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Ackroyd Peter
 

Dickens Dickens
Автор: Жанр: Random House Inc. Издательство: Random House, Inc. Год: 2012 Страниц: 624 Дата загрузки: 20 сентября 2017
   A breathtaking feat of scholarship' The Times. 'I can do no more than praise, recommend, insist that you buy and read this book. It supersedes all other Dickens biographies' Anthony Burgess, Independent. In Peter Ackroyd's abridged edition of his classic biography of Charles Dickens, the acclaimed biographer takes us to the heart of one of the world's greatest writers. From Dickens's birth in Portsmouth to his death at the age of just fifty-eight, Ackroyd explores the life of this renowned author and the hundreds of characters who were born with Dickens but didn't die with him, living on for ever in the pages of his books, on the radio and the television and film screens.
 
Venice Venice
Автор: Жанр: Random House Inc. Издательство: Random House, Inc. Год: 2010 Страниц: 512 Дата загрузки: 18 июля 2011
   In this sumptuous vision of Venice, Peter Ackroyd turns his unparalleled skill at evoking place from London and the River Thames, to Italy and the city of myth, mystery and beauty, set like a jewel in its glistening lagoon. His account is at once romantic and packed with facts, conjuring up the atmosphere of the canals, bridges and sunlit squares, the churches and the markets, the fiestas and the flowers. He leads us through the history of the city, from the first refugees arriving in the mists of the lagoon in the fourth century to the rise of a great mercantile state and a trading empire, the wars against Napoleon and the tourist invasions of today. Everything is here: the merchants on the Rialto and the Jews in the ghetto; the mosaics of St Mark's and the glass blowers of Murano; the carnival masks and the sad colonies of lepers; and, the doges and the destitute and the artists with their passion for colour and form — Bellini, Titian, Tintoretto, Tiepolo. There are wars and sieges, scandals and seductions, fountains playing in deserted squares and crowds thronging the markets. And there is a dark undertone too, of shadowy corners and dead ends, prisons and punishment. The language and way of thinking of the Venetians sets them aside from the rest of Italy. They are an island people, linked to the sea and to the tides rather than the land. 'The moon rules Venice', Ackroyd writes: 'It is built on ocean shells and ocean ground; it has the aspect of infinity. It is the floating world... changing and variable and accidental. 'This book, like a magic gondola, transports its readers to that sensual, surprising realm. We could have no better guide — reading Ackroyd's «Venice» is, in itself, a glorious journey and the perfect holiday'.
 
The English Ghost The English Ghost
Автор: Жанр: Random House Inc. Издательство: Random House, Inc. Год: 2011 Страниц: 144 Дата загрузки: 21 октрября 2014
   The English, Peter Ackroyd tells us in this fascinating collection, see more ghosts than any other nation. Each region has its own particular spirits, from the Celtic ghosts of Cornwall to the dobies and boggarts of the north. Some speak and some are silent, some smell of old leather, others of fragrant thyme. From medieval times to today, stories have been told and apparitions seen — ghosts who avenge injustice, souls who long for peace, spooks who just want to have fun. The English Ghost is a treasury of such sightings — which we can believe or not, as we will. The accounts, packed with eerie detail, range from the door-slamming, shrieking ghost of Hinton Manor in the 1760s and the moaning child that terrified Wordsworth's nephew at Cambridge, to the headless bear of Kidderminster, the violent daemon of Devon who tried to strangle a man with his cravat and the modern-day hitchhikers on Blue Bell Hill. Comical and scary, like all good ghost stories, these curious incidents also plumb the depths of the English psyche in its yearnings for justice, freedom and love.
 
London: The Concise Biography London: The Concise Biography
Автор: Жанр: Random House Inc. Издательство: Random House, Inc. Год: 2012 Страниц: 672 Дата загрузки: 12 мая 2015
   This is an abridged edition of Peter Ackroyd's magisterial biography of the city of London. Prize-winning historian, novelist and broadcast, Peter Ackroyd takes us on a journey — historical, geographical and imaginative — through the city of London. Moving back and forth through time, Ackroyd is an effortless, exuberant guide to times of plague and pestilence, fire and floods, crime and punishment, and sex and theatre. He brings the ever changing streets alive for the reader and shows us what lies beneath our feet and above our heads. His biography is as rich in detail and fizzing with vitality as the city itself.
 
