university of california press berkerley (Over 4,700 results)

Hardcover. Condition: Very Good PLUS. First EditioN. TIGHT CLEAN COPY IN A BRIGHT CRISP CLEAN DUSTJACKET.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. China underwent a dramatic social transformation in the last decade of the twentieth century. This powerful ethnographic study of one community focuses on the logic of everyday practice in post-reform rural China. Enriched with many vivid anecdotes describing life in the village of Zhaojiahe in northwestern China, In One's Own Shadow skillfully analyzes the changes and continuities marking the recent history of this region and highlights the broader implications for the way we understand Chinese modernity. Liu's narrative provides a wonderfully evocative exploration of many domains of everyday life such as kinship and marriage traditions, food systems, ceremonial celebrations, social relations, and village politics. He brings to life many of the personalities and customs of Zhaojiahe as he presents the villagers' strategies to modernize in an environment of scarce resources and a discredited cultural heritage. This accessibly written ethnography will be an essential contribution to the anthropology of China. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Although middle-income families don't earn much more than they did several decades ago, they are buying bigger cars, houses, and appliances. To pay for them, they spend more than they earn and carry record levels of debt. In a book that explores the very meaning of happiness and prosperity in America today, Robert Frank explains how increased concentrations of income and wealth at the top of the economic pyramid have set off "expenditure cascades" that raise the cost of achieving many basic goals for the middle class. Writing in lively prose for a general audience, Frank employs up-to-date economic data and examples drawn from everyday life to shed light on reigning models of consumer behavior. He also suggests reforms that could mitigate the costs of inequality. Falling Behind compels us to rethink how and why we live our economic lives the way we do. Copub: Russell Sage Foundation. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Anyone who cares about opera will find "The Ultimate Art" a thoroughly engaging book. David Littlejohn's essays are exciting, provocative, sometimes even outrageous. They reflect his deep love of opera - that exotic, extravagant, and perpetually popular hybrid performing art form - and his fascination with the many worlds from which it sprang. From its seventeenth-century beginnings, opera has been decried by its detractors for its elitism, its artifice, its absurd costliness, and its social irrelevance. But Littlejohn makes us see that opera embraces an extraordinary amount of intense human emotion and experience, Western culture, and individual psychology. It is also the most complex, challenging, and demanding form of public performance ever developed - at its most spectacular it pulls together in one evening a play, a concert, a ballet, and a pageant, not to mention an exhibition of painting and sculpture. Every opera is a veritable piece of cultural history. The book begins with "The Difference Is They Sing", a potentially controversial essay on the nature of opera and its place in modern culture. From there Littlejohn goes on to consider everything from "Sex and Religion in French Opera" to "What Peter Sellars Did to Mozart". He tells us about every major staging of Wagner's "Ring cycle" since 1876, the troubled fate (in legend, history, and opera) of the city of Nuremberg, and the volatile collaboration of Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthal. Littlejohn presents these and many other fascinating moments in the history of opera with conviction and flair. By the end of the book the reader may very well be persuaded that opera is indeed the ultimate art. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Fair. For this powerful successor to his best-selling guide to California wine, Charles E. Olken has joined forces with Joseph Furstenthal to craft "The New Connoisseurs' Guidebook to California Wine and Wineries". An encyclopedia, atlas, and buying guide combined in one comprehensive, authoritative work, this new guide delivers information and guidance that is not available in any other place. From first page to last, it is geared towards a wide range of consumers, yet also offers the depth and detail that made its predecessor one of the most frequently referenced works by wine educators and industry insiders. Now organized geographically into eight wine regions, the guide has been completely rewritten and expanded to provide the most current information on the state's evolving wine industry - its history, grapes, winemaking, terminology, geography, and leading wineries. A readable copy of the book which may include some defects such as highlighting and notes. Cover and pages may be creased and show discolouration.