Great Art

In his review of Salvador Dali's first autobiography, George Orwell declared that "One ought to be able to hold in one's head simultaneously the two facts that Dali is a good draughtsman and a disgusting human being." Whether or not one agrees with the famous author's assessment, Orwell captures the polarizing nature of Salvador Dali, and the extent to which his undeniable technical virtuosity often brushed against his penchant for provoking his audiences (not to mention provoking long-entrenched standards of "proper" taste).

The poster-child victim of a dysfunctional family from Beech Grove, Indiana, Steve McQueen experienced an unsettled early life with a rebellious and alcoholic mother. McQueen channeled his difficult childhood into a masterful career on screen portraying tough, self-sufficient characters in such iconic films as The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape, The Sand Pebbles, Bullitt, and Papillon.

It’s no secret that writers often used their books, poems, and plays to impart observations, thoughts, and reflections. This was also the case for the literature of the 17th century which followed France’s pioneering status in politics and culture. "500 Quotations from the Great French Writers of the 17th Century" offers a fascinating snapshot of that changing society, seen through the eyes of some of the best writers of the era. A superb book for dipping in and out of, this makes a great gift for anyone with an interest in French literature.

A terrifically engaging and original biography about one of England’s greatest novelists and the glamorous, eccentric, debauched and ultimately tragic family that provided him with the most significant friendships of his life and inspired his masterpiece, Brideshead Revisited.

The story of F. Scott Fitzgerald's creation of Jay Gatsby - war hero and Oxford man - at the beginning of the Jazz Age, when the City of Dreaming Spires attracted an astounding array of intellectuals, including the Inklings, W. B. Yeats, and T. S. Eliot.

Hans Holbein the Younger is chiefly celebrated for his beautiful and precisely realised portraiture, which includes representations of Henry VIII, Thomas More, Thomas Cromwell, Anne of Cleves, Jane Seymour and an array of the Tudor lords and ladies he encountered during the course of two sojourns in England. But beyond these familiar images, which have come to define our perception of the world of the Henrician court, Holbein was a protean and multi-faceted genius.

For centuries, royal families have feared the gut-roiling, vomit-inducing agony of a little something added to their food or wine by an enemy. To avoid poison, they depended on tasters, unicorn horns and antidotes tested on condemned prisoners. The Royal Art of Poison is a hugely entertaining work of popular history that traces the use of poison as a political - and cosmetic - tool in the royal courts of Western Europe from the Middle Ages to the Kremlin today.

James Stourton tells the story of the London art market from the immediate postwar period to the turn of the millennium in engaging and fast-paced style, populating his richly entertaining narrative with a glorious rogues’ gallery of clever amateurs, eccentric scholars, brilliant emigrés, cockney traders and grandees with a flair for the deal.

Mark Scarbrough has been searching for something his entire life. Whether it’s his birth mother, true love, his purpose, or his sexual identity, Mark has been on a constant quest to find out who he really is, with the great Western texts as his steadfast companions. As a boy with his head constantly in a book, desperate to discover new worlds, he can hardly distinguish between their plots and his own reality.

Known as the High Renaissance period, the philosophy of the 1500s leaned towards establishing the relationship between the human body and the human soul. Logic was waning as a philosophical ideal and, instead, the focus fell on human nature. ‘500 Quotations from the Great Philosophers of the 16th Century’ cherry-picks some of the most profound and insightful observations from some of the finest minds of that era. A superb gift for history buffs and philosophy fans alike.

The story of the Stuart dynasty is a breathless soap opera played out in just a hundred years in an array of buildings that span Europe from Scotland, via Denmark, Holland and Spain to England. Life in the court of the House of Stuart has been shrouded in mystery: the first half of the century overshadowed by the fall and execution of Charles I, the second half in the complete collapse of the House itself. Lost to time is the extraordinary contribution the Stuarts made to the fabric of sovereignty.

Drawing from science, literature, art, theology, history, music, philosophy, pop culture, and more, Thaddeus J. Williams paints a fresh and inspiring vision of how we become most truly ourselves by mirroring the greatest person in history.

Throughout art history, certain creative geniuses have helped to steer art in a completely new direction - and their influence has in many cases been extraordinary, enduring down the centuries to impact on future generations of artists, sculptors and architects. This lavish publication looks back over the centuries to explore the life and work of some of history's most influential artists.

"600 Quotations from the Great 18th Century Writers" is a collection of inspiring thoughts and reflections from six of the greatest literary minds of all time. During this time, society was experiencing a cultural upheaval, with more emphasis being placed on happiness and the pursuit of knowledge. While these quotes might be over 200 years old, they bear as much relevance today as they did when they were first coined. A superb read for dipping in and out of.

In Simply Eliot, Joseph Maddrey plumbs the emotional and intellectual life of the man whom critic Edmund Wilson called "one of our only authentic poets". He chronicles Eliot's attempts to create a coherent worldview, and explores how his religious conversion in 1927 led to a spiritual rebirth that allowed him to produce his ultimate poetic statement.

To coincide with the bicentennial of Thoreau's birth in 2017, this thrilling, meticulous biography by naturalist and historian Kevin Dann fills a gap in our understanding of one modern history's most important spiritual visionaries by capturing the full arc of Thoreau's life as a mystic, spiritual seeker, and explorer in transcendental realms.

Hi, fellow music lover! Congratulations on starting your music-making journey. I won't waste your time with a long introduction, but let me say a few words just to get us off on the right foot. Ear training is one of the most rewarding skills you can develop, and it’s one that you can work on every day. Which makes total sense: Music is an aural experience, after all. Ear training helps you turn the music you hear into music you make on your guitar. This works for your own musical ideas, too.

In 1953, Winston Churchill received the Nobel Prize - for Literature. In fact, Churchill was a professional writer before he was a politician, and published a stream of books and articles over the course of two intertwined careers. Now historian Peter Clarke traces the writing of the magisterial work that occupied Churchill for a quarter century, his four-volume History of the English-Speaking Peoples. As an author, Churchill faced woes familiar to many others - chronically short of funds, late on deadlines, scrambling to sell new projects....

In a dystopian world, Caitlin Star lives in the Congo rainforest with her animal and human friends, protecting this last paradise on Earth. After ten years of peace, her home is threatened by a new evil in the form of a ruthless tyrant who rules the remains of what was once America. To battle this new enemy, Caitlin finds she must travel back to her birthplace where she will face grave danger and new challenges beyond anything she could have imagined. The Legend of Caitlin Star is an exciting, brand new stand-alone Caitlin Star adventure from James J. Caterino the author of Caitlin Star: ...

Dennis Hopper has been described as a rebel, an icon, an addict plagued by demons, and one of the most important champions of the pop-art movement. Friend to Warhol, muse to David Lynch, mentor to Sean Penn, champion of Ice-T, Dennis Hopper built a career that was a half-century of rebellion waged at the edge of American popular culture. Tom Folsom's Hopper is a wild ride through Dennis's many lives. Featuring hundreds of interviews with Hopper's fellow actors, artists, musicians, and residents of Taos, New Mexico.