Death by Fame


Book Description

A richly drawn and elegantly written biography of the tragic life of Elizabeth, Empress of Austria-Hungary. 16-page photo insert.




‏ديوان المايدي بن ظاهر


Book Description

"the poetry of al-Māyidī ibn Ẓāhir, the earliest poet in what would later become the United Arab Emirates"--




Everyone Loves You When You're Dead


Book Description

Neil Strauss can uncover the naked truth like nobody else. With his groundbreaking book The Game, Strauss penetrated the secret society of pickup artists. Now, in Everyone Loves You When You're Dead, the Rolling Stone journalist collects the greatest moments from the most insane music interviews of all time. Join Neil Strauss, "The Mike Tyson of interviewers," (Dave Pirner, Soul Asylum), as he Makes Lady Gaga cry, tries to keep Mötley Crüe out of jail & is asked to smoke Kurt Cobain's ashes by Courtney Love Shoots guns with Ludacris, takes a ride with Neil Young & goes to church with Tom Cruise and his mother Spends the night with Trent Reznor, reads the mind of Britney Spears & finds religion with Stephen Colbert Gets picked on by Led Zeppelin, threatened by the mafia & serenaded by Leonard Cohen Picks up psychic clues with the CIA, diapers with Snoop Dog & prison survival tips from Rick James Goes drinking with Bruce Springsteen, dining with Gwen Stefani & hot tubbing with Marilyn Manson Talks glam with David Bowie, drugs with Madonna, death with Johnny Cash & sex with Chuck Berry Gets molested by the Strokes, in trouble with Prince & in bed with . . . you'll find out who inside. Enjoy many, many more awkward moments and accidental adventures with the world's number one stars in Everyone Love You When You're Dead.




Look at Me!


Book Description

Four million adults in the United States say that becoming famous is the most important goal in their lives. In any random sampling of one hundred American adults, two will have fame as their consuming desire. What motivates those who set fame as their priority, where did the desire come from, how does the pursuit of fame influence their lives, and how is it expressed? Based on the research of Orville Gilbert Brim, award-winning scholar in the field of child and human development, Look at Me! answers those questions. Look at Me! examines the desire to be famous in people of all ages, backgrounds, and social status and how succeeding or failing affects their lives and their personalities. It explores the implications of the pursuit of fame throughout a person's lifetime, covering the nature of the desire; fame, money, and power; the sources of fame; how people find a path to fame; the kinds of recognition sought; creating an audience; making fame last; and the resulting, often damaged, life of the fame-seeker. In our current age of celebrity fixation and reality television, Brim gives us a social-psychological perspective on the origins of this pervasive desire for fame and its effects on our lives. "Look at Me! is a fascinating in-depth study of society's obsession with fame. If you ever wondered what it's like to be famous, why fame comes to some and is sought by others, it's all here . . ." ---Jeffrey L. Bewkes, Chairman and CEO, Time Warner "In a voice filled with wisdom and insight, daring and self-reflection, Orville Brim masterfully traces the developmental origins and trajectory of fame. Look at Me! lets us see---with new eyes---the cultural priorities and obsessions that feed our individual hunger and appetites. A rare and rewarding book." ---Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Emily Hargroves Fisher Professor of Education at Harvard University and author of Respect and The Third Chapter Orville Gilbert Brim has had a long and distinguished career. He is the former director of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Successful Midlife Development, former president of the Foundation for Child Development, former president of the Russell Sage Foundation, and author and coauthor of more than a dozen books about human development, intelligence, ambition, and personality. Cover image ©iStockphoto.com/susib




The Life and Death of Peter Sellers


Book Description

Traces the life and career of the British actor, discusses his major roles, and depicts his complex and often difficult personality




After Midnight


Book Description

From Simon & Schuster, After Midnight is Susan Bluestein Davis' exploration of the life and death of Brad Davis. Susan Bluestein Davis tells the heart-wrenching story of her life with her longtime partner, Hollywood star Brad Davis--from his rise to fame through his role in the movie Midnight Express to the painful struggle with AIDS, the disease that finally took his life.




Death & Fame


Book Description

Allen Ginsberg was one of the bravest and most admired poets of this century. Famous for energizing the Beat Generation literary movement upon his historic encounter with Gregory Corso, Jack Kerouac, and William Burroughs in mid-century New York City, Ginsberg influenced several generations of writers, musicians, and poets. When he died on April 5, 1997, we lost one of the greatest figures of twentieth-century American literary and cultural history. This singular volume of final poems commemorated the anniversary of Ginsberg's death, and includes the verses he wrote in the years shortly before he died.




Master of Life and Death


Book Description

By the 23rd century Earth's population had reached seven billion. Mankind was in danger of perishing for lack of elbow room--unless prompt measures were taken. Roy Walton had the power to enforce those measures. But though his job was in the service of humanity, he soon found himself the most hated man in the world. For it was his job to tell parents their children were unfit to live; he had to uproot people from their homes and send them to remote areas of the world. Now, threatened by mobs of outraged citizens, denounced and blackened by the press, Roy Walton had to make a decision: resign his post, or use his power to destroy his enemies and become a dictator in the hopes of saving humanity from its own folly. In other words, should he become the MASTER OF LIFE AND DEATH?




Damned to Fame: the Life of Samuel Beckett


Book Description

_______________ 'A triumph of scholarship and sympathy... one of the great post-war biographies' - Independent 'A landmark in scholarly criticism... Knowlson is the world's largest Beckett scholar. His life is right up there with George Painter's Proust and Richard Ellmann's Joyce in sensitivity and fascination' - Daily Telegraph 'It is hard to imagine a fuller portrait of the man who gave our age some of the myths by which it lives' - Evening Standard _______________ SHORTLISTED FOR THE WHITBREAD PRIZE _______________ Samuel Beckett's long-standing friend, James Knowlson, recreates Beckett's youth in Ireland, his studies at Trinity College, Dublin in the early 1920s and from there to the Continent, where he plunged into the multicultural literary society of late-1920s Paris. The biography throws new light on Beckett's stormy relationship with his mother, the psychotherapy he received after the death of his father and his crucial relationship with James Joyce. There is also material on Beckett's six-month visit to Germany as the Nazi's tightened their grip. The book includes unpublished material on Beckett's personal life after he chose to live in France, including his own account of his work for a Resistance cell during the war, his escape from the Gestapo and his retreat into hiding. Obsessively private, Beckett was wholly committed to the work which eventually brought his public fame, beginning with the controversial success of "Waiting for Godot" in 1953, and culminating in the award of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969.




Digging for Dirt


Book Description

A fan's exploration of the man behind the myth Ol' Dirty Bastard (aka Russell Jones) rose to fame with the Wu-Tang Clan in the early '90s, his unorthodox rap style and reputation for erratic behavior putting him in a media spotlight. As a solo artist, he released two albums that went gold and achieved crossover fame through a duet with Mariah Carey that debuted at number one on the Billboard charts. But for the next decade, his life would be fueled by chaos and excess until it derailed completely, resulting in a fatal drug overdose in 2004 and leaving behind an enigmatic legacy and a remarkably diverse group of fans. In a compelling combination of personal narrative, biography, and cultural criticism, Digging for Dirt explores ODB's life, career, mythology, death, and the troubled trajectory of his public and private worlds. Jaime Lowe met with the people ODB affected and was most affected by—surviving members of the Wu-Tang Clan, his hip-hop contemporaries, his parents, his followers, his managers, his neighbors, and his friends—in an attempt to figure out the man behind the clown-prince persona, and the issues of race, celebrity, mental illness, and exploitation that surrounded his rise and fall.