Literary Figures

With a new introduction by JESMYN WARD'Warm, witty, imaginative . . . A rich and winning book' NEW YORKER 'Devilishly funny and academically solid: delicious mixture' MAYA ANGELOU'One of the greatest writers of our time' TONI MORRISONFirst published in...

Renowned American artist Anne Truitt kept this illuminating and inspiring journal over a period of seven years, determined to come to terms with the forces that shaped her art and life. Within its beautifully written pages, you will come to know a woman...

In 2003 the former Women's Press editor and critic Sarah LeFanu published her acclaimed biography of Rose Macaulay with Virago Press. 'A magnificent job ... imaginative and thoughtful, dense with distilled information ... LeFanu offers a skilled,...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.All What Jazz: A Record Diary 1961 - 1971 gathers Philip Larkin's elegant, witty and penetrating reviews and responses to an enormous range of jazz and other records.About the...

Robert Graves: From Great War Poet to Good-bye to All That casts new light on the life, prose and poetry of Graves, without which the story of Great War poetry is incomplete. The writer and poet Robert Graves suppressed virtually all of the poems he...

This is a book about a poet, about a poem, about a city, and about a world at a point of change. More than a work of literary criticism or literary biography, it is a record of why and how we create and respond to great poetry. This is a book...

Authoritative biography of cult writer and author of NAKED LUNCH, William Burroughs (1914-1997).It has been 50 years since Norman Mailer asserted, 'I think that William Burroughs is the only American novelist living today who may conceivably be possessed...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9780743288811Author Annie ProulxFormat PaperbackPage Count 256Imprint Simon & SchusterPublisher Simon & SchusterWeight(grams) 236gDimensions(mm) 213mm *...

This is a book about a poet, about a poem, about a city, and about a world at a point of change. More than a work of literary criticism or literary biography, it is a record of why and how we create and respond to great poetry. This is a book...

In this extraordinary debut - called 'gripping' by The Times of London - Ben Rawlence sets out to gather the news from a forgotten town deep in Congo's 'silent quarter' where peace is finally being built after two decades of civil war and devastation...

'Darkly angelic prose... a joy to read, with the final part in particular recalling David Foster Wallace at his best' Alex Preston, Observer ________________________________ Will's mother's hokey homily, Waste not, want not... hisses in his ears as he...

Although his hilariously entertaining stories have touched the hearts of generations of children, there was much more to beloved author Roald Dahl than met the eye. His fascinating life began in Norway in 1916, and he became a highly rebellious teenager...

In this startlingly original memoir, composed of twenty-three letters written over the course of thirty years, Emma Reyes describes in vivid, painterly detail the remarkable courage and limitless imagination of a young girl growing up with nothing...

'This book is a glowing achievement by one of the best essayists of her generation' Charlie Brinkhurst-Cuff 'Witty, fresh and full of life' Liv Little 'I can't...

In 1903, after a fire completely destroyed her family home in Norfolk, UK, the 27- year-old Constance helped her mother redesign their house and recreate the garden. It was an experience from which she never looked back, going on to become an...

From Leonardo Da Vinci to Oliver Sacks: the first history of the western polymath, from the Renaissance to the present"An absorbing group portrait and intellectual history."-Kirkus Reviews"An admirable mixture of industry and erudition."-Robert Wilson,...

This classic memoir of the First World War is now a major motion picture starring Alicia Vikander and Kit Harington. Includes an afterword by Kate Mosse OBE.In 1914 Vera Brittain was 20, and as war was declared she was preparing to study at Oxford. Four...

When Iman Mersal stumbles upon a great - yet forgotten - novel written by Enayat al-Zayyat, a young woman who killed herself in 1963, four years before her book was published, Mersal begins to research the writer. She tracks down Enayat's best friend,...

In February 1822 the writer and adventurer Edward John Trelawny arrived in Pisa to make the acquaintance of his heroes Shelley and Byron, leaving a broken marriage and an exotic seafaring career behind him. He became a close companion to them and their...

Michael Gorra asks provocative questions in this historic portrait of William Faulkner and his world. He explores whether William Faulkner should still be read in this new century and asks what his works tell us about the legacy of slavery and the...

