У даній статті доктор історичних наук Борисова О.В. (Луганськ) аналізує питання української історіїї в праці англійського історика Нормана Дейвіса (Norman Richard Davies) «Боже ігрище: історія Польщі».

Це перша праця, в якій філософія національної ідеї розглядається як самостійна інтелектуальна течія, що сягає далеко за межі політології — до питань про сутність і сенс національного буття. На широкому історико-культурному матеріалі автор досліджує місце цієї течії в європейській — і, спеціально, українській — свідомості новітнього часу (XIX — поч. XX ст.). Окремий розділ присвячено національно-екзистенційним пошукам І. Франка, в чиїй особі сконцентровано духовний досвід переломового для долі національної культури покоління української інтеліґенції.

Хто ми — Україна чи Малоросія? Європа чи Росія? Чи українська релігійність — це те саме, що візантійське православ'я? Звідки взялись тамплієри на берегах Дніпра? Яку таємницю берегли «таємні товариства» малоросійських дворян XIX ст.? Звідки в «Лісовій пісні» зашифрована легенда про Грааль? Чи й справді українці — це «селянська нація»? В чому різниця між демократією і хамократією? В чому полягав модерний «український проект» і чи вдалося нам його реалізувати?.. Нова книжка провідної української письменниці, підсумковий плід її багаторічних роздумів — це вражаюча інтелектуальна подорож крізь віки, культури й конфесії в пошуках «України, яку ми втратили». Ключем до неї стає розкритий О. Забужко «код Лесі Українки». Аристократка і єретичка, спадкоємиця древнього лицарського роду і продовжувачка гностичної традиції, ця найвидатніша з українок залишилася незрозумілою в радянській Україні і майже незнаною широкій публіці — в Україні незалежній. Чому? Відповіддю на це питання стає велика історична драма «прихованої війни», яку Оксана Забужко з притаманною їй відвагою виносить із забуття і, на багатющому літературному й історичному матеріалі, відновлює на повен зріст. Це не лише фундаментальна історико-культурна студія чи вишукана філологічна екзегетика. Це ще й книга про наше сьогодення — про те, як жорстоко ми розплачуємося за втрату і забуття багатовікової лицарської культури… * * * «Книга пані Оксани сама по собі годна свідчити, що та висока українська культура, якій вона присвячена, ще не є, дякувати Богові, тільки нашим спомином» Леонід Ушкалов

У чому все-таки причина дотеперішньої загадкової абсолютности постаті Шевченка в українській духовній культурі? На який образ-себе запрограмував він Україну своїм міфом, у культурі Нового Часу типологічно найближчим до дантівського? Які метафізичні смисли земної історії чаяться зашифрованими в Шевченковому тексті, коли підходити до нього з ключем не тільки християнської філософії та європейського романтизму, а й традиційної української демонології? Чи існує в історії «національна» версія християнської есхатології — колективного гріха й колективної покути? На ці та інші питання шукає відповіді Оксана Забужко в своїй книжці, котра стала однією з найголосніших подій сучасної української гуманітаристики.

Рецензія на повість Т.Литовченка "До комунізму залишилось років п'ятнадцять-двадцять"

L'apocalypse, serait-ce donc l'édition numérique, ou comme dans Fahrenheit 451 de Ray Bradbury, la température à laquelle le papier se consume ? Frédéric Beigbeder sauve ici du brasier les 100 œuvres qu'il souhaite conserver au XXIe siècle, sous la forme d'un hit-parade intime. C'est un classement totalement personnel, égotiste, joyeux, inattendu, parfois classique (André Gide, Fitzgerald, Paul Jean Toulet, Salinger et d'autres grands), souvent surprenant (Patrick Besson, Bret Easton Ellis, Régis Jauffret, Simon Liberati, Gabriel Matzneff, et d'autres perturbateurs). Avec ce manifeste, c'est le Beigbeder livresque que nous découvrons, en même temps qu'une autobiographie en fragments, un autoportrait en lecteur.Vincent Jaury, Transfuge.

