Not really for the Gide beginner, this book nevertheless contains extremely subtle readings of Gide's work in an attempt to reveal his (often fairly disingenuous) political and sexual strategies. Lucey is careful to give both the original French and his own translations of some of the more sticky, controversial, or just plain mindblowing passages that are made more controversial and certainly far more mindblowing by Lucey's interpretations. Though the book did take some getting into, the effort was well worth it: It's absolutely one of the most stunning "thematic" studies of any author I've ever read. Even though Lucey tries to make things more comfortable and enlightening by providing some biographical context and synopses, I'd recommend reading at least half the novels first and familiarizing oneself with Gide's biography beforehand. Gide's "classicism" will never be the same again, will never have that whiff of stodginess about it that the word implies...

I travel in France a lot and speak French well. Most traveler's dictionnaries don't have the words I need when reading books or newspapers. So I wanted a dictionnary that was small but still really useful. This Harrap's Mini has by far the best coverage of any mini-dictionnary I have found. It is smaller but a bit thicker than an average paperback book. So it won't fit in a pocket but goes nicely in my small fanny pack. Amazon.fr carries it even if Amazon.com is out of stock.

This has been my closest companion through my many years of French and has become especially valuable at the college level. Harrap's includes clearly visible entries, which is helpful when one is flipping to find a word quickly, is a good size, and contains enough modern words to be a help in reading more recent texts and articles. Grammar and verb notes are brief, and another source may be necessary to help with those areas if the student has not yet mastered these points.

Keith Michael Baker is a highly esteemed historian (previously at U. of Chicago, now at Stanford) of the Enlightenment and the French Revolution. This book is a collection of essays that are unified by their subject matter, which can be described as "the intellectual and ideological origins of the French Revolution".

A few of these essays are more historiographical/theoretical in nature. That is to say, they are more concerned with questions of how historians approach this subject and the methods and intellectual tools they bring to bear on it. These are quite smart (and extremely influential) pieces-- and they have a general applicability to the subject of intellectual/ideological history, and not just to the French Revolution. However, like all works of historiography/methodology, the questions they pose are probably not going to be of interest to anybody other than other historians. (That's a pity really, as these are important questions that history buffs, and even just ordinary folks probably *should* take some interest in...)

Most of the essays in "Inventing the French Revolution", however, are case studies of particular ways in which political ideologies were deployed and contested before and during the Revolution. One of the most important of these has to do with the practice of writing history during the eighteenth century, as well as the collection of documents, the creation of archives, etc. Far from being a disinterested practice, Baker shows, the writing of the past was a way of engaging in partisan political debate. There were royal historians who presented the French past in such a way that tended to legitimize the claims of the crown over those of the aristocracy-- and other historians who took the opposite approach. Libraries and archives were creted on both sides to serve as "ideological aresenals" to provide arms to conduct this ideological/political battle, which provided some of the "ground principles" on which the debates that led to the Creation of the Estates-General (and then the National Assembly) and other events in 1789 and beyond.

All in all, this is an extremely smart, thoughtful, and insightful book. However, it is also a dense book. Though Baker writes clearly , he deals with a lot of heavy, complicated, and abstract concepts-- and he treats them with the seriousness and complexity that they require, rather than oversimplifying them. Consequently, this can sometimes be tough reading for those more used to graceful stylists (like Peter Gay). Also, it should be noted that this is a book about the creation of the *ideologies* that were deployed in both the pre-Revolutionary and Revoultionary era. As such, it's a work of intellectual history, and of political ideology in specific. This means that its a book about ideas, their development, and their function in political discourse. Those expecting a dramatic narrative of the French Revolution that includes the storming of the Bastille and bloody guillotines will be sorely disappointed. Finally, in case it's not obvious from this review, it should be noted that this really is a work of scholarship, written by a professional historian, primarily for other historians. Non-historians who know a lot about the Enlightenment and Revolution may still get something out of this if they're thoughtful and patient, but it's *not* a work of popular history, or a work intended to be read by someone who's not already knowledgeable about the general subject.

This is a beautiful book. French talks about energy, form, mechanism, and economy in natural and man-made things. He compares birds to planes in terms of fuel-capacity, energy conversion efficiency, drag, etc. He compares suspension bridges and dinosaurs. He provides examples of neat inventions and the thought that has gone into them (every- thing from steam-catapults to toy cars to grommets). This is "How Things Work" for the non-moron crowd.

Not only have I read his works, but Dr. Michael Kennedy, Chair of the History Department at Winthrop University is probably one of the greatest men around. His classes are insightful and interesting, and the gentleman knows how to be just that, a gentileman. His intellect on France as a nation and the Revolution as a topic is vastly superior to almost any that i have read or heard from. Truely a leader in this topic.

