Churchill: A Life

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Barry Strauss

An acclaimed, authoritative biography exploring the life, historical impact, and legacy of Julius Caesar.

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Ni Zhen

After graduating from the Beijing Film Academy in 1982, directors like Chen Kaige and Zhang Yimou revolutionized Chinese cinema with Red Sorghum, Farewell My Concubine, Yellow Earth, Raise the Red Lantern, and other international successes. Memoirs from the Beijing Film Academy tells the riveting story of this class of 1982, China's famous "Fifth Generation" of filmmakers. It is the first insider's account of this renowned cohort to appear in English. Covering these directors' formative experiences during China's tumultuous Cultural Revolution and later at the Beijing Film Academy, Ni Zhen--who was both their screenwriter and teacher--provides unique insights into the origins of the Fifth Generation's creativity. Memoirs from the Beijing Film Academy illuminates the Fifth Generation in light of the social and political history of contemporary China. While it addresses the collective identity of the filmmakers, most of whom were born in the late 1940s or early 1950s, it also examines how they view themselves and relate to one another. Ni Zhen has supplemented his personal knowledge of these directors with new interviews conducted for this volume. Intervening in current debates, he argues against mistaken postcolonial criticisms which allege that these filmmakers marketed an exotic image of China to Western audiences. He also demonstrates the diversity of the Fifth Generation, commenting on the breadth of styles and themes explored by its members and introducing a range of male and female directors, cinematographers, and production designers famous in China but less well-known internationally. The book contains vivid descriptions of the production processes of two pioneering films--One and Eight and Yellow Earth.

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Larry Loftis

A biography of Dusko Popov, who, as "an operative for the Abwehr, SD, MI5, MI6, and FBI during World War II ... seduced countless women--including agents on both sides--spoke five languages, and was a crack shot, all while maintaining his cover as a Yugoslav diplomat"--Amazon.com. August 1941. Serbian playboy Dusko Popov created a stir at Casino Estoril in Portugal by throwing down an outrageously large baccarat bet to humiliate his opponent. The Serbian was a British double agent, and the money-- which he had just stolen from the Germans-- belonged to the British. Watching at the sideline was none other than Ian Fleming. An operative for the Abwehr, SD, MI5, MI6, and FBI during World War II, Popov seduced countless women, spoke five languages, and was a crack shot. While MI5 desperately needed Popov to deceive the Abwehr about the D-Day invasion, they assured him that a return to the German Secret Service Headquarters in Lisbon would result in torture and execution. He went anyway....

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Marjorie Agosín

"In Osorno, Chile, the Nazis were the great feudal lords of the south and being Jewish was like possessing a savage and dangerous scar." The author thus describes the backdrop for this memoir of growing up as the daughter of European Jewish immigrants to Chile in the years before and after World War II. Speaking through the voice of her mother, she says, "I write these sometimes intermittent and true memories with the voice of an adolescent and then of a woman. . . . I wish to talk about my life in an unseemly and noisy house in southern Chile and about a town with fifty Nazis and three Jewish families. Everything I tell you is true and this is why I write so that it will be even more certain." This beautifully written story offers glimpses of cultures and landscapes little known outside of Chile. The narrative weaves back and forth through time offering the stories of the narrator's family: her father who had to leave Vienna around 1920 because he fell in love with a Christian cabaret dancer, her paternal grandmother who came to Chile in 1939 with a number tattooed on her arm, her mother's family from Odessa, and numerous aunts and uncles. The narrator returns to Osorno in 1993 and notes how little has changed. The Germans still display portraits of Hitler in their homes and sell Hitler memorabilia.