The Devil and Mr Casement


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History.




The Devil and Mr Casement


Book Description

In September 1910, the human rights activist and anti-imperialist Roger Casement arrived in the Amazon to investigate reports of widespread human rights abuses in the vast forests stretching along the Putumayo river. There, the Peruvian entrepreneur Julio Csar Arana ran an area the size of Belgium as his own private fiefdom; his British registered company operated a systematic programme of torture, exploitation and murder. Fresh from documenting the scarcely imaginable atrocities perpetrated by King Leopold in the Congo, Casement was confronted with an all too recognisable scenario. He uncovered an appalling catalogue of abuse: nearly 30,000 Indians had died to produce four thousand tonnes of rubber. From the Peruvian rainforests to the City of London, Jordan Goodman recounts a crime against humanity that history has almost forgotten, but whose exposure in 1912 sent shockwaves around the world. Drawing on a wealth of original research, The Devil and Mr Casement is a story of colonial exploitation and corporate greed with enormous contemporary political resonance.




The Devil and Mr Casement


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Bad Gays


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An unconventional history of homosexuality We all remember Oscar Wilde, but who speaks for Bosie? What about those ‘bad gays’ whose unexemplary lives reveal more than we might expect? Many popular histories seek to establish homosexual heroes, pioneers, and martyrs but, as Huw Lemmey and Ben Miller argue, the past is filled with queer people whose sexualities and dastardly deeds have been overlooked despite their being informative and instructive. Based on the hugely popular podcast series of the same name, Bad Gays asks what we can learn about LGBTQ+ history, sexuality and identity through its villains, failures, and baddies. With characters such as the Emperor Hadrian, anthropologist Margaret Mead and notorious gangster Ronnie Kray, the authors tell the story of how the figure of the white gay man was born, and how he failed. They examine a cast of kings, fascist thugs, artists and debauched bon viveurs. Imperial-era figures Lawrence of Arabia and Roger Casement get a look-in, as do FBI boss J. Edgar Hoover, lawyer Roy Cohn, and architect Philip Johnson. Together these amazing life stories expand and challenge mainstream assumptions about sexual identity: showing that homosexuality itself was an idea that emerged in the nineteenth century, one central to major historical events. Bad Gays is a passionate argument for rethinking gay politics beyond questions of identity, compelling readers to search for solidarity across boundaries.




The Putumayo, the Devil's Paradise; Travels in the Peruvian Amazon Region and an Account of the Atrocities Committed Upon the Indians Therein


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This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. To ensure a quality reading experience, this work has been proofread and republished using a format that seamlessly blends the original graphical elements with text in an easy-to-read typeface. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.




Defrocking the Devil


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Defrocking the Devil/Theology of Fear is a brief history of the last 2,500 years of monotheism using the actual words of the men who claimed to know the devilfigure most intimately. From Peter to Constantine to Martin Luther to our present day theologians, these men and hundreds more included in this book supported the early Church fathers arguments for the inclusion of Satan into Christian polemics. A dualism appeared in the story of Jesus immediately after his crucifixion. Instead of tirelessly promoting the Christian message of love thy neighbor as thyself a new spiritual equation of hate, torture and murder entered the theological landscape. Defrocking the Devil is an attempt to puncture the myths surrounding the words: evil, devil and hell. Two thousand years after the birth of Christianity and fourteen hundred years after the start of Islam, hundreds of millions of people currently living on this planet are in real fear of one day ending up down in the devils lair. How did Christian belief in Jesus become conditional upon the existence of fictional beings and wicked subterranean places? Defrocking the Devil seeks to illuminate the darkness and empower all people of faith to move beyond theologies that advocate violence into the spiritual equation. There have been many books written about this dark side of Western theology, but few historians do much more than recount its bloody genocidal history. Defrocking the Devil actively seeks to tear down such religious dogmas by using the very words of those who extolled such a hurtful, anti- Christian philosophy.




Stormy Daniels


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Issue #3 of the popular comic book series!




Truman


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The Pulitzer Prize–winning biography of Harry S. Truman, whose presidency included momentous events from the atomic bombing of Japan to the outbreak of the Cold War and the Korean War, told by America’s beloved and distinguished historian. The life of Harry S. Truman is one of the greatest of American stories, filled with vivid characters—Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin, Eleanor Roosevelt, Bess Wallace Truman, George Marshall, Joe McCarthy, and Dean Acheson—and dramatic events. In this riveting biography, acclaimed historian David McCullough not only captures the man—a more complex, informed, and determined man than ever before imagined—but also the turbulent times in which he rose, boldly, to meet unprecedented challenges. The last president to serve as a living link between the nineteenth and the twentieth centuries, Truman’s story spans the raw world of the Missouri frontier, World War I, the powerful Pendergast machine of Kansas City, the legendary Whistle-Stop Campaign of 1948, and the decisions to drop the atomic bomb, confront Stalin at Potsdam, send troops to Korea, and fire General MacArthur. Drawing on newly discovered archival material and extensive interviews with Truman’s own family, friends, and Washington colleagues, McCullough tells the deeply moving story of the seemingly ordinary “man from Missouri” who was perhaps the most courageous president in our history.




Roger Casement


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A fascinating examination of the extraordinary life of Roger Casement, executed as part of the 1916 rising, fighting the empire that had previously knighted him. Roger Casement was a British consul for two decades. However, his investigation into atrocities in the Congo led Casement to anti-Imperialist views. Ultimately, this led him to side with the Irish Republican movement, leading up to the 1916 rising. Arrested by the British for gun trafficking, he was incarcerated in the Tower of London and then placed in the dock at the Royal Courts of Justice in an internationally-publicised state trial for high treason. He was hanged in Pentonville prison on the 3 August—two years to the day after Britain's declaration of war in 1914.




Hyde


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“An ingenious revision” of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic Gothic story told through the eyes of the fiend (The New York Times Book Review). Mr. Hyde is trapped, locked in Dr. Jekyll’s house, certain of his inevitable capture. As the dreadful hours pass, he has the chance, finally, to tell his side of the story—one of buried dreams and dark lusts, both liberating and obscured in the gaslit fog of Victorian London’s sordid backstreets. Summoned to life by strange potions, Hyde knows not when or how long he will have control of “the body.” When dormant, he watches Dr. Jekyll from a distance, conscious of this other, high-class life but without influence. As the experiment continues, their mutual existence is threatened, not only by the uncertainties of untested science, but also by a mysterious stalker. Hyde is being taunted—possibly framed. Girls have gone missing; a murder has been committed. And someone is always watching from the shadows. In the blur of this shared consciousness, can Hyde ever truly know if these crimes were committed by his hands? Narrated by Hyde, this serpentine tale about the nature of evil, addiction, and the duality of man “delivers a new look at this enigmatic character and intriguing possible explanations for Jekyll’s behavior” (The Washington Post, Five Best Thrillers of 2014). “Hyde brings into the light the various horrors still hidden in the dark heart of Stevenson’s classic tale . . . a blazing triumph of the gothic imagination.” —Patrick McGrath, author of Asylum “Earthy, lurid, and unsparing . . . a worthy companion to its predecessor. It’s rich in gloomy, moody atmosphere (Levine’s London has a brutal steampunk quality), and its narrator’s plight is genuinely poignant.” —The New York Times Book Review, Editors’ Choice