In a wide-ranging intellectual career, Michel de Montaigne found no knowledge so hard to acquire as the knowledge of how to live this life well. By casting her biography of the writer as 20 chapters, each focused on a different answer to the question How to live? Bakewell limns Montaigne’s ceaseless pursuit of this most elusive knowledge. Embedded in the 20 life-knowledge responses, readers will find essential facts — when and where Montaigne was born, how and whom he married, how he became mayor of Bordeaux, how he managed a public life in a time of lethal religious and political passions. But Bakewell keeps the focus on the inner evolution of the acute mind informing Montaigne’s charmingly digressive and tolerantly skeptical essays. Flexible and curious, this was a mind at home contemplating the morality of cannibals, the meaning of his own near-death experience, and the puzzlingly human behavior of animals. And though Montaigne has identified his own personality as his overarching topic, Bakewell marvels at the way Montaigne’s prose has enchanted diverse readers — Hazlitt and Sterne, Woolf and Gide — with their own reflections. Because Montaigne’s capacious mirror still captivates many, this insightful life study will win high praise from both scholars and general readers. -Bryce Christensen

“This charming biography shuffles incidents from Montaigne’s life and essays into twenty thematic chapters… Bakewell clearly relishes the anthropological anecdotes that enliven Montaigne’s work, but she handles equally well both his philosophical influences and the readers and interpreters who have guided the reception of the essays.”

—

“Serious, engaging, and so infectiously in love with its subject that I found myself racing to finish so I could start rereading the Essays themselves… It is hard to imagine a better introduction — or reintroduction — to Montaigne than Bakewell’s book.”

—Lorin Stein,

“Ms. Bakewell’s new book, , is a biography, but in the form of a delightful conversation across the centuries.”

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“So artful is Bakewell’s account of [Montaigne] that even skeptical readers may well come to share her admiration.”

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“Extraordinary… a miracle of complex, revelatory organization, for as Bakewell moves along she provides a brilliant demonstration of the alchemy of historical viewpoint.”

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“Well, is a superb book, original, engaging, thorough, ambitious, and wise.”

—Nick Hornby, in the November/December 2010 issue of

“In , an affectionate introduction to the author, Bakewell argues that, far from being a dusty old philosopher, Montaigne has never been more relevant — a 16th-century blogger, as she would have it — and so must be read, quite simply, ‘in order to live’… Bakewell is a wry and intelligent guide.”

—

“Witty, unorthodox… is a history of ideas told entirely on the ground, never divorced from the people thinking them. It hews close to Montaigne’s own preoccupations, especially his playful uncertainty — Bakewell is a stickler for what we can’t know… is a delight…”

—

“This book will have new readers excited to be acquainted to Montaigne’s life and ideas, and may even stir their curiosity to read more about the ancient Greek philosophers who influenced his writing. is a great companion to Montaigne’s essays, and even a great stand-alone.”

—

“A bright, genial, and generous introduction to the master’s methods.”

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“[Bakewell reveals] one of literature's enduring figures as an idiosyncratic, humane, and surprisingly modern force.”

— (starred)

“As described by Sarah Bakewell in her suavely enlightening Montaigne is, with Walt Whitman, among the most congenial of literary giants, inclined to shrug over the inevitability of human failings and the last man to accuse anyone of self-absorption. His great subject, after all, was himself.”

—Laura Miller,

“Lively and fascinating… takes its place as the most enjoyable introduction to Montaigne in the English language.”

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“Splendidly conceived and exquisitely written… enormously absorbing.”

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“ will delight and illuminate.”

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“It is ultimately [Montaigne’s] life-loving vivacity that Bakewell succeeds in communicating to her readers.”

—The Observer

“This subtle and surprising book manages the trick of conversing in a frank and friendly manner with its centuries-old literary giant, as with a contemporary, while helpfully placing Montaigne in a historical context. The affection of the author for her subject is palpable and infectious.”

—Phillip Lopate, author of

“An intellectually lively treatment of a Renaissance giant and his world.”

—

“Like recent books on Proust, Joyce, and Austen, skillfully plucks a life-guide from the incessant flux of Montaigne’s prose… A superb, spirited introduction to the master.”

