In this volume, which reaffirms the uncompromising brilliance of his mind, Cioran strips the human condition down to its most basic components, birth and death, suggesting that disaster lies not in the prospect of death but in the fact of birth, "that laughable accident." In the lucid, aphoristic style that characterizes his work, Cioran writes of time and death, God and religion, suicide and suffering, and the temptation to silence. Through sharp observation and patient contemplation, Cioran cuts to the heart of the human experience.

"A love of Cioran creates an urge to press his writing into someone's hand, and is followed by an equal urge to pull it away as poison."--"The New Yorker"
"In the company of Nietzsche and Kierkegaard."--"Publishers Weekly"
"No modern writer twists the knife with Cioran's dexterity. . . . His writing . . . is informed with the bitterness of genuine compassion."--"Boston Phoenix
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E. M. Cioran confronts the place of today's world in the context of human history--focusing on such major issues of the twentieth century as human progress, fanaticism, and science--in this nihilistic and witty collection of aphoristic essays concerning the nature of civilization in mid-twentieth-century Europe. Touching upon Man's need to worship, the feebleness of God, the downfall of the Ancient Greeks and the melancholy baseness of all existence, Cioran's pieces are pessimistic in the extreme, but also display a beautiful certainty that renders them delicate, vivid, and memorable. Illuminating and brutally honest, "A Short History of Decay" dissects Man's decadence in a remarkable series of moving and beautiful pieces.

The celebrated, National Book Award winning, translation of Baudelaire's masterpiece. "It is the English edition to acquire."-Washington Post Pulitzer Prize winning poet and translator, Richard Howard, gives readers the true voice of Baudelaire in this masterful translation. Charles Baudelaire's 1857 masterwork was scandalous in its day for its portrayals of sex, same-sex love, death, the corrupting and oppressive power of the modern city and lost innocence, Les Fleurs Du Mal (The Flowers of Evil) remains powerful and relevant for our time. In "Spleen et ideal," Baudelaire dramatizes the erotic cycle of ecstacy and anguish-of sexual and romantic love. "Tableaux Parisiens" condemns the crushing effects of urban planning on a city's soul and praises the city's anti-heroes including the deranged and derelict. "Le Vin" centers on the search for oblivion in drink and drugs. The many kinds of love that lie outside traditional morality is the focus of "Fleurs du Mal" while rebellion is at the heart of "Revolte." "Howard's achievement is such that we can be confident that his Flowers of Evil will long stand as definitive, a superb guide to France's greatest poet."-The Nation

In Swann’s Way, the themes of Proust’s masterpiece are introduced, and the narrator’s childhood in Paris and Combray is recalled, most memorably in the evocation of the famous maternal good-night kiss. The recollection of the narrator’s love for Swann’s daughter Gilberte leads to an account of Swann’s passion for Odette and the rise of the nouveaux riches Verdurins.

For this authoritative English-language edition, D. J. Enright has revised the late Terence Kilmartin’s acclaimed reworking of C. K. Scott Moncrieff’s translation to take into account the new definitive French editions of Á la recherché du temps perdu (the final volume of these new editions was published by the Bibliothèque de la Pléiade in 1989).

First published in 2002, Clinical Pain Management is a comprehensive textbook for trainee and practicing specialists in Pain Management and related areas, presenting readers with all they need to know to provide a successful pain management service. This major clinical reference work comprises four volumes. Three clinical volumes deal respectively with all aspects of Acute Pain, Chronic Pain and Cancer Pain; from the basic mechanisms underlying the development of pain, to the various treatments that can be applied in different clinical situations. The fourth volume, Practic and Procedures, complements these by providing helpful advice on practical aspects of clinical management and research, including protocols and established clinical guidelines, making it a ready-reference manual for the busy clinician. Innovative features such as evidence scoring and reference annotation are incoproated for ease of reference, and the text is supported throughout with plentiful illustrations and numerous tables. New for this second edition, there is a companion website containing chapters and illustrations from the four volume set. Written and edited by a large team of acknowledged international aspects, the fully updated second edition of Clinical Pain Management remains an authoritative and comprehensive guide to this growing specialty and is an invaluable addition to the bookshelves of anyone training or working in the field of pain management.

In 1790, while serving in the Piedmontese army, the French aristocrat Xavier de Maistre (1763-1852) was punished for dueling and placed under house arrest for forty-two days. The result was a discursive, mischievous memoir Voyage Around My Room, and its sequel, Nocturnal Expedition Around My Room. Admired by Nietzsche and Machado de Assis, Ossian and Susan Sontag, this classic book proves that sitting on the living-room sofa can be as fascinating as crossing the Alps or paddling up the Amazon. In addition to the Voyage and Expedition, this edition also includes the dialogue "The Leper of the City of Aosta," a preface by Xavier's better-known older brother (the royalist philosopher Joseph de Maistre), and an introduction by Richard Howard.