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Irreverent, charming, eminently quotable, this handbook--an eccentric etiquette guide for the human race--contains sixty-nine aphorisms, anecdotes, whimsical suggestions, maxims, and cautionary tales from Mark Twain's private and published writings. It dispenses advice and reflections on family life and public manners; opinions on topics such as dress, health, food, and childrearing and safety; and more specialized tips, such as those for dealing with annoying salesmen and burglars. Culled from Twain's personal letters, autobiographical writings, speeches, novels, and sketches, these pieces are delightfully fresh, witty, startlingly relevant, and bursting with Twain's characteristic ebullience for life. They also remind us exactly how Mark Twain came to be the most distinctive and well-known American literary voice in the world. These texts, some of them new or out of print for decades, have been selected and meticulously prepared by the editors at the Mark Twain Project. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Trade paperback. Condition: Fine. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 280 p. Contains: Illustrations, black & white. Audience: General/trade; General/trade.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. In many South Asian oral traditions, herons are viewed as duplicitous and conniving. These traditions tend also to view women as fragmented identities, dangerously split between virtue and virtuosity, between loyalties to their own families and those of their husbands. In women's songs, however, symbolic herons speak, telling of alternative moral perspectives shaped by women. The heron's words--and women's expressive genres more generally--criticize pervasive North Indian ideologies of gender and kinship that place women in subordinate positions. By inviting readers to "listen to the heron's words," the authors convey this shift in moral perspective and suggest that these spoken truths are compelling and consequential for the women in North India. The songs and narratives bear witness to a provocative cultural dissonance embedded in women's speech. This book reveals the power of these critical commentaries and the fluid and permeable boundaries between spoken words and the lives of ordinary village women. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Trade paperback. Trade paperback (US). 256 p. Perspectives on Southern Africa., 49. Audience: College/higher education; Professional and scholarly; General/trade. Good. Good+ / cover clean / slight edgewear. text clean / tight.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Herschel B. Chipp's Theories of Modern Art: A Source Book By Artists and Critics is a collection of texts from letters, manifestos, notes and interviews. Sources include, as the title says, artists and critics-some expected, like van Gogh, Gauguin, Apollinaire, Mondrian, Greenberg, just to name a few-and some less so: Trotsky and Hitler, in the section on Art and Politics. The book is a wonderful resource and insight into the way artists think and work. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Beginning with the pre-Hispanic period and ending with the latest democratic developments of the twenty-first century, this definitive one-volume history of Mexico analyzes the ways that economic, social, and political dynamics have interacted to shape the nation's past. Alicia Hernandez Chavez takes into account new historiography--which is fully integrated with anthropology, political science, economics, and international relations--to present an original and fresh interpretation of the structures and processes that determined the country's evolution. Based on the latest sources in both Spanish and other languages, this book illustrates that Mexico's history--far from being one of violent change, uprisings, and revolution--tended more toward stability and political collaboration. Hernandez Chavez argues that Mexicans relied on tradition and institutions to effect change, resorting to disorder and destruction as little as possible. Numerous maps, tables, and charts support the text, providing extensive information on geography, social structures, the economy, politics, education, health, and transportation. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The American experience in Vietnam divided us as a nation and eroded our confidence in both the morality and the effectiveness of our foreign policy. Yet our understanding of this tragic episode remains superficial because, then and now, we have never grasped the passionate commitment with which the Vietnamese clung to and fought over their own competing visions of what Vietnam was and what it might become. To understand the war, we must understand the Vietnamese, their culture, and their ways of looking at the world. Neil L. Jamieson, after many years of living and working in Vietnam, has written the book that provides this understanding. Jamieson paints a portrait of twentieth-century Vietnam. Against the background of traditional Vietnamese culture, he takes us through the saga of modern Vietnamese history and Western involvement in the country, from the coming of the French in 1858 through the Vietnam War and its aftermath. Throughout his analysis, he allows the Vietnamese--both our friends and foes, and those who wished to be neither--to speak for themselves through poetry, fiction, essays, newspaper editorials and reports of interviews and personal experiences. By putting our old and partial perceptions into this new and broader context, Jamieson provides positive insights that may perhaps ease the lingering pain and doubt resulting from our involvement in Vietnam. As the United States and Vietnam appear poised to embark on a new phase in their relationship, Jamieson's book is particularly timely. