Alberto Manguel's Books

Curiosity

By: Alberto Manguel

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An eclectic history of human curiosity, a great feast of ideas, and a memoir of a reading life from an internationally celebrated reader and thinker Curiosity has been seen through the ages as the impulse that drives our knowledge forward and the temptation that leads us toward dangerous and forbidden waters. The question "Why?" has appeared under a multiplicity of guises and in vastly different contexts throughout the chapters of human history. Why does evil exist? What is beauty? How does language inform us? What defines our identity? What is our responsibility to the world? In Alberto Manguel's most personal book to date, the author tracks his own life of curiosity through the reading that has mapped his way. Manguel chooses as his guides a selection of writers who sparked his imagination. He dedicates each chapter to a single thinker, scientist, artist, or other figure who demonstrated in a fresh way how to ask "Why?" Leading us through a full gallery of inquisitives, among them Thomas Aquinas, David Hume, Lewis Carroll, Rachel Carson, Socrates, and, most importantly, Dante, Manguel affirms how deeply connected our curiosity is to the readings that most astonish us, and how essential to the soaring of our own imaginations.

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Page Count

388

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300184786

ISBN 13

9780300184785

A Reader on Reading

By: Alberto Manguel

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A Reader on Reading

By: Alberto Manguel

In this major collection of his essays, Alberto Manguel, whom George Steiner has called “the Casanova of reading,” argues that the activity of reading, in its broadest sense, defines our species. “We come into the world intent on finding narrative in everything,” writes Manguel, “landscape, the skies, the faces of others, the images and words that our species create.” Reading our own lives and those of others, reading the societies we live in and those that lie beyond our borders, reading the worlds that lie between the covers of a book are the essence of A Reader on Reading. The thirty-nine essays in this volume explore the crafts of reading and writing, the identity granted to us by literature, the far-reaching shadow of Jorge Luis Borges, to whom Manguel read as a young man, and the links between politics and books and between books and our bodies. The powers of censorship and intellectual curiosity, the art of translation, and those “numinous memory palaces we call libraries” also figure in this remarkable collection. For Manguel and his readers, words, in spite of everything, lend coherence to the world and offer us “a few safe places, as real as paper and as bracing as ink,” to grant us room and board in our passage.

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Page Count

320

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300163045

ISBN 13

9780300163049

The Library at Night

By: Alberto Manguel

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The Library at Night

By: Alberto Manguel

Inspired by the process of creating a library for his 15th-century home near the Loire, in France, Manguel, the acclaimed writer on books and reading, has taken up the subject of libraries in this captivating meditation on their meaning and significance.

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Page Count

384

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300145217

ISBN 13

9780300145212

Packing My Library

An Elegy and Ten Digressions

By: Alberto Manguel

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Packing My Library

An Elegy and Ten Digressions

By: Alberto Manguel

A best-selling author and world-renowned bibliophile meditates on his vast personal library and champions the vital role of all libraries In June 2015 Alberto Manguel prepared to leave his centuries-old village home in France’s Loire Valley and reestablish himself in a one-bedroom apartment on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. Packing up his enormous, 35,000†‘volume personal library, choosing which books to keep, store, or cast out, Manguel found himself in deep reverie on the nature of relationships between books and readers, books and collectors, order and disorder, memory and reading. In this poignant and personal reevaluation of his life as a reader, the author illuminates the highly personal art of reading and affirms the vital role of public libraries. Manguel’s musings range widely, from delightful reflections on the idiosyncrasies of book lovers to deeper analyses of historic and catastrophic book events, including the burning of ancient Alexandria’s library and contemporary library lootings at the hands of ISIS. With insight and passion, the author underscores the universal centrality of books and their unique importance to a democratic, civilized, and engaged society.

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Page Count

155

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300235496

ISBN 13

9780300235494

A History of Reading

By: Alberto Manguel

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A History of Reading

By: Alberto Manguel

A book for book lovers by a true lover of books! At one magical instant in your early childhood, the page of a book—that string of confused, alien ciphers—shivered into meaning, and at that moment, whole universes opened. You became, irrevocably, a reader. Noted essayist and editor Alberto Manguel moves from this essential moment to explore the six-thousand-year-old conversation between words and that hero without whom the book would be a lifeless object: the reader. Manguel brilliantly covers reading as seduction, as rebellion, and as obsession and goes on to trace the quirky and fascinating history of the reader’s progress from clay tablet to scroll, codex to digital.

