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Words & Ideas

Large 9781742377766

Love and Hunger: Thoughts on the Gift of Food by Charlotte Wood

$30.00 AUD

Available Stock:
0

Category: Contemporary Thought

Love and Hunger is a distillation of everything Charlotte Wood has learned over more than twenty years about cooking and the pleasures of simple food well made. In this age of gastro-porn and the fetishisation of food, the pressure to be as expert as the chefs we've turned into celebrities can feel over whelming. An instant antidote to such madness is this wise and practical book - an ode to good food, prepared and presented with minimum fuss and maximum love. Cooking represents 'creativity in its purest form'. It is meditation and stimulation, celebration and solace, a gift both offered and received. It can nourish the soul - and the mind - as well as the body. Love and Hunger will make you long to get into the kitchen to try the surprising tips and delicious recipes, and will leave you feeling freshly inspired to cook with joy for the people you love. Love and Hunger is a gift for all who value the solitary and shared pleasures of cooking and eating. Like a simple but glorious meal, this feast of a book is infused with warmth and generosity. ...Show more

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Large 9780008421953

Ex Libris: 100 Books for Everyone's Bookshelf by Michiko Kakutani

$35.00 AUD

Available Stock:
18

Category: On Writing

From 'the most powerful book critic in the English-speaking world' (Vanity Fair) comes an inspiring and beautifully illustrated selection of the life-changing books that none of us should miss 'Why do we love books so much?' For legendary literary critic Michiko Kakutani, books have always been an esca pe and a sanctuary, the characters of some novels feeling so real to her childhood self that she worried they might leap out of the pages at night if she left the book cover open. In Ex Libris, she offers a personal selection of over 100 works of fiction, nonfiction and poetry, with passionate essays on why each has had a profound effect on her life. From Homer's The Odyssey to The Writings and Speeches of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale to Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan Novels, Ex Libris covers a rich and vast range of classics, old and new, that will help build a well-rounded reader and citizen of the world. With gorgeous illustrations by lettering artist Dana Tanamachi that evoke vintage bookplates leafed between Kakutani's inspiring essays, Ex Libris points us to our next great read - and proves an unmissable reminder of why we fell in love with reading in the first place. ...Show more

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Large 9780224097017

Vesper Flights by Helen Macdonald

$35.00 AUD

Available Stock:
18

Category: Essays

Animals don't exist to teach us things, but that is what they have always done, and most of what they teach us is what we think we know about ourselves. From the internationally acclaimed author of H is for Hawk comes Vesper Flights, a transcendent collection of essays about the human relationship to th e natural world. In Vesper Flights Helen Macdonald brings together a collection of her best loved pieces, along with new essays on topics and stories ranging from nostalgia and science fiction to the true account of a refugee's flight to the UK. Her pieces ranges from accounts of swan upping on the Thames to watching tens of thousands of cranes in Hungary to seeking the last golden orioles in Suffolk's poplar forests. She writes about wild boar, swifts, mushroom hunting, migraines, the strangeness of birds' nests, what we do when we watch wildlife and why. This is a book about observation, fascination, time, memory, love and loss and how we make the world around us, by one of this century's most important and insightful nature writers. ...Show more

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Large 9781760642792

Watsonia: A Writing Life by Don Watson

$50.00 AUD

Available Stock:
11

Category: Essays

No other writer has journeyed further into the soul of Australia and returned to tell the tale... Watsonia collects the fruits of a writing life. It covers everything from Australian bush humour to America gone berserk; from Don Bradman to Oscar Wilde; from Animal Farmto the Australian parliament. Wher ever Watson turns his incisive gaze, the results are as illuminating as they are enjoyable. Artfully arranged, Watsonia showcases the many sides of Don Watson- historian, speechwriter, commentator, humourist, nature writer and biographer. It also features several previously unpublished lectures and a wide-ranging introduction by the author. This comprehensive anthology - replete with wit, wisdom and diverse pleasures - is essential reading. ...Show more

