As an adult I love these stories. They are repetitive and have a rhythm. This is what the kids love about the books. My son loves the part where Mr. Putter's knees are cranky. Instead of using the word old, decrepit, or any other word that may be over the heads of kids; they used cranky. Kids can relate to this word! It is a true story of friendship. This is a funny story. Kids will love making their predictions as to how the book ends. This is the type of book to let them practice with predictions. It is easy enough that a beginner to chapter books would have an easy time with this book. The words are simple and so is the storyline. This is why Cynthia Rylant's books are all terrific! I highly recommend this book!

The Mr. Putter and Tabby series are the sort of books that I would have loved to have when I was a beginning reader. I know that I would have read them over and over again to no end, even once they began to fall apart from constant use. That's why I am so glad that Mr. Putter and Tabby are around now while my youngest brother is learning to read. The non-repetitious (words are repeated, but not enough to become explicit), non-rhyming storytelling contained within the books makes them a pleasure to read continually, unlike many other easy-reader books. And in my opinion, the Mr. Putter and Tabby books are a step in front of Ms. Rylant's Henry and Mudge collection, due to the fact that, in their own way, they create an appreciation for the elderly as the reader comes to love Mr. Putter, the aging main character whose only companion is his cat, Tabby.

In Mr. Putter and Tabby Pick the Pears, the fourth book in the series, Mr. Putter attempts to pick the pears from the tree in his backyard. The ailments that come with old age try to keep him from accomplishing his task, but Mr. Putter soon comes up with a witty and humorous solution that will have everyone laughing while they continue turning pages to see how it all ends.

Mr. Howard's cartoon-style illustrations greatly enhance this wonderful story, which is written in such a format to be used as either a 3-chapter book for the beginning reader, or a bedtime story that is longer in length. Either way, the Mr. Putter and Tabby books would be a great find for emerging readers' shelves. Like having a kindly old grandpa next door, they only make life richer!

I wish we lived next door to Mr. Putter! This is such a nice book. The part where Mr. Putter cuts up an old pair of boxer shorts to get elastic to make a slingshot is just silly enough to please a potty-humor-newbie, yet is still tasteful.

My son loved all the descriptions of "juicy things"...apple cider, apple pie, pear jelly, apple turnovers. Every time we read this book, he wants to make a different "juicy thing".

I love the comfortable companionship between Mr. Putter and Tabby, as well as the wonderful drawings. This book makes me want to check out the other Mr. Putter and Tabby books!

Arthur has succesfully bared his heart and soul in this extremley personal collection of poems. He has taken his life expiriences and put them out for the world to read. I have learned alot from him and his collection and cannot wait for his next collection to be completed.

I am nearly finished reading this book after having it lent to me by a dear friend and I am so glad that 1)I have this dear friend with an eye for endearing literature, and that 2)This book was produced. As a writer myself and a literary critic for the past ten years, this book has got to be the first look, the first test, the first glimpse into who a writer is, what are his passions, his past, his dreams, his aspiriations, his STORY. Truly unique and a page turner that I can not put down (I don't believe that many could)you easily see the innocence in the beginning (remember if this guy is like 22 now, he was 13--read that again--13 when he started writing his stuff), the sweetness, the unobliterated sugar of tender youth. Then we climax, more and more, harder and harder, higher and higher and slam dunk ourselves into heavy tough questions and concerns, dissertions and wonderings, personal philosophies about homosexuality, grown up, having friends, the pain and the lust of friendships, etc (some of these questioned answered in poetic theory, others are left with a sense of questioning or slight-knowing) it denoues to a brilliant cliffhanger--what else? There has got to be more! You can't leave it like this! Where are we going now? You get through it, and you see that this book is not just an autobiographical look of a human life in poetry, but just it's PROEM! I can't wait for the next book--and you can not wait to buy this one NOW.

