Ageing is about losing youth and finding a varicose vein. It is about fighting your children and making peace with your parents. It is about gaining wisdom and mislaying your reading glasses. Throughout time, people have feared ageing, laughed at it, cried about it, defied it, accepted it - and written about it. This delightful collection gathers together the most memorable quotations about ageing, including those of William Shakespeare, D H Lawrence, Oscar Wilde and Evelyn Waugh, right up to Margaret Thatcher, Joan Rivers and Jerry Seinfeld.
The 1990s and 2000s were especially difficult decades for government–public sector union relations in Canada. Rising costs and growing debts meant that governments were on the lookout for savings, and public sector unions and employees were easy targets for government actions. Bitter conflicts between unions and governments erupted and each labour dispute involved numerous rounds of public rhetoric in which both sides attempted to justify their actions and stigmatize their opponents. In Bad Time Stories, Yonatan Reshef and Charles Keim analyse the language of both parties in order to identify the legitimation strategies at work during government-union conflict. The authors use evidence drawn from newspapers, speeches, parliamentary transcripts, and legal statements in presenting a new framework for understanding the discursive strategies employed by governments and unions in labour disputes. Using a case study and linguistic approach, Bad Time Stories offers a unique perspective on industrial relations and will be of interest to scholars in the areas of business, public policy, and communications, as well to those directly involved in union-management negotiations.
Loss, hardship and love blend together in this intimate picture of one family's life in Post- WWII Germany. A testament to the resiliency of the human spirit.
Since her acceptance at Wisdom Court, Eve Stewart has been haunted by odd accidents and a voice in her head that she can't quite recall. Upon arriving at the stately institute, Eve hopes to connect with fellow artists, but finds the women enduring strange supernatural occurrences while attempting to decipher the second journal of the Institute's late founder, Caldicott Wyntham. The voice grows louder. Desperate to determine what is real and what is not, Eve joins the search for an evil talisman stolen by Caldicott, and for which Caldicott's lover paid the ultimate price at the hand of Severn Barlow, a British earl who attempted to sway World War II. Then Eve stumbles into a secret room and comes upon an old map with instructions on how to end the Earl's remote viewing and destructive spell-work. But Severn has one more trick up his sleeve. THE WISDOM COURT SERIES, in order: Edge of the Shadow A Signal Shown All in Bad Time THE FINNY ALETTER MYSTERIES, in order: Scavenger Hunt Obstacle Course REVIEWS: "Fast-paced and harrowing, with a dark, malevolent nemesis." ~Douglas D. Hawk, author of Denver Dreadful: The Ripper of Capitol Heights
Down and Out in the Great Depression is a moving, revealing collection of letters by the forgotten men, women, and children who suffered through one of the greatest periods of hardship in American history. Sifting through some 15,000 letters from government and private sources, Robert McElvaine has culled nearly 200 communications that best show the problems, thoughts, and emotions of ordinary people during this time. Unlike views of Depression life "from the bottom up" that rely on recollections recorded several decades later, this book captures the daily anguish of people during the thirties. It puts the reader in direct contact with Depression victims, evoking a feeling of what it was like to live through this disaster. Following Franklin D. Roosevelt's inauguration, both the number of letters received by the White House and the percentage of them coming from the poor were unprecedented. The average number of daily communications jumped to between 5,000 and 8,000, a trend that continued throughout the Rosevelt administration. The White House staff for answering such letters--most of which were directed to FDR, Eleanor Roosevelt, or Harry Hopkins--quickly grew from one person to fifty. Mainly because of his radio talks, many felt they knew the president personally and could confide in him. They viewed the Roosevelts as parent figures, offering solace, help, and protection. Roosevelt himself valued the letters, perceiving them as a way to gauge public sentiment. The writers came from a number of different groups--middle-class people, blacks, rural residents, the elderly, and children. Their letters display emotional reactions to the Depression--despair, cynicism, and anger--and attitudes toward relief. In his extensive introduction, McElvaine sets the stage for the letters, discussing their significance and some of the themes that emerge from them. By preserving their original spelling, syntax, grammar, and capitalization, he conveys their full flavor. The Depression was far more than an economic collapse. It was the major personal event in the lives of tens of millions of Americans. McElvaine shows that, contrary to popular belief, many sufferers were not passive victims of history. Rather, he says, they were "also actors and, to an extent, playwrights, producers, and directors as well," taking an active role in trying to deal with their plight and solve their problems. For this twenty-fifth anniversary edition, McElvaine provides a new foreword recounting the history of the book, its impact on the historiography of the Depression, and its continued importance today.
