A fun and practical guide to cultivating a more mindful and fulfilling everyday life by tapping into your inner flaneur—perfect for fans of Marie Kondo and The Little Book of Hygge. Have you ever been walking home from work and unexpectedly took a different path just to learn more about your neighborhood? Or have you been on a vacation and walked around a new city just to take it all in? Then chances are, you’re a flaneur and you didn’t even know it! Originally used to describe well-to-do French men who would stroll city streets in the nineteenth century, flaneur has evolved to generally mean someone who wanders with intention. Even if you’ve already embraced being a flaneur, did you know that flaneuring has benefits beyond satisfying your craving for wanderlust? In The Art of Flaneuring, discover the many ways flaneuring can spark creativity, support a more mindful mentality, and improve your overall well-being, including: -How flaneuring your mundane daily routine can boost your mental health -Why flaneuring isn’t just for jet-setters—you can flaneur anywhere! -How to manage your stress at the office by doing fun flaneur-inspired activities -How to use flaneuring to connect on a deeper level with your friends and partner -And so much more! With this practical and engaging guide, you can learn how to channel your inner flaneur and cultivate a more creative, fulfilling, and mindful everyday life.
"An inspiring book for fl�neurs and Paris lovers. It transforms your walk around Paris into an exciting and memorable experience." A man walks the streets of Paris, alone and without a destination. He travels long avenues of great buildings, loses himself in the crowds at the Grands Magasins. Wrapped up in a black overcoat, he wanders the city restlessly. But what is he looking for? Where is he going? This book teaches you how lose yourself in the city: it contains stories of promenades and urban adventures, stories of dandies and fl�neurs... It contains information regarding characters, authors and artists who have wandered the streets of Paris. By reading these pages you will discover the secrets of fl�nerie, the noble art of wandering without a destination. About the Author. Federico Castigliano holds a PhD in Comparative Literature (University of Turin) and is Associate Professor of Italian Studies. Having worked for several years in France, he currently teaches at Beijing International Studies University. His writing combines nonfiction and fiction and centers on the relationship between the individual and urban spaces, thus exploring the possibilities of today's city. Website: federicocastigliano.com TABLE OF CONTENTS: Itineraries of fl�nerie (map) Instructions for reading this book Prologue - Into the street How to be a true fl�neur A day in the life of a fl�neur Once there was the fl�neur Getting lost Where to wander in Paris Drifting along the boulevards The ruins of Paris A dangerous game The city of tomorrow Shopping as one of the fine arts Paris spleen Epilogue - At the gate Memorandum for fl�neurs Bibliography
A flaneur is a stroller, a loiterer, someone who ambles through city streets in search of adventure and fulfillment. Edmund White, who lived in Paris for sixteen years, wanders through the streets and avenues and along the quays, into parts of Paris virtually unknown to visitors and indeed to many Parisians. In the hands of the learned White, a walk through Paris is both a tour of its lush, sometimes prurient history, and an evocation of the city's spirit. The Flaneur leads us to bookshops and boutiques, monuments and palaces, giving us a glimpse the inner human drama. Along the way we learn everything from the latest debates among French lawmakers to the juicy details of Colette's life. Originally published as part of Bloomsbury's Writer and the City series, this book has sold consistently over the years, and will find a whole new audience in paperback.
FINALIST FOR THE PEN/DIAMONSTEIN-SPIELVOGEL AWARD FOR THE ART OF THE ESSAY A New York Times Notable Book of 2017 The flâneur is the quintessentially masculine figure of privilege and leisure who strides the capitals of the world with abandon. But it is the flâneuse who captures the imagination of the cultural critic Lauren Elkin. In her wonderfully gender-bending new book, the flâneuse is a “determined, resourceful individual keenly attuned to the creative potential of the city and the liberating possibilities of a good walk.” Virginia Woolf called it “street haunting”; Holly Golightly epitomized it in Breakfast at Tiffany’s; and Patti Smith did it in her own inimitable style in 1970s New York. Part cultural meander, part memoir, Flâneuse takes us on a distinctly cosmopolitan jaunt that begins in New York, where Elkin grew up, and transports us to Paris via Venice, Tokyo, and London, all cities in which she’s lived. We are shown the paths beaten by such flâneuses as the cross-dressing nineteenth-century novelist George Sand, the Parisian artist Sophie Calle, the wartime correspondent Martha Gellhorn, and the writer Jean Rhys. With tenacity and insight, Elkin creates a mosaic of what urban settings have meant to women, charting through literature, art, history, and film the sometimes exhilarating, sometimes fraught relationship that women have with the metropolis. Called “deliciously spiky and seditious” by The Guardian, Flâneuse will inspire you to light out for the great cities yourself.
Art History: The Basics is a concise and accessible introduction for the general reader and the undergraduate approaching the history of art for the first time at college or university. It will give you answers to questions like: What is art and art history? What are the main methodologies used to understand art? How have ideas about form, sex and gender shaped representation? What connects art with psychoanalysis, semiotics and Marxism? How are globalization and postmodernism changing art and art history? Each chapter introduces key ideas, issues and debates in art history, including information on relevant websites and image archives. Fully illustrated with an international range of artistic examples, Art History: The Basics also includes helpful subject summaries, further ideas for reading in each chapter, and a useful glossary for easy reference.