I purchased this book from another outlet and you will not believe this guy. Arthur, if you're reading this, and to anyone else reading this review, you KNOW about LIFE, you know about love and you have felt it all, I swear. This book is the epitome of autobiography, new american gay poetry, reminiscent of Ginsberg, Cummins and Plath, I was just astounded through many of the very VERY VERY deep, philosophical, personal, spiritual, emotional, mental, psychological threads woven between each poem to create a story of not only his life, but a story that can be accessable to many many others, Gay or straight. BUY this book--you will not regret it, you will really enjoy it and I really can not wait for it's follow up. This writer is amazing--and should be hailed Ginsberg's love child or Keroac's brainwave; No one else like him, and no one can touch him. BRAVO!!

Sid Bernstein is the legendary impresario that brought the Beatles to America. He presented the original Beatles American debut at Carnegie Hall, as well as the Shea Stadium concerts. As the title, suggests, The Beatles are not all there is to this promoter's career. Bernstein also promoted Tony Bennett's first Carnegie Hall appearance, a series of Judy Garland concerts, Richard Pryor's first times in front of a large audience and more. Bernstein briefly headed The Newport Jazz Festival, brought the Bay City Rollers to American and took The Rascals to England. As a result of these associations, this autobiography becomes a history of the formation of American pop music into a stadium-filling sensation. These stories populated by figures like Woody Allen, Tito Puente and Miles Davis are told in a engaging, personal manner. That is Arthur Aaron extracted these stories from Bernstein and presents them to us in language warm and natural, as if Sid were telling us himself over dinner.

What an incredible book. Sid was the first "Rock Impressario". The book details not only his responsiblity for the British invasion but also his life...from a child to his current status. Sid did it all...from the Newport Jazz Festival to Carnegie Hall. And somewhere in the middle is the amazing story of how he found and brought the Beatles to America..long before Ed Sullivan even knew they existed. A warm and touching story about the man who truly is responsible for Rock and Roll in the 60's and 70's...and even influenced music today. The book is easy to read and the stories are told as if Sid and the reader were having a conversation over dinner. What a great book!

If you're looking for a great read for the beach or a long flight, buy this book. It's tremendous fun. I was genuinely sorry when I reached the end. The authors convey the excitement that seems to have characterized the earlier years of rock. I can't wait to read it again

Let's face it, over the last few years no one has done more to bring Schopenhauer to the people and back in vogue. From his confessions to the recent book on Wagner, Magee has written one damn readable book after another further exploring the richness that exists in Schopenhauer's worldview. After reading Magee anyone who loves music might find themselves becoming a Schopenhauerian! This volume fits right in, and is a must have for any serious fan of the philosopher or Magee. It's ten times as readable as the Companion series volume, and has far more personal and generally unknown tidbits lurking within. This was a wonderful book to have with me as I entered the Schopenhauer opus, and I've referred to it many times, not least for it's sections on Wittgenstein, Sexuality, and modern literary heirs. That being said, what makes this book so compelling is it's author's deep personal conviction that Transcendental Idealism is the closest thing philosophically to the "truth" (see his Confessions also). Magee seems to think that in it's rush to professional irrelevance PHI didn't pay close enough attention to Kant's central arguments. While I agree with his distaste with much of what academic Philosophy has become, his second implied argument is simply not true. Most philosophers have looked at his arguments and found them wanting. Magee doesn't seem to have spent much time searching out the dissenters, and when he did, he doesn't always seem to have understood them. So, it's a criticism I have that the road he's leading you on through Schopenhauer is seriously flawed, if not outright mistaken. But it's a great, and learned road, so you should take it. I think ultimately Schopenhauer was probably more wrong than right metaphysically, but every one of Magee's books will stay on my shelf till that day we find out (or not) for sure.

Bryan Magee is a superb writer with a gift for phrase-making and an uncanny ability to explain and make accessible the most difficult works in the philosophical tradition. It is not simply that he is able to convey the thoughts of philosophers of the caliber of Kant and Schopenhauer, but that he is able to communicate the vital importance of their ideas, together with the effect they have had in his own life and, more generally, their impact upon the trajectory of our civilization.

