Described by the Manchester Evening News as “One of Britain’s most popular conductors”, Anthony Inglis was born into the Royal Air Force with nine of his relatives, senior and distinguished pilots in the service. His family history however, did not stop him from deciding at the age of six that he was going to conduct. Anthony knew academia was not for him and battled to persuade his teachers and even his own parents that he did not need educating at expensive private schools. In the end, they agreed and he left school early to attend the Royal College of Music. His career has seen him conducting many famous orchestras and soloists, travelling the world and working in genres from pop bands such as The Scorpions to Bizet’s opera Carmen. His thirty-three year tenure at Phantom of The Opera in London and Music Directorship of two orchestras, plus his continuing association with Cunard and Katherine Jenkins has meant that although he is at an age when people retire, he continues to be busier than ever. This is a story of perseverance, hard work, joy, laughter, anecdotes and passion, in a career that he would (almost) do for free!

The origins, nature, function and effects of imagination have engrossed writers, theologians, philosophers and practitioners of the arts across the ages; its influence on painting and music continues to be debated. It has been simultaneously feared as a dangerous, uncontrollable force and revered as the supreme visionary power. Cocking's Imagination is an exploration of the history of imagination from antiquity to the Renaissance. The book opens with a treatment of imagination in the writings of Aristotle and Plato. Developments in the Middle Ages are traced, with particular attention to the parallel tradition in Islamic thought of the period and the book pursues the concept through the theories of Dante and the Neo-platonists to the High Renaissance. The manuscript was left unfinished on Professor Cocking's death in 1986 and has been edited by Penelope Murray, who adds an introductory essay. The book will be of particular value as a background to the explosion of interest in the imagination in the Romantic period.

Drawing from a rich corpus of art works, including sarcophagi, tomb paintings, and floor mosaics, Patrick R. Crowley investigates how something as insubstantial as a ghost could be made visible through the material grit of stone and paint. In this fresh and wide-ranging study, he uses the figure of the ghost to offer a new understanding of the status of the image in Roman art and visual culture. Tracing the shifting practices and debates in antiquity about the nature of vision and representation, Crowley shows how images of ghosts make visible structures of beholding and strategies of depiction. Yet the figure of the ghost simultaneously contributes to a broader conceptual history that accounts for how modalities of belief emerged and developed in antiquity. Neither illustrations of ancient beliefs in ghosts nor depictions of afterlife, these images show us something about the visual event of seeing itself. The Phantom Image offers essential insight into ancient art, visual culture, and the history of the image.

Contemporary art is deeply engaged with the subject of classical myth. Yet within the literature on contemporary art, little has been said about this provocative relationship. Composed of fourteen original essays, Contemporary Art and Classical Myth addresses this scholarly gap, exploring, and in large part establishing, the multifaceted intersection of contemporary art and classical myth. Moving beyond the notion of art as illustration, the essays assembled here adopt a range of methodological frameworks, from iconography to deconstruction, and do so across an impressive range of artists and objects: Francis Al?s, Ghada Amer, Wim Delvoye, Luciano Fabro, Joanna Frueh, Felix Gonzales-Torres, Duane Hanson, Yayoi Kusama, Roy Lichtenstein, Kara Walker, and an iconic photograph by Richard Drew subsequently entitled The Falling Man.? Arranged so as to highlight both thematic and structural affinities, these essays manifest various aspects of the link between contemporary art and classical myth, while offering novel insights into the artists and myths under consideration. Some essays concentrate on single works as they relate to specific myths, while others take a broader approach, calling on myth as a means of grappling with dominant trends in contemporary art.

"First Published in 1991, Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company."

"The Opera Ghost really existed," Gaston Leroux declared, introducing the world to his most famous literary character, the Phantom of the Opera. The legendary Opera Ghost continues to live in the hearts of Phans dedicated to Leroux's tale of mystery, passion and unrequited love. "Phantom Phantasia" by E.A. Bucchianeri is a poetical celebration of the enigmatic masked genius haunting the depths of the Paris Opera house. A collection of twenty poems varying in style from the serious to the comic, each poem is richly illustrated with vintage images in addition to artwork, photographs and original colour plates designed by the author evoking the elegant Belle Epoque days of Paris."