“Not many readers will thank the author as he deserves, for he has told us more about ourselves than we perhaps wish to know,” predicted Latin America in Books of Latin America in Caricature—an exploration of more than one hundred years of hemispheric relations through political cartoons collected from leading U.S. periodicals from the 1860s through 1980.
The cartoons are grouped according to recurring themes in diplomacy and complementing visual imagery. Each one is accompanied by a lengthy explanation of the incident portrayed, relating the drawing to public opinion of the day. Johnson’s thoughtful introduction and the comments that precede the individual chapters provide essential background for understanding U.S. attitudes and policies toward Latin America.
Adventurous and perceptive, Laughing to Keep from Dying reveals how African American satirists unmask the illusions and anxieties surrounding race in the twenty-first century.
Who is Mercurius Oxoniensis? The first of his brilliantly witty letters mysteriously appeared, apparently without the authority of the writer, in the Spectator towards the end of 1968. Their candid, penetrating and caustic commentary on personalities and events (considered by some to verge on indiscretion) indicate inside information and sources. They caused an instant stir leading to some wild conjecture as to their authorship in the columns of The Times, in the University Common Rooms and in literary and academic circles. An authorized, accurately transcribed, and annotated publication of these Letters (up to June 1970) is now possible; but the anonymity remains. It is not difficult to see why, because Mercurius names names and spares no reputation: he is altogether too well informed for his own good.
According to the Editor of the Letters, the Oxford Mercurius "is a college tutor in one of the colleges in Turl Street; a bachelor, of declining years and uncertain health; somewhat old-fashioned in his views, and in his language; fond of his glass of port or hock, and teaches, inter alia, the Politics of Aristotle. He is slightly crotchety, but generally in good humour by his family circle and friends."
But what makes Mercurius’s achievement unique is that he has succeeded in fashioning from the English of the seventeenth century, the language both of John Aubrey, the great gossip, and of the racist pamphleteers, the perfect instrument for a sustained and sparkling present-day chronicle of the more noteworthy events in university life, and in particular of the "student stirs" that first prompted him to put quill to paper. Indeed in all the millions of words that have been written about student unrest in the modern world, there has been nothing more perceptive than the devastatingly entertaining observations of old Mercurius on the "fanatiques" and those who confront them.
"Sarah Bird is a true eccentric, but one with a straightforward gift for explaining the human heart. . . . A Lone Star girl-legend." —Boston Globe
What is it that distinguishes Texas women—the famous Yellow Rose and her descendants? Is it that combination of graciousness and grit that we revere in First Ladies Laura Bush and Lady Bird Johnson? The rapier-sharp wit that Ann Richards and Molly Ivins used to skewer the good ole boy establishment? The moral righteousness with which Barbara Jordan defended the US constitution? An unnatural fondness for Dr Pepper and queso?
In her inimitable style, Sarah Bird pays tribute to the Texas Woman in all her glory and all her contradictions. She humorously recalls her own early bewildered attempts to understand Lone Star gals, from the big-haired, perfectly made-up ladies at the Hyde Park Beauty Salon to her intellectual, quinoa-eating roommates at Seneca House Co-op for Graduate Women. After decades of observing Texas women, Bird knows the species as few others do. A Love Letter to Texas Women is a must-have guide for newcomers to the state and the ideal gift to tell any Yellow Rose how special she is.
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