National Network for Equitable Library Service

Iconoclasm - the alteration, destruction, or displacement of icons - is usually considered taboo or profane. But, on occasion, the act of destroying the sacred unintentionally bestows iconic status on the desecrated object. Iconoclasm examines the reciprocity between the building and the breaking of images, paying special attention to the constructive power of destructive acts. Although iconoclasm carries with it inherently religious connotations, this volume examines the shattering of images beyond the spiritual and the sacred.

John Weinzweig (1913-2006) was the pre-eminent Canadian composer of his generation. Influenced by European modernists such as Stravinsky, Berg, and Webern, he was the first Canadian composer to employ serialism, thereby bringing a spirit of innovation to mid-twentieth-century Canadian music. A forceful advocate for modern Canadian composition, Weinzweig played a key role in the founding of the Canadian League of Composers and the Canadian Music Centre during a buoyant and expansive period for the arts in Canada.

Today, debates about the cultural role of the humanities and the arts are roiling. Responding to renewed calls to reassess the prominence of canonical writers, Shakespeare On Stage and Off introduces new perspectives on why and how William Shakespeare still matters. Lively and accessible, the book considers what it means to play, work, and live with Shakespeare in the twenty-first century.

Highlighting the geopolitical and economic circumstances that have prompted migration from Hong Kong and mainland China to Canada, The Transcultural Streams of Chinese Canadian Identities examines the Chinese Canadian community as a simultaneously transcultural, transnational, and domestic social and cultural formation. Essays in this volume argue that Chinese Canadians, a population that has produced significant cultural imprints on Canadian society, must create and constantly redefine their identities as manifested in social science, literary, and historical spheres.

How do the bodies we inhabit affect our relationship with art? How does art affect our relationship to our bodies? T Fleischmann uses Felix Gonzáles-Torres's artwork-piles of candy, stacks of paper, puzzles-as a path through questions of love and loss, violence and rejuvenation, gender and sexuality. From the back porches of Buffalo to the galleries of New York and L.A. and the farmhouses of rural Tennessee, artwork acts as still points, sites for reflection situated in lived experience.

A hilarious, candid account of what life in France is actually like, from a writer for Vanity Fair and GQ Americans love to love Paris. We buy books about how the French parent, why French women don't get fat, and how to be Parisian wherever you are. While our work hours increase every year, we think longingly of the six weeks of vacation the French enjoy, imagining them at the seaside in stripes with plates of fruits de mer. John von Sothen fell in love with Paris through the stories his mother told of her year spent there as a student.

Emmy-Award winning writer and comedian Josh Gondelman's collection of personal stories of best intentions and mixed results. Josh Gondelman knows a thing or two about trying-and failing. The Emmy Award-winning stand-up comic-dubbed a "pathological sweetheart" by the New York Observer-is known throughout the industry as one of comedy's true "nice guys." Not surprisingly, he's endured his share of last-place finishes. But he keeps on bouncing back.

A Publishers Weekly Spring Preview Selection. A deeply personal collection of essays exploring Nigerian-American author Bassey Ikpi's experiences navigating Bipolar II and anxiety throughout the course of her life. Bassey Ikpi was born in Nigeria in 1976. Four years later, she and her mother joined her father in Stillwater, Oklahoma -a move that would be anxiety ridden for any child, but especially for Bassey. Her early years in America would come to be defined by tension: an assimilation further complicated by bipolar II and anxiety that would go undiagnosed for decades.

In an age defined by hyperconnectivity and constant stimulation, Francine Prose makes a compelling case for the solitary act of reading and the great enjoyment it brings. This book includes selections culled from Prose's previous essays, reviews, and introductions, combined with new, never-before-published pieces that focus on her favorite works of fiction and nonfiction.

Lindy West is a catalyst for a national conversation in a world where not all stories are created equal and not every body is treated with equal respect. Shrill is comprised of a series of essays that bravely shares her life, including her transition from quiet to feminist-out-loud.