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For Whom the Bell Tolls was inspired by Hemingway's experiences as a foreign correspondent, first in Paris and then in Spain itself, during the Spanish Civil War. Hemingway visited Spain in 1931, just after the monarchy of Alfonso XIII had been...

In Disgrace (1999), J.M. Coetzee enters intimately into the mind of a twice-divorced academic, David Lurie, as he wrestles with the impediments that societal standards place on the fulfillment of his sexual desire. Fired from his position in Cape...

Winter in the Blood is a novel written by the Native American writer James Welch in the year 1974. In his novel, the author explores the consequences of Native culture clashing with White culture. The main character remains unknown and his name is...

The End of the Affair is one of the best novels written by Graham Greene. The novel about human love, which God has invaded into, was written in 1951. This Greene's novel is considered to be the best of his Christian books - the combination of...

Thunderball is the ninth James Bond adventure from Ian Fleming, published in 1961 just as Bond mania was about to break out on a global scale. The tale of James Bond’s to stop the theft of nuclear weapons began life as a screenplay co-written by...

Ian Flemming published his tenth James Bond novel in 1963. First published by Jonathan Cape in the United Kingdom on April 1, the novel was then released in America in August of 1963 by the New American Library. Fleming also signed 250 copies to...

From Russia with Love was the fifth novel by author Ian Fleming to feature his distinctively British secret agent James Bond. It would be the one that catapulted Bond from regional hero to global phenomenon because one day a reporter from Life...

The State and Revolution was written by Vladimir Lenin, a Russian communist revolutionary. At the time of the pamphlet's completion in September 1917, the future of the Russian Revolution was uncertain after the February Revolution. During this...

Max Weber is a German writer known for his philosophical and political writings. Born in Prussia, Max Weber grew up to be one of the most influential philosophers of his era, his writings inspiring other great thinkers such as Karl Marx.

Weber was...

Published in 1963 by the German author Hannah Arendt, On Revolution is a book that glorifies the events of the American Revolution, and says that the French Revolution was meaningless compared to it. Arendt claims that the leaders of the American...

Melville finished his masterpiece, Moby-Dick, when he was all of thirty-two years old. Still a young writer, he had crafted one of the most incredibly dense and imaginative works in all of literature, a book now praised by many as the greatest...

Written in the 5th century CE, City of God, or The City of God Against the Pagans, is one of the best known and most influential of Saint Augustine’s works. The book was completed less than two decades after the sack of Rome by the Visigoths in...

Thomas Aquinas: Selected Writings is a collection of writings and reflections by the medieval philosopher Saint Thomas Aquinas. Saint Thomas Aquinas was an Italian friar, priest, and Christian philosopher. He was alive during the 13th century and...

Philip K. Dick was an American novelist born on December 16, 1928 in Chicago, Illinois. Dick’s parents divorced when he was five, so he was raised by his mother in Washington D.C. Although he did not receive stellar grades, his elementary and...

In the Time of the Butterflies was published in 1994. It was selected as a Notable Book for 1994 by the American Library Association, and it was also a 1994 Book of the Month Club choice. In 1995, it was a finalist for the National Book Critics...

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone tells the story of an eleven-year-old orphan who suddenly discovers that he is a wizard. J.K. Rowling began writing the book in 1990, prompted by a delayed train ride from Manchester to London during which she...

Ragtime is a novel written by Edgar Lawrence Doctorow that was published in 1975. Ragtime is a historical fiction novel that is set in New York City. Doctorow is a New York City native, and after going to school at Kenyon College and Columbia...

My Mortal Enemy is a novel written by Willa Cather in 1926. The novel revolves around Myra and her husband Oswald who return to their home in Illinois, USA to visit their relatives. Oswald soon receives silver-buttons for his shirt from an old...

Born in Christmas Eve of 1818 in the South-wark section of London, Eliza Cook found early success as a poet. She published her first collection while still a teenager in 1835. The verse featured in Lays of a Wild Harp found a receptive audience...

Ethan Frome was published in 1911, when Wharton was already an established and successful writer. She lived primarily in Paris between 1905 and the outbreak of World War II, and these years were productive. She was growing more self-assured in her...

The Road (2006), Cormac McCarthy's most recent novel, describes the bleak journey of a father and son across a post-apocalyptic American landscape. He was visiting El Paso, Texas, with one of his sons, John Francis McCarthy, in 2003 when the...

Parallax is defined as the illusion that a given object in the distance appears to change position viewed from a different position. You can demonstrate this effect by focusing on an object off the distance as you are reading this and looking at...

Stanley Kubrick. Sidney Lumet. George Roy Hill. According to film critic Daniel O’Brien, these Hollywood luminaries were among a dirty dozen or so who all turned down the opportunity to direct a film adaptation of Richard Hooker’s comic novel...

Woody Allen's cinematic journey took a significant turn with the release of "Annie Hall" in 1977, marking a departure from his earlier slapstick, sketch-based comedies. Before delving into the profound impact of this film, it is crucial to...