dostoevsky and Tolstoy are the titans of Russian literature. As mature artists, they led very different lives and wrote vastly different works, but their early lives and writings display provocative kinships, while also indicating the divergent paths the two authors would take en route to literary greatness. The ten new critical essays here, written by leading specialists in nineteenth-century, Russian literature, give fresh, sophisticated readings to works from the first decade of the literary life of each Russian author-for Dostoevsky, the 1840s; for Tolstoy, the 1850s. Collectively, these essays yield composite portraits of these two artists as young men finding their literary way. At the same time, they show how the early works merit appreciation for themselves, before their authors were Titans.

The Goalkeeper is a new scholarly almanac devoted to the art of Vladimir Nabokov. Himself an ardent goalkeeper, the author of Lolita viewed soccer as more than a game: "I was less the keeper of a soccer goal than the keeper of a secret" (Speak, Memory). The inaugural collection features contributions from two dozen leading Nabokov scholars worldwide, including academic articles (Neil Cornwell, Gerard de Vries, Samuel Schuman, and others); roundtable discussions (Brian Boyd, Jeff Edmunds, Priscilla Meyer, David Rampton, Leona Toker); interviews (Dmitri Nabokov, Alvin Toffler); archival materials; the Kyoto Nabokov conference report; and book reviews (Pekka Tammi, Zoran Kuzmanovich, Galya Diment). The Nabokov Almanac, edited by Yuri Leving, is affiliated with the Nabokov Online Journal, published since 2007.

A scholarly edition of the life of Samuel Johnson. The edition presents an authoritative text, together with an introduction, commentary notes, and scholarly apparatus.

A Book of Untruths is a family story told through lies. This is a book about love, marriage, childhood, ageing, and the terrible acts we commit, remember and forget. It is about how we build a sense of ourselves through the stories we tell and the memories we shape. Shocking, invigorating and revelatory, A Book of Untruths shows that with every breath we take, another untruth may come out.

William Ellery Leonard was an eccentric poet, professor, and critic whose romantic ideals were set against a world whose aesthetics were fast turning away from his own. He lived a life marked by both success and dramatic failure, both personally and professionally. His first wife's suicide would haunt him and mark one of his greatest poems, the sonnet sequence Two Lives; his translations of Lucretius and Beowulf stood as hallmarks of the craft for decades after they were published; and his political satires written in response to the University sphere he lived and worked in remain as effective today as they once were.

'This is a brilliant book about the birth of modernism, one that taught me something on every page ... You will feel - and be! - much smarter after you read it' Edmund White

'The world broke in two in 1922 or thereabouts,' the American author Willa Cather once wrote. Yet for Virginia Woolf, T. S. Eliot, E. M. Forster and D. H. Lawrence, 1922 began with a frighteningly blank page. Eliot was in Switzerland recovering from a nervous breakdown. Forster was grappling with unrequited love. Woolf and Lawrence, meanwhile, were both in bed with the flu. Confronting illness, personal problems and the spectral ghost of World War I, all four felt literally at a loss for words.

As dismal as things seemed, 1922 turned out to be a year of outstanding creative renaissance for them all. By the end of the year Woolf had started Mrs Dalloway, Forster had returned to work on A Passage to India, Lawrence had written his heavily autobiographical novel Kangaroo, and Eliot had finished - and published to great acclaim - 'The Waste Land'.

Full of surprising insights and original research, Bill Goldstein's The World Broke in Two chronicles the intertwined lives and works of these four writers in a crucial year of change.

In the long run, we're all dead. But for some of the most influential figures in history, death marked the start of a new adventure. The famous deceased have been stolen, burned, sold, pickled, frozen, stuffed, impersonated and even filed away in a lawyer's office. Their fingers, teeth, toes, arms, legs, skulls, hearts, lungs and nether regions have embarked on voyages that criss-cross the globe and stretch the imagination. Counterfeiters tried to steal Lincoln's corpse. Einstein's brain went on a cross-country road trip. And after Lord Horatio Nelson perished at Trafalgar, his sailors submerged him in brandy - which they drank. From Mozart to Hitler, Rest in Pieces connects the lives of the famous dead to the hilarious and horrifying adventures of their corpses and traces the evolution of cultural attitudes towards death.