He begins this work with a brief biography of Schopenhauer that seeks to relate the early experiences of the philosopher to the development of his key ideas. Mr. Magee then sets forth the Kantian foundations of Schopenhauer's system and indicates the areas in which Schopenhauer has added to (or "corrected") Kant's transcendental idealism, notably by linking the concept of the Will to the description of the "thing-in-itself." Shopenhauer's ideas on art, on suffering, his connections to eastern religious and metaphysical belief-systems, his famous pessimism, and many other issues are discussed clearly and cogently.

This is simply the best book on Schopenhauer that I have ever read, with the exception of Schopenhauer's own works.

"What about myself in relation to Schopenhauer's philosophy - when I was completely Greek, an optimist? But I made the difficult admission, and from this act of resignation emerged ten times stronger."

The sentiment expressed by Wagner in the previous quotation articulates how I felt when I had discovered Schopenhauer and that is probably true for most readers of these philosophers. There is something in his ontological and aesthetic conclusions that induce a feeling of nausea and repellence and yet they are filled with much liberation. It's sort of like the feeling a prophet gets when he receives a divine revelation.
Magee does a magnificant job in making Schopenahuars ideas accessible to the public. The final chapter added to this 2nd edition dispels the popular misconceptions (misconceptions that I have run across) concerning Schopenhauers treatment of the will. What S really says is that we have direct phenomenal knowledge of the noumena but that 'phenomenal' knowledge is still nevertheless a representation. I don't think to S, the representation of an perceptual object is an illusion but merely that in order to perceive things, the brain develops a conceptual framework so that objects in the external world can be apprehended. Many people who object to his uses of representation often assume that he is saying that what we perceive is something completely different than what it is in itself. What Schopenhauer really saying is that we shouldn't ascribe too much importance, regarding our knowledge, to the object and ignore the perceiving subject as this would greatly retard our quest for understanding.
Magee also points out how avant-garde Schopenhauer was for his time because of his anticipation of Freud's unconscious, Einstein's relativity, and Schrodinger's Quantum Mechanics. One can conclude that Scopenhauer would have not at all have been surprised by these breakthroughs in modern science since he enunciated philosophical ideas that were very similar.
I must say that I find Schopenhaurs treatment of music flawed in that he seems to believe "that in aesthetic contemplation, the individual is no longer an individual but the pure, will-less, painless, timeless subject of knowledge." In this respect I might think Nietzsche was right in the Gay Science when he pointed out how typical it was for many followers of Schopenhauer to adopt the erroneous metaphysical aspects of his philosophy. Music, as with everything, is a manifestation of the phenomenal world. Interaction with music is not will-less if Scophenhauer really thinks everything to be a result of the will. In that sense we see his pessimism getting into the way of his philosophical doctrine. Magee was right when he pointed out the impossibility of renunciating the Will.

In further regard of S's treatment of music, I prefer Wagners theory of Art to be by far much superior to that of Schopenhauers.

"Wagner saw art as a celebtration of the purely human, of this life of ours in the world of experience, whereas Scheopnhauer saw this life as a burden and this world as a vale of tears, and regarded art as concerned with Platonic Ideas and the noumenal; Wagner's theories were historicist, which Schopenhauer would have despised; Wagner believed that the creative artists should address himself to 'the people', whereas Schopenhaur considered only a minority capable of being interested in great art; Wagner considered the main function of art as expressive, whereas Schopenhauer saw it as cognitive."

