In this wry, candid and sometimes poignant memoir, Peter Owen recalls his lonely Jewish boyhood in Nazi Germany and migration to England where he survived the London Blitz, a teenage dalliance with aspiring actress Fenella Fielding, and working with a motley variety of book publishers. He founded his eponymous publishing firm in 1951, becoming one of the youngest publishers in Britain. A pioneer of books on social themes, gay and lesbian writing and literature in translation, Owen’s authors included ten Nobel laureates and brought Hermann Hesse, Ezra Pound and Anaïs Nin to a wider audience. Enjoying their success, he and his wife Wendy were memorably stylish and eccentric figures at the literary parties of the 1960s and 1970s. Owen describes his often hilarious encounters with many of those he published, including John Lennon, Yoko Ono and Salvador Dalí, his adventures in Japan with Yukio Mishima and Shūsaku Endō, and in Morocco with Tennessee Williams and Paul and Jane Bowles. As one of the last of the great émigré publishers, his death in 2016 aged 89 signalled the end of a literary era.
The only novel by the twentieth century's most acclaimed surrealist painter, a richly visual depiction of a group of eccentric aristocrats in the years preceding World War II “The book is so full of visual invention, so witty, so charged with an almost Dickensian energy that it's difficult not to accept its author's own arrogant evaluation of himself as a genius.” — Observer In swirling, surreal prose, the iconic artist Salvador Dalí portrays the intrigues and love affairs of a group of eccentric aristocrats who, in their luxury and extravagance, symbolize decadent Europe in the 1930s. In the shadow of encroaching war, their tangled lives provide a thrilling vehicle for Dalí's uniquely spirited imagination and artistic vision. Hidden Faces beckons readers to enter the bizarre world already familiar to us from Dali's paintings. The story unfolds in vividly visual terms, beginning in the Paris riots of February 1934. The journey leading to the closing days of the Second World War constitutes a brilliant and dramatic vehicle for Dali's unique vision. “Start the first page and you are in the presence of an old-fashioned baroque novel, intelligent, extravagant, as photographically precise as his paintings but not so silly ... Dali notices everything ...” — Guardian
“An absorbing, dark, beautifully written” novel on the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire “written with the melancholy wit and grace of Gogol” (New Statesman, The Times) This deeply moving, deeply philosophical story set in Ukraine touches on timeless themes of uprooted identity, destiny, and loneliness Widely praised and rarely available in English, Weights and Measures builds on Roth's most famous work, The Radetzky March. Among his final works, this fable about the disintegration of a good man transports us back in time to Eastern Europe’s borderlands in the early 20th century. In this haunting and poetic novel, scrupulous artillery officer Anselm Eibenschütz is persuaded by his wife to leave behind his job as an artilleryman in the Austro-Hungarian army and take up a civilian post as Inspector of Weights and Measures in a secluded territory near the Russian border. Once there, his discipline and quiet dignity begin to dissolve as he encounters a shadowy world of smugglers, fugitives, and runaways. A deeply felt commentary on the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Weights and Measures registers on both a historical and personal level to portray the slow capitulation of a good man to insidious small-time corruption and to his own destructive passion. Part of the Pushkin Press Classics series: outstanding classic storytelling from around the world, in a stylishly original series design. From newly rediscovered gems to fresh translations of the world’s greatest authors, this series includes such authors as Stefan Zweig, Hermann Hesse, Ryūnosuke Akutagawa and Gaito Gazdanov.
The extraordinary range of responses to Jewish culture and history in the work of these writers will appeal to literary scholars and readers interested in Jewish women's history.
