This book is in the same genre as 'Eyewitness' with lush illustrations and colour. Possibly more detailed in historical information. Arranged thematically. An excellent armchair companion guide for before or after a trip. I would take 'Eyewitness' with me for the practical information (pictures of bus tickets; how to pay a dolmus driver; what to say to alight from a dolmus). But I am so pleased I purchased this book as well. Will tuck it into my bag next time, space permitting.

This is the most brilliant book on Istanbul in it's cathegory. Very coplexed and detailed on sites, historical monuments, museums and daily life. A must see before visiting Istanbul and Turkey.

First off: I have never been to London, at least not yet. I am a tremendous fan of these Knopf Guides, first buying them for some classes I took in travel school. My collection numbers 10.However, London is special. I dream of going there every day--this particular guide transported me there more than my own dreams could. The sections on architecture through the ages, "London Through the eyes of writers", and various other sections are finger-printed and thumbed and dog-eared. That just shows a person how I value the given information within. A MUST BUY!

During my recent visit to London, this book guided me through all the historical and modern architectural sites with accurate detailed information. I wish the author published a millennium issue of it.

We have looked at several books on our two visits to St. Petersburg, and the Knopf is by far the best. It has superb illustrations and thorough descriptions as well as sample tours. It also has excellent historical and political information to set the City in context.

This guide was invaluable to us on our regretfully short tour of St.Petersburg. We would read it before touring for background and descriptions of the places we visited. The book is worth having for detailed illustrations of the layout of the Hermitage,Peterhof,PushkinPalace, Yusupov Palace...It is a portable guide even with the color illustrations (i.e.not heavy). Comes with it's own bookmark, too! Highly recommended!

This book has great ideas for the future, like: The tallest tower, a future home, solar cars, the future man, and much, much more future ideas! It even has quotes of what people said through the 20th century which end up for future ideas! You should buy this book!

The L.A. Times Book Review said the Eyewitness Books series is "Like a mini-museum between the covers of a book" and that is certainly the perfect description. When you leaf through "Mythology" and see all the color photographs of artifacts and artwork, you will see that this book is a short course in Comparative Mythology, rather than just Classical Mythology. The book approaches the concept of mythology as "religion in story form," and Neil Philip's book is structured by concepts rather than cultures. Each of the two-dozen two-page spreads is devoted to such things as the creation of the world, making humankind, floods and storms, the elements, ancestor worship, superheroes, gods of war, mythical beasts and sacred sites. "Mythology" accounts for dozens of cultures, from the Aborigines of Australia to the Native American Zuni people. I do not know if students today still bother to draw things for their reports or if they just download photographs from the Internet, but "Mythology" is the sort of book where you will find something to draw for any report on any aspect of mythology you have to do for school. These items are taken from literally dozens of major museums around the world and you are pretty much guaranteed to see lots of fascinating objects you have never seen before. Usually students become interested in mythology through the study of the myths of the ancient Greeks. "Mythology" will get them interested in the myths of other cultures as well. Besides, it is fun just to look at the pictures.

"Daniel Deronda" is George Eliot's last and, perhaps, most ambitious novel. It has great literary merit, but I do not think it is her best work. The novel contrasts the lax moral attitudes of the British aristocracy with the focused dedication of the Jewish Zionists. Given the typical anti-Semitic sentiments in Victorian England, and the little known world of the Jews and the Zionist Movement, Ms. Eliot's made a brave and idealistic effort by writing this book.

Ms. Elliot describes the lives of British Jews, a society-within-a-society, of which most of her contemporaries were oblivious, through her hero Daniel Deronda. Through her heroine, Gwendolyn Harleth, who marries for money and power rather than love, Eliot explores a side of human relations that leads only to despair.

Daniel sees Gwendolyn, for the first time, at a roulette table. He is fascinated by her classical, blonde English beauty, and vivacious, self-assured manner. When Ms. Harleth is forced to sell her necklace to pay gambling debts, Deronda, a disapproving observer, buys back the jewelry, anonymously, and returns it to her. This is not the last time the deeply spiritual and altruistic Deronda will feel a need to rescue Gwendolyn.

Daniel was adopted by an English gentleman at an early age. He has received affection, a good education, and to some extent, position, from his guardian. However, Deronda has never been told the story of his true parentage, and sorely feels this lack of roots and his own identity. Not content to play the gentleman, he always appears to be searching for a purpose in life.