Nausea is the story of Antoine Roquentin, a French writer who is horrified at his own existence. In impressionistic, diary form he ruthlessly catalogs his every feeling and sensation. His thoughts culminate in a pervasive, overpowering feeling of nausea which "spreads at the bottom of the viscous puddle, at the bottom of our time -- the time of purple suspenders and broken chair seats; it is made of wide, soft instants, spreading at the edge, like an oil stain."

Winner of the 1964 Nobel Prize in Literature (though he declined to accept it), Jean-Paul Sartre -- philosopher, critic, novelist, and dramatist -- holds a position of singular eminence in the world of French letters. La Nausee, his first and best novel, is a landmark in Existential fiction and a key work of the twentieth century.

In this collection of aphorisms and short essays, E.M. Cioran sets about the task of peeling off the layers of false realities with which society masks the truth. For him, real hope lies in this task, and thus, while he perceives the world darkly, he refuses to give in to despair. He hits upon this ultimate truth by developing his notion of human history and events as "a procession of delusions," striking out at the so-called "Fallacies of Hope." By examining the relationship between truth and action and between absolutes, unknowables, and frauds, Cioran comes out, for once, in favor of "being."

"A Lover's Discourse," at its 1978 publication, was revolutionary: Roland Barthes made unprecedented use of the tools of structuralism to explore the whimsical phenomenon of love. Rich with references ranging from Goethe's "Werther "to Winnicott, from Plato to Proust, from Baudelaire to Schubert, "A Lover's Discourse "artfully draws a portrait in which every reader will find echoes of themselves.

'Not to be born is undoubtedly the best plan of all. Unfortunately it is within no one's reach.' In The Trouble With Being Born, E. M. Cioran grapples with the major questions of human existence: birth, death, God, the passing of time, how to relate to others and how to make ourselves get out of bed in the morning. In a series of interlinking aphorisms which are at once pessimistic, poetic and extremely funny, Cioran finds a kind of joy in his own despair, revelling in the absurdity and futility of our existence, and our inability to live in the world. Translated by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and critic Richard Howard, The Trouble With Being Born is a provocative, illuminating testament to a singular mind.

Is it possible to die a happy death?
This is the central question of Camus's astonishing early novel, published posthumously and greeted as a major literary event. It tells the story of a young Algerian, Mersault, who defies society's rules by committing a murder and escaping punishment, then experimenting with different ways of life and finally dying a happy man.

Barthes investigation into the meaning of photographs is a seminal work of twentieth-century critical theory. This is a special Vintage Design Edition, with fold-out cover and stunning photography throughout. Examining themes of presence and absence, these reflections on photography begin as an investigation into the nature of photographs - their content, their pull on the viewer, their intimacy. Then, as Barthes contemplates a photograph of his mother as a child, the book becomes an exposition of his own mind. He was grieving for his mother at the time of writing. Strikingly personal, yet one of the most important early academic works on photography, Camera Lucida remains essential reading for anyone interested in the power of images. 'Effortlessly, as if in passing, his reflections on photography raise questions and doubts which will permanently affect the vision of the reader' Guardian

"In the sentence 'She's no longer suffering, ' to what, to whom does 'she' refer? What does that present tense mean?" --Roland Barthes, from his diary
The day after his mother's death in October 1977, Roland Barthes began a diary of mourning. For nearly two years, the legendary French theorist wrote about a solitude new to him; about the ebb and flow of sadness; about the slow pace of mourning, and life reclaimed through writing. Named a Top 10 Book of 2010 by "The New York Times" and one of the Best Books of 2010 by "Slate" and "The Times Literary Supplement," "Mourning Diary" is a major discovery in Roland Barthes's work: a skeleton key to the themes he tackled throughout his life, as well as a unique study of grief--intimate, deeply moving, and universal.

Science fiction might not be the first thing that springs to mind when we think of Irish literature. But in the post-war period in Belfast, two authors, Bob Shaw and James White, began producing science fiction stories, eventually selling them to international markets and gaining the respect of luminaries such as Arthur C. Clarke, Brian Aldiss and Stanley Kubrick. Although lauded in the international science fiction scene for their innovations in the genre, Shaw and White's work has been relatively ignored within Irish Studies. This book connects the emergence of science fiction in Belfast with the position of the city as the locus of technological development on the island of Ireland, and the development of a corresponding technological imaginary. Breaking new ground in the study of Irish modernity, Richard Howard draws parallels between the narratives of Shaw and White and the persistent influence of historical narratives embodied by the two-traditions paradigm in the region, as well as exploring the figure of the alien both in science fiction and in the history of Northern Ireland. He also considers the works of Shaw and White as utopian gestures against the backdrop of the Irish Troubles, finding both repressive and redemptive elements therein. The book makes an important contribution to the growing conversation about Irish science fiction and our understanding of modernity in Ireland.

