Knocked off her feet after twenty years in public health nursing, Iris Graville quit her job and convinced her husband and their thirteen-year-old twin son and daughter to move to Stehekin, a remote mountain village in Washington State’s North Cascades. They sought adventure; she yearned for the quiet and respite of this community of eighty-five residents accessible only by boat, float plane, or hiking. Hiking Naked chronicles Graville’s journey through questions about work and calling as well as how she coped with ordering groceries by mail, black bears outside her kitchen window, a forest fire that threatened the valley, and a flood that left her and her family stranded for three days. ...
Bibliographies
We invite visiting authors and scholars to submit a "Bibliography," with or without annotation, of books in some way related to their own book or work. Check each post for details on related events!
What kind of doctor puts his patients on display? As Dawn Raffel artfully recounts, Dr. Couney figured out he could use incubators and careful nursing to keep previously doomed infants alive, and at the same time make good money displaying these babies alongside sword swallowers, bearded ladies, and burlesque shows. How this turn-of-the-twentieth-century émigré became the savior to families with premature infants, known then as "weaklings"––while ignoring the scorn of the medical establishment and fighting the climate of eugenics––is one of the most astounding stories of modern medicine. And as readers will find, Dr. Couney, for all his opportunistic...
In Local Flavor, Jean Iversen chronicles the histories of eight legendary Chicago restaurants that shaped the city's neighborhoods, and she shared a bibliography of books that continue to shape experiences of Chicago. Jean Iversen discusses Local Flavor on Sat. 8/25 3pm at 57th Street Books.
Native Son, by Richard...
Eugene Thacker is the author of Cosmic Pessimism, and of the Horror of Philosophy Trilogy (In the Dust of This Planet, Starry Speculative Corpse, and Tentacles Longer Than Night), among many other titles. In his newest book, ...
When her parents took away her candles to keep their young daughter from studying math...nothing stopped Sophie. When a professor discovered that the homework sent to him under a male pen name came from a woman...nothing stopped Sophie. And when she tackled a math problem that male scholars said would be impossible to solve...still, nothing stopped Sophie.
For six years Sophie Germain...
The summer is the perfect time to get lost in a great book or two, and this year’s Quantrell and Graduate Teaching award winners have suggestions to keep you reading long past Labor Day. (UChicago News)
Stuart Gazes, Senior Lecturer in Physics
“I once read Einstein’s Dreams by Allan Lightman. He’s a physicist and a writer at MIT, and in Einstein’s Dreams, in a few pages, little vignettes, he describes a world in which some law of physics behaves very differently than it does in our universe. What was impressive was...
Little, Big by John Crowley - Crowley's book is a modern fantasy classic, in part because he reconceives the entire genre through family chronicle and dark alternative history. Along with his Aegypt Cycle, this book opened up possibilities of narrative for me within the lyric mode.
Perdido Street Station, The Scar, and Iron Council, by China Miéville - Another modern master...
In Folktales and Legends of the Middle West, Edward McClelland collects these stories and more. Readers will learn the sea shanties of the Great Lakes sailors and the spirituals of the slaves following the North Star across the Ohio River, and be frightened by tales of the Lake Erie Monster and Wisconsin’s dangerous Hodag. A history of the region as told through its folklore, music, and legends, this is a book every Midwestern family should own. Edward will discuss Folktales and Legends of the Middle West on Thursday, 7/5, 6pm at 57th Street Books.
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The Mexican Revolution in Chicago reveals the ways Mexican immigrants created transnational political movements to improve their lives on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border. Through a careful, detailed study of Chicagoland Flores examines how competing immigrant organizations raised funds, joined labor unions and churches, engaged the Spanish-language media, and appealed in their own ways to the dignity and unity of other Mexicans. Painting portraits of liberals and radicals, who drew support from the Mexican government, and conservatives, who found a homegrown American ally in the Roman Catholic Church, Flores recovers a complex and little-...