Nigel Kennedy changed the course of classical music in the late 1980s with his interpretation of Vivaldi’s ‘Four Seasons’. He was revolutionary: in his performance and presentation; in his technique and his open-minded attitude. A natural boundary-pusher and musical adventurer, Nigel Kennedy blew minds - and sales records - as he became the best-selling violinist of all time. Instead of an Introduction, Nigel opens with a tongue-in-cheek ‘Warning’: readers should beware of his politically incorrect writing style and his frank take on the BBC, record companies, the Bavarian Police and any other ‘self-appointed wielders of power.’ It sets the tone for a truly original memoir that is as playful, unconventional and carefully executed as his music. The book is structured like a musical performance, with ‘Interludes’, ‘Outros’ and an ‘Encore’ separating the regular chapters which cover Nigel’s life story, from his humble beginnings and scholarship to the newly created Yehudi Menuhin School - and then New York at The Juilliard School - to his flourishing career and break-through as a world-class superstar. ‘Interludes’ cover subjects varying from Nigel’s best and worst gigs (“It might seem strange that shit gigs stick in the mind so much more than the good ones but I suppose it makes sense…”), to run-ins with rock stars and Police forces around the world. His anecdote on the London Metropolitan Police’s handling of a noise complaint at an after-show all-star jam is particularly funny: “These guys (the Met) were cheerful, they dealt with the situation and didn’t escalate the problem when there wasn’t one. 10/10” ‘Outros’ cover Nigel’s thoughts on classical music today - fascinating reading from the perspective of a virtuoso - to Brexit, where the spelling of the word alone leaves the reader in little doubt as to which side of the fence the author sits. ‘Encores’ is a comprehensive section on Nigel’s recorded output, covering his early classical work, the Four Seasons and later albums. There are insights into his work with rock musicians including Robert Plant, the late drummer Michael Lee, Killing Joke singer Jaz Coleman, and producers Eddie Kramer (Jimmy Hendrix) and John Leckie (Stone Roses). Nigel’s writing on Gershwin, Yehudi Menuhin, Stephan Grappelli (‘my biggest inspiration’), Jimi Hendrix and the Doors is compelling. Nigel writes of his interests outside music - boxing and football - which provide inspiration and balance to his creative output (on Aston Villa - “a true blessing for me to have an outlet in which I was surrounded by normal, honest, hard-working people who did ‘proper jobs’”). There is a splendid chapter on ‘Kitchen Golf’, a not-without-risk variation of the game, conjured up with close friend and mischief-maker Gary Lineker, during a messy late night kitchen session. “My whole life has been spent breaking down barriers between people and this book is proof of that.” states Nigel in his ‘Warning’. It’s a Mission Statement borne out in ‘Uncensored’ with aplomb.
David Sylvester, who died in June 2001, was one of the greatest art critics of our time. He achieved fame with his work on Cezanne but became known especially for his close, perceptive studies of artists who became personal friends: Giacometti, Henry Moore, Francis Bacon. A brilliant interviewer who could make the most reticent artists disclose their secrets, he rarely revealed his own - but in the weeks before his death he wrote this brief, unforgettable account of his childhood in the 1920s. Beginning with his bewildered shuttling between an English nursery school and the turbulent Yiddish-speaking 'parental country', he reaches back for his child's-eye view. We meet Grandma Rosen with her passion for Rudolph Valentino, and Grandpa returning from his fishmonger's shop and reading out next day's runners at Kempton in his thick foreign accent. We learn of the large Sylvester clan, and of his parents' contradictory ambitions for their son: British army officer or 'a career like Noel Coward's'. We hear of friends and nannies, picnics and outings, schools and siblings; of music, politics, rows and disasters; of love and tenderness and death. Dry, comic yet poignantly unforgettable, Memoirs of a Pet Lamb brings us a life and a whole world in miniature.
‘Churchill’s Little Redhead’ is the autobiography of much-travelled author and television presenter, Celia Sandys, Winston Churchill’s granddaughter. In 1959 she accompanied her grandparents on the ‘Christina’, Aristotle Onassis’s superyacht, for a grand tour of the Mediterranean with another guest, the legendary diva, Maria Callas. During the extraordinary journey, sixteen-year-old Celia witnessed the burgeoning romance between Onassis and Callas, a love affair which resulted in two divorces within a year. Celia was born in war-ravaged London in 1943, the daughter of Duncan Sandys, her grandfather’s Minister of Supply in his war cabinet, and Diana Churchill. Celia recalls in much detail post-war rationing and the make-do atmosphere that prevailed at the time. In her spirited book she describes the ups and downs of her three marriages, from which she bore three sons and a daughter. The sad death of her divorced mother is touched upon with tenderness, and the death of her favourite aunt, Sarah, who had spent several years deteriorating into alcoholism following the sudden death of her beloved husband is narrated with much understanding and obvious love. Once her children had flown the nest, Celia developed a new career as an author and wrote three books on her grandfather. One of which, ‘Chasing Churchill’, led her to present it as a television series, in which she travelled the world re-tracing her grandfather’s footsteps: from his military escapades in Cuba, the Boer War, his vital wartime meetings with President Roosevelt and countless other visits to his ‘other country’ the United States. A thoroughly modern and independent woman of spirit, Celia’s eventful life makes for a fascinating read.
Young Albert Weiss was spared the horrors of Auschwitz when his parents threw him and his brother from the transport train. Years later, with the help of other survivors of the holocaust, he explores the myriad ways of confronting not just the evil that robbed him of his childhood, but the guilt he feels for having lost his brother on that wintry night.Mosaic, non-linear and semi-autobiographical, this book is reminiscent in style of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five and in theme of the works of Primo Levi. In documenting the stories of child survivors, it is a moving and necessary addition to the literature of the Holocaust.