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. "How Movies Work" offers the filmgoer an engaging and informative guide to the appreciation and evaluation of films. It provides a comprehensive consideration of movies from idea to script, casting, financing, shooting and distribution. Bruce Kawin addresses the book not just to students of film but to any filmgoer curious to know more about the process of the conception and creation of our favorite entertainment and art form. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. 'I got my first job working in a toy store when I was 41 years old'. So begins sociologist Christine Williams' description of her stint as a low-wage worker at two national toy store chains: one upscale shop and one big box outlet. In this provocative, perceptive, and lively book, studded with rich observations from the shop floor, Williams chronicles her experiences as a cashier, salesperson, and stocker and provides broad-ranging, often startling, insights into the social impact of shopping for toys. Taking a new look at what selling and buying for kids are all about, she illuminates the politics of how we shop, exposes the realities of low-wage retail work, and discovers how class, race, and gender manifest and reproduce themselves in our shopping-mall culture. Despite their differences, Williams finds that both toy stores perpetuate social inequality in a variety of ways. She observes that workers are often assigned to different tasks and functions on the basis of gender and race; that racial dynamics between black staff and white customers can play out in complex and intense ways; and, that unions can't protect workers from harassment from supervisors or demeaning customers even in the upscale toy store. And she discovers how lessons that adults teach to children about shopping can legitimize economic and social hierarchies. In the end, however, "Inside Toyland" is not an anticonsumer diatribe. Williams discusses specific changes in labor law and in the organization of the retail industry that can better promote social justice. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Why do life-saving prescription drugs cost so much? Drug companies insist that prices reflect the millions they invest in research and development. In this gripping expose, Merrill Goozner contends that American taxpayers are in fact footing the bill twice: once by supporting government-funded research and again by paying astronomically high prices for prescription drugs. Goozner demonstrates that almost all the important new drugs of the past quarter-century actually originated from research at taxpayer-funded universities and at the National Institutes of Health. He reports that once the innovative work is over, the pharmaceutical industry often steps in to reap the profit. Goozner shows how drug innovation is driven by dedicated scientists intent on finding cures for diseases, not by pharmaceutical firms whose bottom line often takes precedence over the advance of medicine. A university biochemist who spent twenty years searching for a single blood protein that later became the best-selling biotech drug in the world, a government employee who discovered the causes for dozens of crippling genetic disorders, and the Department of Energy-funded research that made the Human Genome Project possible--these engrossing accounts illustrate how medical breakthroughs actually take place. The $800 Million Pill suggests ways that the government's role in testing new medicines could be expanded to eliminate the private sector waste driving up the cost of existing drugs. Pharmaceutical firms should be compelled to refocus their human and financial resources on true medical innovation, Goozner insists. This book is essential reading for everyone concerned about the politically charged topics of drug pricing, Medicare coverage, national health care, and the role of pharmaceutical companies in developing countries. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. This magnificently produced atlas provides a unique visual survey of the profound economic, political, and social changes taking place in China, as well as their implications for the world at large. China has the world's fastest-growing economy and is the second-largest trading nation. With its pro-entrepreneurial outlook and population of 1.3 billion, it offers unique opportunities for domestic and overseas investors. This dynamic volume provides an abundance of information on China's new wealth, growing unemployment, mass migration to the cities, and trade disputes. The book is completely revised and updated: vivid full-color maps convey a wealth of information quickly and efficiently. It offers comprehensive information on China's population, employment, agriculture, industry, and economics. