Short Essays

Colum McCann's Everything in This Country Must, a writer of fierce originality and haunting lyricism, turns to the troubles in Northern Ireland and reveals the reverberations of political tragedy in the most intimate lives of men and women, parents and children. In the title story, a teenage...

A new history of the world's most embattled idea. Today, democracy is the world's only broadly accepted political system, and yet it has become synonymous with disappointment and crisis. How did it come to this? In Can Democracy Work? James Miller, the author of the classic history of 1960s...

Three awarded short stories for 2016: a short story full of suspense and thrilling events showing how to murder someone, pinning the kill on someone else; a quasi-biographical short story revealing embarrassing moments in a woman's life and her decision to take her life back (better later than never); the revelation of a quirk in the life of the inhabitants of a building that is about to be sold. Enjoy mathematical planning, humor, and good writing!

Rolf Boysen liest Heinrich von Kleist. In seinem Essay "Über die allmähliche Verfertigung der Gedanken beim Reden" gibt Kleist den Rat, Probleme durch das "Darüber reden" mit anderen Menschen zu lösen. Allein schon das Formulieren bringt uns einer Lösung näher, denn "die Idee kommt beim Sprechen". In der Novelle "Das Erdbeben in Chili" droht den Liebenden Jeronimo und Josephe die Hinrichtung, als ein Erdbeben ihnen unverhofft zur Freiheit verhilft.

A book that introduces the listener to several categories and variety in one publication. The venue is unique and the experience intriguing.

The theme of trust, betrayed or fulfilled, runs through this collection of short stories: Parents lead children into peril, husbands abandon wives, wives manipulate husbands, and time undermines all. Love pangs, a favorite subject of the author, take on a new urgency as earthquakes, illnesses...

Meet the married Dads, the divorced Dads, the widowed Dads and the gay Dads; the gamblers, the firemen, the bankers, the nurses, the soldiers and the milkmen. They’re trying to guide their sons through the foothills of childhood into the bewildering uplands of adulthood. But it’s hard to know if they’re doing it right. Or what their sons’ mothers think... Wise and funny, touching and true, What We’re Teaching Our Sons is for anyone who has ever wondered how to be a grown-up.

About this collection: This is the a collection of seven of the author's best short stories, including "The Killing of Train-Man Brown","Send Me a Friend","Then Her Wig Fell Off","Let the Dog Drive","Selma at 4 A.M.","Young Turk", and "Slow Foreplay on a Fast Bus".

This Yuletide collection of stories, poems, and essays has been rescued from obscurity by the editor, who has also edited and annotated them to make these wonderful classics more easily accessible to modern listeners. While some of these authors may be unknown to you, their works have been included in this collection because of their capacity to instantly intrigue and delight. Give them a try, and don't be surprised if a few of them make their way onto your list of all-time personal Christmas favorites!

Eu rezemos só que me safo foi o livro de estreia do professor primário, Marcello D’Orta, e apresenta uma divertida colectânea de sessenta redacções dos alunos da escola primária de Arzano. Foi considerado pela crítica um bestseller de potência bíblica, onde rebelião, ignorância e má educação transformam-se em expressão, até revolução da língua. Renova a fé na existência do humor Napolitano como um género literário autónomo. Um encontro entre o desconhecido e o pensamento infantil que é ao mesmo tempo grandiosamente sério e cómico.

In Quarterly Essay 49, Latham argues that the time has come to go beyond criticism to solutions. In that spirit, he offers a timely assessment of the future for Labor. He examines the key challenges: the union nexus, the Keating settlement, a real education revolution, a new war on poverty, climate change, and handling the Greens. With wit and insight, he suggests that Labor's biggest problem is the steady erosion of its traditional working-class base.

From the author of On Hearing of My Mother's Death Six Years After It Happened: A Daughter's Memoir of Mental Illness, Stories from My Memory-Shelf is the story of my life, told in short fiction and essays. Features author commentary on the real-life events that inspired the stories.

Según el Génesis, el primer castigo fue botánico, y consistió en expulsarnos de un paraíso, de un jardín. Desde entonces vivimos en la añoranza. Bajo esta tensión entre exilio y pertenencia, Clara Obligado nos invita, con su escritura híbrida, a un paseo por la naturaleza en el que se mezclan pensamiento y literatura, ensayo y memorias. Un itinerario por los espacios más indómitos y los más sometidos que chocan y crecen dentro de nosotros. Desde la niñez, desde la semilla, desde distintas partes del mundo, una reflexión poética y conmovedora, un canto a todo lo que crece.

Cuando despertó se sentía mejor de lo que se había sentido en muchas semanas: simplemente no se sentía enfermo. Se apoyó un momento en el marco de la puerta que separaba su dormitorio y el baño hasta que estuvo seguro de que no se había mareado. Ni siquiera un poco, ni siquiera cuando se puso a buscar una zapatilla debajo de la cama.

Winner of the 2013 Eric Hoffer E-book Fiction Award, The War Is Language is a destruction of narrative, an experimental collection of flash fiction. These often humorous pieces exist at story's amorphous limit of spoken word and deconstruction. This disordered collection makes a mosaic with cathartic, inflammatory language.

A Sardinian wedding feast, the search for the perfect seaside pasta with wild fennel, meeting a risotto master: Laura Fraser journeys from the SpaghettiOs of her American childhood to savor the best of Italian cuisine and the culture that cooked it up. Using the same dreamy, delicious type of prose that made An Italian Affair a best-selling memoir, these essays will delight listeners who loved that book and all who love Italian food and culture.

A satirical short story by Junot Diaz, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and others...

Bill Gates discusses his optimism that creativity and intelligence will make the world a better place in "Unleashing the Power of Creativity," his contribution to NPR’s This I Believe series. This I Believe is a National Public Radio program that features Americans, from the famous to the...

Professor and author Azar Nafisi remembers empathy from unexpected sources in "Mysterious Connections that Link Us Together", her contribution to NPR's This I Believe series. This I Believe is a National Public Radio program that features Americans, from the famous to the unknown, completing the...