Foundation: The History of England Foundation: The History of England
Автор: Жанр: Macmillan Publishers Издательство: Macmillan Publishers Год: 2012 Страниц: 356 Дата загрузки: 15 декабря 2014
   Having written enthralling biographies of London and of its great river, the Thames, Peter Ackroyd now turns to England itself. This first volume of six takes us from the time that England was first settled, more than 15,000 years ago, to the death in 1509 of the first Tudor monarch, Henry VII. In it, Ackroyd takes us from Neolithic England, which we can only see in the most tantalising glimpses a stirrup found in a grave, some seeds at the bottom of a bowl to the long period of Roman rule; from the Dark Ages when England was invaded by a ceaseless tide of Angles, Saxons and Jutes, to the twin glories of medieval England its great churches and monasteries and its common law. With his extraordinary skill for evoking time and place, he tells the familiar story of king succeeding king in rich prose, with profound insight and some surprising details. The food we ate, the clothes we wore, the punishments we endured, even the jokes we told are all found here, too.
 
London Under London Under
Автор: Жанр: Random House Inc. Издательство: Random House, Inc. Год: 2012 Страниц: 208 Дата загрузки: 18 июля 2013
   London Under is an atmospheric, imaginative introduction to everything that goes on under London, from original springs and streams and Roman amphitheatres to Victorian sewers, gang hideouts and modern Underground stations. This book tunnels down through the geological layers, meeting the creatures, both real and fictional, that dwell in the darkness — rats and eels, monsters and ghosts. From the Anglo-Saxon graves under St Paul's, to the hydraulic device in Kensal Green cemetery which lowered bodies into the catacombs below, to the fossils uncovered when the Victoria Line was built and the gold bars within the Bank of England's vaults, London Under takes you into a hidden world, beneath our feet.
 
The Death of King Arthur The Death of King Arthur
Автор: Жанр: Penguin Group Издательство: Penguin Group Год: 2013 Страниц: 336 Дата загрузки: 18 марта 2016
   This is an immortal story of chivalry, treachery and death told anew for our times. The legend of King Arthur has retained its appeal and popularity through the ages: Mordred's treason, the knightly exploits of Tristan, Lancelot's fatally divided loyalties and his love for Guenevere, the quest for the Holy Grail. Now retold by Peter Ackroyd with his signature clarity, charm and relish for a good story, the result is not only one of the most readable accounts of the knights of the Round Table but also one of the most moving.
 
Tudors: A History of England: Volume II Tudors: A History of England: Volume II
Автор: Жанр: Macmillan Publishers Издательство: Macmillan Publishers Год: 2012 Страниц: 352 Дата загрузки: 25 мая 2015
   This is the second volume of Peter Ackroyd's masterful history of England: the Tudors. Rich in detail and atmosphere and told in vivid prose, Tudors recounts the transformation of England from a settled Catholic country to a Protestant superpower. It is the story of Henry VIII's cataclysmic break with Rome, and his relentless pursuit of both the perfect wife and the perfect heir; of how the brief reign of the teenage king, Edward VI, gave way to the violent reimposition of Catholicism and the stench of bonfires under 'Bloody Mary'. It tells, too, of the long reign of Elizabeth I, which, though marked by civil strife, plots against the queen and even an invasion force, finally brought stability. Above all, however, it is the story of the English Reformation and the making of the Anglican Church. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, England was still largely feudal and looked to Rome for direction; at its end, it was a country where good governance was the duty of the state, not the church, and where men and women began to look to themselves for answers rather than to those who ruled them.
 
