"Master of language" (The New York Times) John Edgar Wideman's first-ever collection of his most revered works--two novels and story collection all set in the Pittsburgh neighborhood of Homewood where he grew up. Damballah, Hiding Place, and Sent for You Yesterday provide a stunning introduction to the uncompromising work of John Edgar Wideman, whose literary achievements have inspired The New York Times to name him "one of America's premier writers of fiction." Damballah's narratives examine the vexed history of Homewood, a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania neighborhood whose origins are rooted in a time when slavery was still legal in the United States of America. The novels Hiding Place and Sent for You Yesterday personalize and interrogate that history's presence in the contemporary lives of Homewood people and all Americans. Deeply concerned that designations such as "economically oppressed" or "Black" continue to dismiss and marginalize rather than embrace communities like the one in which he was raised, John Edgar Wideman--employing words on the page as his weapon--has dedicated himself to recording the weight, beauty, complexity, and justice that he believes Homewood's voices, stories, and lives have earned and deserve. In 1983, The Homewood Trilogy signaled the arrival of a major voice in American literature. Forty years later, this edition of the Trilogy celebrates Wideman's ongoing contribution by offering these masterworks to a new generation of readers.

This Norton Critical Edition includes: The first edition of the novel, published by Archibald Constable in London in 1897 and chosen by the editors in order to give readers-insofar as such a thing is possible-a more historically authentic reading experience than has been generally available. Arcane words and usages are footnoted at first appearance. Editorial matter by John Edgar Browning and David J. Skal. Eight background pieces, five of them new to the Second Edition, on Count Dracula specifically and vampires more generally; seven reviews and reactions to Dracula's publication, five of them new to the Second Edition; and six selections, two of them new to and two others updated for the Second Edition, on Dracula's many dramatic and filmic variations. Eleven critical essays on Dracula's central themes, six of them new to the Second Edition. A selected bibliography. About the Series Read by more than 12 million students over fifty-five years, Norton Critical Editions set the standard for apparatus that is right for undergraduate readers. The three-part format-annotated text, contexts and criticism-helps students to better understand, analyse and appreciate the literature, while opening a wide range of teaching possibilities for instructors. Whether in print or in digital format, Norton Critical Editions provide all the resources students need.

Freddy, Jason, Frankenstein, and Dracula are just a few of the thrilling movie monsters in this illustrated, collectible reference guide. Monsters from major as well as minor horror films are brought back to life through domestic and international posters, movie stills, and publicity shots. Engaging commentary from leading horror fiction writers, editors, anthologists, and scholars accompany more than 400 movie posters and publicity stills from the early 20th century through to the present day. Not only will you revisit such iconic movies as The Shining, Child's Play, Halloween, Godzilla, and Jaws, to name just a few, you will also learn about the cultural and technological developments that have played a role in the history of the indelible movie monster. Whether you're a screenwriter, producer, director, actor, or just a fan, this reference guide is an invaluable resource about one of our greatest movie genres.

'This is truly inimitable storytelling' Observer '[A] master of language' New York Times A boy stands alone, unable to enter the room in which his grandfather's coffin lies. Freddie Jackson's song 'You Are My Lady' plays on the car radio as a son is brought to a prison cell in Arizona. A narrator contemplates the Atlanta child murders from 1979. Look For Me and I'll Be Gone is vital reading for anyone interested in the state of America today. Historical and contemporary, intimate and expansive, the stories here represent a pioneering writer whose innovation, form and imagination know no bounds.

In plague-ridden eighteenth-century Philadelphia, a young itinerant black preacher searches for a mysterious, endangered African woman. His struggle to find her and save them both plummets them both into the nightmare of a society violently splitting itself into white and black. Spiraling outward from the core image of a cattle killing--the Xhosa people's ritual destruction of their herd in a vain attempt to resist European domination--the novel expands its narrator's search for meaning and love into the America, Europe and South Africa of yesterday and today.

Employing a range of approaches to examine how "monster-talk" pervades not only popular culture but also public policy through film and other media, this book is a "one-stop shop" of sorts for students and instructors employing various approaches and media in the study of "teratologies," or discourses of the monstrous.

