Emanuel Goldenberg was born in Romania and from the age of ten grew up in New York's Lower East Side. He trained at the legendary Theater Guild, changed his name, and starred in many successful Broadway plays before moving to Hollywood. Among his most famous films were Double Indemnity with Barbara Stanwyck, The Stranger with Orson Welles, Key Largo with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, The Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston, The Cincinnati Kid with Steve McQueen, and, of course, Little Caesar. After twenty successful years in film, Robinson's career was shattered by the McCarthy Commission. Although there was never any concrete proof that Robinson was in fact a member of the Communist party, it took five years for him to clear his name. In this fascinating biography, Alan L. Gansberg reveals the man behind the public face, his many memorable roles among more than 100 films, and his struggle to find steady work in Hollywood again. Includes 16 pages of photos.

From the international bestselling author of These Are the Names: “A brilliant exploration of the uneasy transition from adolescence into adulthood” (The Independent). After a decade away, gifted young pianist Ludwig Unger returns to his hometown of Kings Ness, England, where the houses are on the verge of falling into the sea. With little else but a plastic bag filled with his mother’s ashes, Ludwig hopes to make amends with his lonely past and say goodbye to the familial ghosts that still haunt him. Ludwig’s mother tried to create a normal life for him after his father abandoned them, but Ludwig grew up in her shadow, developing an obsession with her and her sensual allure. When he discovers her secret past as “the Grace Kelly of porn,” Ludwig’s world spins out of control. He soon finds himself homeless, shouldering the shame of his mother’s career, and embarking on a journey around the world in search of answers about his dysfunctional artistic family and the legacy they left behind. “Beautifully lyrical storytelling under a banner of gray skies and heavy hearts.” —Dan Kennedy, host of The Moth storytelling podcast and author of Rock On “Although perfectly charming as picaresque, the tragedy of Unger’s plight registers just as strongly as its understated oddness . . . Wieringa plays for keeps.” —Publishers Weekly, starred review “[A] beautifully realized novel about a young man seeking to understand his difficult, eccentric parents.” —Library Journal

Much analysis of gangster movies has been based upon a study of the gangster as a malign figuration of the American Dream, originally set in the era of the Depression. This text extends previous analysis of the genre by examining the evolution of gangster movies from the 1930s to the contemporary period and by placing them in the context of cultural and cinematic issues such as masculinity, consumerism and technology. With a close examination of many films from Scarface and Public Enemy to Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction , this book provides a fascinating insight into a topical and popular subject.

A WATERSTONES BOOK OF THE YEAR Who said that dictatorship was dead? The world today is full of Strong Men and their imitators. Caesarism is alive and well. Yet in modern times it's become a strangely neglected subject. Ferdinand Mount opens up a fascinating exploration of how and why Caesars seize power and why they fall. "Fast paced and impassioned" -- Sunday Telegraph "Wonderfully wry" -- The Guardian "...a delight" -- Sunday Times "Delicious work, beautifully and acerbically written" -- Wall Street Journal There is a comforting illusion shared by historians and political commentators from Fukuyama back to Macaulay, Mill and Marx, that history progresses in a nice straight line towards liberal democracy or socialism, despite the odd hiccup. In reality, every democracy, however sophisticated or stable it may look, has been attacked or actually destroyed by a would-be Caesar, from Ancient Greece to the present day. Marx was wrong. This Caesarism is not an absurd throwback, it is an ever-present danger. There are Big Caesars who set out to achieve total social control and Little Caesars who merely want to run an agreeable kleptocracy without opposition: from Julius Caesar and Oliver Cromwell through Napoleon and Bolivar, to Mussolini, Salazar, De Gaulle and Trump. The saga of Boris Johnson and Brexit frequently crops up in this author's narrative as a vivid, if Lilliputian instance of the same phenomenon. The final part of this book describes how and why would-be Caesars come to grief, from the Gunpowder Plot to Trump's march on the Capitol and the ejection of Boris Johnson by his own MPs, and ends with a defence of the grubby glories of parliamentary politics and a thought-provoking roadmap of the way back to constitutional government.

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