Poe: A Life Cut Short Poe: A Life Cut Short
Автор: Жанр: Daedalus Books Издательство: Daedalus Books Год: 2009 Страниц: 205 Дата загрузки: 14 сентября 2014
   Gothic, mysterious, theatrical, fatally flawed, and dazzling, the life of Edgar Allan Poe, one of America's greatest and most versatile writers, is the ideal subject for Peter Ackroyd. Poe wrote lyrical poetry and macabre psychological melodramas; invented the first fictional detective; and produced pioneering works of science fiction and fantasy. His innovative style, images, and themes had a tremendous impact on European romanticism, symbolism, and surrealism, and continue to influence writers today. In this essential addition to his canon of acclaimed biographies, Peter Ackroyd explores Poe's literary accomplishments and legacy against the background of his erratic, dramatic, and sometimes sordid life. Ackroyd chronicles Poe's difficult childhood, his bumpy academic and military careers, and his complex relationships with women, including his marriage to his thirteen-year-old cousin. He describes Poe's much-written-about problems with gambling and alcohol with sympathy and insight, showing their connections to Poe's childhood and the trials, as well as the triumphs, of his adult life. Ackroyd's thoughtful, perceptive examinations of some of Poe's most famous works shed new light on these classics and on the troubled and brilliant genius who created them.
 
Wilkie Collins Wilkie Collins
Автор: Жанр: Random House Inc. Издательство: Random House, Inc. Год: 2013 Страниц: 208 Дата загрузки: 18 июля 2014
   Short and oddly built, with a head too big for his body, extremely short-sighted, dressed in colourful clothes, Wilkie Collins looked distinctly strange. But he was none the less a charmer, befriended by the great, loved by children, irresistibly attractive to women — and avidly read by generations of readers. This title tells his story.
 
Tudors: A History of England Tudors: A History of England
Автор: Жанр: Macmillan Publishers Издательство: Macmillan Publishers Год: 2013 Страниц: 352 Дата загрузки: 25 мая 2016
   Rich in detail and atmosphere and told in vivid prose, Tudors recounts the transformation of England from a settled Catholic country to a Protestant superpower. It is the story of Henry VIII's cataclysmic break with Rome, and his relentless pursuit of both the perfect wife and the perfect heir; of how the brief reign of the teenage king, Edward VI, gave way to the violent reimposition of Catholicism and the stench of bonfires under 'Bloody Mary'. It tells, too, of the long reign of Elizabeth I, which, though marked by civil strife, plots against the queen and even an invasion force, finally brought stability. Above all, however, it is the story of the English Reformation and the making of the Anglican Church. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, England was still largely feudal and looked to Rome for direction; at its end, it was a country where good governance was the duty of the state, not the church, and where men and women began to look to themselves for answers rather than to those who ruled them.
 
The Canterbury Tales The Canterbury Tales
Автор: Жанр: Daedalus Books Издательство: Daedalus Books Год: 2009 Страниц: 436 Дата загрузки: 26 марта 2012
   A fresh, modern prose retelling captures the vigorous and bawdy spirit of Chaucer's classic Renowned critic, historian, and biographer Peter Ackroyd takes on what is arguably the greatest poem in the English language and presents the work in a prose vernacular that makes it accessible to modern readers while preserving the spirit of the original. A mirror for medieval society, Chaucer's Canterbury Tales concerns a motley group of pilgrims who meet in a London inn on their way to Canterbury and agree to take part in a storytelling competition. Ranging from comedy to tragedy, pious sermon to ribald farce, heroic adventure to passionate romance, the tales serve not only as a summation of the sensibility of the Middle Ages but as a representation of the drama of the human condition. Ackroyd's contemporary prose emphasizes the humanity of these characters as well as explicitly rendering the naughty good humor of the writer whose comedy influenced Fielding and Dickens yet still masterfully evokes the euphonies and harmonies of Chaucer's verse. This retelling is sure to delight modern readers and bring a new appreciation to those already familiar with the classic tales.
 