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Large 9780008429973

Mantel Pieces by Hilary Mantel

$40.00 AUD

Available Stock:
11

Category: Essays

In 1987, when Hilary Mantel was first published in the London Review of Books, she wrote to the editor, Karl Miller, ‘I have no critical training whatsoever, so I am forced to be more brisk and breezy than scholarly.’ This collection of twenty reviews, essays and pieces of memoir from the next three dec ades, tells the story of what happened next. Her subjects range far and wide: Robespierre and Danton, the Hite report, Saudi Arabia where she lived for four years in the 1980s, the Bulger case, John Osborne, the Virgin Mary as well as the pop icon Madonna, a brilliant examination of Helen Duncan, Britain’s last witch. There are essays about Jane Boleyn, Charles Brandon, Christopher Marlowe and Margaret Pole, which display the astonishing insight into the Tudor mind we are familiar with from the bestselling Wolf Hall Trilogy. Her famous lecture, ‘Royal Bodies’, which caused a media frenzy, explores the place of royal women in society and our imagination. Here too are some of her LRB diaries, including her first meeting with her stepfather and a confrontation with a circus strongman. Constantly illuminating, always penetrating and often very funny, interleaved with letters and other ephemera gathered from the archive, Mantel Pieces is an irresistible selection from one of our greatest living writers. ...Show more

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Large 9781760642761

Quarterly Essay 79: The End of Certainty: Scott Morrison and Pandemic Politics by Katharine Murphy

$25.00 AUD

Available Stock:
11

Category: Essays

What has the coronavirus pandemic revealed about Scott Morrison, and where is he taking Australia? Epidemics are mirrors. What has COVID-19 revealed about Australia, and about Scott Morrison and his government? In this gripping essay, Katharine Murphy goes behind the scenes to tell the story of the res ponse to the crisis. Drawing on interviews with Morrison, Brendan Murphy, Josh Frydenberg, Sally McManus and other players, she traces how the key health and economic decisions were taken. Her account is twinned with a portrait of the prime minister. She explores his blend of pragmatism and faith, and shows how a leader characterised by secrecy and fierce certainty learnt to compromise and reach out – with notable exceptions. Now, as the nation turns inwards and unemployment rises, our faith in government is about to be tested anew. What does “We’re all in this together” truly mean? Will Morrison snap back to Liberal hardman, or will he redefine centre-right politics in this country? “Morrison’s a partisan, blue team to the core, but his political philosophy is hard to pin down, because it is predominantly trouble-shooting. By instinct, Morrison is a power player and a populist, not a philosopher; a repairer of walls, not a writer of manifestos … [his] conservatism is extreme pragmatism in defence of what he regards as the core of the nation.” —Katharine Murphy, The End of Certainty ...Show more

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Large 9781800750067

Cynical Theories by Helen Pluckrose and James A. Lindsay

$30.00 AUD

Available Stock:
10

Category: Contemporary Thought

'Exposes the surprisingly shallow intellectual roots of the movements that appear to be engulfing our culture' - Steven PinkerHave you heard that language is violence and that science is sexist? Have you read that certain people shouldn't practise yoga or cook Chinese food? Or been told that being obese is healthy, that there is no such thing as biological sex, or that only white people can be racist?In Cynical Theories, Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay document the evolution and the dogma behind these ideas. While acknowledging the need to challenge the complacency of those who think a just society has been fully achieved, Pluckrose and Lindsay break down how this often-radical activist scholarship does far more harm than good, not least to those marginalised communities it claims to champion. They also detail its alarmingly inconsistent and illiberal ethics. Only through a proper understanding of the evolution of these ideas, they conclude, can those who value science, reason and consistently liberal ethics successfully challenge this harmful and authoritarian orthodoxy - in the academy, in culture and beyond. ...Show more

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Large 9781529108279

A Life on Our Planet by David Attenborough

$40.00 AUD

Available Stock:
10

Category: Science

See the world. Then make it better. 'I am 93. I've had an extraordinary life. It's only now that I appreciate how extraordinary. As a young man, I felt I was out there in the wild, experiencing the untouched natural world - but it was an illusion. The tragedy of our time has been happening all around us , barely noticeable from day to day - the loss of our planet's wild places, its biodiversity. I have been witness to this decline. A Life on Our Planet is my witness statement, and my vision for the future. It is the story of how we came to make this, our greatest mistake - and how, if we act now, we can yet put it right. We have one final chance to create the perfect home for ourselves and restore the wonderful world we inherited.' All we need is the will do so.     ...Show more

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Large 9781922330352

The Climate Cure: Solving the Climate Emergency in the Era of COVID-19 by Tim Flannery