Even though he was overlooked by many, Schopenhauer was definitely the pinnacle of empirical epistemology. Magee interestingly emphasizes that Scopehnhauers philosophy, much like Wittgenstein's, is in some sense mystical because it doesn't imply that the empirical world is all there is. Unfortunately, we see that because of the limits of human understanding, many post-posivist philosophers have jumped on the religious band wagon. Clearly though, Scophenhauer would have thought it ridiculous to claim to know what the noumenal world (and I do not think he thought of it as separate from the phenomenal world) is as the religions of Christianity, Islam, and Judaism claim to do (Nietzsche would later show how little 'faith' in these ascetic religions is worth). Regarding the similarities to Scophenhauer's philosophy and Buddhism, I would not find it unreasonable to conclude that Schopenhauer's philosophy is a more sophisticated and more reasonable form of Buddhism insofar that Buddhism takes a metaphysical approach to life but does not apply phenomenal concepts to the metaphysical world.

I HIGHLY recommend buying this book. Magee has done a tremendous service to the revival of Schopenhauer.

»Traumnovelle« is the book on which the fantastic movie »Eyes Wide Shut« is based. It is written as early as in 1926, and it does not take place in New York but in Vienna.

A VERY beautifully written short story which is much more a poetic dream journey than an erotic story. Very interesting book!

Die Traumnovelle is a psychological novel (in fact Schnitzel and Freud were often in touch) who deals with the need for transgression. The two main characters, married, get bored with their everyday life and routine and so they start longing for what I'd call "adventure". But eventually, they understand that adventure isn't what we really want, it's just a temptation and once we satisfy it, it seems much less exciting than we thought. In fact what the two characters really want is exactly their everyday life and eventually they get back to it... I'm sorry, I could have explained this a lot better in Italian ;-)

"Traumnovelle" is a fine novella which masterfully employs the epic mythological structure to send it's main character Froidlin on a psychosexual odyssey. The character struggles with an attempt to engage in meaningless sexual debauchery in order to cuckold his wife. He finds, however that he can not divorce himself emotionally from sexual activity. Schnitzler is a masterful hand at creating an adult fairy tale the moral of which remains poignant today.

The book just grabbed me from the very first paragraph. I knew that Sir Arthur is an excellent writer but I didn't know that he is that good with medieval adventures.
Everything he writes is very true historically and that makes the book even more enjoyable. His sense of humor and the story made me feel almost being there with Sir Nigel. The story itself is simple but full of surprises. If you are a kid or if you are one of those grown up kids like me you will love this book.

You're a Sherlock Holmes fan, right? Yes, of course you are. Everybody is. Look at the zillions of reprints of these stories. Every year there's another one. And who is the writer? Why, Arthur Conan Doyle, of course.

Or maybe you're a science-fiction or fantasy nut. The books you love best are those in which a very imaginative author conjures up a remarkable, detailed, complex world, puts human-type characters in it, and sets them in motion, reacting to the forces around them. You'd crawl through mud to find a book like this.

So why oh why oh why don't you give this neglected masterpiece, this Sir Nigel--and with Doyle as the author--the acclaim it so richly deserves? No, it's not fantasy or science-fiction, but it begins in England in 1348, and can you possibly imagine a time and place more foreign than that?

To briefly summarize, the story is about a young squire, Sir Nigel, and his quest to perform noble deeds so that he can win the hand of his love, who waits patiently for him to complete them. If you want nothing more than adventure, this book has it. He begins by rescuing a damsel from a scoundrel who would besmirch her honor; there is a small then a large sea battle against the Spanish; there is a journey to a cruel, pirate-infested island, and the revenge exacted on its leader; there are jousts, one on one and thirty on thirty; and in final there is a large, desperate battle between huge armies of French and English where much glory and blood is to be found. Large and small, adventures abound, and I haven't even mentioned half of them. And nothing here stretches credibility. Yes, Nigel is a hero, but he suffers setbacks also--some really embarrassing--and in fact misses most of a set-piece battle he was looking forward to when he almost gets his brains bashed in at the beginning of it.