Daniel's and Gwendolyn's lives intersect throughout the novel. They feel a strong mutual attraction initially, but Gwendolyn, with incredible passivity, decides to marry someone she knows is a scoundrel, for his wealth. The decision will haunt her as her life becomes a nightmare with the sadistic Mr. Harcourt, her husband.

At about the same time, Daniel inadvertently saves a young woman from suicide. He finds young Mirah Lapidoth, near drowning, by the river and takes her to a friend's home to recover. There she is made welcome and asked to stay. She is a Jewess, abducted from her mother years before, by her father, who wanted to use the child's talent as a singer to earn money. When young Mirah forced her voice beyond its limits, and lost her ability to sing, her father abandoned her. She has never been able to reunite with her mother and brother, and was alone and destitute, until Daniel found her. Daniel, in his search for Mirah's family, meets the Cohens, a Jewish shop owner and his kin. Deronda feels an immediate affinity with them and visits often. He also comes to know a Jewish philosopher and Zionist, Mordecai, and they forge a strong bond of friendship.

Daniel finally does discover his identity, and has a very poignant and strange meeting with his mother. He had been actively taking steps to make a meaningful existence for himself, and with the new information about his parents and heritage, he leaves England with a wife, for a new homeland and future.

One of the novel's most moving scenes is when Daniel and Gwendolyn meet for the last time. Gwendolyn has grown from a self-centered young woman to a mature, thoughtful adult, who has suffered and grown strong.

The author is one of my favorites and her writing is exceptional. This particular novel, however, became occasionally tedious with Ms. Eliot's monologues, and the book's length. Her characters are fascinating, original as always, and well drawn. The contrast between the lives of the British aristocracy, the emerging middle class, and the Jewish community gives the reader an extraordinary glimpse into three totally different worlds in Victorian England. A fine book and a wonderful reading experience.

George Eliot's last novel is nothing less than extraordinary. The most obvious thing is that most of it is a thumpingly good read, especially the first third - witty,lively and devoid of Eliot's sometimes irritating commentaries (Eliot has an amazing mind, and her comments can both fascinate and slow the speed of the narrative). We seem to be in a decaying world of Jane Austen, with a descendant of her Emma Wodehouse - silly, headstrong, egotistical yet alluring Gwendolen Harleth.

The tension heightens when Gwendolen finally marries Grandcourt, and both she and the reader realise she has made the most ghastly mistake. Brilliantly, Eliot portrays in disturbing detail the psychological twists and turns of the relationship, as the 'powerful' Gwendolen finds herself trapped by a silent sado-masochist. Grandcourt is actually shown to do very little out of place - which is the achievement - and we are left to imagine what Gwendolen must be going through in the bedroom. We become enmeshed in her consciousness - not always a pleasant experience. It is a brave novel for its time.

The rest of the novel concerns the eponymous Daniel, his discovery of his identity as a Jew, and his final mission to devote himself to his race. It is thought-provoking, and interesting, and much has been said about how the way the novel is really two stories. The problem really is that the Gwendolen part is so well done that a reader feels disappointed to leave her and join the less enthralling Daniel.

The ending doesn't quite thrill as other moments of the book do, and there is an over-long section relating the conversation of a philosophy society, but, thanks to Gwendolen and Grandcourt, it stands out as one of the most memorable pieces of literature in English. Take away the 'Daniel' part and it is Eliot's masterpiece - and great material for the cinema. Maybe it's because she played the aforementioned Emma, but Gwyneth Paltrow could do a fantastic job as Gwendolen - just imagine her playing the great scene where the melodramatic diamonds arrive on her wedding night, and she goes beserk and throws them around!

Daniel Deronda is a moving account of the parallel yet different personal sagas experienced by two extraordinary characters: Daniel Deronda (the perfect "sensitive" man, way before his time) and the superb and brilliantly realized Gwendolyn Harleth. They are both insiders - one a well-bred but recently impoverished beautiful girl, the other a dazzlingly handsome and intelligent man whose birth is shrouded in mystery. As with numerous George Eliot novels, the hero and heroine would seem destined to marry, but don't. Yet they both achieve something greater: a realization of the inner state of unconditional love that Eliot considered the highest ideal of humanity.

Although this book is centered on the matter of Mark Robarts and his moral dilemma, we also encounter his sister, Lucy. She is one who is presented to us as a real Christian woman. She takes on herself the care of Mrs Crawley who is suffering with a deadly fever. Lucy is the ideal woman, beautiful, charitable, caring. She deserves the very best and is rewarded for her efforts by becoming Lady Lufton. Mark on the other hand, suffers a great deal largely from ill-advised friendship with Sowerby. Mark wants to achieve status by ill-advised social connections. Thankfully he is saved from ruin by his friends.

