Author: Halldor Laxness Publisher: Vintage ISBN: 0307427234 Category : Fiction Languages : en Pages : 322
Book Description
From the Nobel Prize winner comes a captivating novel about an idealistic Icelandic farmer who journeys to Mormon Utah and back in search of paradise. • "Full of an earthy poetry...a style wonderfully wise and entirely Scandinavian in its combination of magic and reality." —The New York Times Book Review • With an introduction by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Thousand Acres. The quixotic hero of this long-lost classic is Steinar of Hlidar, a generous but very poor man who lives peacefully on a tiny farm in nineteenth-century Iceland with his wife and two adoring young children. But when he impulsively offers his children's beloved pure-white pony to the visiting King of Denmark, he sets in motion a chain of disastrous events that leaves his family in ruins and himself at the other end of the earth, optimistically building a home for them among the devout polygamists in the Promised Land of Utah. By the time the broken family is reunited, Laxness has spun his trademark blend of compassion and comically brutal satire into a moving and spellbinding enchantment, composed equally of elements of fable and folkore and of the most humble truths.
Author: Greg Matloff Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media ISBN: 0387799869 Category : Technology & Engineering Languages : en Pages : 201
Book Description
What was our planet like before the advent of our modern civilization? What effects has our civilization had on the planet and its ecological systems? Paradise Regained discusses these questions and then creates a scenario for the re-greening of Earth. The authors introduce new and innovative ideas on how humankind might use the resources of the solar system for terrestrial benefit. Earth would then become a place for a technologically advanced human civilization to live in synchronization, if not in harmony, with the environment which gave us birth. Since the formation of our solar system, the resources and ecological state of Earth have undergone many changes. The environmental challenges facing humanity today, as the authors posit them, will not be resolved simply by conservation and Earth-based alternative technologies. Paradise Regained considers the environmental dilemma and highlights the risk of humankind's future extinction from environmental degradation. Human population growth, climate change, and the strained sustainability of the few remaining habitats for wild life are all discussed. The authors, however, are not discouraged and offer a potential solution through the development of space. Not only will extraterrestrial resources help avert environmental disaster, but will also provide the basis for continued technological and societal progress. The resources of the solar system will help meet our projected industrial needs and feed our industry once terrestrial sources are depleted. Space-based power generation systems will work synergistically with Earth-based conservation. Paradise Regained concludes with the discussion on how closed ecological systems in space will help us to build a prosperous and sustainable future for all humanity.
Author: Stevie Davies Publisher: University Press of Kentucky ISBN: 0813187729 Category : Literary Criticism Languages : en Pages : 303
Book Description
The Feminine Reclaimed breaks new ground in the field of Renaissance scholarship. Stevie Davies considers the feminine principle as it was developed through the humanist and Neoplatonic revival of ancient classical learning and from this perspective approaches the major works of the three great literary figures of the English Renaissance—Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton. Through close, perceptive readings of their most crucial works, informed by a familiarity with the whole range of their context in the European literature and thought of their time, Stevie Davies is able to demonstrate the great importance of the feminine principle in the consciousness of these writers and their age, a time of political, religious, and social upheaval in which perceptions of woman and her status in society underwent momentous changes. She analyzes guiding symbols, mythical allusions, and literary structures in major works by the three poets to show that this rediscovered image of the feminine was incorporated into The Faerie Queene, Shakespeare's last plays, and Paradise Lost in such a manner as to create an alternative system of values which either redefined or criticized the patriarchal structures of the contemporary world.
