A distinguished list of contributors explores a variety of perspectives on the artistic culture of France and surrounding countries during the period 1870 to 1914. Aspects of dance, cinema, theater, poetry, prose, painting, social and political science, history, and medicine are covered in interdisciplinary essays that are both useful to researchers and accessible to students.

The first part of the book, which concentrates on France, assembles essays on the prose, poetry, and painting of Symbolism and Decadence, in particular Mallarme and Moreau; on avant-garde dance and performance; on women's writing; and on early cinema from Lumiere, Villiers, and Verne.

The second part explores the relations between France and several cultures. These cross-cultural investigations range from studies of the Anglo-Celtic "Rhymers' Club" to the Italian Crepusculari and include discussions of Belgian Symbolism and the Franco-Anglo-American Axis. The essays consistently point beyond the late nineteenth century and into the twentieth as they explore the multiple beginnings -- as well as the false starts -- that characterize the period.

What is the driving force that motivates someone to sacrifice everything; perhaps even their very existence, and climb into a ring with the intention of overpowering another human being? Aficionados of the fight game agree that champions are not born - they are made of the vigor, the intensity, the drive, and the scarring of deeply embedded life experience. And not all champions are driven by a vow taken as a ten-year-old. Scott Ashley was a child who innocently aspired to learn karate at this tender age - but when his father beat him mercilessly, and his mother left, he made this vow his singular focus. Scott never forgot that night with his parents, and from that day forward, nothing could stop him from thriving through martial arts. In ROAD TO THE TITLE; Scott shares intimate details of the unique experiences that formed his insatiable desire for recognition, and he leads the reader on a journey spanning three decades; originating in 1973 at the Rugby Theater in East Flatbush, and culminating in an Atlantic City Casino, when he becomes a world kickboxing champion. The story envelopes the reader into Scott's adventures working as a shoeshine boy; his struggles to overcome the chaotic dismantling of his family; his independence at age 15, his experiences working as a teen-age bartender in Manhattan; and his relentless pursuit of a championship, which leads to his prize-fighting escapades in; Canada, France, the Ukraine, and Atlantic City, where his dream comes to fruition.