essays

Hardcover. NY, W. W. Norton, 1st, 1992, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. This stimulating and comprehensive collection of original essays on twentieth-century Japan's history and culture provides a unique mix of American and Japanese perspectives on Showa. With an important, substantial Introduction by Carol Gluck, the volume explores the strengths of the Japanese economy, the issue of democracy and Japan's political culture, Japan's achievements in technology and the arts, and its relations with other Asian nations and the United States. Name on front fly leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. Baltimore, John Hopkins University Press, 1st, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. Starkly beautiful photos of abandoned and converted movie theaters with new essays by Peter Bogdanovich, Molly Haskell, Andrew Sarris, and Chester H. Liebs. The single-screen movie theaters that punctuated small-town America's main streets and city neighborhoods since the 1920s are all but gone. The well-dressed throng of moviegoers has vanished; the facades are boarded. In Silent Screens, photographer Michael Putnam captures these once prominent cinemas in decline and transformation. His photographs of abandoned movie houses and forlorn marquees are an elegy to this disappearing cultural icon.

Hardcover. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1st, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, oblong format. Starkly beautiful photos of abandoned and converted movie theaters with new essays by Peter Bogdanovich, Molly Haskell, Andrew Sarris, and Chester H. Liebs. The single-screen movie theaters that punctuated small-town America's main streets and city neighborhoods since the 1920s are all but gone. The well-dressed throng of moviegoers has vanished; the facades are boarded. In Silent Screens, photographer Michael Putnam captures these once prominent cinemas in decline and transformation. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1st, 1934, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn, chipped dust jacket, 362 pages. Richard Steele, best known for his essays in The Tatler and The Spectator, was a powerful and humane influence in letters, the theatre and politics during the times of Queen Anne and the first George. B&w frontis. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Philadelphia, PA, J.B. Lippincott & Co., 1st Thus, 1882, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, 437 total pages, two volumes. Hardcovers. Domestic shipping only. B/w illustrations throughout (tipped in plates). Gilt top edges. Half leather bound, marble gilt boards, gilt title on leather spine with raised bands (gilt slightly faded). As is with agewear: Volume 1 has front cover board completely detached and cover board of Volume 2 is partially detached, pages unmarked with tanning from age. Previous owner attached (via old style paperclip) a relevant document within. "Edition De Luxe. 500 Copies Printed, of Which This is No. 204". Collection of 34 essays and short stories written by the American author Washington Irving under pseudonym Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. DOMESTIC SHIPPING ONLY.

Hardcover. New York, Da Capo Press, Reprint, 1970, Book: Near Fine, Dust Jacket: None,

Hardcover. Leipzig, Bernhard Tauchnitz, 1883, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Copyright Edition, Bernhard Tauchnitz, Leipzig, 1883, 312 pages, illuminated vellum binding, with front-edge flaps, leather stitching, 6.5 x 4.5", beautiful binding reminiscent of Medieval manuscripts with latticed cords and illuminated initial. Previous owner's inscription on front fly leaf, otherwise clean.

Hardcover. NY, Harcourt, 1st, 2000, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 355 pages. An illustrated collection of thrilling tales from science fiction masters such as Bradbury, Asimov, and Vinge focuses on life in space habitats and includes essays by scientists that discuss the potential realities of space stations and homes. Clean copy.

Softcover. Willamette, Willamette Week, 1st wraps, 1990, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. Columns from her early column in the Willamette Week newspaper. SIGNED BY DUNN.

Hardcover. New Haven, Yale University Press , 1st, 2006, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover with dust jacket. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap. This beautifully illustrated book highlights the unique history of The Societe Anonyme, Inc., an organization founded in 1920 by the artists Katherine S. Dreier (1877-1952), Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968), and Man Ray (1890-1976). As America's first "experimental museum" for modern art, the Societe Anonyme provided a means for artists, rather than historians, to chronicle the rise of modernism. Led by Dreier and Duchamp, the group eventually assembled a collection of more than one thousand artworks, which it presented to the public in a variety of innovative programs, publications, and exhibitions. The incredible collection of the Societe Anonyme now belongs to the Yale University Art Gallery, a gift from the Societe and Dreier. It features the work of more than one hundred artists, many of whom are among the century's most renowned--including Jean Arp, Duchamp, Max Ernst, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, El Lissitzky, Piet Mondrian, Man Ray, Kurt Schwitters, and Joseph Stella--as well as works by lesser-known artists whose contributions to modernism are substantial. With new archival information, including personal correspondence between Dreier and the artists whose work she assembled, a host of previously unpublished images, essays by leading scholars, and an interview with artists Robert and Sylvia Mangold about the contemporary significance of this collection, this fascinating book is essential to our understanding of the reception and interpretation of modernism in America.