—

In a wide-ranging intellectual career, Michel de Montaigne found no knowledge so hard to acquire as the knowledge of how to live this life well. By casting her biography of the writer as 20 chapters, each focused on a different answer to the question How to live? Bakewell limns Montaigne’s ceaseless pursuit of this most elusive knowledge. Embedded in the 20 life-knowledge responses, readers will find essential facts — when and where Montaigne was born, how and whom he married, how he became mayor of Bordeaux, how he managed a public life in a time of lethal religious and political passions. But Bakewell keeps the focus on the inner evolution of the acute mind informing Montaigne’s charmingly digressive and tolerantly skeptical essays. Flexible and curious, this was a mind at home contemplating the morality of cannibals, the meaning of his own near-death experience, and the puzzlingly human behavior of animals. And though Montaigne has identified his own personality as his overarching topic, Bakewell marvels at the way Montaigne’s prose has enchanted diverse readers — Hazlitt and Sterne, Woolf and Gide — with their own reflections. Because Montaigne’s capacious mirror still captivates many, this insightful life study will win high praise from both scholars and general readers. -Bryce Christensen Named one of Library Journal’s Top Ten Best Books of 2010 In a wide-ranging intellectual career, Michel de Montaigne found no knowledge so hard to acquire as the knowledge of how to live this life well. By casting her biography of the writer as 20 chapters, each focused on a different answer to the question How to live? Bakewell limns Montaigne’s ceaseless pursuit of this most elusive knowledge. Embedded in the 20 life-knowledge responses, readers will find essential facts — when and where Montaigne was born, how and whom he married, how he became mayor of Bordeaux, how he managed a public life in a time of lethal religious and political passions. But Bakewell keeps the focus on the inner evolution of the acute mind informing Montaigne’s charmingly digressive and tolerantly skeptical essays. Flexible and curious, this was a mind at home contemplating the morality of cannibals, the meaning of his own near-death experience, and the puzzlingly human behavior of animals. And though Montaigne has identified his own personality as his overarching topic, Bakewell marvels at the way Montaigne’s prose has enchanted diverse readers — Hazlitt and Sterne, Woolf and Gide — with their own reflections. Because Montaigne’s capacious mirror still captivates many, this insightful life study will win high praise from both scholars and general readers.

—Bryce Christensen

Sarah Bakewells Buch ist ein Geniestreich: Auf höchst elegante und unterhaltsame Weise erzählt sie das Leben Montaignes und beantwortet zugleich unsere Fragen nach einem guten Leben. Authentischer und aktueller wurde noch nie über den großen Philosophen und Essayisten geschrieben. Das Buch wurde in den USA mit dem „National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography“ und in Großbritannien mit dem „Duff Cooper Prize for Non-Fiction“ ausgezeichnet und stand auf den Shortlists des „Costa Biographie Award“ und des „Marsh Biography Award“.

Lies viel, vergiss das meiste wieder, und sei schwer von Begriff! — Habe ein Hinterzimmer in deinem Geschäft! — Tu etwas, was noch nie zuvor jemand getan hat! — Mach deinen Job gut, aber nicht zu gut! — Philosophiere nur zufällig! — Bedenke alles, bereue nichts! — Mit diesen und anderen Antworten auf die Frage „Wie soll ich leben?“ führt Sarah Bakewell durch das ungewöhnliche Leben des Weingutbesitzers, Liebhabers, Essayisten, Bürgermeisters und Reisenden Michel de Montaigne. Dabei gelingt ihr das Kunststück, ihn ganz im 16. Jahrhundert, im Zeitalter der Religionskriege, zu verorten und gerade dadurch für unsere Zeit verständlich zu machen. Wie soll man Montaigne lesen? Nicht wie ein Kind, um sich zu amüsieren, und nicht wie die Ehrgeizigen, um sich zu belehren. „Nein. Lesen sie ihn, um zu leben!“, empfahl der große Flaubert.

