Humbert Humbert - scholar, aesthete and romantic - has fallen completely and utterly in love with Lolita Haze, his landlady's gum-snapping, silky skinned twelve-year-old daughter. Reluctantly agreeing to marry Mrs Haze just to be close to Lolita, Humbert suffers greatly in the pursuit of romance; but when Lo herself starts looking for attention elsewhere, he will carry her off on a desperate cross-country misadventure, all in the name of Love. Hilarious, flamboyant, heart-breaking and full of ingenious word play, Lolita is an immaculate, unforgettable masterpiece of obsession, delusion and lust.
TELEGRAPH BOOKS OF THE YEAR and OBSERVER BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2014br>br>Limonov is not a fictional character, but he could have been. He''s lived a hundred lives. He was a hoodlum in Ukraine, an idol of the Soviet underground, punk-poet and valet to a billionaire in Manhattan, fashion writer in Paris, lost soldier in the Balkans, and now, in the chaos after the fall of communism a charismatic party leader of a gang of political desperados. Limonov sees himself as a hero, but he is also a bastard. Carrere suspends judgment. Carrere decided to write about Limonov because he thought "that his life, romantic and reckless, tells us something, not just about Limonov or Russia, but the story of all of us after the end of World War II.">
Shanghai, 1941. Une vieille famille crispée autour de sa douairière semble avoir pour seule ambition d'arrêter le temps. Quand Madame Hsü y introduit un riche héritier aux moeurs décadentes pour épouser la Septième Demoiselle, c'est bien davantage sa soeur, Pai Lio-su, la jeune et belle divorcée retournée vivre dans sa famille, qui intéresse Fan Liu-yuan. Devant l'hostilité montante du clan, Pai Lio-su quitte Shanghai pour Hongkong, sans savoir que Fan Liu-yuan l'y attend... Mais le séducteur cherche autre chose en Lio-su qu'une simple aventure. Et son jeu devient partie intégrante de l'amour qu'il lui porte, tandis que celle-ci, furieusement amoureuse, se refuse à lui avec défiance, orgueil, voire insolence. Mais la guerre enflamme Hongkong, les jetant dans l'oeil d'un cyclone qui les dépouille de tout vernis. Et c'est tout le décor dramatique et précieux de leur vie qui tombe avec Hongkong.
Il y a dans Love in a Fallen City un accent fitzgéraldien qui donne toute sa modernité à ce drame de la confrontation entre les moeurs traditionnelles chinoises et l'occidentalisation accélérée. L'art achevé d'Eileen Chang entretisse, avec un sens du détail et une émotion des couleurs tout picturaux, un jeu de métaphores aux délicatesses presque insaisissables de palimpsestes, portraits acerbes de personnages prisonniers de leur rôle social, tout cela dans la grâce saisie sur le vif du sentiment intime comme il naît, s'épanouit et s'étiole. Love in a Fallen City est ici suivi d'une nouvelle inédite Ah Hsiao est triste en automne.
'The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again: but already it was impossible to say which was which...' Halas & Bachelor studio's classic and controversial 1954 animation of Animal Farm , George Orwell's chilling fable of idealism betrayed, was the first ever British animated feature film. This landmark illustrated edition of Orwell's novel was first published alongside it, and features the original line drawings by the film's animators, Joy Batchelor and John Halas.
Abe Ravelstein est un brillant professeur de l'université de Chicago qui peut se targuer d'avoir formé tous les hommes qui comptent dans le monde politique.
Il a vécu sur un grand pied - largement au-dessus de ses moyens. Son ami Chick, le narrateur, lui a suggéré d'exposer sa philosophie politique dans un livre destiné au grand public. A sa propre surprise, Ravelstein s'exécute et devient millionnaire. Durant un séjour à Paris destiné à célébrer ce succès, il incite Chick à écrire un livre sur lui et tous deux échangent des pensées sur la mort, la philosophie et l'histoire, les amours et les amis, et des anecdotes du passé.
