British Art

The fascinating, untold story of how British intelligence secretly used homing pigeons as part of a clandestine espionage operation to gather information, communicate, and coordinate with members of the Resistance to defeat the Nazis in occupied Europe during World War II. Between 1941 and 1944...

Survey documents three leading artists—Lubaina Himid, Yinka Shonibare CBE and Hew Locke—exploring their work and ideas in development, in reviews, and recorded conversations, drawn from the Cv/Visual Arts Research Archive.

Peter Cook and Dudley Moore were two of the brightest stars ever to light up the world of comedy. They set standards that will probably never be surpassed. Cambridge graduates who met in Beyond the Fringe, their chemistry produced some of the funniest, most inventive and downright brilliant comedy ever recorded.They came to wider fame with the tv series Not Only… But Also. The writing and performances were superb....

British Architecture presents an original and engaging overview of the architecture of the British Isles, from medieval times to the present day. Avoiding the traditional approach of a chronological survey of architects and architectural style, each chapter presents a thematic exploration of key aspects of British architecture that endure across time and still have relevance today. Arnold also highlights the ways in which architecture can project national and regional identities.

An essay by Edward Lucie-Smith on David Hockney's portraits exhibited at the Royal Academy's "82 Portraits and One Still-Life", and also "David Hockney and the Yorkshire Landscape" at RA in 2012.

Cinema has had a hugely influential role on global culture in the twentieth century at multiple levels: social, political, and educational. The part of British cinema in this has been controversial—often derided as a whole, but also vigorously celebrated, especially in terms of specific films and film-makers. In this Very Short Introduction, Charles Barr considers films and filmmakers, and studios and sponsorship, against the wider view of changing artistic, socio-political, and industrial climates over the decades of the twentieth century.

Test your knowledge or brush up on it with this unofficial Trivia Book. If you want to remember some of the great moments (with the expanse of time, we couldn’t remember them all!) of one of the most loved television shows ever, this book is for you.

A lot of ink has been spilled covering the lives of history’s most influential figures, but how much of the forest is lost for the trees? In Charles River Editors’ British Legends series, listeners can get caught up to speed on the lives of Great Britain’s most important men and women in the time it takes to finish a commute, while learning interesting facts long forgotten or never known. In 19th century England, few families were as accomplished as the Huxley family, which included prominent figures in the arts, sciences, and literature, but the most famous of them all would come of age in the early 20th century. Aldous Huxley was one of the most unique intellectuals of his age, but he was also one of the greatest. While he was controversial for dabbling with mysticism, a belief in parapsychology and the supernatural, and for advocating the use of psychedelic drugs, nobody could deny his abilities. Having grown up among the Huxley family, Aldous was well-versed in everything from botany to zoology, which helped him write one of the seminal futuristic science fiction novels, Brave New World, which he claimed sprang forth from him because of his experience in "an ordered universe in a world of planless incoherence".

For more than half a century, the name J. R. R. Tolkien (1892-1973) has been synonymous with epic fantasy. Known across the world for his classic The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy, Tolkien both revived interest in fantasy literature and set the standard for the genre. Today he is widely acknowledged as the father of modern fantasy and its most famous author.

A parody for fans of Harry Potter and The Crown, Harry Windzor and the Magic of Monarchy is an irreverent, satirical twist on the life of Prince Harry and the House of Windsor. There are spats between heirs and spares, dodgy deals between the Palace and the press, and so many scandals swept under the rug that even the corgis are suspicious. Maybe this isn’t a satire after all...

An in-depth celebration of the romantic comedy’s modern golden era and its role in our culture, tracking the genre from its heyday in the ’80s and the ’90s, its unfortunate decline in the 2000s, and its explosive reemergence in the age of streaming, featuring exclusive interviews with the...

Ben Edge is a rising star of both the art world and the current folk renaissance. This first trade book of Edge's art, featuring over 200 artworks, is a unique insight into his creative process as well as the first mainstream book to explore the amazing and wildly popular folk customs of the British ritual year. Ben Edge has travelled the length and breadth of Britain recording the weird and wonderful folk customs alive in communities all over the country.

CRT's hit feature Ticonderoga is now a new series! The series picks up where the feature left off, with Captain Taylor; his son, Adam; Mohawk scout Dagadawidah; and Captain Campbell of the 42nd Highlanders remaining at the fort, with a small contingent, while the main army has moved on to Crown Point, poised to follow the French into Canada.

From the author of the Pulitzer Prize–winning Lords of Finance, a magnificent and timely reckoning with the first truly global financial calamity and the famous banking family at the center of the whirlwind Over the course of the 1850s and 1860s, during the first era of globalization, the...

When the leaders of the French Revolution executed Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette in 1793, they sent a chilling message to the hereditary ruling orders in Europe. Believing that monarchy anywhere presented a threat to democratic rule in France, the leaders of the revolution declared war on European aristocracies, including those of Great Britain. For more than 20 years thereafter, France and England waged a protracted war that ended in British victory.

In Clothes...And Other Things that Matter, Alexandra Shulman delves into her own life to look at the emotions, ambitions, expectations and meanings behind the way we dress. From the bra to the bikini, the trench coat to trainers, the slip dress to the suit, she explores their meaning in women's lives and how our wardrobes intersect with the larger world - the career ladder, motherhood, romance, sexual identity, ambition, failure, body image and celebrity.

Paper Cuts is the inside story of the slow death of the British music press. But it's also a love letter to it, the tale of how music magazines saved one man's life. Ted Kessler left home and school around his 17th birthday, determined 'to be someone who listened to music professionally'. That dream appeared forlorn when he was later arrested for theft behind the counter of the record shop he managed during acid house's long hot summer of love.

During the Cold War, over 500 songs were written about nuclear weapons, fear of the Soviet Union, civil defense, bomb shelters, uranium mining, the space race, espionage, the Berlin Wall, and glasnost. This music uncovers aspects of the world-changing events that documentaries and history books cannot. In Atomic Tunes, Tim and Joanna Smolko explore everything from the serious to the comical, the morbid to the crude, showing the widespread concern among musicians who were trying to cope with the effect of communism on American society.

Set in Calcutta, London, the glacier-locked wilds of the Karakoram, and on Everest itself, The Last Englishmen is also the story of a generation. The cast of this exhilarating drama includes Indian and English writers and artists, explorers and Communist spies, Die Hards and Indian nationalists, political rogues and police informers. Key among them is a highborn Bengali poet named Sudhin Datta, a melancholy soul torn, like many of his generation, between hatred of the British Empire and a deep love of European literature, whose life would be upended by the arrival of war on his Calcutta doorstep.

A behind-the-scenes look into the life of Meghan Markle and her romance with Prince Harry—a dishy, delightful must-listen filled with exclusive insights for anyone obsessed with the Royal Family. Leslie Carroll’s books on royalty are “an irresistible combination of People Magazine and the...