This book investigates one of the central preoccupations of our age as it probes the nature of boredom, how it originated, how and why it afflicts us, and why we cannot seem to overcome it by any act
In City and Cosmos, Keith D. Lilley argues that the medieval mind considered the city truly a microcosm: much more than a collection of houses, a city also represented a scaled-down version of the ve
Large, bold, and colorful, Indigenous Australian art—sometimes known as Aboriginal art—has impressed itself on the contemporary art scene, becoming one of the most popular arts in the world. In this b
William Kentridge and Vivienne Koorland are two of South Africa’s foremost visual artists. Kentridge is a successful animator, opera director, performer, and draftsman, while Koorland has enjoyed wide
In January 2006, a man tried to break Marcel Duchamp’s Fountain sculpture with a small hammer. The sculpted foot of Michelangelo’s David was damaged in 1991 by a purportedly mentally ill artist. Each
What is Nigel Farage’s favorite novel? Why do Brexiteers love Sherlock Holmes? Is Philip Larkin the best Brexit poet ever? Through the politically relevant sideroad of English Literature, writ l
Sublime madness, ennui, and melancholy: a condition of imbalance, chaotic and desolate—and a keystone of modern Western thought. Why did this threatening expression of languor and disorder gain
Monsters under Glass explores our enduring fascination with hothouses and exotic blooms, from their rise in ancient times, through the Victorian vogue for plant collecting, to the vegetable monsters o
The Anatomy of Riches tells the story of one British family’s long, hard rise from rags to riches—and their rapid reversal of fortune. Focusing on the seventeenth-century life of Sir Rober
For fifteen centuries, legends of King Arthur have enthralled us. Born in the misty past of a Britain under siege, half-remembered events became shrouded in ancient myth and folklore. The resulting ta
Though reaching ever further toward the skies, today’s cities are overshadowed by multiple threats: climate change, overpopulation, social division, and urban warfare all endanger our metropolitan way
Lesser Dragons is a timely introduction to the fascinating, complex, and vital world of China’s national minorities. Drawing on firsthand fieldwork in several minority areas, Michael Dillon intr
Mapping the Middle East explores the many ways people have visualized the vast area lying between the Atlantic Ocean and the Oxus and Indus River Valleys over the past millennium. By analyzing maps pr
Multimedia experiments are everywhere in contemporary art, but the collaboration and conflict associated with multimedia is not a new phenomenon. From opera to the symphonic poem to paintings inspired
Public sculpture is a major draw in today’s cities, and nowhere is this more the case than in New York. In the Big Apple, urban art has become synonymous with the municipal “brand,”
What do they all mean—the lascivious ape, autophagic dragons, potbellied heads, harp-playing asses, arse-kissing priests, and somersaulting jongleurs to be found protruding from the edges of medieval