Despite its apparently monolithic definition, "teratology" (from the Greek word teras, meaning "monster," and the Latin logia, which is derived from the Greek logos, meaning "a speaking, discourse, treatise, doctrine, theory, science") seems infinitely malleable, flourishing in various rhetorical environments. Teratologies are more than a bestiary: a catalogue of "freaks" designed to celebrate the "normal." Rather, teratologies illustrate how humor, horror, fantasy, and the "real" cross-fertilize each other, resulting in the possibility of new worlds, ethics, and narratives emerging. As a general anthology of teratologies, this book simply maps what, in many ways, has already been occurring across several fields, as it tracks the expansion of this term, creating lacunae that form connections across multiple interpretive communities. It is a cross section of how "monster narratives" intersect with "outsider" positions, from different perspectives - such as those of literary critics, film critics, criminologists, law professors, historians, philosophers - and looks into various strategies of destabilizing normative binaries.

Many animators and designers would like to supplement their Maya learning with a less-technical, more helpful book. This new self-study manual is both a general guide for understanding 3-D computer graphics and a specific guide for learning the fundamentals of Maya: workspace, modeling, animation, shading, lighting, and rendering.

This well-integrated and produced volume covers these fundamentals in each chapter so that readers gain increasingly detailed knowledge. After an initial 'concepts' section launches each chapter, hands-on tutorials are provided, as well as a chapter project that progressively adds newly learned material and culminates in the final animated short. This is the first book on Maya that teaches the subject using a sensible, proven methodology for both novices and intermediate users.

Topics and features: * Proven method that emphasizes preliminaries to every chapter * Integrates the "why" concepts of 3-D simultaneously with the "how-to" techniques * Skills reinforced with tutorials and chapter projects * Real-world experience distilled into helpful hints and step-by-step guides for common tasks * CD-ROM with practice animations, case studies and additional methods

The book, suitable for novices or intermediate users, presents all the basic 3-D animation concepts and Maya software background needed for learning animation techniques and creating sophisticated, state-of-the-art animations. It is an essential resource for animators, game developers, effects specialists, and computer graphic artists, as well as an ideal self-study guide for students or individuals pursuing interests in graphics or animation.

In this new short story collection, John Edgar Wideman blends the historical and the imaginary, the personal and the political, to invent complex, charged stories about love, death and struggle. With a cast of real and fictional characters as diverse as Frederick Douglass, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Wideman's own family, it is a journey through the soul of America. In 'JB & FD' Wideman imagines conversations between white anti-slavery crusader John Brown and abolitionist Frederick Douglass. In 'Williamsburg Bridge' a man contemplates his life as he sits on the edge of the bridge, meaning to jump. In 'Maps and Ledgers' a brother and sister ponder their father's killing of another man. In these and the other stories in this collection, Wideman navigates an extraordinary range of subject and tone. He delivers individual narratives both emotionally precise and intellectually stimulating, and an extended meditation on family, history and loss. American Histories demonstrates a master at his absolute best.

A WALL STREET JOURNAL BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR Forty years after John Edgar Wideman's first book of stories, comes this stunning collection that is vital reading for anyone interested in the state of America today. Its subjects range from Michael Jordan to Emmett Till, from distrust of authority to everyday grief, from childhood memories to the final day in a prison cell. A boy stands alone in his grandmother's house, unable to enter the room in which his grandfather's coffin lies, afraid the dead man may speak, afraid he won't speak. Freddie Jackson's song 'You Are My Lady' plays on the car radio as a son is brought to a prison cell in Arizona. A narrator contemplates the Atlanta child murders from 1979. Never satisfied to simply tell a story, Wideman continues to push form, with stories within stories, sentences that rise like a jazz solo with every connecting clause, voices that reflect who he is and where he's from, and an exploration of time that entangles past and present. Whether historical or contemporary, intimate or expansive, the stories here represent a pioneering American writer whose innovation and imagination know no bounds.