(...) Framley Parsonage speaks SO directly about a subject which is so integrated into our lives that it is hardly questioned in our society, namely ambition.

The last hundred years of American society seem to speak of the primacy of "progress" as a driving force. Just look at the current discussion of flat economic indicators. God forbid that we only produce THE SAME as last year. But I digress. Trollope, in his own masterly way, writes of the temptations and difficulties which accompany ambition. And, much to my delight as a reader, he shows how his main character actually overcomes those difficulties by facing his previous moral failings head on.

(...)

Young clergyman Mark Robarts receives a choice parish, thanks to Lady Lufton, the mother of one of his university friends. However, Robarts, though newly and happily married, is not content to settle into the life of a country minister. Lured by a wealthy and worldly set of new acquaintances, he finds himself pushed into living beyond his means and, worse yet, being held legally responsible for another man's bad debts.

Meantime the young Lord Lufton has been smitten by the charms of Robarts' sister Lucy, much to the displeasure of his aristocratic mother. It take a great act of magnanimity on Lucy's part - helping the impoverished Crawley family during a crisis (the Crawleys are more prominent in "The Last Chronicle of Barset") - to finally convince Lady Lufton that Lucy is worthy of her son.

This beautifully written novel contrasts the simpler integrity, though sometimes snobbish values, of the old ways with the more meretriciously glamorous lives of a newer society. As usual, Trollope has produced a multitude of characters whose motives are completely credible, and his depiction of the different social groups provides a most vivid kaleidoscope of Victorian life and attitudes. As always, there is nothing outdated in Trollope's sure insight into human nature.

Nabokov, in his Lectures on Russian Literature, suggested that Dostoevsky be knocked off the canon of Russian writers, especially in favor of Turgenev, whom Dostoevsky hated. The reason was that Nabokov was against the "novel of ideas" because, he would say, it managed to achieve neither.

Demons is, of Dostoevsky's novels, the most ideological, yet still it is masterfully pulled off. Let it be known, however, that at times, the plot suffers at the expense of ideology, just as one has to expect, BUT THE IDEAS!

This book, although in my opinion it has the nuance of neither, is a perfect bridge between Notes From the Underground and The Brothers Karamazov. The intelligentsia, you suspect, are trying to build the positivistic paradise that the Underground man railed against, but as the novel progresses, you realize that the idealist vision has already been lost by Stepan Trofimovich, that all that remains is his desire to feel alive, even if that means inflicting every sort of pain. This is the same type of monster that Ivan warns against, and identifies himself with--if he were to act--in the Grand Inquisitor.

Also, please note, I tried once to read it in an older translation, and gave up somewhere in the 100s. This one I plunged through with little trouble.

Dostoevsky's tackling political novel is given new life in this fresh translation. This work has been unilaterally been praised for capturing Dostoevsky's power and subtlety. This story is about the political and philosophical ideas that swept Russia in the second half of the 19th century. These demons, then, are ideas, that legion of -isms that came to Russia from the West: idealism, rationalism, empiricism, materialism, utilitarianism, positivism, socialism, anarchism, nihilism, and, underlying them all, atheism.'' Dostoevsky, taking as his starting point the political chaos around him at the time, constructs an elaborate morality tale in which the people of a provincial town turn against one another because they are convinced of the infallibility of their ideas. Stepan Trofimovich, an affable thinker who does little to turn his liberal ideas into action, creates a monster in his student, Nikolai Stavrogin, who takes his spiritual father's teaching to heart, joining a circle of other nihilists who will justify any and all violent excesses for the sake of their ideas. Stavrogin aims for a systematic corrupting of society and all its principles so that out of the resulting destruction he may raise the banner of rebellion. A chilling foreshadowing of Stalinist years. This is a work of art in literature!

Dostoevsky, as the great historian of Russia Richard Pipes notes, hated Socialism and Socialists more than all else under the sun. This is a continuation of his bombardment of collectivists and utopianists that began with "Notes from Underground" and continued with "Crime and Punishment." Dostoevsky, a Christian and a Russian patriot (in the best -- Roger Scrutonian -- sense of the word) -- rejected anything and everything that would make men and women into mere social ciphers, cogs in the machine of history, into "means" rather than "ends" (to use the terminology of Kant).

