Novel about an American art student in Paris during World War II who forges copies of great paintings to keep the real ones from the Nazis. Entertaining read.

Ten Neruda poems from the movie "Il Postino" ("The Postman").

This book weaves together excerpts from Whitman's correspondence and diaries from the war years with his war poetry. It is a different approach to Whitman. I found that better understanding the context of the poems made them all the more vivid.

The title of this book may no longer sound politically correct, but the contents are unbiased and enormously interesting and entertaining. The book presents translations of proverbs and folk wisdom from 27 languages from around the globe. It is a real treasure-trove of quotations and pithy sayings.

An anthology of poetry chosen from the world's great religious and literary traditions.

I seldom read science fiction, but this book was excellent. Octavia Butler's recent, accidental death was tragic. We have lost an inspirational and thought-provoking writer who also created completely believable alternate worlds and who told a great story.

Gedenkausgabe zum fuenfundsiebzigsten Todestag Theodor Storms.

Text edition in Fraktur. Includes vocabulary and notes.

The River Pirates of the Mississippi was written by the German adventure traveler and novelist Gerstacker in 1848. His fictional adventure novels about the American west captivated a generation of German readers and created a demand for the frontier adventure novel genre.

Includes: Romaunt of the Rose, Minor Poems, Boethius de Consolatione Philosophiae, Troilus and Criseyde, The Hous of Fame, The Legend of Good Women, The Treatise on the Astrolabe, and The Canterbury Tales

This book chronicles the events of the 1920's that led to the rise of the Nazi state in Germany. It is the best source I have read not only about the social disruptions of that era, but also about the incredible cultural vibrancy of Berlin in the 1920's that was destroyed by the Nazi hegemony. Friedrich explains the reasons behind the terrible upheavals of the 20th century in a way that is clear and engaging.

I own this as an audio book. I highly recommend it in this format. McCullough reads his own work, and he is an excellent narrator as well as an excellent writer.

Book lists, quizzes and trivia. Very entertaining, but some of the reading suggestions are dated, since this was first published in 1981.

Tao, Taoism, Tao Te Ching, commentaries, Chinese philosophy, Chinese literature

Funniest if read side by side with the better-known "The Prophet" by Gibran. To quote from the introduction: "During much of Albran's lifetime, he was widely thought to be dead. This confusion was the result of the trance-like state Albran affected at public appearances." From the cover: "Illustrated by the author with twelve mystical, hard-to-understand drawings."

From the cover: "A collection of proverbs, anecdotes, opinions and obscure facts on food, drink, cooks, cooking, dining, diners, and dieters.

Sacred writings from all traditions.

Those who know poetry and know cats will love this book. It includes parodies of such works as "Crossing the Bar" by Tennyson ("Cleaning the Box"), "Kubla Khan" by Coleridge ("Kubla Kat"), and Hamlet's Soliloquy: "To go outside and there prechance to stay or to remain withing, that is the question", and many more.

The Ware collection of glass flowers at Harvard University is one of the most amazing artistic and scientific works of the 19th Century. The flowers were hand blown and tinted by the Bohemian glass artist, Blaschka. This book contains pictures of a small sampling of this vast collection and background information about its creation.

Alastair Reid's translations of Neruda are masterful and capture the sense and music of the original poems. This anthology contains "A Callarse" ("Keeping Quiet")--a favorite.

Two Italian graduate students find a clue in a dusty archive that puts them on the trail of a masterpiece by Caravaggio that has been lost to the world for 200 years. Along the way the reader learns about the restoration of priceless paintings and about the colorful life and violent end of the famous painter. The book is as much a page-turner as the DaVinci Code, but it is all true! People who liked fiction thrillers like The Club Dumas by Perez-Reverte, Shadow of the Wind by Ruiz-Zafon, and Possession by A.S. Byatt will probably enjoy this book too.