I love Emerson. For my money, he's one of the most insightful thinkers and beautiful stylists this country has produced. He deserves better than he's received from "professional" philosophers who tend to dismiss him as "just" a person of letters (as if that were a shameful thing to be!).

But this collection of Emersonia is seriously flawed. It prints the essays in Emerson's first collection, but only two from his second. It omits some of his best poems (including "The Sphinx," which Emerson himself so valued that he always had it printed at the very beginning of all the books of poems he published during his lifetime), as well as all of the later essays. In their place, the editors choose to print Emerson's "English Traits," a pleasant enough travel book but rather fluffy compared to the rest of his works. As the editors admit in their Introduction (itself a rather disappointing effort), they tend to feel uncomfortable with Emerson's work on mysticism, and so they decided to leave out of their anthology huge chunks of it. But since Emerson is first and foremost a mystical writer, this is to seriously misrepresent him.

In short, read Emerson--but find a better one-volume collection of his work than this one.

Every Emerson volume is 'a good read'. Unlike some other readers, I love English Traits, maybe because I am English. Emerson is a joy, everyone should read him, at least once.

Emerson's writings are eaily and clearly displayed in this wonderful publication. My thirst for poetry was easily quenched with his powerful and meaningful words. I would recommend this book to anyone who wishes to read thoughtful and discriptive literature.

First of all - you have to rememebr that this book was written several decades ago...and that things ahve changed a lot since then in Africa.

The scenery is graphicaly portrayed - and the incidents that occur in Durrell's animal collecting adventures are classic Durrell humour!

A great book for anyone who loves African animals with fantastic descriptions not only of the animals - but also their temprements and traits!

A good read for a rainy day.....

This book was published in 1954 and I guess that the actual collecting trip must have been in the late 40s. The Africa presented here is a weird mixture of Hollywood movie and anthropological journal. Durrell is quite respectful of the Africans and their culture, but this doesn't prevent him from sitting down and getting repeatedly sloshed with the local king. On the one hand, Durrell never refers to the people of Bafut as savages or anything overtly pejorative, but the 'Bafut beagles' of the title refers to both the mongrel dogs that help him to collect animals and the Bafut hunters themselves. He recounts telling off the hunters for being superstitious, but he never comes close to stereotyping these people. He communicates with the people of Bafut in pidgin English, which is at first a bit difficult to read, but after you get used to its conventions, makes a lot of sense.

Durrell's affection for Africa, its people and the animals that live there permeate this narrative. I am left wondering how similar or different Cameroons is 50 years later. The descriptions of the landscapes and the various animals that are collected contain just enough detail for you to form a picture in your mind, but not so much as to make the picture too literal and therefore somehow limited.

I believe that this was Durrell's first book. If so, I can imagine that he won an immediate audience for his subsequent books if only because his self-description is so winning. He presents himself in a classic Edwardian combination of self-deprecating humor, occasional bumbling, eccentricity, earthiness, but finally practicality and capability. I grew to like him more and more as the book progressed and look forward to meeting him again in later books. He returns to Bafut with his wife in A Zoo In My Luggage.

I loved this and only wish I could also get it in print. Though things have no doubt changed in Africa, there are no doubt still funny stories and people there as on any other continent, and I'm glad Mr. Durrell chronicled these.

Morrison obviously has friends of his in CT writing the reviews for this terrible piece of toilet reading. The exercises are not at all accessible, and even if they were, they are so antiquated, they hardly speak to the modern actor. To say this is an exicting read is a bold-faced lie, since it is so often caught up in enjoying it's own rhetoric, it vears from the point. This may be a useful book for research purposes, or for the novice, but in terms of being a valuable asset to the aspiring professional, look elsewhere. Much better, and more accessible texts have been written by Cohen, Hagen, and Mamet, with far more bearing on the modern American Theatre.

Morrison's CLASSICAL ACTING is perhaps the only available acting text which clearly delineates the adjustment in acting technique necessary to fulfill the demands of heightened classical text. The chapter entitled "Words, Words, Words" is especially valuable in explaining the socio-political background of classical acting; in addition, it clarifies the verbal agility and listening skills required for this work.
It also explains the value of RHETORICAL ARGUMENT and ORATORY as methods of "convincing" in Shakespeare--and notes with sadness our modernist tendency to replace skilled oral argument with attitude.
An extremely valuable book for actors interested in creating vivid, full-blooded, passionate acting in classical texts.

