Willie Nelson sang for Farm Aid and it didn't work: this won't either: yet this is a book: a book about farming and a family man and a familiar county--stung body; stung land--as told by a tweaked-to-warble farm machine that ate a human arm, and the chicken ate what's left, and the hawk ate what's left, and then the hawk died of old age.
The first biography of the artist who “essentially invented indie and alternative rock” (Spin) A brilliant and influential songwriter, vocalist, and guitarist, the charismatic Alex Chilton was more than a rock star—he was a true cult icon. Awardwinning music writer Holly George-Warren’s A Man Called Destruction is the first biography of this enigmatic artist, who died in 2010. Covering Chilton’s life from his early work with the charttopping Box Tops and the seminal power-pop band Big Star to his experiments with punk and roots music and his sprawling solo career, A Man Called Destruction is the story of a musical icon and a richly detailed chronicle of pop music’s evolution, from the mid-1960s through today’s indie rock.
Examines the many reasons and motivations for the destruction of books throughout history, citing specific acts from the smashing of ancient Sumerian tablets to the looting of libraries in post-war Iraq.
From the Publisher: Mass Destruction is the compelling story of Daniel Jackling and the development of open-pit hard rock mining, its role in the wiring of an electrified America, and its devastating environmental effects. This new method of mining, complimenting the mass production and mass consumption that came to define the "American way of life"in the early twentieth century, promised infinite supplies of copper and other natural resources. LeCain deftly analyzes how open-pit mining continues to adversely effect the environment and how, as the world begins to rival American resource consumption, no viable alternatives have emerged.
#4 in the Millennium SF Masterworks series, a library of the finest science fiction ever written. The first Hugo Award winner for best novel in 1953. “One of the all-time classics of science fiction.”—Isaac Asimov “Bester's two superb books have stood the test of time. For nearly sixty years they’ve held their place on everybody’s list of the ten greatest sf novels” —Robert Silverberg In a world policed by telepaths, Ben Reich plans to commit a crime that hasn’t been heard of in 70 years: murder. That’s the only option left for Reich, whose company is losing a 10-year death struggle with rival D’Courtney Enterprises. Terrorized in his dreams by The Man With No Face and driven to the edge after D’Courtney refuses a merger offer, Reich murders his rival and bribes a high-ranking telepath to help him cover his tracks. But while police prefect Lincoln Powell knows Reich is guilty, his telepath's knowledge is a far cry from admissible evidence. Alfred Bester was among the first important authors of contemporary science fiction. His passionate novels of worldly adventure, high intellect, and tremendous verve, The Stars My Destination and the Hugo Award winning The Demolished Man, established Bester as a s.f. grandmaster, a reputation that was ratified by the Science Fiction Writers of America shortly before his death. Bester also was an acclaimed journalist for Holiday magazine, a reviewer for the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and even a writer for Superman.
The director of the famed Bodleian Libraries at Oxford narrates the global history of the willful destruction—and surprising survival—of recorded knowledge over the past three millennia. Libraries and archives have been attacked since ancient times but have been especially threatened in the modern era. Today the knowledge they safeguard faces purposeful destruction and willful neglect; deprived of funding, libraries are fighting for their very existence. Burning the Books recounts the history that brought us to this point. Richard Ovenden describes the deliberate destruction of knowledge held in libraries and archives from ancient Alexandria to contemporary Sarajevo, from smashed Assyrian tablets in Iraq to the destroyed immigration documents of the UK Windrush generation. He examines both the motivations for these acts—political, religious, and cultural—and the broader themes that shape this history. He also looks at attempts to prevent and mitigate attacks on knowledge, exploring the efforts of librarians and archivists to preserve information, often risking their own lives in the process. More than simply repositories for knowledge, libraries and archives inspire and inform citizens. In preserving notions of statehood recorded in such historical documents as the Declaration of Independence, libraries support the state itself. By preserving records of citizenship and records of the rights of citizens as enshrined in legal documents such as the Magna Carta and the decisions of the US Supreme Court, they support the rule of law. In Burning the Books, Ovenden takes a polemical stance on the social and political importance of the conservation and protection of knowledge, challenging governments in particular, but also society as a whole, to improve public policy and funding for these essential institutions.
One hundred years after the events of The Rover, master librarian Edgewick Lamplighter sends his bored halfling apprentice, Jugh, to retrieve an enchanted rare book that sets fire to the Great Library Vault's priceless collection.
A study of aggression from the renowned social psychologist and New York Times–bestselling author of The Art of Loving and Escape from Freedom. Throughout history, humans have shown an incredible talent for destruction as well as creation. Aggression has driven us to great heights and brutal lows. In The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness, renowned social psychologist Erich Fromm discusses the differences between forms of aggression typical for animals and two very specific forms of destructiveness that can only be found in human beings: sadism and necrophilic destructiveness. His case studies span zoo animals, necrophiliacs, and the psychobiographies of notorious figures such as Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin. Through his broad scholarship, Fromm offers a comprehensive exploration of the human impulse for violence. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Erich Fromm including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s estate.