1833, Catherine Jane Hamilton returned from India to Edinburgh to seek a divorce from her husband, the physician Alexander Lesassier. The charge was adultery, and proof for it lay in a trunk containing her husband's personal papers. Catherine won her suit without difficulty and the trunk was deposited in the library of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. Alexander Lesassier died in 1839 during the First Afghan War; his trunk and its contents remained untouched for the next century and a half. It has now been opened and a remarkable tale, told in remarkable detail, has spilled forth. The life of Alexander Lesassier, as expertly reconstructed by Lisa Rosner, affords startling insight into the sensibilities of an era and of the man who, in his own eyes and those of the women who adored him, was its most perfect creation. Affable and self-absorbed, engaging and ignoble Lesassier was a physician, military surgeon, and novelist, who was also a shameless opportunist, charming scoundrel, seducer, and survivor. His is the story of a failed medical man who wanted to be something different and saw himself as entitled to more than he had; someone who can always be guaranteed to make the wrong choice, and then protest that he has done well. This fascinating and deeply absorbing book offers rare insights into Georgian, Regency, and early Victorian Britain through the fortunes and misfortunes, hopes and whims, of "the most beautiful man in existence."

When Andy Warhol cast Paul Swan (1883?1972) in three films in the mid-1960s, he knew that the octogenarian had once been internationally hailed as ?the most beautiful man in the world? and as ?Nijinsky?s successor.? Arthur Hammerstein had advertised Swan as ?a reincarnated Greek God,? and George and Ira Gershwin had celebrated his beauty in their musical Funny Face. What Warhol didn?t know was that Swan had also been called ?America?s Leonardo,? portrait artist of the famous and the infamous, including writer Willa Cather, aviator Charles Lindbergh, British Prime Minister James Ramsay MacDonald, and dictator Benito Mussolini. This book is the first to tell Swan?s story, from his days as a world-famous dancer and artist, through his film career?which ran from silent pictures, including De Mille?s Ten Commandments (1923), to Warhol?s Camp, Paul Swan, and Paul Swan I-IV (1965)?to his portrait painting late in life when Nelson Rockefeller?s children, Malachy McCourt, and Pope Paul VI were among his subjects. With unprecedented access to Swan?s scrapbooks, letters, diaries, and an unpublished memoir that tells the story of a bisexual man trying to build a public life in perilous times, Janis and Richard Londraville reconstruct the intriguing life of this uniquely interesting figure, whose story, although widely glossed in the press, was until now never fully known.

Taking the concept of beauty seriously, this encyclopedia examines how humanity has sought and continues to seek what is "beautiful" in a variety of cultural contexts, giving readers an understanding of how to look at beauty both intellectually and critically. Is beauty ever more than "skin deep"? Arguably yes, considering that the concept of beauty—and the pursuit of it—has shaped cultures worldwide, across every time period, and has even served to change the course of history. Studying beauty practices yields insight into social status, wealth, political ideology, religious doctrine, and gender expectations, including gender nonconformity. A truly interdisciplinary text, Beauty around the World: A Cultural Encyclopedia presents an insightful perspective on beauty that draws from philosophy, literature, sociology, anthropology, psychology, and feminist studies, giving readers a unique view of world beauty practices. This volume offers information about beauty practices from the past to the present in alphabetical entries that address terms and topics such as "beards," "dreadlocks," "Geisha," "moko tattoos," and "progressive muscularity." Readers will better comprehend how beauty shapes many social interactions in profound ways worldwide, and that the unspoken social agreements that shape ideals of attractiveness and desirability within any given culture can matter very much. The encyclopedia's entries challenge readers to consider the questions "What is beauty?" and "Why does it matter?" A comprehensive bibliography is a valuable resource for further research.

Rooted in the creative success of over 30 years of supermarket tabloid publishing, the Weekly World News has been the world's only reliable news source since 1979. The online hub www.weeklyworldnews.com is a leading entertainment news site.

A study of the world of modeling. Exploring an arena of cultural production, it shows how the right 'look' is discovered, developed, and packaged to become a prized commodity. It examines how models sell themselves, how agents promote them, and how clients decide to hire them

Brought up in the Depression, Johnny DaSilva is leader of a fun and imaginative gang that lives out their dreams in the Big Tree in which each has a branch that serves as the Lone Ranger's Silver, the race car of Morey Amsterdam, the rocket ship of Buck Rogers, the crow's nest for Black Bart the Pirate. When World War II broke out, they tried every ruse their young imaginations could think of to get into the marines, army, and navy but had to settle for the Boy Scouts. But the faux pas war to end all wars came too soon for the Big Tree Gang. Johnny is best described by an aunt as having the millstone around the neck of having a strict English Episcopalian conscience and bucking bronco Portuguese sexual proclivities. Two girls are in love with him, one wealthy and popular, the other sexually abused and who considered herself a worthless toy, until she met Johnny. Whatever they knew about the facts of life, male and female, were learned pretty much by trial and error.

"In this exciting new anthology, Wesley Brown and Aimée K. Michel bring together six wonderfully teachable plays by some of the greatest American women dramatists of the past fifty years-- Ntozake Shange, Suzan-Lori Parks, Paula Vogel, Lynn Nottage, Beth Henley, and Susan Yankowitz. The editors provide a helpful Introduction to the last 100 years of theatrical activity, from suffrage and anti-lynching plays, through the explosive 1960s, to recent Broadway triumphs, highlighting women's struggle-a struggle that continues--to put their vision and voices on the American stage." Elin Diamond, Rutgers University, USA This volume celebrates the iconoclastic power of six American women playwrights who pushed the boundaries of the form outside the box of conventional drama. Each play is accompanied by a short introduction providing the biographical background of the playwright as well as discussing the dramatic style of her writing, the extent to which her work is informed by major playwrights of the period, and how the specific work illustrates the overarching themes of her body of work. The plays included are: Gun by Susan Yankowitz Spell #7: geechee jibara quik magic trance manual for technologically stressed third world people by Ntozake Shange The Jacksonian by Beth Henley The Baltimore Waltz by Paula Vogel In the Blood by Suzan-Lori Parks Intimate Apparel by Lynn Nottage

Simone Weil is one of the greatest philosophical and spiritual writers of the 20th century and was hailed by Albert Camus as 'the only great spirit of our times' This book is a classic - and controversial - for the way Weil argues that key themes that later defined Christian belief are first found in ancient Greek writers and philosophers Waiting for God, also by Weil and published in Routledge Classics in 2021, has sold almost 1,000 copies in just over a year Includes a new foreword by Christopher Hamilton