Aspect – serie

"At once erudite and colloquial" (New Yorker), this book provides an accessible introduction to the joys and challenges of poetry In Don't Read Poetry, poet and literary critic Stephanie Burt offers an accessible introduction to the seemingly daunting task of reading, understanding, and appreciating poetry. Burt dispels preconceptions about poetry and explains how poems speak to one another-and how they can speak to our lives. She shows readers how to find more poems once they have some poems they like, and how to connect the poetry of the past to the poetry of the present. Burt moves seamlessly from Shakespeare and other classics to the contemporary poetry circulated on Tumblr and Twitter. She challenges the assumptions that many of us make about "poetry," whether we think we like it or think we don't, in order to help us cherish-and distinguish among-individual poems.A masterful guide to a sometimes confounding genre, Don't Read Poetry will instruct and delight ingénues and cognoscenti alike.

Fifty years ago this spring, David Crosby, Stephen Stills, and Graham Nash released their first album as a group; Crosby, Stills & Nash became a landmark in harmony singing and counterculture values, and after Neil Young joined up with them for 1970's Déjà vu, their supergroup status was cemented. With its distinctive, iconic front men, its current-events songs, and its very structure, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young embodied nearly every aspect of their era.The five decades since have seen the band break up, reunite, and splinter again on a regular basis--making for not only some of rock's most indelible music but also one of the its most riveting and ongoing soap operas, a decades-long story of four men whose intertwining lives, music, and careers have transcended music to become the story of the successes and challenges of the boomer generation itself.Featuring new interviews with band members, colleagues, fellow musicians, and former lovers, plus access to unreleased music and documents, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young is the first and most up-to-date narrative biography of this legendary band. From the same author who gave us the acclaimed Fire and Rain: The Beatles, Simon & Garfunkel, James Taylor, CSNY, and the Lost Story of 1970, this book takes readers inside the creative process of albums both finished and abandoned, the inspirations behind the songs and the dust-ups, and the difficulties each man faced along the way. This is the sweeping story of rock's longest-running, most dysfunctional, yet most influential and artistically rewarding musical family.

The 25th anniversary edition of the #1 New York Times bestseller and Sports Illustrated 's best football book of all time, with a new afterword by the authorReturn once again to the timeless account of the Permian Panthers of Odessa,the winningest High School football team in Texas history. Socially and racially divided, Odessa isn't known to be a place big on dreams, but every Friday night from September to December, when the Panthers play football, dreams can come true. MO-JO! MO-JO! The haunting cheer rocks the stadium filled with 20,000 fans, who are there not only to cheer on their beloved team, but also to reignite their own aspirations and dreams through the young men on the gridiron.Pulitzer Prize-winning author H. G. Bissinger unforgettably captures a season in the life of Odessa: the coaches, parents, fans, and,most of all,the players, who carry an entire city's self-respect on their shoulders. From the prayer that opens the Watermelon Feed before the first game, through the heart-stopping season and its dramatic ending, Bissinger renders a taut, indelible scene: the stale sweltering air, the demanding play on the field, the exhilarating wins, and the punishing,sometimes devastating,losses. Friday Night Lights is both a deeply moving story and a deeply disturbing one. It is a startling examination of the role of high school sports in America,but it is about much more than just sports. As David Halberstam writes: By choosing to write about something small,the culture of high school football in a Texas town,Bissinger has ended up writing about something large: the core values in our society."

humour, like pornography, is famously difficult to define. We know it when we see it, but is there a way to figure out what we really find funny,and why?In this fascinating investigation into the science of humour and laughter, cognitive neuroscientist Scott Weems uncovers what's happening in our heads when we giggle, guffaw, or double over with laughter. While we typically think of humour in terms of jokes or comic timing, in Ha! Weems proposes a provocative new model. humour arises from inner conflict in the brain, he argues, and is part of a larger desire to comprehend a complex world. Showing that the delight that comes with getting" a punchline is closely related to the joy that accompanies the insight to solve a difficult problem, Weems explores why surprise is such an important element in humour, why computers are terrible at recognizing what's funny, and why it takes so long for a tragedy to become acceptable comedic fodder. From the role of insult jokes to the benefit of laughing for our immune system, Ha! reveals why humour is so idiosyncratic, and why how-to books alone will never help us become funnier people.Packed with the latest research, illuminating anecdotes, and even a few jokes, Ha! lifts the curtain on this most human of qualities. From the origins of humour in our brains to its life on the standup comedy circuit, this book offers a delightful tour of why humour is so important to our daily lives.

Fans of Rebecca Stead and Lynda Mullaly Hunt will embrace this heartwarming story about the effects of grief, the power of friendship, and learning that sometimes not all lost things are meant to be found.When twelve-year-old Leah goes to spend the summer in Chicago with her little cousin TJ, she's shocked to discover that he's gone mute after surviving a school shooting. She knows there isn't a "right way" to deal with his pain, but when she learns that he's sneaking out to visit a laundromat at night, it seems all wrong.Determined to discover why the laundromat brings her cousin to life, Leah and her new friend Violet follow him, unwittingly falling into an imaginary world called "The Land of Lost Things," home to the socks and coins and buttons that disappear in the dryer. And when TJ hears about the wonders beyond the portal in the back of the dryer, he actually speaks!Eager to keep him talking, Leah and her new friends populate the world with characters, performing elaborate puppet shows that grab the attention of YouTube viewers everywhere. Soon Leah realizes that there's something in this special world that TJ has to find and get back. But as the Lost Things Club works together to try and make TJ's dreams a reality, they learn there are some lost things that can't come back.

The presidency of Donald Trump marks a profound change in the trajectory of American government, politics, and culture. Like his administration, the movement that put him in office represents a phenomenon that is worth studying.Donald Trump is unlike any president we've ever had. He is the only person ever elected to be commander in chief who has not first held public office or served as a general in the military. His principles grow out of five decades of business and celebrity success-not politics-so he behaves differently than do traditional politicians.In UNDERSTANDING TRUMP, Newt Gingrich shares what he learned from more than two years helping Trump and his team throughout the campaign, the election, and during the first months of the presidency.Mr. Gingrich provides unique insight into how the new president's past experiences have shaped his life and style of governing. This book also includes Mr. Gingrich's thorough analysis of how President Trump thinks and makes decisions, as well as the president's philosophy, doctrine, and political agenda going forward.Further, these pages hold a detailed discussion of Trump-style solutions for national security, education, health care, economic growth, government reform, and other important topics. Mr. Gingrich also identifies the forces in the Washington establishment, media, and bureaucracy that will oppose the president at every turn.Finally, UNDERSTANDING TRUMP explains the president's actions so far and lays out a vision for what Americans can do to help make President Trump's agenda a success.The president owes his position to the people who believed in him as a candidate, not to the elites in government and media who have expressed contempt for him since he began his campaign to become president. The very essence of Trump's mission is a willingness to enact policies and set goals that send our country in a bold new direction - one that may be "unreasonable" to Washington but is sensible to millions of Americans outside the Beltway. Only with the country's help will President Trump be able to overcome the entrenched interests in Washington and fulfill his promise to make America great again for all Americans.