Under the aegis of the Goddess of Love, Isabel Allende uses her storytelling skills brilliantly in Aphrodite to evoke the delights of food and sex. After considerable research and study, she has become an authority on aphrodisiacs, which include everything from food and drink to stories and, of course, love. Readers will find here recipes from Allende's mother, poems, stories from ancient and foreign literatures, paintings, personal anecdotes, fascinating tidbits on the sensual art of food and its effects on amorous performance, tips on how to attract your mate and revive flagging virility, passages on the effect of smell on libido, a history of alcoholic beverages, and much more. An ode to sensuality that is an irresistible blend of memory, imagination and the senses, Aphrodite is familiar territory for readers who know her fiction.
WHAT DO EXCEPTIONAL COUPLES KNOW THAT OTHERS DON’T? If roughly fifty percent of marriages fail, what about the other fifty percent—the ones that “succeed”? Are those couples who stay together necessarily happy? No, not necessarily. In fact, many marriages that remain intact are far less than ideal. A mere seven percent are really good—in fact, exceptional. These couples have much greater than average passion, happiness, longevity, and fulfillment. And the good news is, luck has nothing to do with it. But if less-than-exceptional marriages are made up of men who are supposedly from Mars and women who are supposedly from Venus, what planet do exceptional husbands and wives come from? What are the secrets of exceptional couples . . . and what can they teach us? Marriage therapist Gregory K. Popcak believes that ways of relating employed by exceptional couples can benefit all marriages. In The Exceptional Seven Percent, he looks at the most successful couples and exposes their secrets. Each chapter examines in detail the basic characteristics of exceptional couples, including: · Developing a marital imperative—the key to unlocking all the other Exceptional Couple qualities · Setting and achieving emotional goals · Cultivating exceptional levels of fidelity, loving, service, rapport, negotiation, gratitude, joy, and sexuality Through anecdotes, analyses, exercises, quizzes, and guidance that is consistently supported by marriage research, you’ll learn what your weaknesses are and how you can begin to make positive changes. You have the power to turn your marriage into the most precious thing in your life. Why settle for anything less?
In twenty-seven personal and daring essays, some of our finest women writers examine the second half of their lives. They grapple with what age and life have taught them, contemplate their experiences, and reflect on where they have arrived. These are writers who get down and dirty, who have looked at themselves as they are, and at life as it is, to discover not only what time has taken from them but also the powerful gifts that only come with age and experience. Contributors include: Isabel Allende, Maya Angelou, M. F. K. Fisher, China Galland, Vivian Gornick, Germaine Greer, Erica Jong, Audre Lorde, Grace Paley, Alix Kates Shulman, Gloria Steinem, and Terry Tempest Williams.
There is a wealth of published literature in English by Latin American women writers, but such material can be difficult to locate due to the lack of available bibliographic resources. In addition, the various types of published narrative (short stories, novels, novellas, autobiographies, and biographies) by Latin American women writers has increased significantly in the last ten to fifteen years. To address the lack of bibliographic resources, Kathy Leonard has compiled Latin American Women Writers: A Resource Guide to Titles in English. This reference includes all forms of narrative-short story, autobiography, novel, novel excerpt, and others-by Latin American women dating from 1898 to 2007. More than 3,000 individual titles are included by more than 500 authors. This includes nearly 200 anthologies, more than 100 autobiographies/biographies or other narrative, and almost 250 novels written by more than 100 authors from 16 different countries. For the purposes of this bibliography, authors who were born in Latin America and either continue to live there or have immigrated to the United States are included. Also, titles of pieces are listed as originally written, in either Spanish or Portuguese. If the book was originally written in English, a phrase to that effect is included, to better reflect the linguistic diversity of narrative currently being published. This volume contains seven indexes: Authors by Country of Origin, Authors/Titles of Work, Titles of Work/Authors, Autobiographies/Biographies and Other Narrative, Anthologies, Novels and Novellas in Alphabetical Order by Author, and Novels and Novellas by Authors' Country of Origin. Reflecting the increase in literary production and the facilitation of materials, this volume contains a comprehensive listing of narrative pieces in English by Latin American women writers not found in any other single volume currently on the market. This work of reference will be of special interest to scholars, students, and instructors interested in narrative works in English by Latin American women authors. It will also help expose new generations of readers to the highly creative and diverse literature being produced by these writers.
