The Magical Play of Illusion
The Magical Play of Illusion

Author: Trijang Rinpoche

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2018-10-02

Total Pages: 505

ISBN-13: 1614295271

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The Dalai Lama’s teacher's autobiography offers glimpses into the young Dalai Lama's spiritual upbringing and his escape from Tibet. Trijang Rinpoche was born to an aristocratic Tibetan family in 1901 and quickly recognized as the reincarnation of a very important high lama. Eventually appointed a mentor to the young Fourteenth Dalai Lama, Trijang became one of his most trusted confidants. His status gave him a front-row seat to many of the momentous historical events that befell Tibet. Rinpoche observes the workings of Tibetan high society and politics with an unvarnished frankness, including inside details of encounters between the Dalai Lama and Mao Tse Tung, Jawarlal Nehru, Pope John Paul II, and Indira Gandhi. Most widely known as a yogi with deep and profound, lifelong religious training, Trijang was also a statesman, a preserver of culture, a poet, writer, and artist. His autobiography is a beautifully written tour-de-force account of Tibetan life in the twentieth century, including intimate details about the upbringing of the Dalai Lama.

The Plays of Juan Ruiz de Alarcón
The Plays of Juan Ruiz de Alarcón

Author: Jules Whicker

Publisher: Tamesis Books

Published: 2003

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 9781855660939

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Arising from neo-stoic interpretations of prudence, Alarcon's identification of the successful manipulation of illusion as a moral art serves as a defence of the comedia and offers an alternative to the supposed moral irresponsibility of Lope de Vega."--Jacket.

Shadow of a Mouse
Shadow of a Mouse

Author: Donald Crafton

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 2012-11-05

Total Pages: 392

ISBN-13: 0520261038

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“Donald Crafton, our lively guide, shows us around a Tooniverse populated by performers, not just images, who engage us in all the ways their flesh-and-blood counterparts do, and then some. Taking classical animation as his terrain, Crafton nevertheless pushes ongoing discussions of performance, liveness, and corporeality in the directions in which they need to go if they are to help us describe and navigate our increasingly virtual worlds.” Philip Auslander, author of Liveness: Performance in a Mediatized Culture "Every once in a while a book comes along that marks a transformational point in its discipline. Such a book is Donald Crafton's Shadow of a Mouse. Crafton skillfully draws together theoretical sources, animation history, technological development, and social analysis, deftly weaving together thinkers from Disney to Deleuze and Sito to Stanislavsky. The result is a substantial rethinking of animation that will reshape traditional approaches to the medium. Crafton's magisterial grasp of theory and history is livened by a true fan's passion for the subject and a keen sense of humor. Shadow of a Mouse is a must-read for anyone with an interest in performance, embodiment, popular culture, race, or reception." Mark Langer, Associate Professor of Film Studies, Carleton University

Techniques of Illusion
Techniques of Illusion

Author: Katharina Rein

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-05-03

Total Pages: 341

ISBN-13: 1000891488

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This book explores stage conjuring during its “golden age,” from about 1860 to 1910. This study provides close readings highlighting four paradigmatic illusions of the time that stand in for different kinds of illusions typical of stage magic in the “golden age” and analyses them within their cultural and media-historical context: “Pepper’s Ghost,” the archetypical mirror illusion; “The Vanishing Lady,” staging a teleportation in a time of a dizzying acceleration of transport; “the levitation,” simulating weightlessness with the help of an extended steel machinery; and “The Second Sight,” a mind-reading illusion using up-to-date communication technologies. These close readings are completed by writings focusing on visual media and expanding the scope backwards and forwards in time, roughly to 1800 and to 2000. This exploration will be of great interest to students and scholars in theatre and performance studies.

