Harvard University Press - BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY

From the Great Desire of Promoting Learning

Sun, 31 May 2009 00:00:00 EDT

William H. Bond
Introduction by Allen Reddick
Preface by William Stoneman
This checklist of Thomas Hollis’s gifts to Harvard College Library documents the generosity and the motives of one of the earliest and one of the greatest donors to Harvard University. Thomas Hollis and his books were the subject of William Bond’s 1982 Sandars Lectures in Bibliography at Cambridge University.
Hardcover May 2009

The Annotated Origin

Sat, 30 May 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Charles Darwin
Introduction and notes by James T. Costa
Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species is one of the most important and yet least read scientific works in the history of science. The Annotated Origin is a facsimile of the first edition of 1859, and is accompanied by James T. Costa’s marginal annotations, drawing on his extensive experience with Darwin’s ideas in the field, lab, and classroom. This edition makes available an accessible and practical resource for anyone reading the Origin for the first time or for those who want to reread it with the insights and perspective that a working biologist can provide.
Hardcover May 2009

Arthur Miller

Thu, 21 May 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Christopher Bigsby
This is the long-awaited biography of one of the twentieth century’s greatest playwrights, Arthur Miller, whose postwar decade of work earned him international critical and popular acclaim. Christopher Bigsby’s gripping, meticulously researched biography examines his refusal to name names before the notorious House on Un-American Activities Committee, offers new insights into Miller’s marriage to Marilyn Monroe, and sheds new light on how their relationship informed Miller’s subsequent great plays.
Hardcover May 2009

Aimee Semple McPherson and the Resurrection of Christian America

Fri, 15 May 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Matthew Avery Sutton
Aimee Semple McPherson was the most flamboyant and controversial minister in the United States between the world wars, building a successful megachurch, a mass media empire, and eventually a political career to resurrect what she believed was America's Christian heritage. Sutton's definitive study reveals the woman as a trail-blazing pioneer, her life marking the beginning of Pentecostalism's advance to the mainstream of American culture.
Paperback May 2009

Henry Kissinger and the American Century

Fri, 1 May 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Jeremi Suri
What made Henry Kissinger the kind of diplomat he was? What experiences and influences shaped his worldview and provided the framework for his approach to international relations? Suri offers a thought-provoking, interpretive study of one of the most influential and controversial political figures of the twentieth century.
Paperback May 2009

The Generalissimo

Wed, 15 Apr 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Jay Taylor
One of the most momentous stories of the last century is China’s rise from a self-satisfied, anti-modern, decaying society into a global power that promises to one day rival the United States. Chiang Kai-shek, an autocratic, larger-than-life figure, dominates this story. Drawing heavily on Chinese sources including Chiang’s diaries, The Generalissimo provides the most lively, sweeping, and objective biography yet of a man whose length of uninterrupted, active engagement at the highest levels in the march of history is excelled by few, if any, in modern history.
Hardcover April 2009

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

Wed, 15 Apr 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Frederick Douglass
Introduction by Robert B. Stepto
No book more vividly explains the horror of American slavery and the emotional impetus behind the antislavery movement than Frederick Douglass’s Narrative. In an introductory essay, Robert Stepto re-examines the extraordinary life and achievement of a man who escaped from slavery to become a leading abolitionist and one of America's most important writers. The John Harvard Library text reproduces the first edition, published in Boston in 1845.
Paperback April 2009

The Conservative Turn

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Michael Kimmage
The Conservative Turn tells the story of postwar America’s political evolution through two fascinating figures: Lionel Trilling and Whittaker Chambers, who went on to intellectual prominence, sharing the questions, crises, and challenges of their generation. Kimmage argues that the divergent careers of these two men exemplify important developments in postwar American politics: the emergence of modern conservatism and the rise of moderate liberalism.
Hardcover March 2009

East & West

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Edited by T. Corey Brennan
Edited by Harriet I. Flower
The papers in this volume are based on a 2006 Princeton University symposium in honor of Glen W. Bowersock on the occasion of his retirement from the faculty of the Institute for Advanced Study. The topics offered in East and West range throughout the ancient world from the second century bce to late antiquity, from Hellenistic Greece and Republican Rome to Egypt and Arabia, from the Second Sophistic to Roman imperial discourse, from Sulla’s self-presentation in his memoirs to charitable giving among the Manichaeans in Egypt.
Hardcover March 2009

The Sage Learning of Liu Zhi

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 00:00:00 EDT

Sachiko Murata
William C. Chittick
Weiming Tu
Foreword by Seyyed Hossein Nasr
Liu Zhi (ca. 1670–1724) was one of the most important scholars of Islam in traditional China. His Tianfang xingli (Nature and Principle in Islam), the Chinese-language text translated here, focuses on the roots or principles of Islam. The copious annotations to the translation explain Liu’s text and draw attention to parallels in Chinese-, Arabic-, and Persian-language works as well as differences.
Hardcover March 2009