This is the first-ever book length study of one of the most important and constantly innovative 19th century book and periodical publishers. The mysterious and often elusive but enormously influential Henry Colburn (c.1784 - 16 August 1855) was the pre-eminent publisher of 'silver-fork' novels, and of many influential new writers. Colburn's main claim to rehabilitation are his troop of 'name' authors: Lady Morgan, Disraeli, Bulwer-Lytton, Captain Marryat, G.P.R James, Mrs. Margaret Oliphant, Mrs. Catherine Gore, Mrs. Caroline Norton. Frances Trollope, Anthony Trollope, Richard Cobbold, R. S. Surtees. Many would not have had a start in the careers they later enjoyed were it not for Colburn. This is a lively, and important new work on early 19th-century publishing and the patterns for the century which Colburn set. It sketches in tantalizing outlines the Regency, early nineteenth-century and Victorian book trades - and the consequences of Colburn's impact on those worlds. In addition, the work centres on Colburn's most celebrated authors. The book - which is well illustrated - contains the first catalogue of Colburn's publications.Thus far, literary and Publishing History have drawn a formidable charge sheet against Henry Colburn. In personal pedigree he is slandered as a 'guttersnipe', or a 'royal bastard'. In Disraeli's pungent description he was a publishing 'bawd', engaged in wholesale literary prostitution. A very bad thing. And yet this publishing Barabbas can be argued to have been innovative and a force for constructive change in the rapidly evolving book trade and---paradoxically---a man of taste. Various rumours circulated that he was either a bastard of the Duke of York or of Lord Landsdowne. Date uncertain. He liked to weave illustrious (typically mendacious) pedigrees for himself as much as for his dubiously aristocratic purveyors of silver forkery. What, precisely, did Colburn do that should raise his reputation and make us see him as a good thing? In the largest sense he demonstrated, by example and practice, the need for consolidation between hitherto dismembered arms of the London book world.Beginning his career at apprentice level in the London West End circulating-library business he went on, having learned at the counter what the customer wanted, to become the undisputed market leader in the publication of three-volume novels and (sub-Murray) travel books. The three-decker went on to become the foundation-stone of the 'Leviathan' library system (Mudie's and Smith's) and created a seventy-year stability in the publishing, distribution and reception of English fiction. In 1814 Colburn founded the New Monthly Magazine. In 1817, he set up England's first serious weekly review, the Literary Gazette. In 1828 he helped found the Athenaeum (distant parent of today's New Statesman). His behaviour, as a magazine proprietor and editor at large was typically outrageous. But the link he forged between higher journalism and literature was momentous.

In this biography, chronological chapters follow Zora Neale Hurston's family, upbringing, education, influences, and her major works, and place these experiences within the context of American history. This biography of Zora Neale Hurston, one of the most influential African American writers of the 20th century and a central figure in the Harlem Renaissance, is primarily for students and will cover all of the major points of development in Hurston's life as well as her major publications. Hurston's impact extends beyond the literary world: she also left her mark as an anthropologist whose ethnographic work portrays the racial struggles during the early 20th century American South. This work includes a preface and narrative chapters that explore Hurston's literary influences and the personal relationships that were most formative to her life; the final chapter, "Why Zora Neale Hurston Matters," explores her cultural and historical significance, providing context to her writings and allowing readers a greater understanding of Hurston's life while critically examining her major writing. Provides readers with a brief history of Zora Neale Hurston's life and times Discusses her primary writings Elucidates her literary influences and contributions Provides additional insights through sidebars, a timeline, and a bibliography with key sources

The first study of life narratives produced for, about, and written by children, this book examines the recent popularity of children's biographies and how they engage with the biggest issues of our time: environmental change, health crises, education, and children's personal and political development. Beginning with a literary-historical overview, Children and Biography proceeds to examine 21st-century examples and trends such as illustrated texts including Women in Science, the Fantastically Great Women Who... books, Rebel Dogs, Goodnight Stories for Rebel Girls, Kids Who Did, My Beautiful Birds and The Journey. The book also considers archives of children's writings and drawings, in particular the testimonies of child asylum seekers, children's biographical art, and 'Lockdown diaries' produced during the Covid-19 pandemic. By analyzing these works alongside empirical studies into how such material is received by child readers, and how texts generated by children are perceived both by them and their parents, this book provides new knowledge on how biographies for children are produced and read. Comprehensive and original, Children and Biography, presents an ethical methodological framework for scholarly practice when reading, witnessing and interpreting children's life narratives. The book offers a mandate for future researchers: to place children's voices and writing at the centre of inquiries in ways that facilitate genuine agency for child authors.