A leur retour dans le Midwest, Ravelstein succombe au sida tandis que Chick frôle la mort de peu. Le dernier roman de Saul Bellow est un voyage, tantôt sombre, tantôt férocement drôle, à travers l'amour et la mémoire ; c'est un hymne à l'amitié et à la vie.
An official tie-in edition of Philip K. Dick's dazzling speculative novel to accompany the new TV series, executive produced by Ridley Scott. Philip K. Dick's acclaimed cult novel gives us a horrifying glimpse of an alternative world - one where the Allies have lost the Second World War. In this nightmare dystopia the Nazis have taken over New York, the Japanese control California and the African continent is virtually wiped out. In a neutral buffer zone in America that divides the world's new rival superpowers, lives the author of an underground bestseller. His book offers a new vision of reality - an alternative theory of world history in which the Axis powers were defeated - giving hope to the disenchanted. Does 'reality' lie with him, or is his world just one among many others? 'The most brilliant science fiction mind on any planet' Rolling Stone 'Dick's finest book, and one of the very best science fiction novels ever published' Eric Brown
First published in 1957, this book attempts to tackle the conflict between homosexual and heterosexual love. It tells of David, a young man awakening to his true homosexual nature, through a relationship with a barman named Giovanni, as he awaits his fiancee's arrival from Spain.
22 novembre 1963, assassinat du président kennedy. faute d'élucidation crédible, le mystère est resté total et le drame est entré dans la légende américaine. don delillo a puisé dans la vérité historique tous les éléments d'un fantastique roman policier - agents secrets, activistes de droite et de gauche, mafiosi, stripteaseuses, trafiquants de drogue, cia, fbi, kgb, fidel castro... et un coupable désigné nommé oswald, né sous le signe de la balance (libra, en anglais), meurtrier idéal assassiné à son tour devant les caméras du monde entier. de ce personnage mystérieux, delillo a fait l'antihéros d'un roman saisissant qui prouvera une fois de plus que l'intuition d'un grand romancier peut nous emmener plus loin sur le chemin de la vérité que bien des enquêtes. né à new york en 1936, écrivain reconnu dans le monde entier, don delillo a reçu les plus prestigieuses distinctions dont the national book award et the pen / faulkner award. il a également obtenu the jérusalem prize 1999 pour l'ensemble de son oeuvre ainsi que the howells medal of the american academy of arts and letters pour son roman, outre-monde. la plus grande partie de l'oeuvre de don delillo est publiée en france par actes sud.
Au lendemain de la Deuxième Guerre mondiale, Laurent Newman est un New-Yorkais bon teint, descendant d'une famille anglaise dont les racines remontent au XIXe siècle. Il est cadre à la direction du personnel dans la même société depuis une quinzaine d'années. Un jour, il est réprimandé par son chef pour avoir engagé une secrétaire " à l'air juif ", erreur qu'il impute à la mauvaise vue de Newman. Laurent achète donc sa première paire de lunettes. Celles-ci font ressortir son nez. Tout d'un coup sa vie bascule... On le prend pour un juif. Pressions, brimades, agressions, la spirale de la haine se met en place, Newman perd son travail et échappe de peu à un lynchage. D'autant qu'une sorte de " front " antisémite sévit dans son voisinage. Gertrude, sa femme, le pousse à adhérer au " front ". Newman refuse. De fait, peu à peu, il s'identifie davantage aux victimes qu'aux agresseurs. En se concentrant sur la subjectivité, les doutes et les émotions contrastées de son personnage, Arthur Miller livre un premier roman fascinant sur la confusion des sentiments, de l'identité et sur l'expérience des préjugés, ceux dont on est victime et ceux qu'on abrite en soi. Il annonce également la tonalité de ses futurs chefs-doeuvre : veine humaniste et acuité psychologique.
