Orgueil et préjugés est le plus connu des six romans achevés de Jane Austen. Son histoire, sa question, est en apparence celle d'un mariage : l'héroïne, la vive et ironique Elizabeth Bennett qui n'est pas riche, aimera-t-elle le héros, le riche et orgueilleux Darcy ? Si oui, en sera-t-elle aimée ? Si oui, encore, l'épousera-t-elle ? Mais il apparaît clairement qu'il n'y a en fait qu'un héros qui est l'héroïne, et que c'est par elle, en elle et pour elle que tout se passe.
Nietzsche said that he never travelled anywhere without a volume of Emerson's essays in his pocket, while Mathew Arnold described Emerson as 'the greatest prose writer of the century'. It is a remarkable writer who could at once appeal to a man considered a pillar of Victorian society, and to a man dedicated to bringing down such pillars. In his own time Emerson was considered a profoundly radical thinker, but after his death he was increasingly seen as a bland Boston Brahmin, contentedly ripening with the new England melons, benignly meditating on such viperous notions as the Over–soul.He is now appreciated as one of the truly seminal American writers, refusing all orthodoxies, complacencies and fixities—both a truly celebratory and deeply adversarial thinker. A unique paperback edition, with introduction and chronology of Emerson's life and times.
Moby Dick (1851), le chef-d'oeuvre de Melville, est l'histoire d'une obsession : depuis qu'un féroce cachalot a emporté la jambe du capitaine Achab, celui-ci le poursuit sans relâche de sa haine. Ismaël, matelot embarqué à bord du baleinier le Péquod, se trouve pris peu à peu dans le tourbillon de cette folle vengeance : c'est par sa voix que se fera entendre l'affrontement final de l'homme et du grand Léviathan blanc. Somme encyclopédique érigeant la baleine en un véritable mythe, récit hanté par l'énigme du bien et du mal, Moby Dick nous fait naviguer sur des mers interdites et accoster sur des rivages inhumains. Jamais on n'épuisera la science des baleines, suggère Melville. Jamais non plus on ne viendra à bout de la fascination qu'inspire ce roman sombre et puissant.
Nous sommes au lendemain de la Grande Guerre, le mal du siècle envahit les âmes. C'est l'époque de la Prohibition et des fortunes rapides. En 1922, Jay Gatz, désormais Gatsby, se retrouve fabuleusement riche. Mille légendes courent sur son compte, qui n'empêchent pas les gens chic -et moins chic - de venir en troupe boire ses cocktails et danser sur ses pelouses. Gatsby le Magnifique joue la carte des folles dépenses pour éblouir Daisy, mariée à Tom Buchanan, un héritier millionnaire. Le jour où l'espoir de conquérir sa bien-aimée s'évanouit, la fête prend fin brutalement.
Tanner guides us through Austen's novels from optimistic early works to the darker Persuasion and fragmentary Sanditon--a journey that takes her from acceptance of a society maintained by landed property, family, money, and strict propriety through an insistence on the need for authentication of these values to a final skepticism and even rejection.
Histoire d'amour poignante sur fond de tourmente guerrière, "L'adieu aux armes" suit le lieutenant américain Frederic Henry, qui sert dans le corps des ambulances de l'armée italienne pendant la Première Guerre mondiale. Stationné dans le nord de l'Italie, il rencontre la belle infirmière anglaise Catherine Barkley et tombe amoureux d'elle. Leur passion est cependant assombrie par les horreurs de la guerre. Frederic se rend au front avec un petit détachement, qui subit de lourdes pertes lors d'une offensive, et il doit décider s'il doit déserter ou mourir. Dans cette prose captivante et semi-autobiographique, Hemingway, s'inspirant de ses propres expériences militaires, dépeint les réalités brutales de la guerre, son absurdité et sa cruauté insensée, ainsi que la souffrance des amants pris au piège par des forces supérieures à leurs désirs individuels. Le portrait du protagoniste reflète l'isolement et la désillusion de la génération perdue, ceux qui ont atteint l'âge adulte pendant la guerre.
Eugenia, Baroness Mnster, wife of a German princeling who wishes to be rid of her, crosses the ocean with her brother Felix to seek out their American relatives. Their voyage is prompted, apparently, by natural affection; but the Baroness has also come to seek her fortune. The advent of these visitors is viewed by the Wentworths, in the suburbs of Boston, with wonder and some apprehension. The brilliant Eugenia fascinates her impressionable cousins and their more worldly neighbour, butshe is baffled by these people, 'to whom fibbing was not pleasing'. Meanwhile Felix, painter of trifling sketches, eases them all in and out of various amorous complications, with 'no fear of not being, in the end, agreeable'.
To eat in Hong Kong is endlessly fascinating and exciting. A mere dot on the map of China, and home to seven million migrants, Hong Kong boasts a food scene that is breathtakingly rich and varied. Tony Tan explores this vibrant city through 80 exquisite dishes, from the cutting-edge contemporary to the traditional, from both the high and low of Hong Kong cuisine - with recipes from the city's iconic hotels, its hawker stalls, and even a legendary dumpling house on the outskirts of Kowloon. Tony weaves his recipes with stories that trace Hong Kong's Chinese roots, explore its deep colonial connections and tantalise us with glimpses of today's ultra-modern city and most delicious eating spots. Author BiographyBorn in Malaysia and fluent in both Mandarin and Cantonese, Tony Tan trained at La Varenne, France, and Leiths School of Food and Wine in the UK. He has presented master classes and been guest chef at hotels and restaurants throughout Australia, China, Malaysia, Vietnam, New Zealand and Spain, including the Ritz in Madrid and Alambique, one of Spain's top cooking schools. He was an international judge at Hong Kong's premier Chinese cuisine challenge, The Best of the Best Culinary Competition. He writes for magazines and newspapers in Australia and internationally and comments regularly in the media on food and wine. - Hong Kong Food City By Tony Tan (Hardback)
Here is a novel, glamorous, ironical, compassionate – a marvelous fusion into unity of the curious incongruities of the life of the period – which reveals a hero like no other – one who could live at no other time and in no other place. But he will live as a character, we surmise, as long as the memory of any reader lasts. It is the story of this Jay Gatsby who came so mysteriously to West Egg, of his sumptuous entertainments, and of his love for Daisy Buchanan – a story that ranges from pure lyrical beauty to sheer brutal realism, and is infused with a sense of the strangeness of human circumstance in a heedless universe. It is a magical, living book, blended of irony, romance, and mysticism.
