Lolita
4.990 kr.Poet and pervert, Humbert Humbert becomes obsessed by twelve-year-old Lolita and seeks to possess her, first carnally and then artistically, out of love, ‘to fix once for all the perilous magic of nymphets’. Is he in love or insane? A tortured soul or a monster? Humbert Humbert’s seduction is one of many dimensions in Nabokov’s dizzying masterpiece, which is suffused with a savage humour and rich, elaborate verbal textures. Filmed by Stanley Kubrick in 1962 starring James Mason and Peter Sellers, and again in 1997 by Adrian Lyne starring Jeremy Irons and Melanie Griffith, Lolita has lost none of its power to shock and awe.
The Red Tenda of Bologna
1.290 kr.‘It’s an improbable city, Bologna – like one you might walk through after you have died.’
A dreamlike meditation on memory, food, paintings, a fond uncle and the improbable beauty of Bologna, from the visionary thinker and art critic.
The Iliad
5.490 kr.A stunning Penguin clothbound edition of Homer’s great epic, in E. V. Rieu’s classic translation.
The Iliad is the first and the greatest literary achievement of Greek civilization – an epic poem without rival in the literature of the world, and the cornerstone of Western culture. The story centres on the critical events in the last year of the Trojan War, which lead to Achilleus’ killing of Hektor and determine the fate of Troy. But Homer’s theme is not simply war or heroism. With compassion and humanity, he presents a universal and tragic view of the world, of human life lived under the shadow of suffering and death, set against a vast and largely unpitying divine background..
Seven Greek cities claim the honour of being the birthplace of Homer (c. 8th-7th century BC), the poet to whom the composition of The Iliad and The Odyssey was attributed. The Iliad is the oldest surviving work of Western literature, but the identity – or even the existence – of Homer himself is a complete mystery, with no reliable biographical information having survived.
E. V. Rieu initiated Penguin Classics with Allen Lane and his famous translation of The Odyssey was the first book published in the series in 1947. The Iliad followed in 1950.
Family Happiness
2.490 kr.‘I’m not the sort of husband you dream of when you’re walking alone along the avenue in the evening, am I? And it would be a disaster, wouldn’t it?’ How does love die? This question lies at the heart of Tolstoy’s desperately sad novella. It tells the story of seventeen-year-old Masha who, despite their differences, falls passionately in love with an older man, and marries him. Soon, however, the gap between them becomes unbridgeable.
Stan the Killer
2.490 kr.‘Maigret moved slowly, edging his bulky frame through the throng in Rue Saint-Antoine, which burst into life every morning, the sunshine streaming down from a clear sky on to the little barrows piled high with fruit and vegetables.’ In these three tales of deception, set in and around Paris, Simenon’s celebrated detective uncovers chilling truths about the depths of the human instinct for self-preservation.
Beauty
2.490 kr.‘People should fall in love with their eyes closed. Just close your eyes. Don’t look.’From Warhol’s romantic relationships to his thoughts on interior design, these candid, highly entertaining musings – on love, sex, beauty, work and space – give an intimate glimpse into the mind of one of the most iconic figures in twentieth-century culture.
The Lady Bandit
2.490 kr.Priests with shotguns, scheming lovers and a necrophiliac gravedigger haunt the fables of Emilia Pardo Bazán, the formidable Spanish aristocrat, intellectual and feminist. These stories paint a rich and variegated image of Old Spain – sometimes tender, often provocative, always entertaining. But if you decide to visit, beware the Lady Bandit, whose strong, rough hands might grab your neck, and squeeze and squeeze and squeeze .
The House of Hunger
2.490 kr.‘No, I don’t hate being black. I’m just tired of saying it’s beautiful. No, I don’t hate myself.
I’m just tired of people bruising their knuckles on my jaw.’A novella with the force of a screaming trumpet flare, Dambudzo Marechera’s seminal literary debut explores a body and spirit exiled from the land and the self. An inimitable and internationally admired writer, his profound ambivalence and wry, existential sensibility was forged in this iconic book.
The Emperor’s New Clothes
2.490 kr.Many years ago there lived an Emperor who was so terribly fond of beautiful new clothes that he spent all his money on dressing elegantly… Jewels in storytelling, these magical fairytales by Hans Christian Andersen were inspired by his own life as an outsider. From ‘The Little Mermaid’ to ‘The Red Shoes’, his fables show the ugliest of humanity – its power, greed, vanity – but also how suffering can lead to beauty.
Unpacking My Library
2.490 kr.Every sort of passion verges on chaos, I know, but what the collecting passion verges on is a chaos of memories.’From intimate musings on his book collection, to a dream-like trip through the bustling streets of Marseille, each of these essays offers a compelling journey into the mind of one of the twentieth century’s most influential philosophers.
Tristessa
2.490 kr.Tristessa is a strange fever-dream of morphine sickness and belly-deep sadness. Or, in the words of Allen Ginsberg: ‘a narrative meditation studying a hen, a rooster, a dove, a cat, a chihuahua dog, family meat, and a ravishing, ravished junky lady, first in their crowded bedroom, then out to drunken streets, taco stands, and pads at dawn in Mexico City slums’.