Reconcilable Differences: U.S.-French Relations in the New Era by Michael Brenner (Professor of International Affairs, University of Pittsburgh) and Guillaume Parmentier (Professor, University of Paris II and head of the French Center on the United States at the Institut Francais des Relations Internationales, Paris) is an evenhanded look at modern-day international relations between America and France, especially during the past decade. From economic tension, to clashes in NATO, to the dual face-off of superpower vs. multipolarity, Reconcilable Differences succinctly summarizes the highs and lows of the recent international interactions between the two nations and offers a guarded but insightful relationship projection through the near future. Also available in a hardcover edition ... Reconcilable Differences is a welcome and informative contribution to International Studies reading lists and academic reference collections.

This is a worthwhile book written in a crisp style. Recipes are straightforward and simple. I strongly recommend this book for serious cooks

After almost a century of modern-style research, the world is not exactly short of ethnographies. You can find works on everybody from Indiana town dwellers to Sri Lankan fishermen. Papua New Guinea, as an area where a wide variety of cultures, some with Stone Age technologies, endured well into the 20th century, attracted the attention of anthropologists right from the start. There are a very large number of books on the country, starting with Malinowski's seminal works on the Trobriand Islands during and after WW I. Most, but not all, of them concentrated on investigations of what are often referred to as 'traditional cultures', if not 'primitive'. Anthropologists, not unlike Western tourists, have often been lured by the 'exotic' parts of the world where cultures extremely different from their own could be found. Bateson, Burridge, Glasse, Heider, Hogbin, Mead, Pospisil, Rappaport, Reay, Schieffelin, and Wagner to name a few, gravitated to Papua New Guinea, drawn perhaps by the chance to study people whose cultures were 'untouched' by the West. 'Untouched' is no doubt a relative word. A few others, especially Lawrence and Worsley, delved into the cargo cults, an aspect of Melanesian religion that sprang up in the wake of colonial pressures on traditional beliefs. Modern Papua New Guinea, with its Christianity, bureaucracy, development projects, education, corruption, urban crime, and population explosion, has not received so much attention. Until now. Michael French Smith's VILLAGE ON THE EDGE is a delightful new ethnography based on work in the same village in the mid-1970s and then in the late '90s. Based on the idea of observing change, because Kragur village, on Kairiru island, off the north coast of the country, has been changing rapidly for many decades, Smith succeeds brilliantly. To my taste, he strikes just the right note between popular writing and professional investigation. In a clear, jargon-less style, he covers many areas usually found in ethnographies, such as village structure, family structure, the economic and political system, and religious beliefs, but focusses on how all these things have changed. It is a down-to-earth, non-exotic picture of present dilemmas for the Kragur villagers who still, after over twenty years of independence, remain poised between a sharing, cooperative society based on personal ties and the money-based, more individualistic one introduced as a correct model by the West and emulated by educated, town-dwelling locals. Smith puts himself into the picture, admits to his predilections and difficulties. Refreshingly, he does not hide behind some false 'objectivity', but shows how he accepted certain privileges (and dealt with some problems) that came with being a 'whiteman'. This honesty, coupled with a sense of humor and nice introduction of the flavor of Pidgin English or Tok Pisin, a national language in the country, made the book all the more appealing.

Melanesian societies often believed that knowledge'-of magic or ritual'-held the key to success in any endeavor, would be the best guarantee of prosperity. Those who had the best knowledge grew the best crops, caught the most fish, or had the most successful trading relationships. But, if many people in the village had that knowledge, then the whole village would be prosperous and successful. Thus, Kragur villagers, like most Melanesians, saw Western education as the way to go if they wanted to raise their standard of living, to obtain money and an easier life. Get Western education, prosper like the Westerners. In a way, Smith points out in the heart of the book, they have been proven right, but the results challenge the whole belief system that underlay their society. For them, if individuals prosper, but the village does not, the new knowledge has failed to produce the desired result. But as time goes by, as more individuals prosper, will not the old ideals completely fade, will not the old cooperative society vanish ? The village is on the edge.

I urge everyone interested in knowing what Papua New Guinea is like today to read this book. It should be on every reading list dealing with the modern Pacific, modern Melanesia, or 'dilemmas of development'. If you are trying to attract students to the field of anthropology or to draw their attention to the process of writing ethnographies, you can hardly go wrong with VILLAGE ON THE EDGE.

On a recent trip to Paris, my father-in-law brought along the dictionary part of this book. A bit excessive, I had thought. However, we used it in just about every restaurant we visited - French, Moroccan, Vietnamese, you name it. It defines every imaginable food and preparation type. The English to French translation is not quite as complete, but it doesn't diminish the book's value. Well worth the money and the trouble carrying it (at least the dictionary section). I'm buying this one and the Italian one for myself.