Dostoevsky's primary inspiration for this novel came from an absolutely horrid novel by one Nikolai Cherneshevsky called "Chto Eto", or "What is to be Done?" An early bit of Russian utopianism, it was a precursor of the vicious theories Lenin/Stalin would deploy to "drag" Russia into the 20th century (indeed it was Lenin's favorite novel). The fact that some 66 million would be killed on the grand march to utopia was irrelevant (as the lunatic Shigalyov states in Dostoevsky's novel, "from unlimited freedom, I ended with unlimited despotism. . ." the solution] to the problems of mankind is to grant absolutely freedom to one-tenth and turn the remaining nine-tenths into a herd).

This echoes, of course, the magisterial "dialogue" between Christ and the Grand Inquisitor on the nature of human freedom in The Brothers Karamazov. But this novel is relevant for more than its attack on socialism and communism -- both of which, outside of Cuba, China, and a couple of bookstores in New York City and maybe California -- have collapsed precisely because they could do no more than create misery and murder. What makes The Demons -- indeed, the entire Dostoevsky corpus -- particularly relevant in this first decade of the 21st century is his take on the Russian intelligentsia/liberals of the 1840s -- a group characterized by out and out hatred for their country, which created the conditions for the rise of nihilism, terrorism, and bolshevism in the 1860s-1890s. Those 1840s intellectuals, like the "intelligentsia" of today's America, adopted a "blame Russia first" attitude toward all internal and external problems -- glorying in Russia's humiliations, and cursing her victories. It's not a far leap from Dostoevsky's Stepan Verkhovensky to the likes of Lapham, Vidal, and Moore. The real threat to one's community, Dostoevsky argues, is not the farmer or the factory worker who attends church, votes Republican, and drinks his beer in a tavern, whose sons and daughters march to war because they believe it their duty to the country that bore and sustained them, but those who, cloaking themselves in the false-prophet mantle of "dissent," spit and sneer at the foundations of community, or what Russians would call sobernost -- the things that makes Russia Russia, the things that make America America. Dostoevsky's work is both warning and antidote. It's no wonder he was banned by Lenin; one doubts he is discussed around the smart parties of Manhattan today.

No I do not work for the publisher, but as someone who will spend 4 months planning 14 days away. I must say if I could bring only one book, this would be it. I have used it on every trip to Paris, and have not been led wrong by it. The book touches upon almost every conceivable church, museum, square, fountain, etc. that is within the City proper. If you were to study this book for 2 weeks with a larger Michelin map of the City,(one that is entirely on one looseleaf page, you could put the book down and completely navigate around the City on your own and find everything. Yes it is that good and well thought out. The ultimate writers of the guidebook deserve 'props' for how they did the book. I like the Knopf guides in general, but this one is the best.

Some caveats:

1. The hotel and restaraunt section IN THIS BOOK, in the back is too short and dated. The first and only time I booked a hotel in the back of a Knopf guidebook was in Venice and I GOT BURNED BAD! Unless you are talking about something world renown, like the Crillon, or the Cipriani in Venice, use another guidebook! For Paris, Cheap Sleeps/Cheap Eats has never done me wrong. In fact they have been uncommonly good.

2. There are a lot of tricks for getting around the City, getting into museums, etc. You won't find them in this book, you are going to have to go to Rick Steves for that!

3. The guidebook cant tell you what is best to see in this City, although it is not the Knopf guidebooks fault. It is the fault of the City of Paris. There is so much in that City, if you step off the plane and honestly look around, your head will spin, and perhaps you will start a lifelong love affair with it, as probably millions of others have. I don't think I have ever been happier, or more content, then sitting around drinking wine and eating frites somewhere in the Latin Quarter. Enjoy yourself and relax, the way the U.S. and the world is going, you may not get back there for a long long time.

The trouble with most travel books is that if you don't have the most recent edition, the information is probably out of date. The beauty of this book on Paris is that there is information on the culture, the cuisine, the history, the art, with a small, very small section on hotels and restaurants. This is not just a great book to prepare you for your trip to Paris, this is a book for a student of the city.

