Plutarch's Lives, written at the beginning of the secondcentury A.D., is a brilliant social history of the ancient world byone of the greatest biographers and moralists of all time. In whatis by far his most famous and influential work, Plutarch revealsthe character and personality of his subjects and how they ledultimately to tragedy or victory. Richly anecdotal and full ofdetail, Volume I contains profiles and comparisons of Romulus andTheseus, Numa and Lycurgus, Fabius and Pericles, and many morepowerful figures of ancient Greece and Rome. The present translation, originally published in 1683 inconjunction with a life of Plutarch by John Dryden, was revised in1864 by the poet and scholar Arthur Hugh Clough, whose notes andpreface are also included in this edition.

The first major biography of America’s twenty-eighth presidentin nearly two decades, from one of America’s foremost WoodrowWilson scholars. A Democrat who reclaimed the White House after sixteen years ofRepublican administrations, Wilson was a transformativepresident—he helped create the regulatory bodies and legislationthat prefigured FDR’s New Deal and would prove central togovernance through the early twenty-first century, including theFederal Reserve system and the Clayton Antitrust Act; he guided thenation through World War I; and, although his advocacy in favor ofjoining the League of Nations proved unsuccessful, he nonethelessestablished a new way of thinking about international relationsthat would carry America into the United Nations era. Yet Wilsonalso steadfastly resisted progress for civil rights, while hisattorney general launched an aggressive attack on civilliberties. Even as he reminds us of the foundational scope of Wilson’sdomestic policy achievements, John Milton Cooper, Jr., r

A scandalously talented stage performer, a practiced seductressof both men and women, and the flamboyant author of some of thegreatest works of twentieth-century literature, Colette was ourfirst true superstar. Now, in Judith Thurman's Secrets of theFlesh, Colette at last has a biography worthy of her dazzlingreputation. Having spent her childhood in the shadow of anoverpowering mother, Colette escaped at age twenty into a turbulentmarriage with the sexy, unscrupulous Willy--a literary charlatanwho took credit for her bestselling Claudine novels. Weary ofWilly's sexual domination, Colette pursued an extremely publiclesbian love affair with a niece of Napoleon's. At forty, she gavebirth to a daughter who bored her, at forty-seven she seduced herteenage stepson, and in her seventies she flirted with the Nazioccupiers of Paris, even though her beloved third husband, a Jew,had been arrested by the Gestapo. And all the while, thisincomparable woman poured forth a torrent of masterpieces,including Gigi, Sido,

Leni Riefenstahl, the woman known as “Hitler’s filmmaker,”made some of the greatest and most innovative documentaries evermade. They are also insidious glorifications of Adolf Hitler andthe Third Reich. Now, Steven Bach reveals the truths and liesbehind Riefenstahl’s lifelong self-vindication as an apoliticalartist who claimed to know nothing of the Holocaust and denied hercomplicity with the criminal regime she both used andsanctified. A riveting and illuminating biography of one of the mostfascinating and controversial personalities of the twentiethcentury.

Soon after the fall of the Taliban, in 2001, Deborah Rodriguezwent to Afghanistan as part of a group offering humanitarian aid tothis war-torn nation. Surrounded by men and women whose skills–asdoctors, nurses, and therapists–seemed eminently more practicalthan her own, Rodriguez, a hairdresser and mother of two fromMichigan, despaired of being of any real use. Yet she soon foundshe had a gift for befriending Afghans, and once her professionbecame known she was eagerly sought out by Westerners desperate fora good haircut and by Afghan women, who have a long and proudtradition of running their own beauty salons. Thus an idea wasborn. With the help of corporate and international sponsors, the KabulBeauty School welcomed its first class in 2003. Well meaning butsometimes brazen, Rodriguez stumbled through language barriers,overstepped cultural customs, and constantly juggled the challengesof a postwar nation even as she learned how to empower her studentsto become their families’ breadwinners

The first complete, unvarnished history of Southern rock’slegendary and most popular band, from its members’ hardscrabbleboyhoods in Jacksonville, Florida and their rise to worldwide fameto the tragic plane crash that killed the founder and the band’srise again from the ashes. In the summer of 1964 Jacksonville, Florida teenager Ronnie VanZant and some of his friends hatched the idea of forming a band toplay covers of the Rolling Stones, Beatles, Yardbirds and thecountry and blues-rock music they had grown to love. Naming theirband after Leonard Skinner, the gym teacher at Robert E. Lee SeniorHigh School who constantly badgered the long-haired aspiringmusicians to get haircuts, they were soon playing gigs at parties,and bars throughout the South. During the next decade LynyrdSkynyrd grew into the most critically acclaimed and commerciallysuccessful of the rock bands to emerge from the South since theAllman Brothers. Their hits “Free Bird” and “Sweet Home Alabama”became classics. The