This is a clearly written, thorough text which kept me totally engrossed from cover to cover. It is full of wise advice and excellent examples. The exercises suggested are imaginative and original. ACCESSIBLE, INFORMATIVE, ENTERTAINING! I believe this is a must for anyone who is serious about theatre, whether as a performer or an audience-member. The author is undoubtedly a very experienced theatre-person as well as a superb writer. As an actor I have learned so much on my first reading and intend to return to this invaluable book again and again. I shall certainly look for more by Malcolm Morrison, I see he has written a book called Clear Speech - can't wait to get it!

In my opinion, Mr. Todd writes books by some type of writing formula. No matter the subject, He uses the same source material for each of his books. I find them shallow and sophmoric. They are like an expanded version of a college freshman term paper.

Todd's book is the single best introduction to the subject of Germanic peoples I have found. It contains an accurate summery of the current state of scholarship and is an easy read.

If you can have only one book on the subject, this should be it.

Todd's book has become the standard introduction to the history and archaeology of the early Germanic peoples in English. In a remarkably clear and concise work, Todd manages a comprehensive overview of much of the main evidence regarding the Germanic tribes which goes a long way to correcting the popular conception that they were the filthy grunting savages seen in the opening sequence of the movie 'Gladiator'.

In the first part of the book he covers most of the important aspects of the culture of these tribes, covering the physical landscape of forest and marshland in which they lived, their general social structure, trade and diplomacy with Rome, burial customs, art, technology and (of course) warfare. He draws on both literary and archaeological sources of information and uses both judiciously to present a concise picture of these complex and warlike peoples.

Part Two gives brief but useful summaries of the history of the major tribes who took part in the 'Age of Migrations' from the Third to the Seventh Centuries AD. He presents information on the Goths, Seubi, Vandals, Franks, Alemanni, Burgundians, Gepids, Lombards, Thuringians, Bavarians and the Scandinavian tribes, with mentions of many other minor peoples. Each of these is little more than a useful sketch ranging from four to forty pages each (consider that Herwig Wolfram's 'History of the Goths' checks in at over 600 densely packed pages), but each of these is enough to introduce the essential information about each these peoples and direct the interested reader to more extensive information. It also shows that these tribes differed from each other culturally and, to an extent, linguistically and that what is true about the Germanics in the First Century may not be so in the Sixth.

The book is well illustrated with maps, diagrammes, photos of artefacts (both Germanic and Roman) and line drawings and its bibliography, while not comprehensive, is an excellent jumping off point for the reader who wishes to know more.

While the Celts have become a topic of keen interest in recent years, with a plethora of books on them ranging from fine academic works through coffee table books to arrant New Age nonsense, the ancient Germanics are, in a way, the neglected peoples of the ancient world. Given that England was established by Germanic tribes and that they were in many ways the successors of the Roman world, it is a little surprising that these vibrant, warlike and artistic 'barbarians' are not far better known and understood in the English-speaking world.

An excellent book for both the undergraduate student and the general reader. Along with his 'The Northern Barbarians' I can recommend this work very highly.

The best thing going for this book is its title--which, in many ways, is also the funniest thing about the book. I enjoyed sitting in front of my dorm reading it, to have people ask "what are you reading?" to which I replied, "Eating people is Wrong." "That's true," they'd say.

There are many funny passages in this book. Many funny moments. Malcolm Bradbury has a sharp wit--he's the author. The plot is fairly simple--a college professor in a British school has a sort-of mid-life crisis as he interacts with the arrogant-madman Louis Bates and as they both fall in love with the gentle and mildly attractive Emma Fielding. Things happen, but I felt somewhat claustrophobic in the book as it didn't move around much. It was confining.

But maybe that's the point. Reading this book made me feel like the protagonist, Stuart Treece, probably felt---weary, disillusioned, and not wanting to go on but feeling compelled to (with the book, at least).

There are great passages, and I underlined a few. "Life is catalysed by knowing interesting people. That's where the vivid moments come from. And there just isn't time for bores and fools" (193). I agree with that.

"Moreover, all his life, Treece had been doing things that he did not exactly want to do, journeying off on holidays he had no intention of taking, watching plays he did not wish to see, playing sports he detested, simply because someone had gone to the trouble to persuade him, simply because he felt they cared, simply...well, simply because he could not say no. He always thought what a hard time of it he would have had if he had been a woman; he would have been pregnant all the time" (149).

There were moments that I loved this book, that I laughed and reread the passage aloud. Then there were moments where I found myself lost in a paragraph, completely uninterested, irritated that I was stilling reading this, asking myself, "is this going anywhere?" So I'm not sure if I recommend it. If any of this sounded interesting to you, then you should read it. If not, then don't. I'm not passionate about it or anything...but in the end, I'm glad I read it. After all, like Treece, since Bradbury had gone to the trouble of writing it, I couldn't say no.