Like all of Doyle's creations, this novel is rich in small details also. For example, forks hadn't been invented yet. It was considered good manners to hold your meat with your thumb and middle finger while cutting it; to do otherwise was bad form. When you're done with the meat, you toss the bone behind you for the dogs. Once a week, the whole mess was swept out and more hay is laid on the floor. He shows a great knowledge of weaponry as well, talking about the relative merits of the bow and the arbalest, the heavy stones heaved by mangonels, and of course the use of swords and shields and lance. These are just a couple of examples. Practically every page reveals insights as to the way of life in those times, not the least of which is the portrayal of the chivalraic code by which they all lived.

Lastly, it is beautifully written, almost lyrical. Nigel comes upon the fair Edith, "whose face had come so often betwixt him and his sleep." Is there a more economical or descriptive way to put this? And later, marching in war-torn Brittany: "As the darkness deepened there came in wild gusts the howling of wolves from the forest to remind them that they were in a land of war. So busy had men been for many years in hunting one another that the beasts of the chase had grown to a monstrous degree, until [even] the streets of the town were no longer safe . . ." Descriptive? Indeed, chilling.

This is exciting, informative, first-class fiction, and warrants a much larger audience than it has apprarently been getting over the years. Do your part!

I don't have much time to write this review, but if I did, it would be a long one full of words of praise. I read this book in its Spanish language version(only about 15 times). I found it really exciting and interesting. It is the classic story of the undersized fighter who at the end gets all the glory. The story is full of surprises and it will capture anyone's imagination (it got mine). Read it! -

Arthur Gordon writes great stories. However, realistic but inspirational insight into the joys we often miss will enrich the reader's life. I have probably bought and given away a dozen copiers of A TOUCH OF WONDER since it was first given to me.

This is a truly special book written with great insight! I keep a copy on my bookshelf because its an old friend, and it reminds me (every time I glance at it) to keep and listen with an open heart to my everyday experience.

I had to read this book for an Interpersonal Relations class in college. It is now one of my favorite books of all time. I read it everytime I feel down or need some inspiration. It is a wonderful book to give as a gift. I would recommend this book to everyone.

I bought this guide when it first came out and enjoyed every tree, word and atticism. I am going to revisit this wonderful book to journey back into the life of a city's street trees. Wonderful, delightful and perfectly good reading for the neighborhood tree-hugger. A must have for any one who appreciates trees and literature. Mr. Plotnik gives us a vortiginous account of what trees are. "It's not what you look at, but what you see." - H.D.T.

I will always keep this book close at hand throughout my journey through life. Excellent. Vostellung!

When after all those rave reviews I bought a copy I was slightly dissappointed. This is an unassuming paperback. There are books on trees you buy for the illustrations: this is not one of them. The illustrations are nice, even tasteful (although I assume they would look a lot better in color) but are nothing more than just that, an illustration of the text.

However, when actually reading in the book I was quickly forced to the conclusion that this is a real find. Arthur Plotnik not only is inspired by trees, he also did his home-work (in a big way!) and he surely can write. This book reminds me very strongly of D.C.Peattie, as he would write if he were to live today. What can I add to that?

P.S. I can add that this book has an impressive list of references for further reading and a perhaps even more impressive list of internet sites on trees.

Typically, when I browse learned books, be they history, science, art, whatever, if the author's qualifications to teach me about the subject don't measure up, they go back on the shelf. Talented amateurs have their place, but with so many good books out there, I can't afford to risk having my time wasted.

This book is a great exception. By touching only lightly on the dry botanical aspects of the trees, and focussing on their characters, the author shows confidence in the subject while letting his enthusiasm and wit have full rein.

Again, most illustrations drawn by authors' partners usually serve for breaking up the text. Not these. The unison between the illustrations and the textual descriptions is evidence of true collaboration and a rare conjunction of talent.

If you're interested in "those big things with the leaves", and you don't happen to live in a forest, but this book.

I've been searching for a math reference book to use while pursuing an MBA. Much of the math that is used in the classes I'm taking is relatively simple and was more then adequately covered by my undergraduate education. But it has been all been forgotten long ago. This book fits the bill.

