Netherlands Books

I thought this book was very interesting. I love history and if you do too, this is the book for you! I had never really known about Vermeer before this and now I'm totally interested. Read this book!!

Sullivan's work is an excellent contribution to the study of crime in early America. It's well researched, gracefully written, intelligently organized, and persuasively argued.

Chevannes, author of many articles and another book on Rastas, edits and contributes to this volume. His thesis is that Rastafari should be seen simultaeneously as a "continuance of and departure from" Revivalism, an Afro-Carribean folk religion. The other scholars in this text agree with Chevannes, and they probe the relationships of transformation in these and other religious movements.

Four topics stand out for treatment in this work---Rastafari language construction, the origin of Dreadlocks with the arrival of the Youth Black Faith, the psychoanalytic treatment of the meaning of Dreads, and the chapter on Women's discourse on Possession in Surinamese Creole.

Chevannes excels here in the areas he is known for best, Rasta symbolism and history.

This book completely met my expectations for two reasons so I gave it 5 stars. It's not exactly a "bestseller of the month" topic, so others may not be so generous. I don't find much about New Amsterdam and was excited to find a book hot off the presses that went into enough background information about early Dutch settlement. I was also quite pleased to find the names of several ancestors named as settlers prior to 1625. Quite readable. There is an occasional non-native English speaker grammatical error, but I actually like that and I thank the author for his hard work and a job well done!

amazing, written by a historian with an extremely fresh approach, knowledgable, highly readable, covering the topic from all relevant angles, may they be social, religious, cultural or economical. I am writing a book about 2500 years of Spanish jewish history and have among all the material I have gone through not found anything remotely as interesting as this book which may have a non-inviting title but reads like a thriller. Of course I am grateful to mr. Swetschinski for confirming my being a descendant of 4 out of 10 of the first jewish heads of families settling in Amsterdam, but I won't let that distract me from reviewing the book objectively. This is a must-read for anyone who want to understand the development of past-1492 jewish life in all its glory. It also lays a foundation of pride under presentday sephardi life in Israel, if only the sephardim there would share the knowledge available through masterworks like RELUCTANT COSMOPOLITANS..............

The books in this series are the best books I've seen to introduce children to great artists. "Getting to Know Great Artists" books bring to life the person behind the painting with fun cartoons about his life. Why did Rembrandt start painting? What's so great about his paintings? This book makes kids care about the man and his art. Your kids will wind up knowing more about Rembrandt than most adults ever will! The combination of cartoons with color photographs of the artist's paintings makes the book lively to look at. The text is interesting and easy to read. The artist's greatest works are shown within the context they were made: what was going on in the artist's life, how the work was received by society at the time. I recommend this whole series of "Getting to Know Great Artists" very highly.

Are you tired of the fuss about real or false Rembrandts? Then read prof. Svetlana book. First of all, Rembrandt was allways interested in such confusion and gladly endorsed it. If he could get a fee for all false stuff under his name or painted by his pupils, that would be fine. So, dont worry, in the end, all the Rembrandts in one way or another are authentic...

I'm very surprised that this book has no reviews. I'm reading it in preparation for a trip to Amsterdam. It is a wonderful, wonderful book.

We don't know a lot about Rembrandt or his life, but Lee quilts the pieces together in a delightful narrative which seamlessly knits together the historical record with speculation. It also sets the stage for analysis of his masterpieces: if you didn't really "get" Nightwatch before, Lee tells you why it was like a bolt of lightning. Also, Lee exposes the dark side of the art world (finance) in the historical setting of Holland in the 17th century.

Prior to this book, I knew a little bit about art, but nothing about Rembrandt. Now, I am very much looking forward to the museums in Amsterdam. Moreover, the tone of the book has that magical quality of being intelligent and witty at just the right places. I rarely laugh out loud when reading, but Lee cracked me up to the point of wanting to have dinner with him (Lee) and/or sending him money over top the price of the book.

Perhaps I could do a portrait for him? A flattering, 3/4-length piece at the reasonable sum of 600 guilders?

Beautiful full-color drawings, photos, and reproductions of major works of art offer children a way to explore Rembrandt and his works. Rembrandt blends biography with artistic insights for grades 4-6 and beyond, providing bright pages of art and fun drawings and color. Highly recommended.

The collaboration of novelist and playwright Philo Bregstein and author Salvador Bloemgarten, Remembering Jewish Amsterdam presents an informed and informative overview of Jewish culture and personalities that impacted the economic and social life of Amsterdam from the seventeenth century, until the obliterating holocaust of German occupation in 1940. Presented almost entirely in the form of brief testimonies from individuals, Remembering Jewish Amsterdam covers common occupations to religious practices, living and housing in the old Jewish quarter, entertainment and recreation, immigration, zionism, Jewish-Christian relations of the era and much more. The words of the people who once lived in Jewish Amsterdam recapture as vivid a picture as possible of what life was once like before the shadow of the Holocaust. A handful of black-and-white and some color photographs illustrate this welcome addition to Judaic history and studies reference shelves.