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Page Count

557

Publisher

Penguin

Published Date

ISBN 10

0698178971

ISBN 13

9780698178977

The City of Words

Understanding Civilisation Through Story

By: Alberto Manguel

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The City of Words

Understanding Civilisation Through Story

By: Alberto Manguel

And yet stories, even the best and truest, can't save us from our own folly. Stories can't protect us from suffering and error, from natural and artificial catastrophes, from our own suicidal greed. The only thing they can do is ... offer consolation for suffering and words to name our experience. Stories can tell us who we are ... and suggest ways of imagining a future that, without calling for comfortable happy endings, may offer us ways of remaining alive, together, on this much-abused earth.' Based on Canada's 2007 CBC Massey Lectures (to be broadcast in Australia by ABC Radio National in April 2008), Alberto Manguel's The City of Words takes a fresh look at the rise of violent intolerance in our societies. We strive to build societies with sets of values all citizens can agree on. But something has gone wrong- race riots in France, political murder in the Netherlands, bombings in Britain and Bali - are these symptoms of a multicultural experiment gone awry? Why is it so difficult for us to live together when the alternatives are demonstrably horrifying? With his trademark wit and erudition, Alberto Manguel suggests a fresh approach- we should look at what visionaries, poets, novelists, essayists and filmmakers have to say about building societies. Perhaps the stories we tell hold secret keys to the human heart. From Cassandra to Jack London, the Epic of Gilgamesh to the computer Hal in 2001- A Space Odyssey, Don Quixote to Atanarjuat- The Fast Runner, Manguel draws fascinating and revelatory parallels between the personal and political realities of our present-day world and those of myth, legend and story.

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Page Count

180

Publisher

Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

0702236845

ISBN 13

9780702236846

The Traveler, the Tower, and the Worm

The Reader as Metaphor

By: Alberto Manguel

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The Traveler, the Tower, and the Worm

The Reader as Metaphor

By: Alberto Manguel

Alberto Manguel examines metaphors of readers and reading from literatures across centuries and the globe, from the ancient epic Gilgamesh to the World Wide Web, from the adventures of Ulysses to the tragedy of Emma Bovary, and he considers how these metaphors reflect the cultures that invent them.

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Page Count

153

Publisher

University of Pennsylvania Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0812245237

ISBN 13

9780812245233

Stevenson Under The Palm Trees

By: Alberto Manguel

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Stevenson Under The Palm Trees

By: Alberto Manguel

In the lush, uninhibited atmosphere of Samoa, Robert Louis Stevenson is languishing with the disease that will soon kill him; when a chance encounter with the mysterious Scottish missionary, Mr Baker, turns his thoughts back to his conservative, post-Reformation Edinburgh home. As Stevenson's meetings with the tantalizingly nebulous missionary become increasingly strange, a series of crimes against the native population sours the atmosphere. With its playful nod to Stevenson's life and work Manguel has woven an intoxicating tale in which fantasy infiltrates reality.

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Canongate Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1847677231

ISBN 13

9781847677235

Bride of Frankenstein

By: Alberto Manguel

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Bride of Frankenstein

By: Alberto Manguel

Manguel gives a detailed and highly sensitive account of the film's felicities of inventive film-making. He also traces the literary roots of the Frankenstein myth, the creation of a living being by a man usurping the powers of a jealous God. And he finds echoes in the work of modern artists such as Max Ernst and Marcel Duchamp of the Bride as a kind of femme fatale, monstrous and threatening.

