Lawrence's first novel is a compelling exploration of the estrangements of modern life. Focusing on three relationships - one destructively stillborn, one disastrously unfulfilling, and one passionately unspoken - Lawrence exploits the language and conventions of the rural tradition to foreground man's alienation from the natural world. His evocation of the vanishing countryside of the English Midlands, as seen through the eyes of the effete Cyril Beardsall, is both vivid and arresting, and as the novel draws towards its tragic conclusion Lawrence handles his themes with an increasingly visionary power. The White Peacock is both a fascinating precursor of the more famous novels to come and a moving and challenging book in its own right.
I stood watching the shadowy fish slide through the gloom of the mill-pond. They were grey, descendants of the silvery things that had darted away from the monks, in the young days when the valley was lusty. The whole place was gathered in the musing of old age. The thick-piled trees on the far shore were too dark and sober to dally with the sun; the weeds stood crowded and motionless. Not even a little wind flickered the willows of the islets. The water lay softly, intensely still. Only the thin stream falling through the mill-race murmured to itself of the tumult of life which had once quickened the valley.I was almost startled into the water from my perch on the alder roots by a voice saying: "Well, what is there to look at?" My friend was a young farmer, stoutly built, brown eyed, with a naturally fair skin burned dark and freckled in patches. He laughed, seeing me start, and looked down at me with lazy curiosity."I was thinking the place seemed old, brooding over its past."He looked at me with a lazy indulgent smile, and lay down on his back on the bank, saying: "It's all right for a doss-here.
Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi—known to the world as an icon for democracy and nonviolent dissent in oppressed Burma, and to her followers as simply “The Lady”—has recently returned to international headlines. Now, this major new biography offers essential reading at a moment when Burma, after decades of stagnation, is once again in flux. Suu Kyi’s remarkable life begins with that of her father, Aung San. The architect of Burma’s independence, he was assassinated when she was only two. Suu Kyi grew up in India (where her mother served as ambassador), studied at Oxford, and worked for three years at the UN in New York. In 1972, she married Michael Aris, a British scholar. They had two sons, and for several years she lived as a self-described “housewife”—but she never forgot that she was the daughter of Burma’s national hero. In April 1988, Suu Kyi returned to Burma to nurse her sick mother. Within six months, she was leading the largest popular revolt in the country’s history. She was put under house arrest by the regime, but her party won a landslide victory in the 1990 elections, which the regime refused to recognize. In 1991, still under arrest, she received the Nobel Peace Prize. Altogether, she has spent over fifteen years in detention and narrowly escaped assassination twice. Peter Popham distills five years of research—including covert trips to Burma, meetings with Suu Kyi and her friends and family, and extracts from the unpublished diaries of her co-campaigner and former confidante Ma Thanegi—into this vivid portrait of Aung San Suu Kyi, illuminating her public successes and private sorrows, her intellect and enduring sense of humor, her commitment to peaceful revolution, and the extreme price she has paid for it.
Catching the Dream is a collection of poems written by 14 poets from all over the world. These poets all share a common trait: they fell in love with Susan Boyle´s voice and personality and were inspired enough to join a fan site (for the first time ever for most of them) where they discovered each other and enjoyed the pleasures of cyber-creation and communication. Long-time lovers of words and word games, they naturally expressed the joy and wonderment they felt through poetry. Their common adventure started with playing a word tag game of having the "Last Word." As they shared thoughts and feelings, experimenting different poetic styles, they gained trust with each other and joined on the same journey -- ultimately taking the form of individual spiritual quests into the common humanity that unites us all. Calling themselves the Golden Girls, these poets reflect the uniqueness and preciousness of gold, as well as its overtones of age, ripeness and wisdom. Each poet has a distinctive voice but together they create a continuous chant, their voices blending to sing a Hymn to Life. The 211 poems were edited and arranged by Joyce W. Leo and Nathalie Roy.
