40,80 zł

Letter from America Penguin

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When Alistair Cooke retired in March 2004 and then died a few weeks later, he was acclaimed by many as one of the greatest broadcasters of all time. His Letters from America, which began in 1946 and continued uninterrupted every week until early 2004, kept the world in touch with what was happening in Cooke's wry, liberal and humane style. This selection, made largely by Cooke himself and supplemented by his literary executor, gives us the very best of these legendary broadcasts. Over half have never appeared in print before. It is a remarkable portrait of a continent - and a man. Fred Astaire 26 June 1987 Movie stars don't make it. Nor statesmen. Not Prime Ministers, or dictators unless they die in office. Not even a world-famous rock star, unless he's assassinated. But last Monday, none of the three national television networks hesitated about the story that would lead the evening news. On millions of little screens in this country and I don't doubt in many other countries around the world, the first shots were of an imp, a graceful wraith, a firefly in impeccable white tie and tails. And for much longer than the lead story usually runs, for a full five minutes on NBC, we were given a loving retrospective of the dead man, ending with the firm declaration by Nureyev that 'He was not just the best ballroom dancer, or tap dancer, he was simply the greatest, most imaginative, dancer of our time.' And the newsmen were right to remind us of the immortal comment of the Hollywood mogul, who, with the no-nonsense directness of an expert, reported on Fred Astaire's first film test: 'Has enormous ears, can't act, can't sing, dances a little.' That Hollywood mogul, long gone, spent his life ducking round corners, to avoid being identified as the oaf who looked in the sky and never saw the brightest star. However, that expert opinion was, as the lawyers say, controlling at the time and in Astaire's first movies, there was no thought of allowing him to act or sing. But not for long. And thanks to the invention of television, and the need to fill vast stretches of the afternoon and night with old movies, it has been possible for my daughter, for instance, to claim Fred Astaire as her favourite film star from the evidence of all the movies he made fifteen, ten, five, three years before she was born. When I got the news on Monday evening here, and realized with immediate professional satisfaction that the BBC had smartly on hand a musical obituary tribute to him I put together eight years ago, I couldn't help recalling the casual, comic way this and similar radio obituaries came about. I was in London at the end of 1979, and Richard Rodgers - one of the two or three greatest of American songwriters - had just died, I believe on New Year's Eve or the night before. Britons, by then, were getting accustomed, without pain, to making what used to be a two-day Christmas holiday into a ten-day much-needed rest. For all laborious research purposes, the BBC was shut up. And there was no retrospective programme on the life and music of Richard Rodgers in the BBC's archives. Of course, in a gramophone library that looks like an annex to the Pentagon, there were hundreds, perhaps thousands, of recordings of his songs. The SOS went out to a writer, a producer, and - I presume - a man who had the key to the gramophone library. The silent place was unlocked, and the three of them laboured through the day to put together an hour's tribute to Richard Rodgers. It was done. It was competent enough, but rushed to an impossible deadline. This hasty improvisation happened just when my own music producer and I, who had enjoyed working together for six years or so on American popular music, were wondering what we could offer next. We'd done a sketch history of jazz, through individuals. We'd gone through all the popular music of the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s, and were stumped for a new series, at which point I asked if we mightn't go and talk to the head of the channel, network or whatever. We went in, and the genial boss asked me what we had in mind. 'A morgue,' I said. A what? 'Where', I asked, 'is your morgue?' He was not familiar with the word, a newspaper term. 'Well,' I said, 'all newspapers have them.' 'How d'you mean?' 'If, I explained, 'Mrs Thatcher died tonight and you woke up and read a two-sentence obituary, you'd be rightly outraged. But if you saw a two-page obituary, you'd take it for granted. When d'you suppose it was written?' 'That's right,' he said thoughtfully. What I was proposing was a morgue of the Americans eminent in popular music and jazz, so they'd not get caught short again. A splendid idea, the man said; pick your stars. We made a list and were commissioned to return to America and finish all of them. Naturally, we looked at a calendar, and birthdates of Hoagy Carmichael, Earl Hines, Harold Arlen, Ethel Merman, Stephane Grappelli, Ella Fitzgerald. But then, in a spasm of panic, we thought of two giants - if the word can be used about two comparative midgets: Irving Berlin and Fred Astaire. Berlin was then 91. And Fred Astaire was just crowding 80. The boss man, to whom the idea of a morgue had been, only a few minutes before, quaint if not morbid, wondered what we were waiting for. Better get busy, at once, on Berlin and then on Astaire. I remember doing the Astaire obit, then and there, while I was still in London. Meanwhile, we'd simply pray every night that the Lord would keep Irving Berlin breathing till I could get home and get busy. I remember being picked up in a car by a charming young girl to get to the BBC and record my Astaire narration - there wasn't a moment to lose. She asked me, in the car, what the script was that I was clutching. 'It's an obituary', I said, 'of Fred Astaire.' 'Fred Astaire,' she shrieked, 'dead?' and almost swerved into a bus. 'Of course, he's not dead,' I said, 'but he's going to be one day.' She, too, was new to the institution of a morgue. I recalled that when I was a correspondent for a British paper in the United States, and when for example. Dean Acheson was appointed Secretary of State, the first cable I had from my editor said, 'Welcome Acheson obituary soonest.' How ghoulish, she said. I imagine that to two generations at least, it's assumed that Fred Astaire, this slim, pop-eyed newcomer to Hollywood who couldn't act, couldn't sing, danced a little, only made a fool of the mogul through the movies he made, with Ginger Rogers, in the mid- and late 1930s. But long before then, from the mid-1920s on, he was already an incomparable star - as a dancer - to theatre audiences both in New York and in London. Perhaps more in London than anywhere, certainly in the 1920s, with the early Gershwin hits, Funny Face and Lady Be Good, and lastly, in 1933, in Cole Porter's Gay Divorce (which was the title of the theatre show; Hollywood would not then allow so shocking a title and called the movie version, The Gay Divorcee). Of all the thousands of words that have been written this week, and will be written, there is a passage I went back to on Tuesday night which, I think, as well as anything I know, sums up Astaire's overall appeal - the appeal that takes in but transcends one's admiration for his dancing and for his inimitably intimate singing style. This was written in November 1933, by a theatre critic who had so little feel for dancing that he marvelled why London should go on about 'Mr Astaire's doing well enough what the Tiller Girls at Blackpool do superbly'. The critic, the writer, was James Agate, the irascible, dogmatic, opinionated but brilliant journalist, and I believe the best critic of acting we have had this century. He is writing his review of Gay Divorce, after declaring yet again his contempt for musical comedy as an entertainment for idiots, deploring the play's plot and the acting and hoping 'Micawberishly, for something to turn up'. 'Presently,' he wrote, 'Mr Fred Astaire obliged, and there is really no more to be said.' Except

