This posthumously published collection of essays takes up such diverse subjects as the poet Oppian, Tantrism, the feasts of the Christian year, Durer, the Japanese studies of Ivan Morris, the erotic mysticism of the Gita-Govinda, the eternal spirit of Andalusia, and Bede's Ecclesiastical History. The title esay consider's time's transforming effect on arrt, meditating on the erosion of a statue and the resulting production of a new, sublime work of art.

Fires consists of nine monologues and narratives based on classical Greek stories. Antigone, Clytemnestra, Phaedo, Sappho are all mythical figures whose stories are mingled with contemporary themes. Interspersed are highly personal narratives, reflecting on a time of profound inner crisis in the author's life. "The unwritten novel among the fantasies and aphorisms of Fires is a classic tale."—Stephen Koch, New York Times Book Review

This volume is the first comprehensive collection of texts on the conservation of art and architecture to be published in the English language. Designed for students of art history as well as conservation, the book consists of forty-six texts, some never before translated into English and many originally published only in obscure or foreign journals. The thirty major art historians and scholars represented raise questions such as when to restore, what to preserve, and how to maintain aesthetic character. Excerpts have been selected from the following books and essays: John Ruskin, The Seven Lamps of Architecture; Bernard Berenson, Aesthetics and History in the Visual Arts; Clive Bell, The Aesthetic Hypothesis; Cesare Brandi, Theory of Restoration; Kenneth Clark, Looking at Pictures; Erwin Panofsky, The History of Art as a Humanistic Discipline; E. H. Gombrich, Art and Illusion; Marie Cl. Berducou, The Conservation of Archaeology; and Paul Philippot, Restoration from the Perspective of the Social Sciences. The fully illustrated book also contains an annotated bibliography and an index.

This collection includes: How Wand-fo was Saved, Marko's Smile, The Milk of Death, The Last Love of Princess Genji, The Man Who Loved the Nereids, Our Lady of the Swallows, Aphrodissia; the Widow, Kali Beheaded, The End of Marko Kraljevic, The Sadness of Cornelius Berg, and a Postscript by the Author. "From China to Japan, the Balkans to India, Oriental Tales addresses love, conquest, betrayal, murder, religion, and passion in an eloquent and exquisite telling."--Kirkus Reviews.

Subversive Subjects: Reading Marguerite Yourcenar is the first collection of articles in English to deal with many of this very private author's best-known works. Its contributors make use of a variety of literary theories to probe the complex ambiguities at the heart of Yourcenar's writings. Each contributor ventures beyond traditional readings of Yourcenar's complex texts, pushing against the boundaries of interpretation that the Belgian-born writer carefully established. Many of the essays read like a mystery; hence they follow Yourcenar's call for rigorous explications du texte as they probe her complex ouevre. Judith Holland Sarnecki is Associate Professor of French at Lawrence University. Ingeborg Majer O'Sickey is Associate Professor of German and Women's Studies at the State University of New York, Binghamton.

A dynamic, scholarly engagement with Susanne Bier's work

One of the most respected writers in the French language and best known as the author of Memoirs of Hadrian and The Abyss, Yourcenar received countless literary honors and became the first woman to be elected to the Academie Francaise. An uncompromising and intimate portrait. 50 halftones.

A completely updated new edition of David Lowenthal's classic account of how we reshape the past to serve present needs.

"It was with Alexis that, in 1929, Marguerite Yourcenar began her career as a novelist. Few literary debuts in this centry are quite as astonishing; for this profound analysis of a man's homosexuality was written by a young woman of twenty-four. The novel takes the form of a letter from the protagonist, Alexis, to his wife, Monique. His letter declares that he can no longer continue in the marriage, that he must obey the demands of his own sexuality, against which he has struggled in vain, to achieve a freedom without which he cannot live"--Back cover.

Everyday aesthetic experiences and concerns occupy a large part of our aesthetic life. However, because of their prevalence and mundane nature, we tend not to pay much attention to them, let alone examine their significance. Western aesthetic theories of the past few centuries also neglect everyday aesthetics because of their almost exclusive emphasis on art. In a ground-breaking new study, Yuriko Saito provides a detailed investigation into our everyday aesthetic experiences, and reveals how our everyday aesthetic tastes and judgments can exert a powerful influence on the state of the world and our quality of life. By analysing a wide range of examples from our aesthetic interactions with nature, the environment, everyday objects, and Japanese culture, Saito illustrates the complex nature of seemingly simple and innocuous aesthetic responses. She discusses the inadequacy of art-centered aesthetics, the aesthetic appreciation of the distinctive characters of objects or phenomena, responses to various manifestations of transience, and the aesthetic expression of moral values; and she examines the moral, political, existential, and environmental implications of these and other issues.