Pros: Have been able to find everything I've needed quickly. (Chain rule, logarithms, conditional probability, general solution to quadratic equations.) The explanations are terse but clear.

Cons: Crowed typography, could have used more margins, maybe a choice that was made for this reprint. Sections are number x.y-z, makes it hard to notice when the index refers to a range: x.y-za-zb. The index doesn't always lead directly to the desired section, for instance there is no entry for chain rule, but differentiation takes you right there.

Unfortunately, I'm already through most of the classes where I could have made good use of this book, but for those starting out, this might be a handy reference.

While it has very good structure and layout, this well organized reference book is much more a teoretical rather than an applied mathematical handbook. It covers many engineering issues, but it doesn't shows practical examples in mechanics, thermodynamics and electrics, like the old good Pipes/Harvill.

over a period of thirty-plus years, i've benefited countless times from this dizzyingly broad and accurate handbook. it must be seen in that light: handbook. but, as such, there is simply no competition, at least for the engineer doing mathematical evaluations or predicting performance. i myself even find it enjoyable to just read in it. also to remember: it is not a compendium of computer-based techniques; indeed, it is a handbook of actual mathematics. i appreciate this small forum as an opportunity to say: Thanks, K&K.

If you're familiar with Machen, you've probably read the frequently anthologized chapters of "The Three Imposters" -- "The Novel of the White Seal" and "The Novel of the Black Powder" -- as stand alone short stories. I found that I appreciate them more after having read them in their original context as chapters or "novels" of this odd picaresque (or maybe arabesque) novel. In "The Three Imposters", these "novels" appear as stories narrated by characters within the main plot. It's an interesting idea. However, the "novels" stand out as better stories than the narrative in which they are imbedded. So I'm not sure it's such a good idea. The book ends with a truly gruesome finish -- even for Machen.

This is definitely a worthwhile read even if you've read the aforementioned novels. As usual, skip Joshi's introduction. For example, Joshi finds the source of Machen's numinous sense of horror in -- surprise! -- Machen's Victorian discomfort with sexuality. Not to mention the fact that he was a Christian, too. Ooh those Christians just hate sex! I suppose we are then to believe that Machen undertook the translation of Casanova's "Memoirs" as some sort of penance, like the protagonist's hair shirt in Machen's "Hill of Dreams". (Machen's "Memoirs" is still the standard translation in English, by the way.) Or could it be the case that Machen was more subtle than the freshman composition caricature of a sexually repressed Victorian Anglo-Catholic Joshi draws in his introduction; that in fact one of Machen's great themes is the reconciliation of sensuality with mysticism? Not surprisingly Joshi, who professes a peculiarly coarse and unreflective variety of atheistic materialism, is blind to this possibility.

Whatever happened to E. F. Bleiler or Lin Carter? (Well, they're dead, sadly. But can't Chaosium and Dover find a better editor for their Weird Fiction?)

arthur machen is a great writer. his approach to his own material is calm, cold and scientific. sometimes it feels like a public servant writing a report (by that I am refering to his technical approach, like detective novels, this does NOT mean boring, it means details, objective considerations, etc), without passion. arthur machen most times only hints at what's going on, maybe letting some character come with a theory (this is what I mean by scientific). his style is suggestive. not being a passionate writer, machen doesn't carry you away, but he sure can make you believe his stories. his stories mostly dwells at one thing (a personality change, for example), making the story sometimes too boring. his greatest accomplishment is his stories about the little people, where there are many interesting stories.

In my own opinion, Arthur Machen was the best author before Lovecraft in helping us see the "cracks" in reality -- those gaps in our everyday way of looking at the world through which almost anything may come out at us. This stories of this collection (and its companion volume) have a certain haunting beauty to which Machen's rather straightforward prose is an obedient servant. Chaosium is to be highly commended for keeping these stories in print.