In a great Irish tradition of autobiographical fiction that includes James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and Seamus Deane’s Reading in the Dark, Parker’s poignant novel depicts events surrounding the amputation of his left leg as a nineteen-year-old university student. Masterful vignettes present the callow protagonist’s life before, during and after this ordeal. Belfast, drear locus of rain and despond, contributes to the heaviness at the novel’s heart, as its characters strive to rise above the pervasive melancholy of the city and find some human happiness that they can share. Tosh, Parker’s alter-ego, is drifting through life before his cancer diagnosis, plagued by the twin ‘cankers’ of a puzzling pain in the leg and a crippling loneliness. The amputation forces him into a more authentic relationship with life, which ‘Starts with the wound. Ends with the kiss. For the lucky ones.’ This remarkable, posthumously edited work, largely written in the early 1970s, prefigures the skills Parker would demonstrate in his plays: plainspoken and stoical in tone, the emotion seeps through a membrane of numb reserve. The writing is impressionistically vivid, the descriptions of pain and discomfort wholly authoritative. Hopdance is a beautiful, sincere, personal testament by a true artist, a wondrous ‘lost treasure’ of literature now presented to its reading public.

A study of the allegation of anti-Semitism against Marxism and the Soviet Union until the death of Stalin.

Revised and updated edition for 2011. This book examines the reality of the social and political situation in Belarus. Belarus is placed within its correct historical context and the myth of 'Europe's last dictatorship' is exposed.

The history of diving helmet designs from around the world. The diving helmet is an iconic piece of history. Years after it has been retired by modern navies and professional divers it retains its place on qualification badges and dive club logos. The early years of diving produced some amazing and some bizarre ideas and this book tracks their development and the reasoning behind them. The different approaches taken by the designers and their relative merits and successes are covered, taking away some of the mystery from these copper, brass and bronze legacies of a bygone age. With over 60 photos and illustrations the author also examines the various dangers of diving including the obligatory giant squid, as well as chronicling homemade diving equipment and his own 'deep sea diving' adventure. With a foreword by Tony Groom, author of Diver and In2Deep.

"Stewart Parker was a playwright whose sense of history and elegance of wit and feeling were unusual in the British Theatre" (Observer) This volume includes three of Stewart Parker's most striking plays - Northern Star: 'Only an Irishman could have written something like this: a freewheeling, lunatic sense of invention is harnessed to a cultivated, literary imagination and stoked up by moral outrage. It is a captivating play' (Sunday Times); Heavenly Bodies: 'The colourful, rather Balzacian story of Boucicault ...An undoubted talent for pungent dialogue' (The Times); Pentecost: 'One of the most stimulating, most satisfying, most touching, most illuminating in years of Irish theatre. A total theatrical experience' (Irish Times)

This lavishly illustrated work by two renowned scholars narrates the history of the spread of Islam all over the world, from its birth in Arabia in the seventh century to the present day. Islam remains an active and stillspreading phenomenon whose influence in different parts of the world is profound, and, to many non-Muslims, mysterious and little understood. With its 180 maps, 200 illustrations and carefully prepared text, the book brings clarity and under-standing to a religious and cultural force of great contemporary significance.