Understories: Plants and Culture in the American Tropics establishes the central importance of plants to the histories and cultures of the extended tropical region stretching from the U.S. South to Argentina. Through close examination of a number of significant plants – cacao, mate, agave, the hevea brasilensis, kudzu, the breadfruit, soy, and the ceiba pentandra, among others – this volume shows that vegetal life has played a fundamental role in shaping societies and in formulating cultural and environmental imaginaries in and beyond the region. Drawing on a wide range of cultural traditions and forms across literature, popular music, art, and film, the essays included in this volume transcend regional and linguistic boundaries to bring together multiple plant-centred histories or ‘understories’ – narratives that until now have been marginalized or gone unnoticed. Attending not only to the significant influence of humans on plants, but also of plants on humans, this book offers new understandings of how colonization, globalization, and power were, and continue to be, imbricated with nature in the American tropics.
Focusing on women's writing of the last two centuries, Scenes of the Apple traces the intricate relationship between food and body image for women. Ranging over a variety of genres, including novels, culinary memoirs, and essays, the contributors explore works by a diverse group of writers, including Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Toni Morrison, Tsitsi Dangarembga, and Jeanette Winterson, as well as such nonliterary documents as discussions of Queen Victoria's appetite and news coverage of suffragettes' hunger strikes. Moreover, in addressing works by Hispanic, African, African American, Jewish, and lesbian writers, the book explodes the myth that only white, privileged, and heterosexual women are concerned with body image, and shows the many cultural contexts in which food and cooking are important in women's literature. Above all, the essays pay tribute to the rich and multiple meanings of food in women's writing as a symbol for all kinds of delightful—and transgressive—desires.
Isabel Allende garnered immediate attention and international acclaim with the 1982 publication of House of Spirits. Allende drew favorable comparisons to male Latin American writers who were dominating a boom movement that mixed political and magical themes. Yet her engaging epic became a bestseller based on its artistic merit, regardless of gender issues, and her ensuing output of fiction and nonfiction continued to establish her esteemed place in the literary ranks. This Critical Companion introduces readers to Allende's writings with accessible literary analysis of her six novels, featuring discussions of plot, character development, thematic concerns and style, historical contexts, and alternative critical perspectives. A fascinating biographical chapter traces Allende's journey from wife, mother, and journalist in Chile to internationally acclaimed author. Her life story—as stimulating as her novels—offer students and readers a better understanding of the historical and political forces that informed her work. The Literary Heritage chapter provides will deepen readers' appreciation for Allende's contributions to, and place in, the Latin American literary tradition. A select bibliography includes reviews and resources that will be especially useful for student research projects.
Let Great Reading Fuel Your Writing Great writers read–voraciously and across many topics and genres. They read to learn, to research, to study the style of others, and to improve their own work. They read because they love the written word. But becoming well read takes time, dedication, and patience. The thought can be daunting–especially when you're eager to get to your own writing. Fred White, author of The Daily Writer, helps you sort through the plethora of reading material available by providing you with 366 engaging excerpts from ancient poetry to modern science, on topics from allegory to food to writer's block. Each thoughtfully chosen excerpt is followed by a brief reflection and a prompt that allows you to integrate elements from each piece into your own writing. The Daily Reader makes broad reading accessible, invigorates your thirst for the written word, and equips you to put the power of the pros behind your writing.
A biography of Chilean American novelist Isabel Allende, discussing her youth and family in Lima, her marriage to Michael, her work as a journalist, her clashes with the government, her career as a writer, and the death of her daughter, Paula.
From the whimsical idealism of Miguel de Cervantes Don Quixote to the magical realism of Gabriel García Márquezs 100 Years of Solitude, Spanish-language literature has substantially enriched the global literary canon. This volume examines the vibrant prose and dynamic range of both Spanish and Latin American authors, whose narratives are informed as much by their imaginations as the turbulent histories of these native lands. Influenced by a plethora of diverse cultures, these tales truly tell a global story.
