Bill Bryson's bestselling biography of William Shakespeare takes the reader on an enthralling tour through Elizabethan England and the eccentricities of Shakespearean scholarship -- updated with a new introduction by the author to commemorate the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death William Shakespeare, the most celebrated poet in the English language, left behind nearly a million words of text, but his biography has long been a thicket of wild...

Likely written around 1607 or 1608 and attributed at least in part to Shakespeare, "Pericles, Prince of Tyre" is an adventure-filled play that follows the extended sailing journeys of a young prince. Pericles, a young prince from Phoenicia, is forced to flee Antioch when he correctly guesses a riddle that reveals the incestuous activity of King Antiochus. Unable to stay at home in Tyre because of Antiochus' vengeance, he sails away and ends up shipwrecked...

"Rather than making "something" out of "nothing," what follows is an endeavour to express the potential of language and thought to encounter what is infinitely beyond both yet to be imagined. In The Nothing That Is , Johanna Skibsrud gathers essays about the very concept of "nothing." Addressing a broad range of topics-including false atrocity tales, so-called fake news, high-wire acts, and telepathy, as well as responses to works by John Ashbery,...

The Old Man and the Sea is a deceptively simple work. An old man goes fishing. He catches a giant marlin after much struggle. Sharks attack and destroy the fish. The old man is left with the bare bones of the fish-a Monday morning "fish story." But much lies beneath the surface. The action is condensed and presented in carefully crafted images, in words and details selected because of their multivalent meanings, and in several external narrative strands,...

A delightful, witty, spirited collection of short pieces and essays by the inimitable E. B. White.

"Updike is Adam Begley's masterful, much-anticipated biography of one of the most celebrated figures in American literature: Pulitzer Prize-winning author John Updike--a candid, intimate, and richly detailed look at his life and work.In this magisterial biography, Adam Begley offers an illuminating portrait of John Updike, the acclaimed novelist, poet, short-story writer, and critic who saw himself as a literary spy in small-town and suburban America,...

This fascinating volume reveals the real men — and women — behind some of the most infamous London villains ever to appear in fiction. Fagin, Professor Moriarty, Moll Cutpurse and the notorious 'cracksman' A.J. Raffles were all rooted in the lives and deaths of a litany of real-life criminals, agitators and activists. With a special emphasis on the city that spawned them, this book brings together their stories for the first time and shows how...

From eastern woods and farmlands to the Pacific northwest coast, to tropical islands and rivers, the author explores the world of natural facts and human meanings.

How do we know a cat is a cat ... and why do we call it a cat? An "intriguing and often fascinating-look at words, perceptions, and the relationship between them (Newark Star-Ledger). In Kant and the Platypus, the renowned semiotician, philosopher, and bestselling author of The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum explores the question of how much of our perception of things is based on cognitive ability, and how much on linguistic resources....

A Study Guide (New Edition) for Margaret Atwood's "The Handmaid's Tale", excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Novels for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Novels for Students for all of your research needs."