Welcome to a year of sustainable living with renowned ceramicist Christopher Spitzmiller, with advice and inspiration for seasonal entertaining, gardening, tending heritage chickens, and more. Christopher Spitzmiller is known to his many friends and Instagram fans as the ultimate weekend farmer, who raises his own chicks, grows his own flowers, and puts up his own jam, cider, and honey. In his first book, he treats readers to a full year at his country retreat, Clove Brook Farm. Organized into four sections by season, the book begins with spring: the lilacs and appleblossoms, the dovecote with Indian fantail pigeons, Easter lunch, with daffodils and porcelain, and Spitzmiller's recipe for rhubarb pie. Summer brings hydrangeas, dahlias, readying the chickens for the Dutchess County Fair, and a garden cocktail party. Fall focuses on collecting, cider making, an orchard luncheon and a Thanksgiving table, honey-gathering, and planting bulbs. Winter closes the book with holiday decorating, gilding allium, a holiday buffet, and homemade gifts. Filled with tips on creating beautiful seasonal flower arrangements, living with animals, and garden planning, this is a wonderful resource and gift for anyone longing for farmstead living.
Diva, a small yet brave dog, and Flea, a curious streetwise cat, develop an unexpected friendship in this unforgettable tale of discovery. For as long as she could remember, Diva lived at 11 avenue Le Play in Paris, France. For as long as he could remember, Flea also lived in Paris, France-but at no fixed address. When Flea passed Diva's courtyard one day, their lives were forever changed. Together, Diva and Flea explore and share their very different worlds, as only true friends can do.
The flaneur is a cultural and literary phenomenon usually associated with nineteenth–century Paris, but the type also exists in the artistic and literary panorama of other major European capitals, such as London, Berlin, and Moscow. Despite massive recent interest in the figure of the flaneur in scholarly studies, analyses about the nineteenth–century British analogue are often fragmentary, appearing in the form of isolated articles. However, there is an abundant amount of nineteenth–century novels, sketches and journalistic essays which offer remarkable and hitherto overlooked accounts of the British metropolis, and which frequently include the figure of the flaneur as a central character or the topic of flanerie as a theme. This book explores a great array of texts, making an essential contribution to our knowledge and understanding of the prehistory or, rather, history of the British flaneur from the early eighteenth century to the early twentieth century, with a special focus on the nineteenth century. The flaneur is looked at as a figure in which the development and dynamics of the modern metropolis and its impact on the literary discourse are manifested from a formal, as well as thematic, perspective.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s landmark Incerto series is an investigation of luck, uncertainty, probability, opacity, human error, risk, disorder, and decision-making in a world we don’t understand, in nonoverlapping and standalone books. All four volumes—Antifragile, The Black Swan, Fooled by Randomness, and the expanded edition of The Bed of Procrustes, updated with more than 50 percent new material—are now together in one ebook bundle. ANTIFRAGILE “Startling . . . richly crammed with insights, stories, fine phrases and intriguing asides.”—The Wall Street Journal Just as human bones get stronger when subjected to stress and tension, many things in life benefit from disorder, volatility, and turmoil. What Taleb has identified and calls “antifragile” is that category of things that not only gain from chaos but need it in order to survive and flourish. The resilient resists shocks and stays the same; the antifragile gets better and better. What is crucial is that the antifragile loves errors, as it incurs small harm and large benefits from them. Spanning politics, urban planning, war, personal finance, economic systems, and medicine in an interdisciplinary and erudite style, Antifragile is a blueprint for living in a Black Swan world. THE BLACK SWAN “[A book] that altered modern thinking.”—The Times (London) A black swan is a highly improbable event with three principal characteristics: It is unpredictable; it carries a massive impact; and, after the fact, we concoct an explanation that makes it appear less random and more predictable. The astonishing success of Google was a black swan; so was 9/11. In this groundbreaking and prophetic book, Taleb shows that black swan events underlie almost everything about our world, from the rise of religions to events in our own personal lives, and yet we—especially the experts—are blind to them. FOOLED BY RANDOMNESS “[Fooled by Randomness] is to conventional Wall Street wisdom approximately what Martin Luther’s ninety-five theses were to the Catholic Church.”—Malcolm Gladwell, The New Yorker Are we capable of distinguishing the fortunate charlatan from the genuine visionary? Must we always try to uncover nonexistent messages in random events? Fooled by Randomness is about luck: more precisely, about how we perceive luck in our personal and professional experiences. Set against the backdrop of the most conspicuous forum in which luck is mistaken for skill—the markets—Fooled by Randomness is an irreverent, eye-opening, and endlessly entertaining exploration of one of the least understood forces in our lives. THE BED OF PROCRUSTES “Taleb’s crystalline nuggets of thought stand alone like esoteric poems.”—Financial Times This collection of aphorisms and meditations expresses Taleb’s major ideas in ways you least expect. The Bed of Procrustes takes its title from Greek mythology: the story of a man who made his visitors fit his bed to perfection by either stretching them or cutting their limbs. With a rare combination of pointed wit and potent wisdom, Taleb plows through human illusions, contrasting the classical views of courage, elegance, and erudition against the modern diseases of nerdiness, philistinism, and phoniness.
In this richly descriptive and haunting narrative, Caryl Phillips chronicles a journey through modern-day Europe, his quest guided by a moral compass rather than a map. Seeking personal definition within the parameters of growing up black in Europe, he discovers that the natural loneliness and confusion inherent in long jorneys collides with the bigotry of the "European Tribe"-a global community of whites caught up in an unyielding, Eurocentric history. Phillips deftly illustrates the scenes and characters he encounters, from Casablanca and Costa del Sol to Venice, Amsterdam, Oslo, and Moscow. He ultimately discovers that "Europe is blinded by her past, and does not understand the high price of her churches, art galleries, and history as the prison from which Europeans speak." In the afterword to the Vintage edition, Phillips revisits the Europe he knew as a young man and offers fresh observations.