Civil War: The History of England Volume III Civil War: The History of England Volume III
Автор: Жанр: Macmillan Publishers Издательство: Macmillan Publishers Год: 2014 Страниц: 512 Дата загрузки: 19 апреля 2018
   In Civil War, Peter Ackroyd continues his dazzling account of England's history, beginning with the progress south of the Scottish king, James VI, who on the death of Elizabeth I became the first Stuart king of England, and ends with the deposition and flight into exile of his grandson, James II. The Stuart dynasty brought together the two nations of England and Scotland into one realm, albeit a realm still marked by political divisions that echo to this day. More importantly, perhaps, the Stuart era was marked by the cruel depredations of civil war, and the killing of a king. Ackroyd paints a vivid portrait of James I and his heirs. Shrewd and opinionated, the new King was eloquent on matters as diverse as theology, witchcraft and the abuses of tobacco, but his attitude to the English parliament sowed the seeds of the division that would split the country in the reign of his hapless heir, Charles I. Ackroyd offers a brilliant — warts and all — portrayal of Charles's nemesis Oliver Cromwell, Parliament's great military leader and England's only dictator, who began his career as a political liberator but ended it as much of a despot as 'that man of blood', the king he executed. England's turbulent seventeenth century is vividly laid out before us, but so too is the cultural and social life of the period, notable for its extraordinarily rich literature, including Shakespeare's late masterpieces, Jacobean tragedy, the poetry of John Donne and Milton and Thomas Hobbes' great philosophical treatise, Leviathan. Civil War also gives us a very real sense of the lives of ordinary English men and women, lived out against a backdrop of constant disruption and uncertainty.
 
London Under: The Secret History Beneath the Streets London Under: The Secret History Beneath the Streets
Автор: Жанр: Daedalus Books Издательство: Daedalus Books Год: 2011 Страниц: 228 Дата загрузки: 26 мая 2014
   »London Under» is a wonderful, atmospheric, imagina-tive, oozing short study of everything that goes on under London, from original springs and streams and Roman amphitheaters to Victorian sewers, gang hideouts, and modern tube stations. The depths below are hot, warmer than the surface, and this book tunnels down through the geological layers, meeting the creatures, real and fictional, that dwell in darkness — rats and eels, mon-sters and ghosts. When the Underground's Metropolitan Line was opened in 1864, the guards asked for permission to grow beards to protect themselves against the sulfurous fumes, and named their engines after tyrants — Czar, Kaiser, Mogul — and even Pluto, god of the underworld. To go under London is to penetrate history, to enter a hid-den world. As Ackroyd puts it, «The vastness of the space, a second earth, elicits sensations of wonder and of terror. It partakes of myth and dream in equal measure.»
 
Civil War: Volume III: The History of England Civil War: Volume III: The History of England
Автор: Жанр: Macmillan Publishers Издательство: Macmillan Publishers Страниц: 512 Дата загрузки: 15 июня 2009
   In Civil War, Peter Ackroyd continues his dazzling account of England's history, beginning with the progress south of the Scottish king, James VI, who on the death of Elizabeth I became the first Stuart king of England, and ends with the deposition and flight into exile of his grandson, James II. The Stuart dynasty brought together the two nations of England and Scotland into one realm, albeit a realm still marked by political divisions that echo to this day. More importantly, perhaps, the Stuart era was marked by the cruel depredations of civil war, and the killing of a king. Ackroyd paints a vivid portrait of James I and his heirs. Shrewd and opinionated, the new King was eloquent on matters as diverse as theology, witchcraft and the abuses of tobacco, but his attitude to the English parliament sowed the seeds of the division that would split the country in the reign of his hapless heir, Charles I. Ackroyd offers a brilliant — warts and all — portrayal of Charles's nemesis Oliver Cromwell, Parliament's great military leader and England's only dictator, who began his career as a political liberator but ended it as much of a despot as 'that man of blood', the king he executed. England's turbulent seventeenth century is vividly laid out before us, but so too is the cultural and social life of the period, notable for its extraordinarily rich literature, including Shakespeare's late masterpieces, Jacobean tragedy, the poetry of John Donne and Milton and Thomas Hobbes' great philosophical treatise, Leviathan. Civil War also gives us a very real sense of the lives of ordinary English men and women, lived out against a backdrop of constant disruption and uncertainty.
 

 

 

 
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