Worshipped as heroes, treated as gods, movie stars are more than objects of admiration. A star's influence touches on every aspect of ordinary life, dictating taste in fashion, lifestyle, and desire. Edgar Morin's remarkable investigation into the cultural and social significance of the star system traces its evolution from the earliest days of the cinema - when stars like Chaplin, Garbo, and Valentino lived at a distance from their fans, far beyond all mortals, to the postwar era in which stars like Humphrey Bogart and Marilyn Monroe became familiar and familial, less unapproachable but more moving, and concludes with an analysis of the furious religious adulation surrounding the life and death of James Dean. Ultimately, Morin finds, stars are more than just creations of the movie studios; they serve as intermediaries between the real and the imaginary. Today, with the cult of fame more pervasive and influential than ever, The Stars remains a vibrant, vital, and surprising work.

After a failed attempt on his life by an unknown terrorist cell, Professor Daniel Dupont decides to fake his own death. The government authorities, believing that the attack is part of a series of political assassinations, send Wallas, a recently promoted special investigator, to the provincial town where the crime took place. As he wanders the confusing streets of the town, he finds himself increasingly lost in a web of conspiracies, doppelgangers and memories. Cleverly deconstructing the detective genre, The Erasers, Alain Robbe-Grillet's first published novel, shifts between various characters and time frames, while maintaining the suspense of a conventional thriller. The result is an engrossing examination of consciousness and reality which is also one the founding texts of the nouveau roman school.

Roland Barthes's last book, combining a selection of photographs with reflections on photography. It begins as as an investigation into the nature of photographs, and then, as Barthes contemplates a photograph of his mother as a child, the book becomes an exposition of his own mind.

Dubbed "Nietzsche without his hammer" by literary critic James Wood, the Romanian philosopher E. M. Cioran is known as much for his profound pessimism and fatalistic approach as for the lyrical, raging prose with which he communicates them. Unlike many of his other works, such as "On the Heights of Despair" and "Tears and Saints," "The New Gods" eschews his usual aphoristic approach in favor of more extensive and analytic essays. Returning to many of Cioran's favorite themes, "The New Gods "explores humanity's attachment to gods, death, fear, and infirmity, in essays that vary widely in form and approach. In "Paleontology" Cioran describes a visit to a museum, finding the relatively pedestrian destination rife with decay, death, and human weakness. In another chapter, Cioran explores suicide in shorter, impressionistic bursts, while "The Demiurge" is a shambolic exploration of man's relationship with good, evil, and God. All the while, "The New Gods "reaffirms Cioran's belief in "lucid despair," and his own signature mixture of pessimism and skepticism in language that never fails to be a pleasure. Perhaps his prose itself is an argument against Cioran's near-nihilism: there is beauty in his books.

We are in the bombed-out Berlin of 1949, after the Second World War, rendered with an atmosphere reminiscent of Orson Welles' The Third Man. Henri Robin, a special agent of the French secret service, arrives in the ruined former capital to which he feels linked by a vague but recurrent childhood memory. But the real purpose of his mission has not been revealed to him, for his superiors have decided to afford him only as much information as is indispensable for the action expected of his blind loyalty. But nothing is what it seems, and matters do not turn out as anticipated. Indeed, the events that punctuate the secret agent's stay in Berlin are liable to abrupt transitions, thrilling and questionable in equal measure: a shooting, a kidnapping, druggings, encounters with pimps and teenage whores, police interrogations, even some elegantly staged torture. These bloody events take place amid thick fog along the city's canals, and even more mysterious narrative tricks. Robin--or is the narrator actually twin brothers?--falls in love with a mysterious woman named Jo Kast (a reference to Oedipus's mother Jocasta). Her teenaged daughter Gegenecke (the German translation of Antigone), a provocative blonde, will form a strange partnership reminiscent of the blind Oedipus led into exile by Antigone. Dupont, the hero of The Erasers, returns here as van Brucke (both names mean "Of the Bridge," one in French, the other in German). In this astonishing fictional cat-and-mouse game, reminiscent of Daedalus's labyrinth, nothing that is remembered can be altogether true, but only what is remembered can be real. Readers of Robbe-Grillet's novel Erasers will recognize, as the secret agent of Repetition slowly becomes aware that he was in Berlin before--as a child, with his mother, perhaps looking for his father--the same allusions to bits and pieces of the Oedipus story built into the hero's own. Indeed "erasing" a story by retelling it is the central motif of all Robbe-Grillet's fiction and films, of which this latest and probably last novel is in many ways the most revealing and triumphant version.

A graceful, contemplative volume, "Camera Lucida "was first published in 1979. Commenting on artists such as Avedon, Clifford, Mapplethorpe, and Nadar, Roland Barthes presents photography as being outside the codes of language or culture, acting on the body as much as on the mind, and rendering death and loss more acutely than any other medium. This groundbreaking approach established "Camera Lucida "as one of the most important books of theory on the subject, along with Susan Sontag's "On Photography."