A superb collection of Maxwell's essays and reviews of books, most of them written for the New Yorker over the past several decades.

Best known as the longtime fiction editor at The New Yorker, William Maxwell worked closely with greats like Vladimir Nabokov, John Updike, Mary McCarthy, John Cheever, and many others. His own novels include They Came Like Swallows and So Long, See You Tomorrow, and have become so highly acclaimed that many now consider him to be one of the twentieth-century's most important writers. Barbara A. Burkhardt's William Maxwell: A Literary Life represents the first major critical study of Maxwell's life and work.Writing with an economy and elegance befitting her subject, Burkhardt addresses Maxwell's highly autobiographical fiction by skillfully interweaving his biography with her own critical interpretations. She begins each chapter with commentary on the biographical circumstances and literary influences that affected each of his compositions. By contextualizing his novels and short stories in terms of events including his mother's early death from influenza, his marriage, and the role of his psychoanalysis under the guidance of Theodore Reik, Burkhardt's subsequent literary analyses achieve an unprecedented depth.Drawing on a wide range of previously unavailable material, Burkhardt includes letters written to Maxwell by authors like Eudora Welty and Louise Bogan, excerpts from Maxwell's unpublished manuscripts and correspondence, and her own interviews with key figures from his life, including John Updike, Roger Angell, New Yorker fiction editor Robert Henderson, and Maxwell's family and friends. She also presents several lengthy sessions with Maxwell himself.A must for anyone already familiar with the understated charms of Maxwell's writing, this volume also represents a major addition to the growing collection of New Yorker lore, sure to fascinate anyone interested in the fiction, history, and personalities connected with the most influential weekly.Barbara A. Burkhardt is an assistant professor of English at the University of Illinois at Springfield. A close acquaintance of Maxwell, she organized his correspondence for the Maxwell archives at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign library, as well as writing the catalog for two exhibitions.

The Nature and Function of Dreaming presents a comprehensive theory of dreaming based on many years of psychological and biological research by Ernest Hartmann and others. Critical to this theory is the concept of a Central Image; in this volume, Hartmann describes his repeated finding that dreams of being swept away by a tidal wave are common among people who have recently experienced a trauma of some kind - a fire, an attack, or a rape. Dreams with these Central Images are not dreams of the traumatic experience itself, but rather the Central Image reveals the emotional response to the experience. Dreams with a potent Central Image, like the tidal wave, vary in intensity along with the severity of the trauma; this pattern was shown quite powerfully in a systematic study of dreams occuring before and after the September 11 attacks in New York. Hartmann's theory comprises three fundamental elements: dreaming is simply one form of mental functioning, occurring along a continuum from focused waking thought to reverie, daydreaming, and fantasy. Second, dreaming is hyperconnective, linking material more fluidly and making connections that aren't made as readily in waking thought. Finally, the connections that are made are not random, but rather are guided by the dreamer's emotions or emotional concerns - and the more powerful the emotion, the more intense the Central Image.

Everybody has dreams--but how many of us get to see our dreams come true? Disneyland, Starbucks, Google, the first manned landing on the Moon, every novel ever written, ever motion picture ever filmed, every painting ever created--all began as a dream in someone's imagination. And all became real through the power of Extreme Focus. After assembling an NBA championship team in Philadelphia in the 1980s, author Pat Williams dreamed of building an NBA expansion team in central Florida--the Orlando Magic. Applying the same success principles he teaches in Extreme Focus, Williams achieved that dream. For more than two decades, the Magic has been rocking the sports world and proving that dreams really do come true through the power of Extreme Focus. This is not just another collection of rah-rah motivational slogans. Extreme Focus is a practical, proven, step-by-step guide to turning dreams into reality, written by someone who has been there, done that. In these pages, Pat Williams shows you how to discover and focus on your passion in life, how to achieve great things tomorrow by focusing on today, how to discipline yourself for success, how to increase your courage and confidence, and more. The principles and stories in Extreme Focus will get you off the treadmill of a ho-hum life and onto the road to your dreams!

In this magically evocative novel, William Maxwell explores the enigmatic gravity of the past, which compels us to keep explaining it even as it makes liars out of us every time we try. On a winter morning in the 1920s, a shot rings out on a farm in rural Illinois. A man named Lloyd Wilson has been killed. And the tenuous friendship between two lonely teenagers—one privileged yet neglected, the other a troubled farm boy—has been shattered. Fifty years later, one of those boys—now a grown man—tries to reconstruct the events that led up to the murder. In doing so, he is inevitably drawn back to his lost friend Cletus, who has the misfortune of being the son of Wilson's killer and who in the months before witnessed things that Maxwell's narrator can only guess at. Out of memory and imagination, the surmises of children and the destructive passions of their parents, Maxwell creates a luminous American classic of youth and loss.

In magic a special language is spoken - not the spells, not the old languages that nobody uses for thousands of years, not the language of grimoires ... but the language of images. This language is direct and sincere and true - it is what it is, it tells how it is, it shows the innermost essence of what is signified ... the words of this language are a reflection of what they point to. The language of magic needs the connection to what it wants, it must be accurate, without inner contradiction ... otherwise this language has no magical effect. The language of magic works in the subconsciousness - and the subconsciousness is not judgmental, it is not moral, it hides nothing, it sees everything ... and that is where magic works. The words of magic direct the life-force - and what is the life-force but the "substance" of the subconsciousness? ... therefore the language of the magicians must be a True Language. The language of magic in astrology is the Moon: the inner images, the dreams, the dream journeys, the visions, the symbols, the omens, the fairy tales, the myths ... the language of magic is the "Language of the Moon"

"A book club gives the opportunity to meet up with friends and wake the brain up a bit with lively and often quite aggressive discussion" Dawn French How do you keep your reading groups discussions lively and focussed? If you want to gain new insight into literature and share your passion with friends this book offers readers guides for 75 of the very best reads - guaranteed to provoke spirited debate! Each of the readers guides includes a summary of the book, a brief author biography, discussion points to spark debate, and a set of titles for further reading that deal with similar themes. A `background' section provides pointers to more material about the book online and as well as further thought-provoking material: Where did the author come from? What made them write the book? How did the context in which they wrote influence them? If you'd like further insight, debate, discussion and analysis to underpin your understanding and enjoyment of reading - then look no further than this guide. New titles in this edition include: The Long Firm, Leper's Companions, By the Sea, The Ninth Life of Louis Drax, Buddha of Suburbia, The Icarus Girl, Black and Blue, The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break, Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, The Cutting Room, Shadow of the Wind, Giving up the Ghost...and many more!