No one is better poised to write the biography of JamesHerriot than the son who worked alongside him in the Yorkshireveterinary practice when Herriot became an internationallybestselling author. Now, in this warm and poignant biography, JimWight ventures beyond his father's life as a veterinarian to revealthe man behind the stories--the private individual who refused toallow fame and wealth to interfere with his practice or his family.With access to all of his father's papers, correspondence,manu*s, and photographs--and intimate recollections of thefarmers, locals, and friends who populate the James Herriotbooks--only Jim Wight could write this definitive biography of theman who was not only his father but his best friend.

The Outsider is an unsentimental yet profoundly moving look atone family’s experience with mental illness. In 1978, CharlesLachenmeyer was a happily married professor of sociology who livedin the New York suburbs with his wife and nine-year-old son,Nathaniel. But within a few short years, schizophrenia–adevastating mental illness with no known cure–would cost himeverything: his sanity, his career, his family, even the roof overhis head. Upon learning of his father’s death in 1995, Nathanielset out to search for the truth behind his father’s haunted,solitary existence. Rich in imagery and poignant symbolism, TheOutsider is a beautifully written memoir of a father’s struggle tosurvive with dignity, and a son’s struggle to know the father helost to schizophrenia long before he finally lost him todeath. The Outsider is a recipient of the Kenneth Johnson MemorialResearch Library Book Award and is the winner of the 2000 Bell ofHope Award, presented annually by the Mental Health Associatio

The God of Thunder returns in the New York Times Bestseller –Now in paperback and hotter than hell! * More insight from the Demon – Including the making of Destroyerand the truth behind the greatest rock band in the world * Look for all four special collector's covers * And more photos You wanted the truth, you got the truth—the hottest book in theworld! Fueled by an explosive mix of makeup, costumes, and attitude, KISSburst onto the music scene thirty years ago and has become a rockinstitution. The band has sold more than eighty million records,has broken every concert attendance record set by Elvis Presley andthe Beatles, stands behind the Beatles alone in number of goldrecords from any group in history, and has spawned more than 2,500licenses. There would have been no KISS without Gene Simmons, the outrageousstar whose superlong tongue, legendary sexual exploits, and demonicmakeup have made him a rock icon. KISS and Make-Up is the wild,shocking, unbelievable story, from the man himself, about how an

In this extraordinary memoir, Nobel Prizewinning author GnterGrass remembers his early life, from his boyhood in a crampedtwo-room apartment in Danzig through the late 1950s, when The TinDrum was published. During the Second World War, Grass volunteeredfor the submarine corps at the age of fifteen but was rejected; twoyears later, in 1944, he was instead drafted into the Waffen-SS.Taken prisoner by American forces as he was recovering fromshrapnel wounds, he spent the final weeks of the war in an AmericanPOW camp. After the war, Grass resolved to become an artist andmoved with his first wife to Paris, where he began to write thenovel that would make him famous. Full of the bravado of youth, therubble of postwar Germany, the thrill of wild love affairs, and theexhilaration of Paris in the early fifties, Peeling the Onionwhichcaused great controversy when it was published in GermanyrevealsGrass at his most intimate.

Succeeds more than any previous book in bringing Ali into focus. . . as a starburst of energy, ego and ability whose like willnever be seen again.-- The Wall Street Journal "Best Nonfiction Book of the Year"-- Time "Penetrating . . . reveal[s] details that even close followers of[Ali] might not have known. . . . An amazing story." -- The NewYork Times On the night in 1964 that Muhammad Ali (then known as Cassius Clay)stepped into the ring with Sonny Liston, he was widely regarded asan irritating freak who danced and talked way too much. Six roundslater Ali was not only the new world heavyweight boxing champion:He was "a new kind of black man" who would shortly transformAmerica's racial politics, its popular culture, and its notions ofheroism. No one has capturedAli--and the era that he exhilarated and sometimes infuriated--withgreater vibrancy, drama, and astuteness than David Remnick, thePulitzer Prize-winning author of Lenin's Tomb (and editor of The New Yorker ). In charting Ali's rise fro