The Dalai Lama
The Dalai Lama

Author: Alexander Norman

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin

Published: 2020

Total Pages: 445

ISBN-13: 0544416589

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The first authoritative biography of the Dalai Lama--a story by turns inspiring and shocking--from an acclaimed Tibetan scholar with exceptional access to his subject. The Dalai Lama's message of peace and compassion resonates with people of all faiths and none. Yet, for all his worldwide fame, he remains personally elusive. At last Alexander Norman--acclaimed Oxford-trained scholar of the history of Tibet--delivers the definitive, unique, unforgettable biography. The Dalai Lama recounts an astonishing odyssey from isolated Tibetan village to worldwide standing as spiritual and political leader of one of the world's most profound and complex cultural traditions. Norman reveals that, while the Dalai Lama has never been comfortable with his political position, he has been a canny player--at one time CIA-backed--who has maneuvered amidst pervasive violence, including placing himself at the center of a dangerous Buddhist schism. Yet even more surprising than the political, Norman convinces, is the Dalai Lama's astonishing spiritual practice, rooted in magic, vision, and prophecy--details of which are illuminated in this book for the first time. A revelatory life story of one of today's most radical, charismatic, and beloved world leaders.

Film Theory
Film Theory

Author: Philip Simpson

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 424

ISBN-13: 9780415259743

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This major new collection identifies the critical and theoretical concepts which have been most significant in the study of film and presents a historical and intellectual context for the material examined.

Exploring Race, Ethnicity, Gender, and Sexuality in Four Spanish Plays
Exploring Race, Ethnicity, Gender, and Sexuality in Four Spanish Plays

Author: Beth Ann Bernstein

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2021-07-21

Total Pages: 185

ISBN-13: 1793620555

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Exploring Race, Ethnicity, Gender, and Sexuality in Four Spanish Plays explores society’s influence on identity in Spanish theatrical works and discusses parallels to these works in contemporary popular culture. The Spanish plays El retablo de las maravillas (The Marvelous Puppet Show) by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra (1615); Virtudes vencen señales (Virtues Overcome Signs) by Vélez de Guevara (1620); El público (The Audience) by Federico García Lorca (1929); and La llamada de Lauren (Lauren’s Call) by Paloma Pedrero (1985) all deal with characters in the midst of a crisis of identity. Using an eclectic approach, supported by contemporary theories of race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality, Beth Bernstein analyzes the four plays in terms of identity and shows how society imposes the construction of identity. As the characters reach to define themselves, internal and external pressures guide them in interpreting acceptable behavior. This book offers a close reading of the psychological struggle of the characters, driven by society to cover their differences with a symbolic mask which, if donned, will eventually devour their true identity.

Uncanny Modernity
Uncanny Modernity

Author: Jo Collins

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2008-04-01

Total Pages: 243

ISBN-13: 0230582826

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This book explores the sense in which the uncanny may be a distinctively modern experience, the way these unnerving feelings and unsettling encounters disturb the rational presumptions of the modern world view and the security of modern self-identity, just as the latter may themselves be implicated in the production of these experiences as uncanny.

David Copperfield's History of Magic
David Copperfield's History of Magic

Author: David Copperfield

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2021-10-26

Total Pages: 272

ISBN-13: 198211293X

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An illustrated, illuminating insight into the world of illusion from the world’s greatest and most successful magician, capturing its audacious and inventive practitioners, and showcasing the art form’s most famous artifacts housed at David Copperfield’s secret museum. In this personal journey through a unique and remarkable performing art, David Copperfield profiles twenty-eight of the world’s most groundbreaking magicians. From the 16th-century magistrate who wrote the first book on conjuring to the roaring twenties and the man who fooled Houdini, to the woman who levitated, vanished, and caught bullets in her teeth, David Copperfield’s History of Magic takes you on a wild journey through the remarkable feats of the greatest magicians in history. These magicians were all outsiders in their own way, many of them determined to use magic to escape the strictures of class and convention. But they all transformed popular culture, adapted to social change, discovered the inner workings of the human mind, embraced the latest technological and scientific discoveries, and took the art of magic to unprecedented heights. The incredible stories are complimented by over 100 never-before-seen photographs of artifacts from Copperfield’s exclusive Museum of Magic, including a 16th-century manual on sleight of hand, Houdini’s straightjackets, handcuffs, and water torture chamber, Dante’s famous sawing-in-half apparatus, Alexander’s high-tech turban that allowed him to read people’s minds, and even some coins that may have magically passed through the hands of Abraham Lincoln. By the end of the book, you’ll be sure to share Copperfield’s passion for the power of magic.