The Poverty Curtain

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This volume provides a radical and timely corrective to received wisdom about the seemingly inevitable transition from communism to capitalism. Arguing against popular misconceptions that portray collectivized agriculture as an unqualified failure, the contributors draw upon newly available local sources to illuminate its costs, benefits, successes, and failures. They highlight the wide variety of state policies, local responses, and economic outcomes, as well as the influence of local geography, political structures, and economic institutions. With its institutionalist analysis of both the causes and impacts of policy differences, this study provides lessons of continuing relevance to the many countries grappling with agrarian reform.

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The critically acclaimed laboratory standard, Methods in Enzymology, is one of the most highly respected publications in the field of biochemistry. Since 1955, each volume has been eagerly awaited, frequently consulted, and praised by researchers and reviewers alike. The series contains much material still relevant today - truly an essential publication for researchers in all fields of life sciences.

Methods in Enzymology, Volume 124: Hormone Action, Part J: Neuroendocrine Peptides

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Methods in Enzymology, Volume 124: Hormone Action, Part J: Neuroendocrine Peptides
P. Michael Conn
Manufacturer: Academic Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OH2EBM

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Peer-Led Team Learning: On Becoming a Peer Leader
Vicki Roth , Ellen Goldstein , Gretchen Mancus , and Reuters
Manufacturer: Prentice Hall
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General & Reference | Chemistry | Science | Subjects | Books
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Peer-Led Team Learning: A Guidebook

Peer-Led Team Learning: General Chemistry (2nd Edition) (Educational Innovation Series)

ASIN: 0130408115

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Peer-Led Team Learning: On Becoming a Peer Leader
Ellen Goldstein, Gretchen Mancus, Reuters Vicki Roth
Manufacturer: Prentice Hall
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OHXTDE

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And now I found these fancies creating their own realities, and all imagined horrors crowding upon me in fact'. The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym is an archetypal American story of escape from home and family which traces a young man's rite of passage through a series of terrible brushes with death during a fateful sea voyage. But it also goes much deeper, as Pym encounters various interpretative dilemmas, at last leaving the reader with a broken-off ending that defies solution. Apart from its violence and mystery, the tale calls attention to the act of writing and to the problem of representing truth. Layer upon layer of elaborate hoaxes include its author's own role of posing as ghost-writer of the narrative; Pym - his only novel - has become the key text for our understanding of Poe. This edition offers eight short tales which are linked to Pym by their treatment of persistent themes - fantastic voyages, gigantic whirlpools, and premature burials - or by their ironic commentary on Poe's mystification of his readers.

Customer Reviews:

Mesmerizing Account of Tragic Death, Canabalism, Saving from Sea Death and more.......2006-09-06

I have not read this masterpiece until recently. Somehow it escaped my view. But a young Edgar Allen Poe does not dissapoint. This tale unfolds with the desire of a young lad to go to sea against his fathers and grandfathers wishes. Before departing he accidently runs into his grandfather at the fishermans warf and is again warned. But he desires to disobey his family and his hidden on board by his best (only) friend. His friend manages to bring his friends dog with them. It starts out with their plans going array when is friend does not introduce him to the crew once far out to see and this perplexes our hereo. Later he understands that there has been a mutiny and later is introduced to the seamen at a point of starvation. But the story line developes much further with a harsh view of starvation and being cast off at sea with violent mutineers. This is a magnificient story well told and is very griping from the start. Its a psychological terror well advanced for 1834. Poe should have been prouder of this work because he historically did not like.

"I feared I should not be able to write, from mere memory, a statement so minute...".......2006-02-13

Claiming that this is the true narrative of a sea voyage by Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, Edgar Allen Poe records the strange, unbelievable events aboard the ship Grampus in 1827 and on a voyage of discovery to the Antarctic six months later. Published in 1838, Poe's fictionalized narrative, supposedly penned by Pym, a young man from Nantucket, describes Pym's experiences beginning in July, 1827. Stowed away in the hold of the ship and aided by his friend Augustus Barnard, whose father is captain of the Grampus, Pym endures more than a week alone and in almost total darkness before he discovers that a mutiny has occurred onboard.

Macabre details of ghastly deaths and unrelieved bloodlust, the massacre of the crew, and the casting adrift of the captain presage even more gory events. A countermutiny, equally bloody, leaves only four men alive on the Grampus. A gale, a gruesome death ship which passes them, circling sharks, and additional deaths leave only two men alive when the brig capsizes.