The college setting and the main characters have remained with me since reading this book approximately 3 years ago. Rather highbrow, although expected from Malcolm Bradbury's background as a professor. Well worth the time and money.

The most amusing, scintillating, ascerbic book yet. Keep up the excellent work, Malcolm!

Some of the recepies were enjoyable, but on the whole not particularly exciting. The book provided very little insight into the entertaining process, and even less guidence regarding the appropriate method of execution for each of the menus.

The suggested decorations, while somewhat interesting, were completely useless provided one doesn't own at least 5 sets of brightly colored tableware, or a spare 40 hours to assemble some of the decarations detailed in the book.

This book is beautifully put together and offers a lot of great pictures and interesting ideas. Originally got from the library and had to buy a copy for myself. Great planning ideas too.

I got this cookbook last year, and it has become one of my favorites. The menus are complex, yet not fussy, and offer a wide variety of dishes and cuisines. I especially like the sections on table settings --some fresh ideas, and appreciate the section on where to put glasses, silverware, napkins, etc. Useful to young hostesses and for those of us who need a reminder now and then. I have many cookbooks, but find myself going to this one when entertaining.

First off, I just HATE the use of the word "Dummies" in this highly successful series of books. Dummy carries such a negative connotation! I am using this book as one of my resources in putting together curriculum for teaching people with disabilities how to be more effective at speaking in public, which in turn empowers them by giving the disabled a voice to be heard by politicians, policy-makers, service providers and others. Some of the content in this book is good, but because of the title, I keep the book hidden in a drawer in my desk. I don't want my clients seeing the book and thinking that "dummies" applies to them! Also, the emphasis on the book has to do with giving a speech, though there is a small chapter dealing with panel discussions and other situations. People perform public speaking in a variety of formats besides the "typical" stand at a podium and give a speech. Speaking up at a 12-Step meeting, speaking from the audience during a public hearing, and speaking as part of an organized "protest" or other public advocacy format are just three examples. The book's value lies in four chapters that cover organizing your material, building the speech, getting off on the right foot, and how to wrap up a speech. There are some topics there that can be generalized to any speaking situation, and those are useful. But, by and large, this book has been a bit of a letdown. If you are giving a formal speech before an organization, this would probably be helpful. The tips for dealing with panel discussions are also helpful. But for anyone who wants to participate in other public speaking situations, this book falls a bit short. It's helpful, but not thorough -- and, again, the title is just downright offensive...

I am new to this Public Speaking business! In my new position, I must make lots of presentations. Public Speaking for Dummies is a very helpful manual. Lots of good tips and suggestions. I also really liked the book called, Speech Communication Made Simple: A Multicultural Perspective. Both of these books have given me a lot of confidence when public speaking and have helped me to overcome much of my nervousness when speaking before groups.

I have been giving speeches for the past 16 years, and am well acquainted with the ropes. I was looking for a book that wouldn't just tell me "how not to be nervous" etc., but a book that would sharpen my speeches and make me a more polished speaker. Well, that's exactly what happened. I took Malcolm's ideas and started incorporating them into all my talks, classes, and speeches. It seems that overnight, I was being complimented more and more, and I myself feel that my speeches have much more "pizzaz" - but not only. They also are more well-built, educational, and get my points across fast. Malcolm Kushner's book is also very humorous. Perhaps sometimes the humor is just a little bit TOO much, but the easy, informative way he writes is a real treasure. Recommended!

This book by the late publishing mogul Malcolm Forbes offers a number of intriguing biographical sketches of famous people in history from all walks of life and basically tells how they died. A history professor introduced me to this book sometime ago and I've found it very intriguing... There are a lot of surprises and moments where even the ardent history buff will say "Hey I didn't know that!" It's one of those books that is easy to pick up and read on one of those rainy days.

They Went That A-Way is a collection of over 150 1-2 page sketches of famous personalities, mostly from the 19th and 20th centuries. Each sketch contains a short summary of the person's life and accomplishments, then a description of how they met their end. The book is well done, however I found it a little depressing, as the majority of the personalities were dysfunctional, dying from alcoholism, drugs, or suicide.

I passed by this book 1000's of times, but finally took it off the shelf and saw the very fine print of the subtitle "How the famous, the infamous and the great died". Not the topic I had expected. I love trivia, so my interest was peaked.
From the dust-jacket flap: "Here, for your entrancement and enlightenment, are exits made by 175 people famous during the past 3,000 years". The book covers people from John Jacob Astor IV to 'Mama' Cass Elliot and Ivan the Terrible to Virginia Woolf. Don't know who the person was? He does briefly discuss what made the person famous (or infamous) and sometimes adds in some deliciously odd twists that occurred during the person's life. He then, of course, goes into their often bizarre or ironic deaths.