If you are going to Paris, this is one of the two books that you must have as a minimum. It is gorgeous, lush, dense with illustrations. Knopf does the best job on items like flora, fauna, architecture, history, art, how the city has been seen by others, its fashion legacy, street life, medieval influence, sub-cultures, music, and so on, each topic at least a two page spread that is always satisfying to the eyes.
A guided walking tour is the standard Knopf format for revealing the city, as opposed to the Eyewitness itemized number format. The Eyewitness guide is the other half of the pair that you must have to visit Paris, each complementing the other rather than competing. This Knopf guide has some gorgeous pull out maps/pages in the middle of the book that are really great.
The Knopf weakness is in it's ability to help you plan: There is a wonderful diagram of the Catacombs, on a fold out page showing details about the fascinating sites beneath the city, with pictures of some of the bones in the Catacombs; but nowhere will the Knopf guide tell you what time it is open or when. The Eyewitness guide is much stronger in that respect, the Knopf guides are almost as good as the Eyewitness when it comes to maps, the Eyewintness being better.
The Knopf guide has 7 pages of general index plus 10 pages for listing illustrations. The Eyewitness guide has 20 pages of general index with none for illustrations, which is to say the Knopf guide is more romantic, the Eyewitness guide more practical, they are 5 star both, and you should have both.

As a big fan of Augustine's writing I give this book five stars. The way that he has interwoven his thoughts, feelings, and personal experiences with the humble eloquence of repentance will have you as the reader very exuberant. In reading this work you will learn more of Augustine's life, the spiritual turmoil he faced, and how he came to knowledge of the truth in a most triumphant manner. Although, that's not all that you will find interesting in the Confessions. In fact once Augustine converts to Catholicism and discovers the mystery of the faith, he then proceeds to fill in the blanks philisophically were he had once been left in error. Finally Augustine ponders on the book of Genesis and discourses a respectable point of view on the creation of heaven and earth. Oh Yeah! I forgot to explain how Augustine corresponds the subject matter of this book with a profound emphasis on the Holy Scriptures. So I recommend this masterpiece to anyo ne who has a love for great Latin literature, or to all that wish to read the prestige of Christian writings.

I was asked to read this book as a freshmen in college and I loved it. It is not an easy read, but once you read over a part once more, Augustine's logic makes perfect sense. If you've read any other Augustine, such as "Freedom of the will", this book fits right in there and explains it perfectly. In fact, this book explains most of Augustine's tenants perfectly. If anyone wants to know why Christianity took such a harsh stand against sexual sins...it's Augustine lashing out at his past. He was really tormented. Worship God or worship sex. He chose God and I'm sure he thought about going back. Augustine also developed the full Christian idea of free will, which is manifested in this book as well. Augustine is an incredible figure and a role model for modern Christians. His trials are not much different from ours, seeing as we live in a society so obsessed with sex. Augustine's Confessions is one of my favorite books. A must-read for any theologian and philosopher.

St. Augustine's Confessions is a treasure of Western literature, and, much like the book of Job and the Psalms, really belongs to the heritage of the entire culture and has transcended sectarian importance. That is not to say that these books are not religiously important--of course they are, and the Confessions perhaps even more so to a confessing Christian. Much of what the entire Western church still believes comes straight from the mind and pen of St. Augustine, and to understand his mind one really needs to read the Confessions. Nearly the entire orthodox Catholic tradition of fall-redemption theology sprung full-formed from Augustine's mind, which can be seen in his allegorical interpretaiton of Genesis 1, the section that ends the Confessions and gives them an "unfinished" quality. Augustine was a well-known and revered man when he wrote this book, and rather goes out of his way to depict himself as a youthful deviant to his followers. This is both a heuristic device and what Ausgustine really believes about himself; he is interested in his flock realizing his own fallenness and finitude, and seeing it in themselves as well. A brilliantly modern book for fourth-century fare, it is amenable (at the risk of anachronism)to a multitude of interpretations. Here one can find existential angst, control-dramas, the quest for and the overturning of the ego-self, and an almost pathological study of human guilt (it has been quipped that if the Saint from Hippo had had a good psychotherapist, the Church might have been spared nearly two millennia of sexual dysfunction). Augustine's conversion in the garden reads almost like a kensho experience in Zen. Read the book and draw your own conclusions, but never forget that, as you read, you are sitting at the feet of (and in judgement of) one of the sharpest minds ever produced in Latin Christianity. He writes, "For although I cannot prove to mankind that these my confessions are true, at least I shall be believed by those whose ears are opened to me by love" Book 10.3, and whether or not your ears are open to him in love, they should at least be open. Augustine always has something to say to the careful reader, and no less a careful reader than Derrida lui-même is an inveterate reader and student of Augustine's. Quite a compliment from a reader who certainly does not share Augustine's faith concerns....