Best Selling Books by Richard Howard

Offers a profile of the French photographer and gathers a selection of his works.

Richard Howard has been writing stylish, deeply informed commentary on modern culture and literature for more than four decades. Here is a selection of his finest essays, including some never before published in book form, on a splendid range of subjects--from American poets like Emily Dickinson and Marianne Moore to French artists such as Rodin and Michel Delacroix. Also included are considerations of modern sculpture and of the photography of the human body. Howard''s intense familiarity with modern poetry is seen to excellent effect in essays on the "poetry of forgetting," on the causes and effects of experimental poetry, and on the first books of poets whose work he helped introduce--among them, J. D. McClatchy, Frank Bidart, and Cynthia MacDonald. Of course, Howard brings to his consideration of French literature a rare wisdom drawn from his celebrated work as a translator of Stendhal and Gide, Barthes and Cocteau, Yourcenar and Gracq. Hilton Kramer once wrote that Richard Howard "performs the essential critical service. He shows us the extent of the terrain. He points out its essential features. And he gives us a very vivid sense of its ethos as well as of its esthetics." Howard, now in his seventy-fifth year, continues his adroit, inventive commentary, which enriches us all.

As Napoleon prepares to invade Prussia, a war-weary sergeant is pushed to his limit in this epic military adventure series. France, 1806. Napoleon Bonaparte’s Grande Armeé is poised for war. But this is no ordinary mission. Having crushed the forces of Austria and Russia the year before, Bonaparte now seeks to avenge the French Army’s annihilation by Frederick the Great’s Prussian forces in 1757. When Prussia refuses to comply with Bonaparte’s demands that they surrender and form an alliance against England, war becomes inevitable. Sergeant Alain Lausard and his war-weary squadron of dragoons have been through many epic battles under Napoleon’s command. They would do anything for their great leader. But as they prepare to enter into yet another bloody campaign that will feature battles at Jena and Auerstadt, their loyalties are stretched to the limit . . .

A cavalry officer roots out conspirators in Paris as Napoleon mounts his fateful coup in this epic historical novel. France, 1799: As corruption spreads through the ruling Directory and rebels terrorize the countryside, the ideals of the Revolution seem far away. Napoleon Bonaparte returns from Egypt determined to restore order—and take control. Recalled to Paris to buttress their commander''s political ambitions, Alain Lausard and his heroic cavalry unit look on as Bonaparte stages a coup d''état. With Bonaparte under pressure to make peace with France''s enemies abroad, Lausard''s dragoons are reduced to flushing out enemies hiding in the gutters of Paris. When Bonaparte prepares to reclaim lost territory in Italy, Lausard is relieved. He owes his freedom to Bonaparte—and only through war can he contain the guilt he still feels for fleeing his family during The Terror. As the French cavalry crosses the Alps, Lausard''s men will face their most daunting challenge yet . . .

In a recent conversation with Priscilla Becker published by the Poetry Society of America, Richard Howard commented that, |I don''t like direct self-expression...I am more interested in the dialogue of others than in merely the dialogue with another...the dialogue of the others who are not me.| Among the speakers in The Silent Treatment are Hannah Arendt, George Eliot, Cosima Wagner and a boy in a photograph by Arkansas photographer, Mike Disfarmer.

Napoleon’s mighty army face the inferno of the Egyptian desert in this thrilling historical adventure, the sequel to Bonaparte’s Sons. France, 1798. Seventeen thousand French troops leave Toulon harbor in May, unaware of their ultimate destination. Barely three months after taking Rome, Napoleon Bonaparte has rewarded his finest regiments with a place among the Army of the Orient, bound for Egypt. Alain Lausard and his cavalry unit are on board the frigate L’Esperance. Their first battle is merely to survive the degradation that is life at sea. By the time they stagger, starved and exhausted, upon the shores of Egypt, Lausard’s dragoons have more than glory to fight for. As his beleaguered soldiers march into the desert, Bonaparte watches his tactical gamble collapse. Even when the Mameluke army is defeated beneath the pyramids, Admiral Nelson’s destruction of the French fleet and Bonaparte’s obsessive war-mongering convince Lausard that he will never see Paris again . . .

“Something in that magical atmosphere had subtly changed as if the previous stillness had been merely a portent to some mysterious event... He tilted his head to catch whatever sound it was that suddenly made him feel that someone, or something, was watching him.” Tales of the Lost is a book of short stories for adults, ranging from realms of fantasy to modern-day settings. Richard Howard’s stories are born out of a lifelong love of ghost stories and ‘curious tales’, which he read as a child. Some are ghost stories, others are simply scary, and most have a twist in the tail. In each story, there is a character who, one way or another, feels lost. One story, Flora’s Return, takes its main character from Henry James’ novella The Turn of the Screw, which was filmed in 1960 as The Innocents. Richard takes this story, which he believes is one of the finest ghost stories ever written, and continues it with an exciting new twist. Richard’s stories are based on his experiences of growing up in a house with its own ghosts during his childhood. Ghosts created by the author M.R.James, the many aspects of horror and disquiet by William Hope Hodgson, the dark humour of Saki and the relationship between man and the forces of nature in Arthur Machen and Algernon Blackwood have all inspired the author to contribute to the short story genre. From science fiction to fairy tales, stories have been written that allow us to enjoy feeling scared in a safe environment. This collection will not disappoint.

In Richard Howard''s new collection, voices of myth and memory prevail by means of prevarication.

This widely adopted text provides a fresh look at cultural anthropology and challenges students to engage in active and collaborative learning and critical thinking, as well as to recognize their own cultures as a basis for understanding the cultures of others. The book is organized around problems rather than topics, creating a natural and integrated discussion of such traditional concerns as kinship, caste, gender roles, and religion within the context of meaningful questions, including How can people begin to understand beliefs and behaviors that are different from their own. How do societies give meaning to and justify collective violence? Why are some societies more industrially advanced that others? What can anthropology tell us about attempts to link intelligence and class?

Henry Farber was born 1826 in Germany and died in 1913 in St. Anthony, Iowa.