Robert Altman—visionary director, hard-partying hedonist,eccentric family man, Hollywood legend—comes roaring to life inthis rollicking oral biography. After an all-American boyhoodin Kansas City, a stint flying bombers in World War II, and jobsranging from dog tattoo entrepreneur to television director, RobertAltman burst onto the scene in 1970 with M*A*S*H . Hereinvented American filmmaking, and went on to produce suchmasterpieces as McCabe Mrs. Miller, Nashville , ThePlayer, Short Cuts, and Gosford Park . In RobertAltman , Mitchell Zuckoff has woven together Altman’s finalinterviews; an incredible cast of voices including Meryl Streep,Warren Beatty, Paul Newman, among scores of others; andcontemporary reviews and news accounts into a riveting tale of anextraordinary life.

How does he assess the information that is brought to him? Howdoes his personal or political philosophy, or a moral sense,sustain him? How does he draw inspiration from those around him?How does he deal with setbacks and disasters? In this brilliantclose-up look at Winston Churchill's leadership during the SecondWorld War, Gilbert gets to the heart of the trials and strugglesthat have confronted the world's most powerful leaders, even up tocurrent politicians such as George Bush and Tony Blair. Basing the book on his intimate knowledge of Churchill's privateand official papers, Sir Martin Gilbert, Churchill’s officialbiographer, looks at the public figure and wartime propaganda, toreveal a very human, sensitive, and often tormented man, whonevertheless found the strength to lead his nation forward from thedarkest and most dangerous of times.

After losing her entire family to the Nazis at age 13, AliciaAppleman-Jurman went on to save the lives of thousands of Jews,offering them her own courage and hope in a time of upheaval andtragedy. Not since The Diary of Anne Frank has a young voice sovividly expressed the capacity for humanity and heroism in the faceof Nazi brutality. HC: Bantam.

One of America’s finest historians shows us how Bob Dylan, oneof the country’s greatest and most enduring artists, stillsurprises and moves us after all these years. Growing up in Greenwich Village, Sean Wilentz discov??ered themusic of Bob Dylan as a young teenager; almost half a centurylater, he revisits Dylan’s work with the skills of an eminentAmerican historian as well as the passion of a fan. Drawn in partfrom Wilentz’s essays as “historian in residence” of Dylan’sofficial website, Bob Dylan in America is a unique blend of fact,interpretation, and affinity—a book that, much like its subject,shifts gears and changes shape as the occasion warrants. Beginning with his explosion onto the scene in 1961, this bookfollows Dylan as he continues to develop a body of musical andliterary work unique in our cultural history. Wilentz’s approachplaces Dylan’s music in the context of its time, including theearly influences of Popular Front ideology and Beat aesthetics, andoffers a larger critica

Based on ten years' astonishing new research, here is thethrilling story of how a charismatic, dangerous boy became astudent priest, romantic poet, gangster mastermind, prolific lover,murderous revolutionary, and the merciless politician who shapedthe Soviet Empire in his own brutal image: How Stalin becameStalin.

As he magnificently combines meticulous scholarship withirresistible narrative appeal, Richardson draws on his closefriendship with Picasso, his own diaries, the collaboration ofPicasso's widow Jacqueline, and unprecedented access to Picasso'sstudio and papers to arrive at a profound understanding of theartist and his work. 800 photos.

Warren Buffett is the most successful investor of all time. His ability to consistently find undervalued companies has made him one of the world's richest men. Yet while his track record is hard to argue with, the Buffett way isn't the only way, nor is it always the best way, to invest. Even Buffett Isn't Perfect dispels many myths about Buffett and his "solid as a rock" style. It shows readers how to learn from the master's best moves while avoiding strategies that don't apply to small investors -- and avoiding Buffett's mistakes, such as sometimes riding his winners too long.

From Ann Wroe, a biographer of the first rank, comes astartlingly original look at one of the greatest poets in theWestern tradition. Being Shelley aims to turn the poet's life inside out: ratherthan tracing the external events of his life, she tracks the innerjourney of a spirit struggling to create. In her quest tounderstand the radically unconventional Shelley, Wroe pursues thequestions that consumed the poet himself. Shelley sought to freeand empower the entire human race; his revolution was meant toshatter illusions, shock men and women with new visions, find truelove and liberty—and take everyone with him. Now, for the firsttime, this passionate quest is put at the center of his life. Theresult is a Shelley who has never been seen in biographybefore.