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Does the number of children gunned down double each year? Does anorexia kill 150,000 young women annually? Do white males account for only a sixth of new workers? Startling statistics shape our thinking about social issues. But all too often, these numbers are wrong. This book is a lively guide to spotting bad statistics and learning to think critically about these influential numbers. "Damned Lies and Statistics" is essential reading for everyone who reads or listens to the news, for students, and for anyone who relies on statistical information to understand social problems. Joel Best bases his discussion on a wide assortment of intriguing contemporary issues that have garnered much recent media attention, including abortion, cyberporn, homelessness, the Million Man March, teen suicide, the U.S. census, and much more. Using examples from the "New York Times", the "Washington Post", and other major newspapers and television programs, he unravels many fascinating examples of the use, misuse, and abuse of statistical information. In this book Best shows us exactly how and why bad statistics emerge, spread, and come to shape policy debates. He recommends specific ways to detect bad statistics, and shows how to think more critically about 'stat wars', or disputes over social statistics among various experts. Understanding this book does not require sophisticated mathematical knowledge; Best discusses the most basic and most easily understood forms of statistics, such as percentages, averages, and rates. This accessible book provides an alternative to either naively accepting the statistics we hear or cynically assuming that all numbers are meaningless. It shows how anyone can become a more intelligent, critical, and empowered consumer of the statistics that inundate both the social sciences and our media-saturated lives. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Hard cover. Cloth over boards. 760 p. Mark Twain Papers, 10. Audience: Professional and scholarly. very good plus, clean and tight. Very good in very good dust jacket.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. In this sequel to the acclaimed "Damned Lies and Statistics", which the "Boston Globe" said 'deserves a place next to the dictionary on every school, media, and home-office desk', Joel Best continues his straightforward, lively, and humorous account of how statistics are produced, used, and misused by everyone from researchers to journalists. Underlining the importance of critical thinking in all matters numerical, Best illustrates his points with examples of good and bad statistics about such contemporary concerns as school shootings, fatal hospital errors, bullying, teen suicides, deaths at the World Trade Center, college ratings, the risks of divorce, racial profiling, and fatalities caused by falling coconuts. "More Damned Lies and Statistics" encourages all of us to think in a more sophisticated and skeptical manner about how statistics are used to promote causes, create fear, and advance particular points of view. Best identifies different sorts of numbers that shape how we think about public issues: missing numbers are relevant but overlooked; confusing numbers bewilder when they should inform; scary numbers play to our fears about the present and the future; authoritative numbers demand respect they don't deserve; magical numbers promise unrealistic, simple solutions to complex problems; and contentious numbers become the focus of data duels and stat wars. The author's use of pertinent, socially important examples documents the life-altering consequences of understanding or misunderstanding statistical information. He demystifies statistical measures by explaining in straightforward prose how decisions are made about what to count and what not to count, what assumptions get made, and which figures are brought to our attention. Best identifies different sorts of numbers that shape how we think about public issues. Entertaining, enlightening, and very timely, this book offers a basis for critical thinking about the numbers we encounter and a reminder that when it comes to the news, people count - in more ways than one. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Climate change, population increase, and the demands made by the growing number of people adopting urban lifestyles and western diets threaten the world's supply of freshwater, edging us closer to a global water crisis, with dire implications for agriculture, the economy, the environment, and human health. Completely revised and updated, The Atlas of Water is a compelling visual guide to the state of this life-sustaining resource. Using vivid graphics, maps, and charts, it explores the complex human interaction with water around the world. This vibrant atlas addresses all the pressing issues concerning water, from water shortages and excessive demand, to dams, pollution, and privatization, all considered in terms of the growing threat of an increasingly unpredictable climate. It also outlines critical tools for managing water, providing safe access to water, and preserving the future of the world's water supply. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The foremost authorities in the field of music from around the world have contributed twenty original essays for this volume, edited by Elizabeth May. Only European musics have been omitted, except insofar as they affect other musics discussed here. North American music is represented by the musics of the Native Americans and the Alaskan Eskimos. The essays are profusely illustrated with maps, drawings, diagrams, photographs, and music examples. There are extensive glossaries, bibliographies, and annotated film lists. The book is directed to readers seriously interested in acquainting themselves with musics beyond the confines of Western musicology. Contributors include Bruno Nettl, Kuo-huang Han and Lindy Li Mark, Kang-sook Lee, William P. Malm, David Morton, Bonnie C. Wade, Margaret J. Kartomi, Adrienne L. Kaeppler, Trevor A. Jones, Atta Annan Mensah, John Blacking, Alfred Kwashie Ladzekpo and Kobla Ladzekpo, Cynthia Tse Kimberlin, Jozef M. Pacholczyk, Ella Zonis, Abraham A. Schwadron, David P. McAllester, Lorraine D. Koranda, and Dale A. Olsen. Please note: this book was originally published with records. The edition available now does not include the records. We are hoping to make the original recordings available in some other way. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Why do life-saving prescription drugs cost so much? Drug companies insist that prices reflect the millions they invest in research and development. In this gripping expose, Merrill Goozner contends that American taxpayers are in fact footing the bill twice: once by supporting government-funded research and again by paying astronomically high prices for prescription drugs. Goozner demonstrates that almost all the important new drugs of the past quarter-century actually originated from research at taxpayer-funded universities and at the National Institutes of Health. He reports that once the innovative work is over, the pharmaceutical industry often steps in to reap the profit. Goozner shows how drug innovation is driven by dedicated scientists intent on finding cures for diseases, not by pharmaceutical firms whose bottom line often takes precedence over the advance of medicine. A university biochemist who spent twenty years searching for a single blood protein that later became the best-selling biotech drug in the world, a government employee who discovered the causes for dozens of crippling genetic disorders, and the Department of Energy-funded research that made the Human Genome Project possible--these engrossing accounts illustrate how medical breakthroughs actually take place. The $800 Million Pill suggests ways that the government's role in testing new medicines could be expanded to eliminate the private sector waste driving up the cost of existing drugs. Pharmaceutical firms should be compelled to refocus their human and financial resources on true medical innovation, Goozner insists. This book is essential reading for everyone concerned about the politically charged topics of drug pricing, Medicare coverage, national health care, and the role of pharmaceutical companies in developing countries. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Music and fashion: the deep connection between these two expressive worlds is firmly entrenched. Yet little attention has been paid to the association of sound and style in the early twentieth century - a period of remarkable and often parallel developments in both high fashion and the arts, including music. This beautifully written book, lavishly illustrated with fashion plates and photographs, explores the relationship between music and fashion, elegantly charting the importance of these arts to the rise of transatlantic modernism. Focusing on the emergence of the movement known as Neoclassicism, Mary E. Davis demonstrates that new aesthetic approaches were related to fashion in a manner that was perfectly attuned to the tastes of jazz-age sophisticates. Looking in particular at three couturiers - Paul Poiret, Germaine Bongard, and Coco Chanel - and three breakthrough fashion magazines - "La Gazette du Bon Ton", "Vanity Fair", and "Vogue" - Davis illuminates for the first time the ways in which fashion's imperatives of originality and constant change influenced composers such as Erik Satie, Igor Stravinsky, and Les Six. She also considers the role played by the Ballets Russes, and explores the contributions of artists including costume and set designer Leon Bakst, writer and director Jean Cocteau, Amedee Ozenfant, and Pablo Picasso. The first study to situate music in this rich context, "Classic Chic" demonstrates the profound importance of the linked endeavors of composition and couture to modernist thought. In addition to its innovative approach to this important moment in history, Davis's focus on the social aspects of the story makes the book a tremendously engaging read. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. Beneath the histories of religious traditions - from biblical wars to crusading ventures and great acts of martyrdom - violence has lurked as a shadowy presence. Images of death have never been far from the heart of religion's power to stir the imagination. In this wide-ranging and erudite book, Mark Juergensmeyer asks one of the most important and perplexing questions of our age: Why do religious people commit violent acts in the name of their god, taking the lives of innocent victims and terrorizing entire populations? This, the first comparative study of religious terrorism, explores incidents such as the World Trade Center explosion, Hamas suicide bombings, the Tokyo subway nerve gas attack, and the killing of abortion clinic doctors in the United States. Incorporating personal interviews with World Trade Center bomber Mahmud Abouhalima, Christian Right activist Mike Bray, Hamas leaders Sheik Yassin and Abdul Azis Rantisi, and Sikh political leader Simranjit Singh Mann, among