„Eine bezaubernde Einführung in Leben und Denken Montaignes und ein großes Lesevergnügen. Hier ist eine Autorin, deren Liebe zu ihrem Gegenstand ansteckend ist.“

„Eine Mischung aus Biographie und Alain-de-Bottonesker Lebensphilosophie, … die erfreulichste Einführung in Montaigne in englischer Sprache, … eine überzeugende Verbindung von Literatur und Leben.“

„Montaigne hat hier die Biographie, die er verdient, und hätte seine Freude an ihrem unkonventionellen Aufbau.“

„Eine wunderbar souveräne und klare Einführung … Man kann Sarah Bakewell nur dazu gratulieren, dass sie den Lesern einen so reizvollen Zugang zu Montaigne eröffnet.“

„Glänzend konzipiert und vorzüglich geschrieben. … Sarah Bakewell bringt eine neue Generation dazu, sich in Montaigne zu verlieben …, enorm fesselnd …, rühmenswert.“

„Das Buch schöpft gekonnt eine Lebenskunst aus dem breiten Strom der Montaigne'schen Prosa. … Eine überragende, begnadete Einführung in den Meister!“

From one of the most impassioned of writers of our time, this powerful collection of essays offers a stark portrait of post-9/11 realities. John Berger occupies a unique position in the international cultural landscape: artist, filmmaker, poet, philosopher, novelist, and essayist, he is also a deeply thoughtful political activist. In his artistry and activism meld in an attempt to make sense of the current state of our world. Berger analyzes the nature of terrorism and the profound despair that gives rise to it. He writes about the homelessness of millions who have been forced by poverty and war to live as refugees. He discusses Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine, Serbia, Bosnia, China, Indonesia-anyplace where people are deprived of the most basic of freedoms. Berger powerfully acknowledges the depth of suffering around the world and suggests actions that might finally help bring it to an end.

The writing career of John Berger — poet, storyteller, playwright, and essayist — has yielded some of the most original and compelling examinations of art and life of the past half century. In this essential volume, Geoff Dyer has brought together a rich selection of many of Berger’s seminal essays.

Berger’s insights make it impossible to look at a painting, watch a film, or even visit a zoo in quite the same way again. The vast range of subjects he addresses, the lean beauty of his prose, and the keenness of his anger against injustice move us to view the world with a new lens of awareness. Whether he is discussing the singleminded intensity of Picasso’s the parallel violence and alienation in the art of Francis Bacon and Walt Disney, or the enigmatic silence of his own mother, what binds these pieces throughout is the depth and fury of Berger’s passion, challenging us to participate, to protest, and above all, to see.

The pocket in question is a small pocket of resistance. A pocket is formed when two or more people come together in agreement. The resistance is against the inhumanity of the New World Economic Order. The people coming together are the reader, me, and those the essays are about — Rembrandt, Paleolithic cave painters, a Romanian peasant, ancient Egyptians, an expert in the loneliness of a certain hotel bedroom, dogs at dusk, a man in a radio station. And unexpectedly, our exchanges strengthen each of us in our conviction that what is happening in the world today is wrong, and that what is often said about it is a lie. I’ve never written a book with a greater sense of urgency.

— John Berger

Michael Chabon's sparkling first book of nonfiction is a love song in sixteen parts — a series of linked essays in praise of reading and writing, with subjects running from ghost stories to comic books, Sherlock Holmes to Cormac McCarthy. Throughout, Chabon energetically argues for a return to the thrilling, chilling origins of storytelling, rejecting the false walls around "serious" literature in favor of a wide-ranging affection.

Within the writer's life, words and things acquire power. For Borges it is the tiger and the color red, for Cortázar a pair of amorous lions, and for an early Egyptian scribe the monarch butterfly that metamorphosed into the Key of Life. Ducornet names these powers . Her essays take us from the glorious bestiary of Aloys Zötl to Abu Ghraib, from the tree of life to Sade's Silling Castle, from to virtual reality. Says Ducornet, "To write with the irresistible ink of tigers and the uncaging of our own Deep Zoo, we need to be attentive and fearless — above all very curious — and all at the same time."

Geoff Dyer, described by the as 'possibly the best living writer in Britain', takes on his biggest challenge yet: unlocking the film that has obsessed him all his adult life. Magnificently unpredictable and hilarious (and surely one of the most unusual books ever written about cinema), takes the reader on an enthralling, thought-provoking journey.

The ostensible subject of is the film , by the great Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky. As Dyer immerses us in the movie, it becomes apparent that is only the point of departure for a wonderfully digressive exploration of cinema, of how we understand our obsessions and of how we try to realise — and, discover — our deepest wishes.

'An impassioned, yet acerbic and witty appraisal of a screen classic is a work of art in its own rights.'

