La France des fondeurs

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Siegbert Wolf

Als Literaturkritiker, Übersetzer, Roman- und Novellenautor, Vortragsredner und Essayist, als nichtmarxistischer libertärer Sozialist und jüdischer Kulturphilosoph genoss Gustav Landauer (1870–1919) hohes Ansehen. Er agierte als Sprach- und Kulturkritiker, sowie Initiator zahlreicher Projekte. Was Gustav Landauer vor allem antrieb, betraf die Suche nach einer menschlichen Gemeinschaft freier und gleichberechtigter Menschen in einer dezentralen und föderal vernetzten Welt. Ob in seiner umfassenden Rezeption der Dramen William Shakesspeares sowie der Französischen Revolution von 1789 oder in seinen zahlreichen Vorträgen (deutsche und internationale Literaturgeschichte, Regeneration des Judentums, Antimilitarismus) – stets wird seine Sehnsucht nach einem selbstbestimmten Miteinander deutlich. Landauers noch heute lesenswerte Bücher und Essays vermitteln das sozialgeschichtliche Panorama einer bewegten Zeit am Ausgang des 19. Jahrhunderts und in den ersten beiden Jahrzehnten des 20. Jahrhunderts. Seine Wirkung motivierte so unterschiedliche Zeitgenossen wie Martin Buber, Erich Mühsam, Margarete Susman, Walter Benjamin, Ernst Bloch, Georg Kaiser und Ernst Toller. (Quelle: Edition AV)

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John G. Demaray

The design, staging allusions and symbolism of The Tempest are here freshly reconsidered in light of the drama's historical and theatrical milieu. Demaray maintains that Shakespeare, in composing this play, was not reverting to the "academic" dramatic structures, themes and character types of his early career, but was instead forging from different theatrical traditions a new kind of experimental drama. The Tempest, then, draws upon the European and English spectacle, pastoral, "romance" and dramatic traditions; it emphasizes reformist open symbolism rather than the classical iconography of Ben Jonson; and it points the way to the stylized "heroic" dramas of the Restoration with their exotic themes and staged scenic illusions. Shakespeare and the Spectacles of Strangeness pays close attention to genre, structure and issues of printing and textual scholarship. Demaray examines the First Folio printings of The Tempest and of printings of drama, masques, balets de cour, spectacle productions and stage documents. On the basis of these primary documents, Demaray is able to show the influence of the conventions of court presentations on Shakespeare's theatrical references, and to reveal new accounts of the imaginative significance of stage illusions designed by Inigo Jones in the early 1600s.

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James Lee Burke

Son Holland arrived in the Louisiana penal camp determined not to spend the rest of his days suffering in a chain gang - but he didn't imagine for one minute that in order to escape he would need to kill a man. Terrified for his life, he flees the state across the river to Texas, taking with him a beautiful Indian squaw and a fellow prisoner. And as they make their way towards General Houston's infamous Texas Rangers they find themselves in the midst of the final tragic battle for the Alamo.

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Theda Perdue

Theda Perdue examines the roles and responsibilities of Cherokee women during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, a time of intense cultural change. While building on the research of earlier historians, she develops a uniquely complex view of the effects of contact on Native gender relations, arguing that Cherokee conceptions of gender persisted long after contact. Maintaining traditional gender roles actually allowed Cherokee women and men to adapt to new circumstances and adopt new industries and practices. - Publisher.