Julian Elfer
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English
Description
"Libraries are much more than mere collections of volumes. The best are magical, fabled places whose fame has become part of the cultural wealth they are designed to preserve. Some still exist today; some are lost, like those of Herculaneum and Alexandria; some have been sold or dispersed; and some never existed, such as those libraries imagined by J.R.R Tolkien, Umberto Eco, and Jorge Luis Borges, among others. Ancient libraries, grand baroque libraries,...
Author
Pub. Date
2022.
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English
Description
"Impeccably researched, and written like a thriller, Edmund Richardson's The King's Shadow is the extraordinary untold and wild journey of Charles Masson--think Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid meets Indiana Jones--and his search for the Lost City of Alexandria in the 'Wild East' during the age of empires, kings, and spies. For centuries the city of Alexandria Beneath the Mountains was a meeting point of East and West. Then it vanished. In 1833...
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English
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In his widely acclaimed book Time to Start Thinking, Financial Times chief US columnist and commentator Edward Luce charted the course of America's relative decline, proving to be a prescient voice on our current social and political turmoil. In The Retreat of Western Liberalism, Luce makes a larger statement about the weakening of western hegemony and the crisis of liberal democracy--of which Donald Trump and his European counterparts are not the...
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English
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"In one of the most amazing rescues of WWII, the Swedish head of the Red Cross rescued more than 30,000 people from concentration camps in the last three months of the war. Folke Bernadotte did so by negotiating with the enemy-- shaking hands with Heinrich Himmler, the head of the Gestapo. Time was of the essence, as Hitler had ordered the destruction of all camps and everyone in them. A Forgotten Hero...
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English
Description
"A rich and illuminating history of the world capital that has transformed art, culture, and politics. Vienna is unique amongst world capitals in its consistent international importance over the centuries. From the ascent of the Habsburgs as Europe's leading dynasty to the Congress of Vienna, which reordered Europe in the wake of Napoleon's downfall, to bridge-building summits during the Cold War, Vienna has been the scene of key moments in world...
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This fascinating history tells the story of the people of Japan, from ancient teenage priest-queens to teeming hordes of salarymen, a nation that once sought to conquer China, yet also shut itself away for two centuries in self-imposed seclusion.
First revealed to Westerners in the chronicles of Marco Polo, Japan was a legendary faraway land defended by a fearsome Kamikaze storm and ruled by a divine sovereign. It was the terminus of the...
First revealed to Westerners in the chronicles of Marco Polo, Japan was a legendary faraway land defended by a fearsome Kamikaze storm and ruled by a divine sovereign. It was the terminus of the...
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English
Description
Explores Jesus' symbolic practices, his teachings, and his public career, and emphasizes how his actions, such as his healings, were just as important as his words. Placing Jesus in his proper historical context by considering Jewish religion and society in the land of Israel under Roman rule, Bauckham concludes by considering the significance Jesus has come to have for Christian faith worldwide.
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English
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"A genius . . . a writer who spent his life decrying the onward march of the Machine." — The New Yorker
Brave New World author Aldous Huxley on enlightenment and the "ultimate reality."
In this anthology of twenty-six essays and other writings, Aldous Huxley discusses the nature of God, enlightenment, being, good and evil, religion, eternity, and the divine. Huxley consistently examined the spiritual
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A comprehensive, yet entertaining look at China's history through a modern lens.
For millennia, China was the largest and richest nation on earth. Two centuries ago, however, its economy sank into a depression from which it had not fully recovered-until now. China's modern resurgence as the world's largest nation in terms of population and its second-largest economy-where 800 million people have been lifted out of poverty in the space of a few decades-is...
Author
Pub. Date
2017
Language
English
Description
The Pharmacist of Auschwitz is the little-known story of Victor Capesius, a Bayer pharmaceutical salesman from Romania who, at the age of thirty-five, joined the Nazi SS in 1943 and quickly became the chief pharmacist at the largest death camp, Auschwitz. Based in part on previously classified documents, Patricia Posner exposes Capesius's reign of terror at the camp, his escape from justice, and how a handful of courageous survivors and a single brave...