The Art of Ardency' is a symphony of words written by 40 co-authors. As you will find, within the pages, phrases which will inspire and resonate to challenge and aspire. It has stories which can easily be relatable to readers and poems which can tap into the deepest feelings of the reader and stir them. Many threads of thoughts, feelings, opinions and emotions of writers have been interwoven to create this book, aiming to spread positivity and love in the hearts of the readers through the magic of words. This book is compiled by Aastha Khodaria, who is grateful to have received the opportunity to voice out the inner thoughts of many brilliant minds, including her own, and hopes that it brings out a significant, positive change in the readers.

Stereotypes often cast communism as a defunct, bankrupt ideology and a relic of the distant past. However, recent political movements like Europe's anti-austerity protests, the Arab Spring, and Occupy Wall Street suggest that communism is still very much relevant and may even hold the key to a new, idealized future. In The Oxford Handbook of Communist Visual Cultures, contributors trace the legacies of communist ideology in visual culture, from buildings and monuments, murals and sculpture, to recycling campaigns and wall newspapers, all of which work to make communism's ideas and values material. Contributors work to resist the widespread demonization of communism, demystifying its ideals and suggesting that it has visually shaped the modern world in undeniable and complex ways. Together, contributors answer curcial questions like: What can be salvaged and reused from past communist experiments? How has communism impacted the cultures of late capitalism? And how have histories of communism left behind visual traces of potential utopias? An interdisciplinary look at the cultural currency of communism today, The Oxford Handbook of Communist Visual Cultures demonstrates the value of revisiting the practices of the past to form a better vision of the future.