Forbes speaks in language that is colorful and keeps you so interested that you want to read it from front to back, even though the set-up allows you to pick the book up, turn to any page and learn something that you didn't know before. I enjoyed it immensely.

So I was a little dissappointed that "Winter in Moscow" was a fictionalized account based on Muggeridge time in Russia in the early 30's. The characters mostly foreign reporters & writers are witness to the transformation of an entire society from a feudal state to the world first Communist nation. They are a sorry lot. This is a group that Muggeridge despises yet he was one of them. They enjoyed their life of privledge & luxury while mouthing the glories of the "Dictatorship of the Proletariat". They were either hypocrites or incredibly ignorant. It is however a reporter's story of the terror & hell that was Stalin's Russia circa 1932. Muggeridge was there.

This book was ahead of its time in revealing the true nature of the Bolsheviks and those that implemented its horrors as never seen before in history.Much of what Muggeridge revealed was verified in the many publications of late from those authors in Yale University Press'Annals of Communism Series'.
Ironic how so little exposure these revelations have had in our media.

Malcolm Muggeridge, a confirmed life-long Fabian, went to Moscow as a journalist to realize his dream of studying first-hand the wonders of this political-economic dictatorship that the NY Times correspondent had called "The Future". ("We have seen the future and it works!")

In a very short period, Muggeridge, an intelligent, politically savvy man, saw through the propaganda which hid to the world the all-pervading Terror, the economic disaster, the assasinations, the rape and thievery of the country's riches, the hunger-induced cannibalism, and the mountains of cadavers, all of this savagery carried out by a chosen few, who saw nothing wrong with the way that they, who controlled it all, were taking over and destroying the country, for their exclusive benefit.

Muggeridge saw legions of foreign, leftist radicals who were taking advantage of the real Russians, who were starving; he saw as well other regiments of "useful-idiots" who gained little from the cruel experiment, but rejoiced in the mystic "values" that they saw, which obscured to them the grim reality of the disaster that was taking place.

The book is historical fiction. Muggeridge tried to counter the damage to Freedom caused by the admiration of the cuckolded Western press, either seduced by what they did not understand or afraid for what might happen one day, should this perverted, absurd experiment that was Communism, triumph. To do so, from his lone position of weakness, against the clamor of socialists and internationalists who still today constitute the nucleus of the editors and managers who run what we erroneously believe is a free press, he was forced to trivialize what he saw, trying to achieve small gains for the truth, rather than be overwhelmed and steam-rollered by the lying leviathan.

That Muggeridge saw nothing trivial about the rape of a nation, is obvious by what he did upon his return to England and what his life became, after the highly educational, but terrifying experience he had just lived through. He immediately left the Fabian organizations he had belonged to all of his life; a politically-confirmed atheist, he became a Catholic; he gave speeches and explained to anyone who would listen to him, the evils of Communism; he wrote several books and tracts against this menace - although his voice was almost lost amidst the din of the Media, fawning all over itself to present favorably the lies and exaggerations of the communist savages, who had then, and retain today, certain elements of chic adored by those amongst us who enjoy every degeneracy that today has become "politically correct".

Mr.Muggeridge did his very best, with the meager tools he had been given, to staunch the flow of irrational propaganda that promised to flood the world to bring about Lenin's dreams of a world under the specter of communism, leading to the eventual liquidation of all religion, the eradication of ethics and morality, the removal of patriotism, and the assassination of anyone who dared oppose this universal Genocide - the worst ever perpetrated in all of history.

Unfortunately, our increasingly uneducated masses would not have understood the magnitude of the threat. Muggeridge was forced to feed us all the information piece-meal, diluted enough to be comprehensible for the average reader. He was not being silly; he was being intelligent and by measuring his words, making what small gains he could to an uncomprehending public.

I loved the first Vogue socks knitting book but this one is a disappointment. The socks in it are blah and boring.

This book is okay, better than the first sock book.

What I don't like about this entire series is that the print is small, and the charts are in color, usually very dark colors, that are difficult to read even in good light under normal circumstances.

Also, it would be nice if some of the patterns would tell you the multiple, so that you could use the pattern say for a hat brim or mitten cuff. And, it would be better if they had actual size photos of the yarns, so that the book will be more useful years from now.

Finally, any book this new should have had directions for using two circulars instead of double-pointed needles.

I have both Socks books and prefer Socks Two. They both have the same basic information regarding sock knitting. However I preffered the patterns they gave in Socks Two and found more that I would actually make.