THE STORY: An hilarious farce about an imagined meeting in Paris, 1897, between the famous theater divas Sarah Bernhardt and Eleonora Duse. The two actresses--who were the biggest and most temperamental stars of their day--were scheduled to perform b

This riveting biography brilliantly explores the short, intense, and passionate life of the country girl from Normandy, who at thirteen fled her brute of a father to go to Paris. Almost overnight she became one of the most admired courtesans of the 1840s—the inspiration for Alexandre Dumas fils’ The Lady of the Camellias and Verdi’s La Traviata. With her aristocratic ways, elegant clothes and signature camellias, Marie was always a subject of fascination at the opera and the boulevard cafés. Her death at twenty-three from tuberculosis created such an outpouring of sympathy in the press that Charles Dickens, who was in Paris at the time, was amazed. “Everything is erased in the face of an incident which is far more important,” he wrote, “the romantic death of one of the glories of the demi-monde, the beautiful, the famous Marie Duplessis.”

How did Paris and its musical landscape influence Verdi's La traviata? In this book, Emilio Sala re-examines La traviata in the cultural context of the French capital in the mid-nineteenth century. Verdi arrived in Paris in 1847 and stayed for almost two years: there, he began his relationship with Giuseppina Strepponi and assiduously attended performances at the popular theatres, whose plays made frequent use of incidental music to intensify emotion and render certain dramatic moments memorable to the audience. It is in one of these popular theatres that Verdi probably witnessed one of the first performances of Dumas fils' La Dame aux camélias, which became hugely successful in 1852. Making use of primary source material, including unpublished musical works, journal articles and rare documents and images, Sala's close examination of the incidental music of La Dame aux camélias - and its musical context - offers an invaluable interpretation of La traviata's modernity.

A brief description and history of each state's flower and tree symbols, plus those of Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and American Virgin Islands.

Bestselling author Suzanne Robinson takes readers back to the days of the Civil War, as passions run high and even a proper British lady cannot resist the pull of history—or the rugged charms of a Union spy. Visiting friends in Mississippi, Lady Eva Sparrow hopes to escape the tedium of London society’s social calendar. Instead she is appalled by the slavery she finds in the South. Though she is a British citizen, her heart demands that she do something to improve the slaves’ lot. But little does the lady imagine that she possesses the tools for espionage, the influence to turn the tide of a Confederate plot, and the courage to root out a rebel assassin. Texan Ryder Drake works for President Lincoln, setting up a network of spies across the Confederacy. Seeking Britain’s support, Ryder is introduced to Lady Eva, who has powerful political connections in London. Unwilling to trust the fate of the Union to a silly socialite, he dismisses the lovely lady—until her sharp wit and intelligence win him over . . . head and heart. And though Eva is no innocent, just one dangerous glance from Ryder sets her pulse racing—and readies her spirit to risk everything to help him infiltrate society’s highest circles.

Eighteen-year-old Hilda, known as "the girl in the gold bikini" when she swam at her country club in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, abruptly leaves the gilded life to take up residence in room 304 of the Hotel Marvelous—as a prostitute. There she becomes Hilda Hurricane, an erotic force of nature no man can resist. The exception is reporter-narrator Roberto Drummond, who attempts to unravel the mystery of why the girl in the gold bikini would forego a comfortable life to join the world's oldest profession. While some in Belo Horizonte cheer Hilda's liberated lifestyle, others seek to have her moved outside the city limits, and a would-be saint cannot seem to finish the exorcism he began outside the Hotel Marvelous. Set against the social and political upheaval of the 1960s, Hilda's story seduces even as Drummond becomes aware of more ominous forces approaching Belo Horizonte. Hilda Hurricane was both a critical and a commercial success in Brazil, with more than 200,000 copies sold. (The DVD of the television adaptation has sold more than a million copies.) Admirers of Kurt Vonnegut will revel in Drummond's similarly sharp satire and playful digressions, particularly about left-wing politics, which blur the boundary between fiction and autobiography. Yet the real genius of the author's interventions may be that they never slow the story long enough to lose sight of this mysterious beauty swept up in the turmoil of the times.

This “lively” study of female lawbreakers across centuries and cultures is “chock full of disquieting stories and truly twisted personalities” (Booklist). Organized A-to-Z under six categories, this book offers insight into the lives and minds of women in different centuries and different countries, with diverse cultures and backgrounds from the poverty-stricken to royalty, who have defied law and order and social taboos. Read about mistresses, murderers, smugglers, pirates, prostitutes, and fanatics with hearts and souls that feature every shade of black (and gray!). From Cleopatra to Ruth Ellis, from Boudicca to Bonnie Parker, from Lady Caroline Lamb to Moll Cutpurse, from Jezebel to Ava Gardner—as well as less familiar names like Victorian brothel-keeper Mary Jeffries, American gambler and horse thief Belle Starr, and La Voisin, the seventeenth-century Queen of all Witches in France—you’ll find a variety of women from the daring and outrageous to the desperate to the downright evil. Wicked? Misunderstood? Naïve? Foolish? Predatory? Manipulative? Or just rebellious? Read their stories and decide. “[A] rollicking survey of 100 female renegades . . . this compendium of historical trivia is a lot of fun to read.” —Publishers Weekly Includes photos and illustrations

Meet Sarah Walters, a Camellia Society debutante with a weakness for bad ideas. Sarah's mother lectures her on etiquette but tends to get loose after a few gins. Still, Sarah tries to follow the debutante code - after all, in Charleston, manners mean everything. But it's not easy to follow the rules, particularly in the summers when she runs into boys in pickup trucks, or, later, when she moves to New York with her friends. For the Camellia girls soon learn, careers don't always go to plan and men don't always love you back: the bright future they thought was theirs dissolves into heartbreak, illness and addiction. And when a shocking event brings thirty-something Sarah back home to Charleston, she must decide where 'home' really is.