Hardcover. New York , Lyons Press, 1st, 1999, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Limited to 250 copies SIGNED by McGuane and publisher Nick Lyons. Slipcased. B&w illustrations by Buckeye Blake.

Hardcover. Cambridge MA, The MIT Press, 1st, 1997, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, pictorial boards with brown cloth spine. 246 pages, Includes black and white illustrations, appendices, chronology, index. "Marsden Hartley (1877-1943), the American modernist painter, was also a prolific writer who published dozens of essays and reviews and several volumes of poetry and prose. Yet the revealing memoir he wrote about his own life and relationships has remained unpublished until now." Transcribed from Hartley1s own handwritten manuscripts, this edition is accompanied by photographs (some never before published), notes, and an introduction discussing Hartley1s fascination with autobiography in the context of his struggle with notions of self-representation in art. Susan Ryan also describes the circumstances surrounding the composition of Somehow a Past, and explains the distinctions between this original version and two later ones also in the Beinecke Library. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Cambridge MA, Harvard University Press, 1st, 1995, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 266 pages. In these eloquent essays on recent American, British, and Irish poetry, Helen Vendler shows us contemporary life and culture captured in lyric form by some of our most celebrated poets. An incomparable reader of poetry, Vendler explains its power; it is, she says, more often the voice of the soul than the socially marked self, speaking directly to us through the stylization of verse. 'Souls Says,' the title of a poem by Jorie Graham, is thus the name of this collection. In essays on Seamus Heaney, Donald Davie, Allen Ginsberg, John Ashbery, Rita Dove, Jorie Graham, and others, Vendler makes difficult poetry accessible and explores the force and beauty of contemporary lyric verse. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, McGraw Hill, 1st, 1971, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 230 pages. Cultural commentary and autobiography of life in Alabama. The euthor's second book.

Softcover. Minneapolis, Milkweed Editions, 1st, 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. SIGNED BY AUTHOR. 107 pages, b&w engravings by Steven Sorman. Light edge wear to wrappers. Else a very clean, tight copy.

Hardcover. NY, Abrams, 1st, 2014, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. This collection of more than 250 remarkable images is the result of seven years of painstaking fieldwork across the Pacific Ocean, using photographic techniques that Middleton developed to capture these extremely fragile creatures on camera, creatures who are astonishingly diverse in their shapes, patterns, textures, and colors--in nature's fashion show, they are the haute couture of marine life. Middleton also provides short essays that examine the place these invertebrates occupy on the tree of life, their vast array of forms, and their lives in the ocean.Scientist Bernadette Holthuis contributes profiles describing each species, many of them for the first time. Middleton's book is a stunning view of nature that harmoniously combines art and science. 255 pages in color. Clean copy. PLEASE NOTE: DUE TO SIZE & WEIGHT, DOMESTIC SHIPPING ONLY.

Softcover. Santa Fe NM, Museum of New Mexico Press, 2nd pr, 1988, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover in pictorial wraps. Foreword by George Kubler. Profusely illustrated in color and black and white. 127 pages. 81 artists interpret this masterpiece of 19th century Spanish Franciscan architecture. Map of Taos laid in. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, David McKay, 2nd pr., 1971, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 247 pages. For Gibbons the good life is sharing & enjoying nature & maintaining an environment where natural thing can flourish. Camping without polluting or plundering. Memorable journeys into the wild. Creative specific solutions to ecological poblems. Clean copy.