The second half of the account details the trip of discovery taken by Pym and the other survivor, along with an English crew from a passing ship, south to the "Antarctic Sea," a voyage in which they go "more than eight degrees farther south than any previous navigators." On this journey they encounter a monstrous "Arctic bear," more than 15 feet long, a cat-like animal with red teeth and claws, warm water with Galapagos tortoises, a series of islands inhabited by canoe-paddling natives, the Aurora Borealis, hot and milky water, white ashy showers, and a huge human figure in white, not the sights reported by later Antarctic explorers.

Poe's only novel, in the romantic tradition of sea adventures, presages the publication of Melville's Typee, which is a true story. In this case, Poe plays with the reader's sense of reality, claiming that his fictional narrative is true and that the fictional Pym had "refused" to publish it because he thought no one would believe his tale. Ironies abound, matched only by the romantic embellishments and imaginative "discoveries" in Antarctica that make this fast-paced narrative as full of tense drama as any soap opera. The abrupt "conclusion" remains ironically inconclusive. Breathless excitement and near death experiences, combined with mystical visions and inexplicable events, make this exciting narrative fun to read. n Mary Whipple

Poe's One and Only Novel:.......2003-04-20

In this novel I had the same feeling I used to have watching or reading Treasure Island. It is one of the best adventure novels I have ever read.

It speaks about an adventure seeker, a Mr. A. Gordon Pym. He tries to leave the luxury of his little city Nantucket, where he used to live with his father. One friend of his convinces him to travel. The first voyage was a total disaster. But he did not quit his dream. He went on yet another ... Man, it was the most chilling experience I ever had. It is not like anything you dream, it is even stranger. No goblins nor trolls appear hear, yet still, Poe can really bring the horror to your heart.

A mutiny is added to the singular experience Pym had, and then Cannibalism. And after you thought the story finished, you see that Poe starts a new story which not as impressive as the first, yet turns the attention to some other direction.

The end was a bit shaky. I did not like it at all. I usually do not like open endings. That was the only reason I gave 4 instead of 5 stars.

Overall, I would recommend you to read it in the middle of the night (if you do not have anything else to do), with a cup of tea, and with no one else around! You would enjoy it even more.

A disturbing tale of shipwreck and savagery.......2002-03-13

This story, Poe's only novel, is an endurance test for both reader and characters. I believe it was originally serialized, and reads like a collection of incidents rather than a complete story. However, it is a captivating tale, astounding in it's detail and casual horror. Arthur Gordon Pym was born under an unlucky star. He survives in the most inconceivable circumstances, from a drifting, overturned hulk to the frozen waters of the Antarctic. Each page turned piles more horror in his path, described with a growing clinical distance. Pym himself becomes more desensitized to each incident, until he views the irrational with a casual curiosity. The language is beautifully detailed, and some feel this story is the inspiration for "Moby Dick."

Altogether, a delightfully disturbing story. One of the best I have read.

Poe's Best Long Work -- And His Only, Even.......2000-02-19

At 150 pages or so, Arthur Gordon Pym is the closest Poe came to a novel. Rife with his characteristic polarization and dreamscape plots, this stands, in my opinion, as one of Poe's best. The short stories included only add to the mainstay, and it's a great value.

The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, and Related Tales (The World's Classics)

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The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket, and Related Tales (The World's Classics)
Edgar Allan Poe J. Gerald Kennedy
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000OJSPKY

Book Description

This volume explores the subject of religious conversion over broad expanses of time and space, considering cases from the thirteenth through the twentieth centuries and from settings across the world. Leading scholars from a variety of historical sub-fields address the theme at a moment when the utility of the concept of conversion is vigorously debated. The historical settings treated here stretch from thirteenth-century England to sixteenth-century southern India and Andean Peru, from Bohemia to China during the age of the Reformations, from the fifteenth-century Low Countries to seventeenth-century New France and from the nineteenth-century Minnesota borderlands to late colonial Zimbabwe and modern India. The book's broad mixture of examples and approaches will both encourage a deepening of specialist knowledge about particular places and times, and spark new thinking about religious change, cultural appropriations, and interactive emergence across discipline and fields. This book is one of two collections of essays on religious conversion drawn from the activities of the Shelby Cullum Davis Center for Historical Studies at Princeton University between 1999 and 2001. The other volume, Conversion in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, is also published by the University of Rochester Press.