Outsiders tells the stories of five novelists - Mary Shelley, Emily Bronte, George Eliot, Olive Schreiner, Virginia Woolf - and their famous novels.We have long known their individual greatness but in linking their creativity to their lives as outsiders,...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9780679746508Author Lucy SanteFormat PaperbackPage Count 320Imprint Vintage BooksPublisher Random House USA IncWeight(grams) 289gDimensions(mm) 200mm * 132mm...

The meeting of Voltaire, successful financier, famous poet and troublemaker, and the enchanting amateur physicist and countess Emilie du Chatelet, was a meeting of both hearts and minds. In the Chateau de Cirey, the two brilliant intellects scandalised...

In Paris in 1902, Auguste Rodin had just completed The Thinker; visiting from Prague was Rainer Maria Rilke, broke and with writer's block. When Rilke was commissioned to write a book about Rodin, everything changed. You Must Change Your Life tells one...

At 22, Kate Mulgrew gave birth to a daughter. Having already signed the adoption papers, she was allowed only a fleeting glimpse of her child. Three days later, she returned to work as the star of a popular soap opera. Twenty years later, she went in...

WINNER OF THE SOMERSET MAUGHAM AWARD NBCC AWARD FINALIST WINNER OF THE 2017 SLIGHTLY FOXED BEST FIRST BIOGRAPHY PRIZE Selected as a Book of the Year 2016 in The Sunday Times, Daily Telegraph, Guardian, Financial Times, Spectator and ObserverAngela...

Paragon of English virtues or racist imperialist? Andrew Lycett (acclaimed biographer of Ian Fleming) has returned to primary sources to tell the intricate story of a misunderstood genius who became Britain's most famous and highest earning author. Among...

One of Ireland's greatest contemporary writers turns her attention to one of the country's greatest novelists: James Joyce - in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the iconic classic ULYSSES.'As skilful, stylish and pacy as one would expect from so...

Hemingway's captivating memoir of living in Paris during the twenties.'If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast'Hemingway's memories of...

Volume One of the Letters of T. S. Eliot, edited by Valerie Eliot in 1988, covered the period from Eliot's childhood in St Louis, Missouri, to the end of 1922, by which time he had settled in England, married and published The Waste Land. Since 1988,...

'A marvel of clarity, fluency, and (Morris's favourite word in her final days) kindness.' The Sunday Times The first full account of the remarkable life of Jan Morris: writer, soldier, traveller, and trans pioneer. Jan Morris is widely considered one...

Eclectic and impassioned, a collection that affirms the power of the written word.' - ObserverThe Boy Behind the Curtain is a portrait of a life, a place and a man. In this deeply personal collection of true stories and essays Tim Winton shows how...

Can it be that the human brain possesses an in-built faculty for language? Noam Chomsky, one of the most brilliant linguists of the 20th century, believes that it does- that there exists a 'universal grammar' common to all languages. Around the world...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.AwardsShort-listed for Edgar Award Nominee 2021.Book InformationISBN 9781641292948Author Jacqueline WinspearFormat PaperbackPage Count 312Imprint Soho PressPublisher Soho Press

In Journey Through a Small Planet (1972), the writer Emanuel Litvinoff recalls his working-class Jewish childhood in the East End of London: a small cluster of streets right next to the city, but worlds apart in culture and spirit. With vivid intensity...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9780375726491Author Jonathan AmesFormat PaperbackPage Count 288Imprint Random House IncPublisher Random House USA IncWeight(grams) 231gDimensions(mm) 201mm *...

Book of the Week on Radio 4, and in the Observer, Sunday Times, Daily Mail and The Week 'Riveting, and immaculately written' Sunday Telegraph 'A superb psychological study of a literary genius' Business Post 'A rounded picture... and gets to...

"A visual treat as well as a literary one...for gardeners and garden lovers, connoisseurs of botanical illustration, and those who seek a deeper understanding of the life and work of Emily Dickinson." -The Wall Street Journal Emily Dickinson was a keen...

Richard Wright's memoir of his childhood as a young black boy in the American south of the 1920s and 30s is a stark depiction of African-American life and a powerful exploration of racial tension.'A compelling indictment of life in the Deep South between...

From the teenager in provincial Russia in 1875 to his premature death in Germany in 1904, Chekhov wrote over 4,500 letters to a range of correspondents, including family and friends, his publisher and fellow writers - not to mention actresses. These...