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Bloomsbury Publishing

Published Date

ISBN 10

1838714677

ISBN 13

9781838714673

Fabulous Monsters

By: Alberto Manguel

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Fabulous Monsters

By: Alberto Manguel

An original look at how literary characters can transcend their books to guide our lives, by one of the world's most eminent bibliophiles Alberto Manguel, in a style both charming and erudite, examines how literary characters live with us from childhood on. Throughout the years, they change their identities and emerge from behind their stories to teach us about the complexities of love, loss, and the world itself. Manguel's favorite characters include Jim from Huckleberry Finn, Phoebe from The Catcher in the Rye, Job and Jonah from the Bible, Little Red Riding Hood and Captain Nemo, Hamlet's mother, and Dr. Frankenstein's maligned Monster. Sharing his unique powers as a reader, Manguel encourages us to establish our own literary relationships. An intimate preface and Manguel's own "doodles" complete this delightful and magical book.

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Page Count

257

Publisher

Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300247389

ISBN 13

9780300247381

A History of Reading

By: Alberto Manguel

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A History of Reading

By: Alberto Manguel

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Page Count

557

Publisher

Penguin

Published Date

ISBN 10

0698178971

ISBN 13

9780698178977

The Library at Night

By: Alberto Manguel

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The Library at Night

By: Alberto Manguel

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384

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Yale University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0300145217

ISBN 13

9780300145212

Into The Looking-Glass Wood

Essays on Words and the World

By: Alberto Manguel

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Into The Looking-Glass Wood

Essays on Words and the World

By: Alberto Manguel

By the award-winning author of A History of Reading "For me, words on a page give the world coherence--Words tell us what we, as a society, believe the world to be--I believe there is an ethic of reading--a commitment that is both political and private in the act of turning the pages. And I believe that sometimes, beyond the author's intentions and beyond the reader's hopes, a book can make us better and wiser." Through personal stories and literary reflections, in a style rich in humour and gentle erudition, Manguel leads us, the readers, to reflect upon the pleasures and responsibilities of reading, and the links that exist between the world we live in, and the words we live amongst. Into the Looking-Glass Wood is a voyage into the subversive heart of words - a voyage fired by the author's humanity and extraordinary breadth of vision.

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Page Count

281

Publisher

Vintage Canada

Published Date

ISBN 10

0307363686

ISBN 13

9780307363688

All Men Are Liars

By: Alberto Manguel

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All Men Are Liars

By: Alberto Manguel

In this gorgeously imagined novel, a journalist interviews those who knew—or thought they knew—Alejandro Bevilacqua, a brilliant, infuriatingly elusive South American writer and author of the masterpiece, In Praise of Lying. But the accounts of those in his circle of friends, lovers, and enemies become increasingly contradictory, murky, and suspect. Is everyone lying, or just telling their own subjective version of the truth? As the literary investigation unfolds and a chorus of Bevilacqua’s peers piece together the fractured reality of his life, thirty years after his death, only the reader holds the power of final judgment. In All Men Are Liars, Alberto Manguel pays homage to literature’s inventions and explores whether we can ever truly know someone, and the question of how, by whom, and for what, we ourselves will be remembered.

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Page Count

131

Publisher

Penguin

Published Date

ISBN 10

1101574895

ISBN 13

9781101574898

The City of Words

Understanding Civilisation Through Story

By: Alberto Manguel

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The City of Words

Understanding Civilisation Through Story

By: Alberto Manguel

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Page Count

180

Publisher

Macmillan

Published Date

ISBN 10

0702236845

ISBN 13

9780702236846

Mishima

A Vision of the Void

By: Marguerite Yourcenar,Alberto Manguel

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Mishima

A Vision of the Void

By: Marguerite Yourcenar,Alberto Manguel

On November 25, 1970, Japan's most renowned postwar novelist, Yukio Mishima, stunned the world by committing ritual suicide. Here, Marguerite Yourcenar, a brilliant reader of Mishima and a scholar with an eye for the cultural roles of fiction, unravels the author's life and politics: his affection for Western culture, his family and his homosexuality, his brilliant writings, and his carefully premeditated death.

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Page Count

174

Publisher

University of Chicago Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0226965325

ISBN 13

9780226965321

The Penguin Book of Christmas Stories

By: Alberto Manguel

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The Penguin Book of Christmas Stories

By: Alberto Manguel

Internationally acclaimed anthologist Alberto Manguel offers an immensely enjoyable collection of 22 brilliant stories from across the globe, written under the merry canopy of Christmas. The Penguin Book of Christmas Stories features tales by the best master storytellers, including Alice Munro, John Cheever, Richard Ford, Anne Beattie, William Trevor, Muriel Spark, Paul Auster, Mavis Gallant, Alistair MacLeod, and Vladimir Nabokov.