Amazon.com

"There are two types of British queens," says Columbia University historian David Cannadine."Those who hold the position strictly as wife of the king, and those (few) who have ruled as sovereign in absence of a male heir." Queen Caroline, who briefly held title when King George IV was crowned in 1820 is numbered among the former. Vulgar, selfish, and undisciplined, she fled from the husband she hated and became nearly as well known for her promiscuity as King George IV himself. Viewed by the public as a wronged woman, she survived George's attempts to dissolve the marriage, but opinion turned against her and she died in 1821.

Book Description

Flora Fraser gives us the fascinating story of a mismatched Prince and Princess of Wales, married in 1795 and separated less than a year later. George III arranged the marriage of his niece Caroline of Brunswick to his son George. Their disastrous, and probably bigamous, marriage (George having earlier privately married a Catholic widow), had profound political consequences culminating in the trial of Caroline for adultery. Caroline's place in history has generally been limited to that of persecuted wife but Fraser, with access to previously unavailable documents, provides a complex portrait of a spirited woman who refused to be victimized.

Customer Reviews:

They can research -but- the Frasers can't write!.......2005-07-17

Both Fraser Mother & Fraser daughter can research a subject to death. However, neither writes gracefully or entertainingly. This book reads like a compilation of notes. Yawn. I'd rather read a loosey goosey Mitford biography, as if I wanted sleep, I'd read dissertations.

An enigma, still unexplained.......2005-01-25

This is a fascinating, almost incredible, true story, but (as reviewers who've preceded me here have pointed out) Flora Fraser hasn't managed to do it justice. Queen Caroline's actions are so baffling, so inconsistent, and so seemingly self-destructive that a writer really must have a "take" on her for a biography to be enlightening or moving. Fraser seems almost afraid to take a stand, or else so mired in her research that she's lost the need for a big picture. The result is that when Caroline veers in completely new directions-- suddenly taking lovers after years of faithfulness to a husband who despised her, or leaving England at the drop of a hat after years of determination to fight her battles there-- the reader gets the (highly detailed) facts without any insights that could help us understand a seemingly random shift. We don't even learn why Caroline, with few marital prospects into her mid-20s, was chosen to marry the future George IV in the first place. It's not even clear whether Fraser likes her subject, approves of her actions, or felt much enthusiasm for the project except as a collector of commemorative objects she calls "Carolingiana." I guess writing biographies is just the family business...

Specific oddities include no real sense of George IV's personality or motivation, the tendency of key people to drop out of the narrative altogether when they're not present in Caroline's life (even those important to Caroline, like her daughter Charlotte), and detailed descriptions of paintings (by one of Caroline's supposed lovers, Thomas Lawrence) that Fraser hasn't actually included in the illustrations. So much is made of the transformation of Caroline's appearance over the years that we really do need to see more from her later life than caricatures and cartoons.

It would seem inevitable that someone will make a great drama out of this story-- as a biography, or even as a play or film. It's a shame that Fraser didn't see that she could convey some of this drama, and real insight, without compromising her extensive research.

Exciting history.......2004-01-16

Flora Fraser writes beautifully, and her research is impeccable. This is one of the best "life and times" set in Georgian England available today. The popularity of Queen Caroline with the populace, always looking for symbols of opposition to the monarchy, makes clearer the similar fascination in our time with as inexplicable a figure as Diana, Princess of Wales. The books is a great read that has something to say, rather like the wonderful Mediterranean histories written by the late Sir Steven Runicman (e.g., History of the Crusades). The Unruly Queen, along with David Gilmour's Curzon, are must reading for those interested in British history.

May I have my time back, please?.......2003-07-21

Whatever were they THINKING!?! I mean, the author, and worse, the editors. This is an appallingly bad book. I staggered through the whole University of California paperback version, convinced that eventually it would improve. Sadly, I was too optimistic.

Caroline of Brunswick was clearly quite an unpleasant person all 'round. Ill-educated, dishonest, gullible, ill-bred, plain at best, lacking in style and sense, desperate for any sort of attention, she would be difficult to like in the hands of the most talented biographer. It's a shame that she was left to Flora Fraser. This particular Ms. Fraser is living proof that a talent for biography isn't hereditary. She is pendantic, tedious, and apparently without enthusiasm for her subject, whom she abandons regularly in pursuit of political minutiae.

I was startled by the ineptitude of the editing. In a number of instances the vocabulary used was clearly anachronistic slang, but the quotes were not footnoted, leaving the reader bewildered as to the meaning of the quote. In these instances, the Oxford English Dictionary was no help, surely a responsible standard for an editor of a British/American release? Some quotes are simply inaccurate.

