A portrait based on access to the late actor's personal writings offers insight into his experiences as a soldier in World War II, his stage and film achievements, and his fiercely private personal life.

This series whisks you away to the scenic hillside of Ohio's Amish country and draws you into the excitement as Cheryl and her Amish friend, Naomi, work together to solve intriguing mysteries.

A marvelously entertaining diary from one of the most distinguished--and beloved--actors of stage and screen. Revealing the octogenarian spryness of a civilized mind and a beguiling mixture of the meditative and the hedonistic, My Name Escapes Me offers a glimpse of the private side of Guinness's often very public life.

The definitive, highly revealing biography of a great actor whose career spanned the twentieth century. Alec Guinness appeared in 77 films and 55 plays, winning acclaim for commanding roles such as Professor Marcus in The Lady Killers, Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars and George Smiley in Smiley`s People. He was an astonishingly gifted actor who became a British institution, a familiar figure to many. And yet Alec Guinness was a many-layered, complex man who was careful throughout his life to show only a little of his real self, never too much. He died with a large part of the truth still hidden. Now, for the first time, Garry O`Connor is able to reveal the full story, including startling new information on Guinness`s childhood, his secret relationships and the fears that haunted him. Backed by impeccable research, including interviews with Guinness himself as well as those close to him, this riveting biography will at last fill in the gaps, adding a new depth to our understanding not just of Guinness`s life but of his remarkable acting ability. Garry O`Connor has directed at the Royal Shakespeare Company, been a critic for The Times and written authoritative biographies of Paul Scofield, Peggy Ashcroft, Ralph Richardson and Sean O`Casey.

"The result is a charming book of wisdom and reflection, consolation and sheer pleasure, and one that offers an extraordinary insight into the mind of one of the great actors of the twentieth century."--BOOK JACKET.

George Smiley is assigned to uncover the identity of the double agent operating in the highest levels of British Intelligence.

Driven away from his parish by a censorious bishop, Monsignor Quixote sets off across Spain accompanied by a deposed renegade mayor as his own Sancho Panza, and his noble steed Rocinante – a faithful but antiquated SEAT 600. Like Cervantes’s classic, this comic, picaresque fable offers enduring insights into our life and times.

The Plymouth Theatre, George W. George and Frank Granat present Alec Guinness in Peter Glenville's production of "Dylan," a new play by Sidney Michaels, with Kate Reid, James Ray, Barbara Berjer, Martin Garner, Jenny O'Hara, Gordon B. Clarke, Ernest Graves, Margaret Braidwood, scenery designed by Oliver Smith, costumes by Ruth Morley, music by Laurence Rosenthal, lighting Jack Brown, directed by Peter Glenville.

"Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406) is generally regarded as the greatest intellectual ever to have appeared in the Arab world--a genius who ranks as one of the world's great minds. Yet the author of the Muqaddima, the most important study of history ever produced in the Islamic world, is not as well known as he should be, and his ideas are widely misunderstood. In this groundbreaking intellectual biography, Robert Irwin provides an engaging and authoritative account of Ibn Khaldun's extraordinary life, times, writings, and ideas. Irwin tells how Ibn Khaldun, who lived in a world decimated by the Black Death, held a long series of posts in the tumultuous Islamic courts of North Africa and Muslim Spain, becoming a major political player as well as a teacher and writer. Closely examining the Muqaddima, a startlingly original analysis of the laws of history, and drawing on many other contemporary sources, Irwin shows how Ibn Khaldun's life and thought fit into historical and intellectual context, including medieval Islamic theology, philosophy, politics, literature, economics, law, and tribal life. Because Ibn Khaldun's ideas often seem to anticipate by centuries developments in many fields, he has often been depicted as more of a modern man than a medieval one, and Irwin's account of such misreadings provides new insights about the history of Orientalism. In contrast, Irwin presents an Ibn Khaldun who was a creature of his time--a devout Sufi mystic who was obsessed with the occult and futurology and who lived in an often-strange world quite different from our own"--Jacket.