others, Juergensmeyer takes us into the mindset of those who perpetrate and support violent acts. In the process, he helps us understand why these acts are often associated with religious causes and why they occur with such frequency at this moment in history. "Terror in the Mind of God" places these acts of violence in the context of global political and social changes, and posits them as attempts to empower the cultures of violence that support them. Juergensmeyer analyzes the economic, ideological, and gender-related dimensions of cultures that embrace a central sacred concept - cosmic war - and that employ religion to demonize their enemies. Juergensmeyer's narrative is engaging, incisive, and sweeping in scope. He convincingly shows that while, in many cases, religion supplies not only the ideology but also the motivation and organizational structure for the perpetrators of violent acts, it also carries with it the possibilities for peace. This book won the "Los Angeles Times" Best Nonfiction Book of 2000 award. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Fine. The history of India is the engrossing story of an ancient civilization, reborn as a modern nation. More a continent than a single nation, India is home to over one-fifth of humanity, yet it remains a mystery to most non-Indians, barely appreciated and poorly understood. Stanley Wolpert's third edition of India provides a much-needed, concise overview of Indian history and culture. His new preface brings the book up to date, discussing the most recent national elections, the economic effects of the new globalization, and the consequences of joining the nuclear arms race.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. When Ferdinand 'Jelly Roll' Morton sat at the piano in the Library of Congress in May of 1938 to begin his monumental series of interviews with Alan Lomax, he spoke of his years on the West Coast with the nostalgia of a man recalling a golden age, a lost Eden. He had arrived in Los Angeles more than twenty years earlier, but he recounted his losses as vividly as though they had occurred just recently. The greatest loss was his separation from Anita Gonzales, by his own account 'the only woman I ever loved', to whom he left almost all of his royalties in his will. In "Dead Man Blues", Phil Pastras sets the record straight on the two periods (1917-1923 and 1940-1941) that Jelly Roll Morton spent on the West Coast. In addition to rechecking sources, correcting mistakes in scholarly accounts, and situating eyewitness narratives within the histories of New Orleans or Los Angeles, Pastras offers a fresh interpretation of the life and work of Morton, one of the most important and influential early practitioners of jazz. Pastras' discovery of a previously unknown collection of memorabilia - including a 58-page scrapbook compiled by Morton himself - sheds new light on Morton's personal and artistic development, as well as on the crucial role played by Anita Gonzales. In a rich, fast-moving, and fascinating narrative, Pastras traces Morton's artistic development as a pianist, composer, and bandleader. Among many other topics, Pastras discusses the complexities of racial identity for Morton and his circle, his belief in voodoo, his relationships with women, his style of performance, and his roots in black musical traditions. Not only does "Dead Man Blues" restore to the historical record invaluable information about one of the great innovators of jazz, it also brings to life one of the most colorful and fascinating periods of musical transformation on the West Coast. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.

Paperback. Condition: Very Good. The 'keys' provided by Herve Lacombe in this richly informed book open the door to understanding the essence of nineteenth-century French lyric theater. Lacombe illuminates the diverse elements that constitute opera by focusing his investigation around three main categories: composition and production; words, music, and drama; and the interaction of society, genre, and aesthetics. Lacombe chooses Bizet's "Pearl Fishers" (1863) as the exemplar of French opera that combines tradition and innovation. He uses "Pearl Fishers" as a paradigmatic point of reference for exploring questions of genesis, style, and aesthetic in other nineteenth-century French operatic works. French opera was a social art, he writes, and looping between past and future, between tradition and innovation, it achieved the seemingly impossible union of two antithetical aspects of Romanticism: the taste for theatricality and the desire for intimacy. The voices of contemporary witnesses are heard throughout Lacombe's book. He makes abundant use of the writings of such musician-critics as Berlioz, Reyer, and Saint-Saens and also draws on the works of many French writers, including Stendhal, Balzac, Baudelaire, and Zola. Illustrations showing costume sketches, scenery, posters, paintings, photographs, and magazine articles are attractive complements to discussions of particular operas. Together with Edward Schneider's accessible translation, the illustrations make this well-rounded and original study a trove of information for both music scholars and French historians. The book has been read, but is in excellent condition. Pages are intact and not marred by notes or highlighting. The spine remains undamaged.