Marco Papi Boeken

This biography of the Nobel Prize-winning novelist and playwright is a monumental work of scholarship, arguably the most significant book about Beckett ever published. It offers a compelling narrative of Beckett's life, from his upper-middle-class Irish childhood to his early years in Paris and his complex relationship with Joyce. The book reveals Beckett's psychological struggles through over 300 previously unknown letters to confidant Thomas McGreevy, his heroic service with the French Resistance, and the extraordinary post-World War II period that birthed his first masterpieces. It chronicles his tumultuous family relationships, the psychosomatic illnesses that hindered his writing, and the autobiographical elements in his work. The narrative also delves into his connections with publishers, actors, directors, and friends, painting a portrait of Beckett as the poet of despair and an enigmatic artist who transformed modern man's destitution into exaltation. Despite Beckett's initial refusal to authorize the book, Deirdre Bair conducted extensive research across multiple countries and interviewed countless individuals, resulting in a literary biography that meets the highest scholarly standards. Bair, an accomplished academic, has taught at prestigious institutions and continues to contribute to the field of literature.

In an extraordinary period immediately before the first non-racial election and the beginning of majority rule in South Africa, Vera Stark, the protagonist of Nadine Gordimer's passionate new novel, weaves a ruthless interpretation of her own past into her participation in the present as a lawyer representing blacks in the struggle to reclaim the land. The return of exiles is transforming the city, and through the lives of Didymus Maqoma, his wife Sibongile, and their lovely daughter who cannot even speak her parents' African language, the reader experiences the strange passions, reversals, and dangers that accompany new-won access to power. All must change: Didymus, once a major actor in the resistance, making way for Sibongile's emergence as a political figure; Vera, working through the consequences of a lifetime's commitments to a new kind of relationship with a new man of the times, Zeph Rapulana.

Edith Hope heeft een misstap begaan en is in ongenade gevallen bij haar omgeving. Wanneer de herfst invalt, trekt ze zich terug in een familiehotel aan het Meer van Genève om zich te bezinnen op het leven, en om haar damesroman te voltooien. De mensen in het hotel en de gebeurtenissen in het verleden belemmeren haar echter om een happy end te schrijven. Edith weet van zichzelf dat ze wel 'figuren kan verzinnen, maar ze in het werkelijke leven niet kan doorgronden'. Dat blijkt dan ook wanneer ze in het hotel schuchter toenadering zoekt tot de andere gasten, en een van hen werk van haar begint te maken. Alleen een zeer onverwachte gebeurtenis redt haar van een desastreuze vergissing.

Autentico bestseller 'ante litteram', destinato a incidere in modo profondo sui gusti e sull'immaginario dell'intero Ottocento, Ivanhoe (1820) realizza una mirabile fusione tra il realismo del romanzo storico e la fantasia del racconto di avventure. Con i suoi conflitti tra sassoni e normanni, con le sue foreste popolate da nobili fuorilegge e signori arroganti, l'opera di Walter Scott costituisce tuttora una delle rappresentazioni letterarie più vive e stimolanti del Medioevo.