The Long Hard Road Out of Hell

Nicola Moorby (Author)

Turner and Constable: Art, Life, Landscape

0, Born just fourteen months apart, one in London and the other in rural Suffolk, J. M. W. Turner and John Constable went on to change the face of British art The two men have routinely been seen as polar opposites, not least by their peers. Differing in temperament, background, beliefs, and vision, they created images as dissimilar as their personalities. Yet in many ways they were fellow travellers. As children of the late eighteenth century, both faced the same challenges and opportunities. Above all, they shared common cause as champions of a distinctively British art. Through their work, they fought for the recognition and appreciation of landscape painting--and in doing so ensured their reputations were forever intertwined and interlinked. Nicola Moorby offers us a fresh perspective on two extraordinary artists, uncovering the layers of fiction that have embellished and disguised their greatest achievements. For Turner & Constable is not just a tale of two artists; it is also the story of the triumph of landscape painting.

Anthony Julius (Author)

Abraham: The First Jew

1,The story of Abraham, the first Jew, portrayed as two lives lived by one person, paralleling the contradictions in Judaism throughout its history In this new biography of Abraham, Judaism's foundational figure, Anthony Julius offers an account of the origins of a fundamental struggle within Judaism between skepticism and faith, critique and affirmation, thinking for oneself and thinking under the direction of another. Julius describes Abraham's life as two separate lives, and as a version of the collective life of the Jewish people. Abraham's first life is an early adulthood of questioning the polytheism of his home city of Ur Kasdim until its ruler, Nimrod, condemns him to death and he is rescued, he believes, by a miracle. In his second life, Abraham's focus is no longer on critique but rather on conversion and on his leadership over his growing household, until God's command that he sacrifice his son Isaac. This test, the Akedah (or "Binding"), ends with another miracle, as he believes, but as Julius argues, it is also a catastrophe for Abraham. The Akedah represents for him an unsurpassed horizon--and in Jewish life thereafter. This book focuses on Abraham as leader of the ...

Kenneth Turan (Author)

Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg: The Whole Equation

2,Kenneth Turan brings to life the extraordinary partnership of Louis B. Mayer and Irving Thalberg and their role in creating the film industry as we know it "Sharply observant."--Farran Smith Nehme, Wall Street Journal A New Yorker Best Book of the Year One was a tough junkman's son, the other a cosseted mama's boy, but they dreamed the same mighty dream: that the right movies could make a profit and change both the culture and individual lives. Sharing a religion and an evangelical zeal for film, Louis B. Mayer (1884-1957) and Irving Thalberg (1899-1936) were unlikely partners in one of the most significant collaborations in movie history. Over the course of their decade-long relationship, as key players at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and major players in Hollywood, they joined forces in redefining and mastering the template for the film industry. Mayer, older by more than a dozen years, was the business-minded face of the studio, while Thalberg worked closely with the creative corps, especially writers; together they rarely set a foot wrong. And while Mayer initially viewed Thalberg as the son he never had, the two would go from passionate friends to near enemies before Thalberg's ...