The Evolution of Horror in the Twenty-First Century examines the intimate connections between the horror genre and its audience's experience of being in the world at a particular historical and cultural moment. This book not only provides frameworks with which to understand contemporary horror, but it also speaks to the changes wrought by technological development in creation, production, and distribution, as well as the ways in which those who are traditionally underrepresented positively within the genre- women, LGBTQ+, indigenous, and BAME communities - are finally being seen and finding space to speak.

When Emmett Till was murdered aged fourteen for allegedly whistling at a white woman, photographs of his destroyed face became a flashpoint in the civil rights movement. A decade earlier Emmett's father, Louis, had also been killed - court-martialled and hanged. Though the circumstances could hardly have been more different, behind both deaths stood the same crime, of being black. In Writing to Save a Life, John Edgar Wideman, born the same year as Emmett Till, investigates the tragic fates of father and son. Mixing research, memoir and imagination, this book is an essential commentary on racism in America - illuminating, humane and profound.

These stories offer spellbinding reflections on abolitionists and artists, fathers and sons, the bonds of family and the pull of memory. A re-imagined conversation takes place between white anti-slavery crusader John Brown and black abolitionist Frederick Douglass. A man sits on the edge of Williamsburg Bridge, contemplating suicide. The author considers the deaths of his brother, uncle, mother and niece. John Edgar Wideman's fiction challenges the boundaries of the form. Emotionally precise and intellectually stimulating, this is Wideman at his best.

Zombie Talk offers a concise, interdisciplinary introduction and deep analytical set of theoretical approaches to help readers understand the phenomenon of zombies in contemporary and modern culture. With essays that combine Humanities and Social Science methodologies, the authors examine the zombie through an array of cultural products from different periods and geographical locations: films ranging from White Zombie (1932) to the pioneering films of George Romero, television shows like AMC's The Walking Dead, to literary offerings such as Richard Matheson's I am Legend (1954) and Seth Grahame-Smith's Pride, Prejudice and Zombies (2009), among others.

Even if you've never touched a 3D printer, these projects will excite and empower you to learn new skills, extend your current abilities, and awaken your creative impulses. Each project uses a unique combination of electronics, hand assembly techniques, custom 3D-printed parts, and software, while teaching you how to think through and execute your own ideas. Written by the founder of Printrbot, his staff, and veteran DIY authors, this book of projects exemplifies the broad range of highly personalized, limit-pushing project possibilities of 3D printing when combined with affordable electronic components and materials. In Make: 3D Printing Projects, you'll: Print and assemble a modular lamp that's suitable for beginners--and quickly gets you incorporating electronics into 3D-printed structures. Learn about RC vehicles by fabricating--and driving--your own sleek, shiny, and fast Inverted Trike. Model a 1950s-style Raygun Pen through a step-by-step primer on how to augment an existing object through rapid prototyping. Fabricate a fully functional, battery-powered screwdriver, while learning how to tear down and reconstruct your own tools. Get hands-on with animatronics by building your own set of life-like mechanical eyes. Make a Raspberry Pi robot that rides a monorail of string, can turn corners, runs its own web server, streams video, and is remote-controlled from your phone. Build and customize a bubble-blowing robot, flower watering contraption, and a DIY camera gimbal.

This anthology comprises essays that study the form, aesthetics and representations of LGBTQ+ identities in an emerging sub-genre of film and television that we term 'New Queer Horror.' New Queer Horror designates horror that is crafted by directors/producers who identify as gay, bi, queer or transgendered, or works that feature homoerotic or explicitly homosexual narratives with 'out' LGBTQ+ characters. Unlike other studies, this anthology argues that New Queer Horror projects contemporary anxieties within LGBTQ+ subcultures onto its characters and into its narratives, building upon the previously figurative role of Queer monstrosity in the moving image. New Queer Horror thus highlights the limits of a metaphorical understanding of queerness in the horror film in an age where its presence has become more unambiguous. Ultimately, this anthology aims to show that 'New Queer Horror' has in recent years turned the focus of fear on itself, on its own communities and subcultures.