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74,50 zł

Far from the Madding Crowd WW Norton & Co

Książki / Literatura obcojęzyczna

Set in his fictional Wessex countryside in southwest England, Far from the Madding Crowd was Thomas Hardy's breakthrough work. Though it was first published anonymously in 1874, the quick and tremendous success of Far from the Madding Crowd persuaded Hardy to give up his first profession, architecture, to concentrate on writing fiction. The story of the ill-fated passions of the beautiful Bathsheba Everdene and her three suitors offers a spectacle of country life brimming with an energy and charm not customarily associated with Hardy. ("When Farmer Oak smiled, " the novel begins, "the corners of his mouth spread till they were within an unimportant distance of his ears. . . .")----The text is based on the authoritative Wessex Edition of 1912, revised and corrected by Hardy himself.----This edition is the companion volume to the Mobil Masterpiece Theatre WGBH television presentation broadcast on PBS. It stars Paloma Baeza as Bathsheba Everdene, Nathaniel Parker as Gabriel Oak, Nigel Terry as Mr. Boldwood, and Jonathan Firth as Frank Troy. Adapted by PhilomenaMcDonagh, Far from the Madding Crowd is directed by Nick Renton. The Modern Library has played a significant role in American cultural life for the better part of a century. The series was founded in 1917 by the publishers Boni and Liveright and eight years later acquired by Bennett Cerf and Donald Klopfer. It provided the foundation for their next publishing venture, Random House. The Modern Library has been a staple of the American book trade, providing readers with affordable hardbound editions of important works of literature and thought. For the Modern Library's seventy-fifth anniversary, Random House redesignedthe series, restoring as its emblem the running torchbearer created by Lucian Bernhard in 1925 and refurbishing jackets, bindings, and type, as well as inaugurating a new program of selecting titles. The Modern Library continues to provide the world's best books, at the best prices.

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69,76 zł

"Allo 'Allo" Samuel French Ltd

Książki / Literatura obcojęzyczna

Comedy Characters: 10 male, 5 female, plus extras Scenery: Unit set Based on the hugely successful British television series that ran for seven seasons, this uproarious comedy relates the adventures of a hapless cafe owner, Rene, in occupied France. You can see all of your favorite TV characters in the flesh, including Rene's tone-deaf wife Edith, Major-General von Klinkerhoffen and the Gestapo officer Herr Flick! He and his wife have stashed a priceless portrait stolen by the Nazis in a sausage in their cellar, where two British airmen are also hiding until the Resistance can repatriate them. Communications with London using the wireless that is disguised as a cockatoo add to the many embarrassments this intrepid proprietor endures in the company of his patrons. News that the Fuhrer is scheduled to visit the town inspires tricksters disguised as Hitler to frequent the cafe. Meanwhile Rene summons all the wit he can muster to save his cafe and his life.

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35,81 zł

Revival Hodder & Stoughton General Division

Książki / Literatura obcojęzyczna

The No. 1 hardback bestseller, King's spectacularly dark and electrifying novel about music, the powerful bond between two people, addiction, religion and what might exist on the other side of life, is now available in mass market paperback.A spectacularly dark and electrifying novel about addiction, religion, music and what might exist on the other side of life.In a small New England town, in the early 60s, a shadow falls over a small boy playing with his toy soldiers. Jamie Morton looks up to see a striking man, the new minister, Charles Jacobs. Soon they forge a deep bond, based on their fascination with simple experiments in electricity.Decades later, Jamie is living a nomadic lifestyle of bar-band rock and roll. Now an addict, he sees Jacobs again - a showman on stage, creating dazzling 'portraits in lightning' - and their meeting has profound consequences for both men. Their bond becomes a pact beyond even the Devil's devising, and Jamie discovers that revival has many meanings.This rich and disturbing novel spans five decades on its way to the most terrifying conclusion Stephen King has ever written. It's a masterpiece from King, in the great American tradition of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe.STEPHEN KING is the author of more than fifty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His novels include CARRIE, THE SHINING and MR MERCEDES.Many of his stories have been turned into celebrated films and television series including MISERY, THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION and UNDER THE DOME. Over the years, King has had various cameo roles in film adaptations of his books as well as playing rhythm guitar in The Rock Bottom Remainders, a rock and roll band made up of some of America's bestselling and best-loved writers.King was the recipient of the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives with wife, Tabitha King, in Maine.

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Sklepy zlokalizowane w miastach: Warszawa, Kraków, Łódź, Wrocław, Poznań, Gdańsk, Szczecin, Bydgoszcz, Lublin, Katowice

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