Softcover. NY, Taschen, 1st, 2019, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover. Barry Lyndon is a cinematic masterwork without equal. At first misunderstood upon its 1975 release, it is now widely considered to be one of Kubrick's finest achievements. Each set in TASCHEN's Making of a Masterpiece series comes in a deluxe LP sized folio and includes a DVD of the remastered film, the original poster, essays, interviews, and extensive behindthescenes materials from Kubrick's archives. Based on William Makepeace Thackeray's picaresque novel of 1844, Barry Lyndon tells the story of a social-climbing opportunist (Ryan O'Neal) who succeeds in marrying a beautiful aristocrat far above his social station (Marisa Berenson), only to see his gains eventually undone by avarice and spite. Meticulously conceived and sumptuously photographed-using a specially-modified lens and almost exclusively lit by candles and natural light-Barry Lyndon is at once a satirical and sympathetic portrayal of a strangely endearing antihero. (Because "he has charm and courage," said Kubrick, "it's impossible not to like him despite his vanity, his insensitivity, and his weakness.")

Softcover. London/NY, Routledge, 1st, 1991, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 340 pages, b&w illustrations. In the past stars have been studied as cogs in a mass entertainment industry selling desires and ideologies. But since the 1970s, new approaches have reopened debate, as film and cultural studies try to account for the active role of the star in producing meanings, pleasures, and identites for a diversity of audiences. Stardom brings together for the first time some of the major writing of the last decade which seeks to understand the phenomenon of stars and stardom. Gathered under four headings - The System, Stars and Society, Performers and Signs, Desire and Politics - these essays represent a range of approaches drawn from film history, sociolgy, textual analysis, audience research, psychoanalysis, and cultural politics. They raise important issues about the politics of representation and the cultural limitations and possibilities of stars. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Heidelberg, Germany, Kehrer Verlag, 1st, 2014, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 108 pages. Hardcover with no dust jacket. Very clean, unmarked copy still in shrink wrap. Many color photographs throughout. Tight copy. "State Fair" is filled with captivating images. Christopher Chadbourne takes you on a journey filled with interesting characters, vibrant colors, and memorable moments - all compiled from years of photographing the goings-on at this uniquely American institution. Chadbourne knows state fairs and has an uncanny ability to catch often peculiar scenarios as people mingle, eat, and participate in this once a year event.

Hardcover. Heidelberg, Germany, Kehrer Verlag, 1st, 2014, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 108 pages. Hardcover with no dust jacket. Very clean, unmarked copy still in shrink wrap. Many color photographs throughout. Tight copy. "State Fair" is filled with captivating images. Christopher Chadbourne takes you on a journey filled with interesting characters, vibrant colors, and memorable moments - all compiled from years of photographing the goings-on at this uniquely American institution. Chadbourne knows state fairs and has an uncanny ability to catch often peculiar scenarios as people mingle, eat, and participate in this once a year event.

Hardcover. NY, ZE Books, 1st, 2020, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, black cloth with white lettering. No dust jacket issued. With Stay, acclaimed poet, artist, and bestselling memoirist Nick Flynn presents a self-portrait via a constellation of topics that have circled his work. Ranging from the impact of suicide and homelessness to addiction, political engagement, and the vital power of artistic friendships, Stay is a mixed-media retrospective that shows nothing is created in isolation. Mirroring Flynn's life, this work of visual and literary memoir is populated by examples of his collaborations since the 1980s with such luminaries as the photographers Amy Arbus and Catherine Opie, composer Guy Barash, actor Robert De Niro, cartoonist Josh Neufeld, author Sarah Sentilles, filmmaker Paul Weitz, and artists John Baldessari, Marilyn Minter, and Bill Shuck. In Flynn's refusal to conform to narrative or the safety of his own perspective, Stay grasps for an essential truth, an answer to what art, in the end, can and cannot reflect. Illustrated in color, b&w.

Hardcover. New York, Random House , 1st, 2002, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 402 pages. Cloth boards in a bright dust jacket. Clean, tight copy. The subjects of Salman Rushdie's collection of non-fiction range from The Wizard of Oz, U2, India and Indian writing, the death of Princess Diana, and football, to twentieth-century writers including Angela Carter, Arthur Miller, Edward Said, J. M. Coetzee and Arundhati Roy. In a central section, 'Messages from the Plague Years', Rushdie focuses on the fight against the Iranian fatwa, presenting texts both personal and political, which show for the first time how it was to live through those days. Rushdie's columns for the New York Times confront current issues - Kashmir, Northern Ireland, Kosovo, Islam and the West - as well as lighter topics such as reality TV, sport and sleaze. The book ends with the lectures that give it its title - Rushdie's exploration of the theme of frontiers: crossing them, breaking taboos, and - in the light of September 11 - the world of permeable frontiers in which we all live.