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Page Count

340

Publisher

Penguin Canada

Published Date

ISBN 10

0143054252

ISBN 13

9780143054252

Staring at the Light

By: Frances Fyfield,Alberto Manguel

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Staring at the Light

By: Frances Fyfield,Alberto Manguel

Why should a man want to destroy his brother? Or his brother's wife? For John Smith, a man without conscience, a soul incapable of redemption, the motive was simple. Someone who had stolen the only person he had ever loved--his twin brother, Cannon. And Johnny would stop at nothing to be his brother's keeper once more. When Cannon, sometime bomb-maker and artist, is released from prison he goes into hiding, eschewing Johnny's destructive and overwhelming brand of brotherly love. He turns instead to Sarah Fortune, a lawyer whose rag-tag clients draw her into their own desperate lives. Sarah Fortune finds herself centre stage in a drama of extraordinary proportions when she takes on Cannon's cause, concealing him and his wife, Julie, from the brother intent on hunting them down.

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Page Count

292

Publisher

Knopf Canada

Published Date

ISBN 10

0676972446

ISBN 13

9780676972443

Don't Panic, I'm Islamic

Words and Pictures on How to Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the Alien Next Door

By: Lynn Gaspard

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Don't Panic, I'm Islamic

Words and Pictures on How to Stop Worrying and Learn to Love the Alien Next Door

By: Lynn Gaspard

Bursting with creativity, wit and intelligence' Brian Eno How can you tell if your neighbour is speaking Muslim? Is a mosque a kind of hedgehog? Can I get fries with that burka? You can't trust the media any longer, but there's no need to fret: Don't Panic, I'm Islamic provides you with the answers. Read this book to learn how you too can spot an elusive Islamist. Discover how Arabs (even 21-year-old, largely innocuous and totally adorable ones) plant bombs and get tips about how to interact with Homeland Security, which may or may not involve funny discussions about your sexuality. Commissioned in response to the US travel ban, Don't Panic, I'm Islamic includes cartoons, graffiti, photography, colouring in pages, memoir, short stories and more by 34 contributors from around the world. Provocative and at times laugh-out-loud funny, these subversive pieces are an explosion of expression, creativity and colour. Contributors: Hassan Abdulrazzak, Leila Aboulela, Amrou Al-Kadhi, Shadi Alzaqzouq, Chant Avedissian, Tammam Azzam, Bidisha, Chaza Charafeddine, Molly Crabapple, Carol Ann Duffy, Moris Farhi, Negin Farsad, Joumana Haddad, Saleem Haddad, Hassan Hajjaj, Omar Hamdi, Jennifer Jajeh, Sayed Kashua, Mazen Kerbaj, Arwa Mahdawi, Sabrina Mahfouz, Alberto Manguel, Esther Manito, Aisha Mirza, James Nunn, Chris Riddell, Hazem Saghieh, Rana Salam, Karl Sharro, Laila Shawa, Bahia Shehab, Sjón, Eli Valley, Alex Wheatle.

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Page Count

206

Publisher

Saqi Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

0863569935

ISBN 13

9780863569937

Homer's the Iliad and the Odyssey

A Biography

By: Alberto Manguel

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Homer's the Iliad and the Odyssey

A Biography

By: Alberto Manguel

Examines "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey" from their origins, the colorful characters and events chronicling the Trojan War and its aftermath, and their legacy for Western culture.

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Page Count

308

Publisher

Canongate U.S.

Published Date

ISBN 10

0802143822

ISBN 13

9780802143822

Une histoire de la lecture

By: Alberto Manguel

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Une histoire de la lecture

By: Alberto Manguel

L'auteur, romancier, traducteur et éminent polyglotte, est parti à la recherche des raisons qui font aimer le livre et la lecture à travers les âges. Chaque étape de ce voyage lui est occasion de détours, de visites et de réflexions.

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Page Count

427

Publisher

Arles [France] : Actes Sud ; [Montréal] : Leméac

Published Date

ISBN 10

2742723994

ISBN 13

9782742723997

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