Stealing Lincoln's Body

Sat, 28 Feb 2009 00:00:00 EST

Thomas J. Craughwell
On the night of the 1876 presidential election, a gang of counterfeiters attempted to steal the entombed embalmed body of Abraham Lincoln and hold it for ransom. Craughwell returns to this bizarre, and largely forgotten, event with the first book to place the grave robbery in historical context. This rousing story of hapless con men, intrepid federal agents, and ordinary Springfield citizens offers an unusual glimpse into late-nineteenth-century America.
Paperback February 2009

First Lady of the Confederacy

Sun, 15 Feb 2009 00:00:00 EST

Joan E. Cashin
When Jefferson Davis became president of the Confederacy, his wife, Varina Howell Davis, reluctantly became the First Lady. Pro-slavery but also pro-Union, Varina Davis was inhibited by her role as Confederate First Lady and unable to reveal her true convictions.Cashin offers a splendid portrait of a fascinating woman who struggled with the constraints of her time and place.
Paperback February 2009

Up from History

Mon, 19 Jan 2009 00:00:00 EST

Robert J. Norrell
This compelling biography reveals how conditions in the segregated South led Booker T. Washington to call for a less contentious path to freedom and equality. Norrell details the positive power of Washington’s vision, one that invoked hope and optimism to overcome past exploitation and present discrimination.
Hardcover January 2009

Your Death Would Be Mine

Mon, 15 Dec 2008 00:00:00 EST

Martha Hanna
Paul and Marie Pireaud, a young peasant couple from southwest France, were newlyweds when World War I erupted. Drawing upon the hundreds of letters they wrote, Martha Hanna tells their moving story and reveals a powerful and personal perspective on war.
Paperback December 2008

Confessions of a Confirmed Extensionalist and Other Essays

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 00:00:00 EST

W. V. Quine
Edited by Dagfinn Follesdal
Edited by Douglas Boynton Quine
In the twenty years between his last collection of essays and his death in 2000, Quine continued his work and occasionally modified his position on central philosophical issues. This volume collects the main essays from this last, productive period of Quine’s prodigious career.
Hardcover November 2008

Mazarin's Quest

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 00:00:00 EST

Paul Sonnino
Sonnino examines the diplomatic negotiations that took place in Westphalia from 1643 to 1648, which brought an end to the agonizing civil and religious conflict of the Thirty Years’ War.
Hardcover November 2008

Quine in Dialogue

Sun, 30 Nov 2008 00:00:00 EST

W. V. Quine
Edited by Dagfinn Follesdal
Edited by Douglas Boynton Quine
Quine was one of the twentieth century’s great philosophers. This volume begins with a number of interviews Quine gave about his perspectives on twentieth-century logic, science and philosophy, the ideas of others, and philosophy generally. Also included are his most important articles, reviews, and comments on other philosophers, from Rudolf Carnap to P. F. Strawson.
Hardcover November 2008

Loneliness as a Way of Life

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EDT

Thomas Dumm
“What does it mean to be lonely?” Dumm asks. His inquiry, documented in this book, takes us beyond social circumstances and into the deeper forces that shape our very existence as modern individuals. The modern individual, Dumm suggests, is fundamentally a lonely self. This book challenges us, not to overcome our loneliness, but to learn how to re-inhabit it in a better way.
Hardcover September 2008

Reading Tao Yuanming

Tue, 30 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EDT

Wendy Swartz
Tao Yuanming (365?–427), although dismissed as a poet following his death, is now considered one of China’s greatest writers. This study of the posthumous reputation of a central figure in Chinese literary history, the mechanisms at work in the reception of his works, and the canonization of Tao himself and of particular readings of his works sheds light on the transformation of literature and culture in premodern China.
Hardcover September 2008

Samuel Johnson

Thu, 18 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EDT

Peter Martin
Benefiting from recent critical scholarship that has explored new attitudes toward Johnson, Martin’s biography gives us a human and sympathetic portrait of Dr. Johnson. The Johnson that emerges from this biography is still the foremost figure of his age but a more rebellious, unpredictable, flawed, and sympathetic figure than has been previously known.
Hardcover September 2008

Hadrian

Mon, 15 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EDT

Thorsten Opper
Even in the panoply of Roman history, Hadrian stands out. This book moves beyond the familiar image of Hadrian to offer a new appraisal of this Emperor’s contradictory personality, his exploits and accomplishments, his rule, and his military role, against the backdrop of his twenty-one-year reign.
Hardcover September 2008