Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library
One of the world's largest libraries devoted entirely to rare books and manuscripts and Yale's principal repository for literary archives, early manuscripts, and rare books.
The Man Who Loved Books Too Much
People have been collecting—and stealing—books since even before Gutenberg invented the printing press. Internationally, according to Interpol, rare book theft is more widespread than fine art theft. In The Man Who Loved Books Too Much, Allison Hoover Bartlett takes us deep inside the world of rare books and tells the cat-and-mouse story of two men caught in its allure. She introduces us to John Gilkey, an unrepentant, obsessive book thief, and Ken Sanders, the equally obsessive self-styled “bibliodick,” a book-dealer turned amateur detective. While their goals are at direct odds, both men share a deep passion for books and a fierce determination—Gilkey, to steal books; Sanders, to stop him.
Julian MacLaren-Ross
Julian Maclaren-Ross fitted the profile of a Soho flaneur. The story of his career is one of a spiralling descent, and his biographer Paul Willets described him as “the mediocre caretaker of his own immense talent”. In Anthony Powell’s A Dance To The Music Of Time he’s lightly fictionalised as a novelist. Careless, feckless, cripplingly impractical, he squandered his grand ability, the talent to write. Always the dandy, with his waved hair, elegant overcoat, and silver-topped Malacca cane, and an effortlessly riveting raconteur, his shambolic life of short-leash rootlessness tacked around the fringes of the literary establishment, involving permanent insolvency and occasional bouts of homelessness.
A Hero of Our Time
A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov is a a psychologically probing portrait of a disillusioned 19th-century aristocrat. The novel is set in the Russian Caucasus in the 1830s. Grigory Pechorin is a bored, self-centered, and cynical young army officer who believes in nothing. With impunity he toys with the love of women and the goodwill of men.
Bruges-la-Morte
Bruges-la-Morte is a short novel by Georges Rodenbach, first published in 1892. It tells the story of a widower overcome with grief, who takes refuge in Bruges, where he becomes obsessed with a dancer he sees at the opera Robert le diable who is the exact likeness of his dead wife. The book is notable for its poetic evocation of the decaying city and for its innovative form.
Robert Walser
Robert Walser, a German-Swiss prose writer and novelist, enjoyed high repute among a select group of authors and critics in Berlin early in his career, only to become nearly forgotten by the time he committed himself to the Waldau mental clinic in Bern in January 1929.
The Cane as a Weapon
The Cane as a Weapon is a book by Andrew Chase Cunningham presenting a concise system of self defense making use of a walking stick or umbrella. It was first published in 1912 in the United States of America.
Felisberto Hernández
A giant of Latin American letters and precursor to the magic realist writers is well served by this absorbing translation of some of his most acclaimed works. Once a pianist who accompanied silent films, Felisberto Hernández crafts luminous works that reflect the guileless drama and visual intensity of silent films. His characters, all pianists of one level or other, are constantly reliving a past recital or pondering their next performance. Music is the subtext for narratives that plumb aspects of memory and thought, without a definable plot. Hernández revels in images that are simple and repetitive: arms, light and shadow, the houses of the wealthy and their odd contents. The stories acquire a luxurious sheen from the ease with which they navigate memories, taking pleasure in recounting them with no intention other than tracking the mind's twists and turns.
Dick Francis
Dick Francis was a British jockey and crime writer, many of whose novels centre around horse racing.
Rimes De La Mere Oie
Rimes De La Mere Oie is a book of French translations of Mother Goose nursery rhymes.