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Skylark Farm

A beautiful, wrenching debut novel chronicling the life of a family struggling for survival during the Armenian genocide in Turkey, in 1915.

cover of Skylark Farmauthor: Antonia Arslan
ASIN or ISBN-10: 1400044359
binding: Hardcover
list price: $23.95 USD
amazon price: $39.51 USD


The Zürau Aphorisms of Franz Kafka

The essential philosophical writings of one of the twentieth century’s most influential writers are now gathered into a single volume with an introduction and afterword by the celebrated writer and publisher Roberto Calasso.

cover of The Zürau Aphorisms of Franz Kafkaauthor: Franz Kafka
ASIN or ISBN-10: 0805212078
binding: Paperback
list price: $15.95 USD
amazon price: $15.95


The Fallen Oak

original Italian poem


La Quercia Caduta

Dov’era l’ombra, or sé la quercia spande
morta, né più coi turbini tenzona.
La gente dice: Or vedo: era pur grande!

Pendono qua e là dalla corona
i nidietti della primavera.
Dice la gente: Or vedo: era pur buona!

Ognuno loda, ognuno taglia. A sera
ognuno col suo grave fascio va.
Nell’aria, un pianto… d’una capinera

che cerca il nido che non troverà.

(1900)

November

original Italian poem


Novembre

Gemmea l’aria, il sole cosí chiaro
che tu ricerchi gli albicocchi in fiore,
e del prunalbo l’odorino amaro
senti nel cuore.

Ma secco è il pruno, e le stecchite piante
di nere trame segnano il sereno,
e vuoto il cielo, e cavo al piè sonante
sembra il terreno.

Silenzio, intorno: solo, alle ventate,
odi lontano, da giardini ed orti,
di foglie un cader fragile. È l’estate,
fredda, dei morti.

(1891)

The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana

Yambo, a sixtyish rare-book dealer who lives in Milan, has suffered a loss of memory-he can remember the plot of every book he has ever read, every line of poetry, but he no longer knows his own name, doesn't recognize his wife or his daughters, and remembers nothing about his parents or his childhood. In an effort to retrieve his past, he withdraws to the family home somewhere in the hills between Milan and Turin. There, in the sprawling attic, he searches through boxes of old newspapers, comics, records, photo albums, and adolescent diaries.

cover of The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loanaauthor: Umberto Eco
ASIN or ISBN-10: 0156030438
binding: Paperback
list price: $18.00 USD
amazon price: $18.00 USD


Zurau Aphorisms

cover of Zurau Aphorismsauthor: Franz Kafka
ASIN or ISBN-10: 1846550092
binding: Hardcover

Pinocchio (New York Review Books Classics)

Though one of the best-known books in the world, Pinocchio at the same time remains unknown—linked in many minds to the Walt Disney movie that bears little relation to Carlo Collodi’s splendid original. That story is of course about a puppet who, after many trials, succeeds in becoming a “real boy.” Yet it is hardly a sentimental or morally improving tale. To the contrary, Pinocchio is one of the great subversives of the written page, a madcap genius hurtled along at the pleasure and mercy of his desires, a renegade who in many ways resembles his near contemporary Huck Finn.

cover of Pinocchio (New York Review Books Classics)author: Carlo Collodi
ASIN or ISBN-10: 1590172892
binding: Paperback
list price: $14.00 USD
amazon price: $11.83 USD


The Nature of Things (Penguin Classics)

The seminal Epicurean text, in a brilliant new translation The Epicureans of ancient Rome discarded the ideas of life after death and of an interventionist God in favor of the tactile pleasures of nature. In The Nature of Things, Lucretius celebrates with wit and sharp perception the extraordinary breadth of the Epicurean belief system, ranging from the indestructibility of atoms and the discovery of fire to the folly of romantic love and the phenomena of clouds and rainstorms.

cover of The Nature of Things (Penguin Classics)author: Lucretius
ASIN or ISBN-10: 0140447962
binding: Paperback
list price: $16.00 USD
amazon price: $14.07 USD


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