Literature in Art Books

This is the story of Marco Polo, told with a poets ear.
Frutkin uses this most interesting of historical figures
to explore what it means to be human. (No pun intended.)
Though this is a fictional account, I feel closer to
Polo than any sterile account could have taken me. This
story is filled with magic, and all connected to the
statue of the winged Lion of Venice that guards
Marco Polo's hometown. To Marco, the Lion is real,
a fiece guardian guiding him in times of danger.
And there is plenty of danger for a traveler in the 13th Century.
From desert sand storms to distrustful natives,
Marco sees it all. Marco Polo's journey from Venice to
China and back to Venice again took almost a quarter of a
century. He saw amazing sights, he endured illness and
difficult traveling conditions. And he lived to tell his
tale. And oh what a telling it is. I was hooked from
the first word to the last. I could have read this
book in a day, but instead I took a month in hopes
of savoring every turn of phrase and every image Frutkin
evokes. In my family there is a waiting list to read
this book, and the list keeps growing. Get this book
and you will not be disapointed.

This book gives detailed instructions for not only teaching reading and writing effectively, but how to reach EVERY child. Kathryn Au has provided us all with a step-by-step method for creating a readers' and writers' workshop in every classroom. This method will work with all children including ESL and SPED. Literacy Instruction for Today is an essential book for every classroom, including inclusive classrooms. Your children will not want to stop writing. Teachers who have tried this method claim that they can't get their students to stop writing. Not only are there step-by-step instructions for teachers to go by, there are also samples of students' work and teacher logs. Summer is a great time to buy this book. Teachers will then have time to plan their own readers' and writers' workshops for their classrooms in the Fall. Good news:this method is applicable for grades K-12 and beyond.

The author's purpose, he says in the preface, is to provide guidelines to "work our way through, to use a Borgesian metaphor, the seemingly infinite labyrinth of forking paths" (read choices) in doing a literary translation. Additionally, his is "a practical, not a theoretical guide. While I have no quarrel with theorists, in theory at least, this is a get-your-hands-dirty, wrestle-with-reality type of book." Its content speaks to Landers's success in achieving his goal. He sets the brisk, colloquial, and often irreverent tone on the opening page, where he reproduces his translation of a "Night Drive," a chilling vignette by the noted Brazilian writer Rubem Fonseca. From there he deals, often episodically, with questions of technique such as: Getting started, stages of translation, fluency and transparency, adaptation vs. translation, tone, register, and other topics beginning and more experienced translators need to know. There are also items not to be found in more conventional texts: A day in the life of a literary translation, the hijacked author, when not to translate cultural cues, fiction and footnotes, pornography or "pornography?", English before there was English, and my favorite, "stalking the treacherous typo." In the book's less exciting but necessary final section, "The Working Translator," Landers deals with more mundane matters-e.g., translator's tools such as dictionaries and reference books, taxes, setting a fee, workspaces, contracts, and copyright. Several typographical errors (one of the most amusing is Stewart Potter for Potter Stewart) will hopefully be corrected in a future edition, and an index would have been useful. Still, this is the most up-to-date and readable of any work aiming at the would-be literary translator.

Out of all the books I've read for my Roman seminar this semester, I strongly feel that this is the one of the best, ranking right up there with M.I. Finley's book on the ancient economy. Feeney dedicates his book to exploding myths about religion in the Roman era. He uses literature as a means of example in arguing that Rome was not dominated by adopted Greek ideas, culture and myth, but that Rome took these ideas and dynamically changed them. The idea that Rome was spiritually bankrupt...of Greek ideas comes from the 19th century movement of philhellenists such as Lord Byron who promoted Greek greatness in all avenues of thought. This philhellenism has had a lingering effect on scholars right up to modern times.

Feeney divides his book into four sections: Belief, Myth, Divinity and Ritual. A brief epilogue also looks at knowledge. Feeney believes that it is ritual that stands at the core of Roman religion, not belief. This seems alien to modern practitioners of Christianity, Judaism or Islam. Feeney is not saying that belief does not exist, but rather that it is a peripheral element in Roman religious practice. Belief in the Roman pantheon is summed up by "brain-balkanization," or a multiplicity of different beliefs in different contexts. These different beliefs are represented in literature and compete with each other. Therefore, belief as expressed by Cicero differed from that of the Augustan age.