Set in the rich farmland of the Salinas Valley, California, this often brutal novel follows the intertwined destinies of two families - the Trasks and the Hamiltons - whose generations hopelessly re-enact the fall of Adam and Eve and the poisonous rivalry of Cain and Abel.
The portrayal of Stephen Dedalus's Dublin childhood and youth, his quest of identity through art and his gradual emancipation from the claims of his family, religion and Ireland itself, is also an oblique self-portrait of the young James Joyce and a testament to the artist's "eternal imagination".
Survivor, genius, perfumer, killer: this is Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. He is abandoned on the filthy streets of Paris as a child, but grows up to discover he has an extraordinary gift: a sense of smell more powerful than any other human's. Soon, he is creating the most sublime fragrances in all the city. Yet there is one odour he cannot capture.
Audacious, controversial and hilarious, The Monkey Wrench Gang is Edward Abbey's masterpiece - a big, boisterous and unforgettable novel about freedom and commitment that ignited the flames of environmental activism. Throughout the vast American West, nature is being vicitimized by a Big Government / Big Business conspiracy of bridges, dams and concrete. But a motley gang of individuals has decided that enough is enough. A burnt-out veteran, a mad doctor and a polygamist join forces in a noble cause: to dismantle the machinery of progress through peaceful means, or otherwise.
'The ultimate Camp statement: it's good because it's awful.' These two classic essays were the first works of criticism to break down the boundaries between 'high' and 'low' culture, and made Susan Sontag a literary sensation. Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kathy Acker to James Baldwin, Truman Capote to Stanislaw Lem and George Orwell to Shirley Jackson; essays radical and inspiring; poems moving and disturbing; stories surreal and fabulous; taking us from the deep South to modern Japan, New York's underground scene to the farthest reaches of outer space.
'This is the work of a born storyteller at the height of his powers' Edmund White, Washington Post When Arthur Montana, world-renowned 'Emperor of Soul', is found dead in a London pub, his grief-stricken brother looks back over thirty years in the lives of their group of friends: from their childhood spent preaching and singing in Harlem churches, to their struggles with war and poverty, and their encounters with wealth, love and fame. Set against a vividly drawn background of the civil rights movement of the sixties, Baldwin's last novel is a monumental saga that ranges from New York to Paris, Korea to Africa to portray how profoundly racial politics can shape life, especially in the private business of love. 'Warm, melancholy . . . Hall Montana's voice is the conduit for Baldwin's most distinctive quality as a writer, his abundant tenderness' The New York Times
When Cousin Lymon, a dwarf and a hunchback, arrives at Miss Amelia's store, he releases feelings of tenderness in Miss Amelia's hardened heart. Together they transform the store into a cafe. But their contentment is to be short lived, for Miss Amelia's estranged husband finds his way back to her.
' The general uncertainty as to what is really happening makes it easier to cling to lunatic beliefs ' Biting and timeless reflections on patriotism, prejudice and power, from the man who wrote about his nation better than anyone. Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kathy Acker to James Baldwin, Truman Capote to Stanislaw Lem and George Orwell to Shirley Jackson; essays radical and inspiring; poems moving and disturbing; stories surreal and fabulous; taking us from the deep South to modern Japan, New York's underground scene to the farthest reaches of outer space.
Nightmarish and fiercely funny, William Burroughs' virtuoso, taboo-breaking masterpiece Naked Lunch follows Bill Lee through Interzone: a surreal, orgiastic wasteland of drugs, depravity, political plots, paranoia, sadistic medical experiments and endless, gnawing addiction. One of the most shocking novels ever written, Naked Lunch is a cultural landmark, now in a restored edition incorporating Burroughs' notes on the text, alternate drafts and outtakes from the original. 'A masterpiece. A cry from hell, a brutal, terrifying, and savagely funny book that swings between uncontrolled hallucination and fierce, exact satire' Newsweek ' Naked Lunch is a banquet you will never forget' J. G. Ballard