Author: Trausti Valsson Publisher: How the World will Change ISBN: 1545015333 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 218
Book Description
This book is an auto-biography of Trausti Valsson, an Icelandic architect, planner, theoretician and a professor of planning at the University of Iceland. It gives a personal account of what shaped planning and design in the world and in Iceland as he experienced it in his lifetime. Valsson e.g. tells about his personal encounter with Ian McHarg, Buckminster Fuller and Christopher Alexander. Early TV started working on a future plan for Iceland, consisting, for example, of roads connecting Iceland´s settlements, across the Central Highlands. He also started an overlay mapping project, mapping both the hazard- and resource areas of the country, which created a basis for his Iceland-Plan proposals. Work on this he continued at Berkeley and at the University of Iceland as he started teaching there in 1988. Many of his articles and books deal with this subject. In 1980 Valsson started his PhD studies in Environmental Planning at UC Berkeley, California. In the philosophical section of his dissertation he presented his argument that the Western, mechanistic worldview was the underlying cause for today´s alienation, and that more holistic and integrative schemes were inherent in Eastern worldviews. TV´s dissertation is called A Theory of Integration for Design and Planning – Based on the Concept of Complementarity (1987). In 1988 – a year after Valsson returned to Iceland – he got an associate professor position in planning at the Engineering Faculty of the University of Iceland, and later a tenured professor position. The last part of this book describes Valsson’s 27 years at the University. The title of this present book: Shaping the Future – Ideas – Planning – Design, reflects how wide Valsson´s field of his operation has been.
Author: Halldor Gudmundsson Publisher: MacLehose Press ISBN: 1529433746 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 758
Book Description
"An enthralling, heartening study of a man of unflagging interest in life" Independent "A thoroughly researched biography" New York Review of Books "Provides readers of English with a perfect introduction to the life and works of an outstanding writer, one whom everyone should read" Irish Times "I am thoroughly convinced by Gudmundsson's portrayal of Laxness" J. M COETZEE A strong and memorable portrayal of a man who fought heroically to write for the world, but in one of its rarest languages. Halldór Laxness won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1955. During his life, which spanned nearly the entire century, he not only wrote sixty books, but also became an active participant in Europe's idealistic debates and struggles. In the 1930s, Laxness became attracted to Soviet communism. He travelled widely in the Soviet Bloc and, despite witnessing some atrocities, remained a defender of communism until the 1960s. But his political leanings never dominated his work. Laxness continually sought to divulge the world of beauty that lurks beneath the everyday, ensuring his artistry remained a sanctuary of humanism and reflection. In this biography, Guðmundsson has been granted access to unique material by Laxness' family. As a result, the interrelationships between Laxness' personal life, his politics and his career are meticulously examined. What emerges is a grand description of a fascinating personality in which the manifold conflicts of the 20th century are mirrored. "Laxness is a writer of the first degree, a writer I dreamed of coming close to" BORIS PASTERNAK, 1960 "When in a bad mood I have picked one of your books. And there the pure and deep sound has welcomed me, strong and charming from the first page" KAREN BLIXEN in an open letter to Laxness in 1952 Translated from Icelandic by Philip Roughton
Author: Garrick V. Allen Publisher: SCM Press ISBN: 0334055261 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 247
Book Description
Drawing upon the pioneering work of the British theologian David Brown who argues for a non-static, ‘moving text’ that reaches beyond the biblical canon, this volume brings together twelve interdisciplinary essays, as well as a response from Brown. With essays ranging from New Testament textual criticism to the fiction of David Foster Wallace, The Moving Text provides an introduction to Brown and the Bible that will be of interest to undergraduate and postgraduate students, as well as specialists in a wide range of fields. Contributions include: Ian Boxall (The Catholic University of America) "From the Magi to Pilate's Wife: David Brown, Tradition and the Reception of Matthew's Text," Robert MacSwain (The University of the South) "David Brown and Eleonore Stump on Biblical Interpretation," Aaron Rosen (Rocky Mountain College) "Revisions of Sacrifice: Abraham in Art and Interfaith Dialogue," Dennis F. Kinlaw III (Houston Baptist University) "The Forms of Faith in Contemporary American Fiction".
Author: Halldor Laxness
Author: Greg Matloff
Author: John Milton
Author: John Milton
Author: John Milton
Author: John Milton
Author: Stevie Davies
Author: Trausti Valsson
Author: Halldor Gudmundsson
Author: Garrick V. Allen