With myth, Feeney argues that it is not merely the usurpation of Greek myth by the Romans, but a trans-cultural dialogue between the two entities. Greek myth itself is hardly original, as it arose as a response to other Near East cultures. If one is accusing the Romans of stealing Greek myth, the same charge must then be leveled against the Greeks. The real difference comes in how myth is assimilated. The Greeks, with their closed off Polis system and distrust of foreigners, took their myths to heart. The Romans recognized that the myths they subscribed to were foreign, but they took them in and changed them to fit their needs. This, according to Feeney, is an incredible development in history, as it was the first time that this had been done and it laid the groundwork for subsequent Western mythological development. Feeney notes that there were backlashes against this foreign intrusion of ideas in Rome, but these backlashes helped contour and define the ideas in a new way. Feeney also sees that the Romans, as outsiders to the ideas they took from the Greeks, were able to borrow and develop other ideas that the Greeks were incapable of attaining.

The section on divinity discusses such themes as the place of divinity in the structure of Rome, anthropomorphic representations of deity, and personifications (which are divinities attached to human conditions such as modesty, shame, etc.). The Romans deified these human conditions in order to make them divine so they can have power that can then be called upon by men. Feeney finishes by discussing the various encounters Romans had with divinity, such as epiphany.

Ritual, as stated above, is seen as the center of Roman religion. The problem that confronts scholars when studying Roman religion is the abundant amount of rituals. The Romans have rituals for everything, oftentimes multiple rituals for one activity. Even more problematic is the origins of these rituals. Even the Roman writers are reduced to stating multiple origins for certain rituals. These multiple origins fit into the dynamic of Roman religion: a contextual approach to religion where different ideas emerge and compete within one society. Feeney points out that Greek origins are static, with multiple origins for ritual rarely appearing.

This is an excellent book that I enjoyed immensely, as can probably be seen from my detailed description above. However, the argument that belief is not central to Roman religion is a tough nut to swallow. Certainly any interactions with a deity have to come from some type of belief on the part of man, otherwise how can the development of ritual be explained? That belief could certainly be forgotten over time and replaced by ritual is a real possibility, but that doesn't imply that belief never played a crucial, central role in the practice. Feeney addresses this in part in the epilogue on knowledge, emphasizing that Christianity has probably suffered the same fate. How many Christians can really explain the nuts and bolts of Sunday services? These are the kinds of things found in this book and they really provoke some interesting thoughts. Highly Recommended.

I have to say first off that I do not own this book *yet*. However, I have looked at it often and will buy it when I can. Because it looks to be an amazing way to dive head first into the Little House books.

Most subjects are covered - math, science, reading, history, and more. I believe that anyone living on the Great Plains would be well advised to use this for at least one year of home schooling to learn more about the region.

With this book you really can't push the grade or age. My DD is advanced for her age and I know I have to wait to use this. It would mean a lot of work to adapt it down in age.

It was the perfect teaching tool to help my fifth graders understand the book and the author's purpose.

I have looked everywhere for materials to help me teach my 11th graders the novels that are required, but still meet the content standards for Florida. Everything from the vocabulary activities to the post-reading activites are great. I would recommend this guide to all teachers--much better than Teacher Created Materials.

Peter M. Daly, Professor of German at McGill University, is one of the founders of modern Emblematic research. His book is one of the best, holistic, introduction to the emblem and emblematic studies. Emblematics is one of the most curious sub-disciplines in Renaissance studies. Some professors that I've talked to believe emblematics was a phenomenon of the 1970s and 1980s, and that its "fad" has since died out. I don't think this is true. A brief search using the MLA bibliography shows that new articles and books in this field are published every year. I think emblematics will gain more popularity as time goes on, in large part because of its interdisciplinary approach. Emblematics combines studies in myth, fable, art, painting, literature, philosophy, semiotics, and visual media--and of course Renaissance emblem books.

In short, I highly recommend this book to those are interested in Renaissance studies, as well as to those who are just curious about how the gap between the fields of art history and literature has been bridged.

This is the book for all teachers who love literature and desire to utilize internet resources with their children, but don't have the time to research hundreds of sites on their own. Karen A. Moran has done a thorough job of finding appropriate sites that relate to 38 different children's books. To name a few, the book includes Charlotte's Web, Night of the Twisters, Hatchet, Cricket in Times Square, Indian in the cupboard, Ribsey, Summer of my German Soldier, and The Watson's go to Burmingham - 1963. For each title, the author lists an average of five different web sites that contain a curriculum connection to the book. The activity suggestions range in grade level ability and are both fresh and creative! Included also are other suggested resources, and professional materials.

A must have for any elementary teacher working with books and computers!

I had to read this for government, it is worth the time. It goes in depth about books banned; art of love, casndide, dubliners, the handmaid's tale, judge the obscure, lolita, madame bovary, and women in love. The sad fact is that there are millions of book lost by the surpression of a few, with it went our first amendment rights!