C'est le besoin d'argent qui, très tôt, pousse le jeune Maupassant, alors employé de ministère, à donner des articles de critique littéraire. Mais il rechigne un peu à se lier à un journal comme à se livrer à une écriture trop hâtive : « Jamais mon nom au bas d'une chronique écrite en moins de deux heures. » Et cependant, après la publication de « Boule de suif » au printemps de 1880 - il a trente ans tout juste -, sa réputation de conteur change la donne : c'est une rémunération d'écrivain reconnu qu'on lui offre et, l'année suivante, une soixantaine de chroniques paraissent dans Le Gaulois. D'autres journaux accueilleront aussi sa signature jusqu'à ce que, en 1887, il décide de pleinement se consacrer à ses derniers livres. Mais il aura écrit près de deux cent cinquante chroniques, dont le présent volume offre une anthologie ordonnée selon quatre grands thèmes : société et politique, mœurs du jour, flâneries et voyages, lettres et arts. Ainsi se dessine un témoignage capital sur son époque, mais ainsi se construit aussi une part de son œuvre qu'on ne saurait négliger : dans les journaux, les chroniques alternent avec les contes ou les nouvelles, et des parentés de structure ou de thèmes ne manquent pas d'apparaître au point que l'on hésite à faire de tel texte une nouvelle plutôt qu'une chronique. Assurément, l'unité est ici celle d'un monde et d'une époque : mais c'est aussi bien celle que leur imposent le regard et la plume d'un homme qui a pu se dire « acteur et spectateur de lui-même et des autres ».

Du papyrus au fichier électronique, nous traversons deux mille ans d’histoire du livre à travers une discussion à la fois érudite et humoristique, savante et subjective, dialectique et anecdotique, curieuse et goûteuse. On y parcourt les temps et les lieux, les personnes réelles s’y mêlent aux personnages de fiction, on y fait l’éloge de la bêtise, on y analyse la passion du collectionneur, les raisons pour lesquelles telle époque engendre des chefs-d’œuvre, la manière dont fonctionnent la mémoire et le classement d’une bibliothèque. En ces temps d’obscurantisme galopant, c’est peut-être le plus bel hommage qui se puisse imaginer à la culture de l’esprit, et l’antidote le plus efficace au désenchantement.

Gass writes:

Of the colors, blue and green have the greatest emotional range. Sad reds and melancholy yellows are difficult to turn up. Among the ancient elements, blue occurs everywhere: in ice and water, in the flame as purely as in the flower, overhead and inside caves, covering fruit and oozing out of clay. Although green enlivens the earth and mixes in the ocean, and we find it, copperish, in fire; green air, green skies, are rare. Gray and brown are widely distributed, but there are no joyful swatches of either, or any of the exuberant black, sullen pink, or acquiescent orange. Blue is therefore most suitable as the color of interior life. Whether slick light sharp high bright think quick sour new and cool or low deep sweet dark soft slow smooth heavy old and warm: blue moves easily among them all, and all profoundly qualify our states of feeling.

Join Ursula K. Le Guin as she explores a broad array of subjects, ranging from Tolstoy, Twain, and Tolkien to women’s shoes, beauty, and family life. With her customary wit, intelligence, and literary craftsmanship, she offers a diverse and highly engaging set of readings.

L'écrivain français Jean-Marie Gustave Le Clézio, qui a reçu son prix Nobel mercredi 10 décembre des mains du roi de Suède, a fait samedi 7 décembre l'apologie de la littérature universelle dans son discours de réception prononcé à Stockholm.

When the called Ursula K. Le Guin, “America’s greatest living science fiction writer,” they just might have undersold her legacy. It’s hard to look at her vast body of work—novels and stories across multiple genres, poems, translations, essays, speeches, and criticism—and see anything but one of our greatest writers, period.

In a series of interviews with David Naimon (), Le Guin discusses craft, aesthetics, and philosophy in her fiction, poetry, and nonfiction respectively. The discussions provide ample advice and guidance for writers of every level, but also give Le Guin a chance to to sound off on some of her favorite subjects: the genre wars, the patriarchy, the natural world, and what, in her opinion, makes for great writing. With excerpts from her own books and those that she looked to for inspiration, this volume is a treat for Le Guin’s longtime readers, a perfect introduction for those first approaching her writing, and a tribute to her incredible life and work.