$25.00 AUD

Available Stock:
9

Category: Climate

Australians are witnessing an unprecedented government response to crisis-swift decisive action to avert catastrophe. And the advice of scientists has informed every step of the way. But for decades the advice of scientists on the impending catastrophe that climate change will bring has been ignored, di smissed and even ridiculed. Renowned climate scientist Tim Flannery takes aim at those in government and in the fossil fuel industries for their inaction and lies in response to calls to address the very real and immediate threats posed by climate change. Threats that are now upon us, as the 2019/20 Australian bushfires and floods have shown. Flannery sees 2020 as a turning point. He explores the measures at our disposal to reduce CO2 emissions. He looks at the ways carbon can be drawn out of the atmosphere and safely stored to stabilise atmospheric carbon levels. And he demands a new approach that puts tackling climate change in the hands of the scientists who can lead the way. The Climate Cure is an action plan for survival, a call for government policies that, like its COVID-19 response, rise to the very real climate challenges we face. There is reason for optimism - if we act now. ...Show more

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Large 9781529104547

Life: a User's Manual - Philosophy for (almost) Any Eventuality by Julian Baggini; Antonia Macaro

$35.00 AUD

Available Stock:
8

Category: Philosophy

How should I live? What is my purpose? Can I find happiness? Ever felt as though life would be simpler if it came with an instruction manual? There are no easy answers to the big questions. And life does not follow a straight path from A to B. Since the beginning of time, people have asked questions a bout how they should live and, from Ancient Greece to Japan, philosophers have attempted to solve these questions for us. The timeless wisdom that they offer can help us to find our own path. In this insightful, engaging book, renowned existential psychotherapist and philosophical counsellor Antonia Macaro and bestselling philosopher Julian Baggini cover topics such as bereavement, luck, free will and relationships, and guide us through what the greatest thinkers to ever walk the earth have to say on these subjects, from the Stoics to Sartre. Discover advice from the world's greatest thinkers on questions like- Is there a right way to grieve? What is free will? How can we learn from past mistakes? Do we make our own luck? ...Show more

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Large 9780571354023

On Connection by Kae Tempest

$15.00 AUD

Available Stock:
7

Category: Essays | Series: Faber Social Ser.

Staggering talent Kae Tempest's first work of non-fiction: a hopeful theory of creativity - the power of creative connection to act as the antidote to numbness.The increasingly hyper-individualistic, competitive and exploitative society that we live in has caused a global crisis at the turn of the new d ecade; in order to survive, numbness has pervaded us all.In this urgent and incisive pamphlet, Kae (formerly Kate) Tempest leads the reckoning against this system, placing our legacy in our own hands. Creativity holds the key: the ability to provide us with internal and external connection, to move us beyond consumption, to allow us to discover authenticity and closeness to all others, to deliver us an antidote for our numbness. This is beyond 'art'. Creative connection is anything that brings us closer to ourselves and fellow human beings, and it has the potential to offer insights into mental health, politics and beyond. Powerful, hopeful and full of humanity, On Connection confirms Tempest as one of the most important voices of their generation. ...Show more

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Large 9780008245122

The Bad Boy of Athens: Classics from the Greeks to Game of Thrones by Daniel Mendelsohn

$25.00 AUD

Available Stock:
6

Category: On Writing

'Mendelsohn takes the classical costumes off figures like Virgil and Sappho, Homer and Horace ... He writes about things so clearly they come to feel like some of the most important things you have ever been told.' - Sebastian Barry. Over the past three decades, Daniel Mendelsohn's essays and reviews h ave earned him a reputation as 'our most irresistible literary critic' (New York Times). This striking new collection exemplifies the way in which Mendelsohn - a classicist by training - uses the classics as a lens to think about urgent contemporary debates. There is much to surprise here. Mendelsohn invokes the automatons featured in Homer's epics to help explain the AI films Ex Machina and Her, and perceives how Ted Hughes sought redemption by translating a play of Euripides (the 'bad boy of Athens') about a wayward husband whose wife returns from the dead. There are essays on Sappho's sexuality and the feminism of Game of Thrones; on how Virgil's Aeneid prefigures post-World War II history and why we are still obsessed with the Titanic; on Patrick Leigh Fermor's final journey, Karl Ove Knausgaard's autofiction and the plays of Tom Stoppard, Tennessee Williams, and Noël Coward. The collection ends with a poignant account of the author's boyhood correspondence with the historical novelist Mary Renault, which inspired his ambition to become a writer. In The Bad Boy of Athens, Mendelsohn provokes and dazzles with erudition, emotion and tart wit while his essays dance across eras, cultures and genres. This is a provocative collection which sees today's master of popular criticism using the ancient past to reach into the very heart of modern culture. ...Show more

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