I suspect the editors may have been overawed by Flora Fraser's lineage, and hopeful of a comparison between Diana Spencer and Caroline of Brunswick. If Caroline was as Flora Fraser describes, there is scant ground for such hopes.

I majored in British history, am quite accustomed to dry texts, and have read each and every one of Lady Antonia Fraser's splendid works with pleasure. In this case, the daughter should NOT have attempted to go into the family trade, she has no talent for it.

I very much regret the time I wasted plodding through this exceedingly dull book about a sad, dreary woman who would have been best left to rest in peace.

And no, to the best of my knowledge, I'm no relation to this branch of Frasers.

A woman with a heart but next to no common sense!.......2003-07-05

A biography about one of England's most enigmatic and on this side of the pond at least lesser known Queens. Charlotte born into the rather stogy provincal atmosphere of the Hanoverian Court was married off while still a teenager to her first cousin the future King George IV. A dandy and bon vivant who had already contracted a marriage years ago to the attractive and apparently virtuous widow Mrs. FitzHerbert. Alas Mrs. FitzHerbert was not only a commoner but a staunch catholic and George was a spend thrift. When His father refused to continue filling his coffers unless he found himself a proper (i.e. Royal) bride he abandoned Mrs. FitzHerbert and wed poor Charlotte.

Almost at once however he was repulsed by his cousin (whom he had never before met). After siring one child (a daughter Charlotte) he promptly returned to the far more worldly and appealing Mrs. FitzHerbert. This led poor Charlotte to rebel.

Her rebellion was to cost her dearly. Leading in the end to a notorioius and flawed trial headed by parliment to decide if she was in fact guilty of adultry.

Charlotte led a tragic but interesting life. As with Marie-Antoinette it can be said that Charlotte's own bad judgement and ignorance were as much (if not more) to blame for her misfortunes as the ill will of her enemies.

Overall it was an engaing account of a fascinating woman and period in time. It gave glimpses into the lives of the rest of the British Royal Family. From George's rather embittered maiden sisters to his mad father King George III and his outwardly sweet but meddling mother Queen Charlotte.

Customer Reviews:

Beginners Start.......2000-08-09

Being new to LabVIEW this book was a great help in learning. It starts with the basics and step through each phase. Excellent for any LabVIEW user.

A great book for a novice trying to become more proficient........1999-05-17

I had read all of the manuals that came with LabVIEW, but still needed something more to get me over the initial learning curve; something to answer the "Why should I do it that way?" questions .vs. the "Here's how to do it." The latter part of "LabVIEW for Everyone" did just that, in addition to providing more detail in how to perform basic operations.

Provides enough information to get started.......1998-06-05

Gives excellent overview and lets you see the potential of the software.

Good starting resource - lots of examples.......1997-08-10

I've been programming data acquisition systems for a long time and was daunted by the scope of learning yet another programming language. LabView product literature seemed difficult to understand. But, with the help of LabView for Everyone, I got into the project quickly and get results immediately. The book is easy to read, sometimes cutsey, but filled with good examples that work! They point out pitfalls, problem areas, and provide examples of how-to for many situations (for example, why the wires are different colors and sizes; common errors that result from broken wires, and so forth). Their examples were invaluable for getting my project done in a reasonable amount of time. I'd strongly recommend this book for people faced with getting going with LabView. I developed my project typing with one hand and leafing through this book with the other. I guess it saved me 4 weeks of work. That alone makes it worth the price, several-fold.

Book Description

Since World War II, the Green Revolution has boosted agricultural production in Latin America and other parts of the Third World, with money, technical assistance, and other forms of aid from United States development agencies. But the Green Revolution came at a high price--massive pesticide dependence that has caused serious socioeconomic and public health problems and widespread environmental damage. In this study, Douglas Murray draws on ten years of field research to tell the stories of international development strategies, pesticide problems, and agrarian change in Latin America. Interwoven with his considerations of economic and geopolitical dimensions are the human consequences for individual farmers and rural communities. This highly interdisciplinary study, integrating the perspectives of sociology, ecology, economics, political science, and public health, adds an important voice to the debate on opportunities for and obstacles to more lasting and sustainable development in the Third World. It will be of interest to a wide audience in the social and environmental sciences.

Cultivating Crisis: The Human Cost of Pesticides in Latin America

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Cultivating Crisis: The Human Cost of Pesticides in Latin America
Douglas L. Murray
Manufacturer: University of Texas Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000ORMAP2

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