This is a selection of the best of Brecht's poems and songs, combining private and public poems from all stages of an intense and turbulent life as well as the most popular lyrics from plays such as Mahagonny and Mother Courage.
It's the first day of school, and Camilla discovers that she is covered from head to toe in stripes, then polka-dots, and any other pattern spoken aloud! With a little help, she learns the secret of accepting her true self, in spite of her peculiar ailment.
**A New York Times Editor's Choice selection!** This outrageous and hilarious memoir follows a film and television director’s life, from his idiosyncratic upbringing to his unexpected career as the director behind such huge film franchises as The Addams Family and Men in Black. Barry Sonnenfeld's philosophy is, "Regret the Past. Fear the Present. Dread the Future." Told in his unmistakable voice, Barry Sonnenfeld, Call Your Mother is a laugh-out-loud memoir about coming of age. Constantly threatened with suicide by his over-protective mother, disillusioned by the father he worshiped, and abused by a demonic relative, Sonnenfeld somehow went on to become one of Hollywood's most successful producers and directors. Written with poignant insight and real-life irony, the book follows Sonnenfeld from childhood as a French horn player through graduate film school at NYU, where he developed his talent for cinematography. His first job after graduating was shooting nine feature length pornos in nine days. From that humble entrée, he went on to form a friendship with the Coen Brothers, launching his career shooting their first three films. Though Sonnenfeld had no ambition to direct, Scott Rudin convinced him to be the director of The Addams Family. It was a successful career move. He went on to direct many more films and television shows. Will Smith once joked that he wanted to take Sonnenfeld to Philadelphia public schools and say, "If this guy could end up as a successful film director on big budget films, anyone can." This book is a fascinating and hilarious roadmap for anyone who thinks they can't succeed in life because of a rough beginning.
Every day, customers see the results of companies where fiefdoms have formed and silos create divisional or departmental strife: poor sales and profits, and lackluster products. It’s not hard to see that such companies are headed for an early grave. Regardless of the manner in which company fractures manifest themselves, tech leaders must find a way to rid their workplaces of the divisions that threaten to undermine their company’s productivity, profits, and survival. That’s why, in Unite the Tribes: Leadership Skills for Technology Managers, Christopher Duncan, bestselling author of The Career Programmer, provides corporate leaders with a ten-point plan for joining their company’s divided ranks together in a way that helps employees achieve their goals while also accomplishing those of the company. Using the metaphors of the company as empire and the groups that form within companies as tribes, Duncan explains that the formation of tribes within an empire is unavoidable. After all, regardless of the situation in which they find themselves, human beings are social creatures who align themselves with those whose goals and motivations match their own. That’s why the accountants hang together in the break room, while developers talk shop and geek culture in a watering hole down the street. Yet the job of leaders is to build a cohesive, powerful, and enduring empire by bringing all groups together in service to a shared, inspiring mission. And that goes double for tech companies, where breakthroughs create new landscapes on a daily basis. In Unite the Tribes, you will learn: How to build alliances and a spirit of unity across all levels of the company to achieve higher employee morale, greater profits, and increased productivity. How to come up with strategies that win market share as well as the hearts and minds of your employees. How to manage conflict. Why self-interest rules the day and how knowing another’s wants and needs helps you achieve goals of your own. Unite the Tribes will show you, the visionary leader, how to establish an empire by convincing your tribes of a simple but crucial truth: Alone, you are weak and vulnerable. United, you are invincible. What you’ll learnReaders of Unite the Tribes will learn: Practical, down-to-earth approaches to problem solving and productivity that make sense to corporate leaders who have to do real work in the real world. How to arrive at a plan for uniting the disparate groups that operate within their company when faced with the daily reality of office politics, maneuvering, ambition, incompetence, and short-term thinking. How to convey the company's purpose to employees in a way that is realistic and meaningful so that all workers can contribute to the company's greater good. Who this book is for Those serving in leadership or managerial capacities (i.e., those overseeing one or more employees) at technology companies plagued with division and dysfunction will find the solutions they need to rally their employees to join forces in Unite the Tribes. In addition, leaders and managers of companies whose cohesion is still healthy yet is being threatened with fracture will be provided with real-world strategies for reinforcing the glue that holds their company together in this practical, applications-driven guide. Table of Contents The Myth of Absolute Power Building the Future A Lasting Empire Vision Leadership Organization Mobility Competitiveness Persuasion Strategy Brilliance Morale Unite
