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10 episodes tracing the history of jazz from its roots in the African-American community of New Orleans to its heights and continuing presence.

Behind the Christmas songs we love to sing lie fascinating stories that will enrich your holiday celebration. Taking you inside the nativity of over thirty favorite songs and carols, Ace Collins introduces you to people you've never met, stories you've never heard, and meanings you'd never have imagined. The next time you and your family sing "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen," you'll have a new understanding of its message and popular roots. You'll discover...

The Roman Way was the author's second book, providing contrasts between ancient Rome and present-day life. Hamilton describes life as it existed according to ancient Roman poets such as Plautus, Virgil and Juvenal, interprets Roman thought and manners, and compares them to people's lives in the twentieth century. She also suggests how Roman ideas can be applied to the modern world.

The story of how The Godfather was made is as dramatic, operatic, and entertaining as the film itself. Over the years, many versions of various aspects of the movie's fiery creation have been told. Mark Seal sifts through the evidence, has extensive new conversations with director Francis Ford Coppola and several heretofore silent sources, and complements them with colorful interviews with key players, for irresistible insights into how the movie...

Focusing on the years 1971 to the present, Questlove finds the hidden connections in the American tapestry, whether investigating how the blaxploitation era reshaped Black identity or considering the way disco took an assembly line-approach to Black genius. And these critical inquiries are complemented by his own memories as a music fan, and the way his appetite for pop culture taught him about America.

This collection of pervasive essays not only sheds light onto eighteenth and nineteenth-century American consciousness but also on Lawrence's own perspectives and individuality. He focuses on authors such as Melville, Whitman, and Edgar Allen Poe, creating an engaging exploration of their talents, and at the same time demonstrating his own.

A collection of essays on literary history and criticism.

Selects ten songs recorded between 1956 and 2008 that embody rock and roll as a thing in itself--in the story each song tells, inhabits, and creates in its legacy.

"There is a sadness at the back of life which some people do not attempt to mitigate. Entirely aware of their own standing in the shadow, and yet alive to every tremor and gleam of existence, there they endure." 'The Common Reader' is a collection of essays that, as the title suggests, is for the common reader -- the one who reads for pleasure's sake. Shedding academic language and the high brow style, Virginia Woolf explores authors like Jane Austen...