Written in Paris in the early 1950s, this book created controversy in its analysis of 'modern' society that had allowed itself to be hypnotized by socio-political doctrines, and to accept totalitarian terror on the strength of a hypothetical future.

With deft, picturesque prose, Aubrey presents biographical sketches for an intriguing and colorful parade of statesmen, poets, philosophers, and scientists, including Walter Raleigh, Francis Bacon, William Shakespeare, John Milton, Thomas Hobbes, and Rene Descartes, as well as a host of lesser known but equally fascinating figures. This anecdotal, gossipy collection brings to life the tumultuous world of Elizabethan and Stuart England and its revolutions in politics, science and morality. At the same time, Aubrey revels in the sheer variety of human nature and in the detailed, intimate, and sometimes scandalous aspects of his subjects' lives. An antiquarian, Aubrey began his collection as source material for his friend Anthony Wood's histories of Oxford University. In this new edition, more faithful to the original text than previous versions, Brief Lives emerges as a revolution in the art of English biography, a mixture of entertainment and erudition, and a lively portrait of an age.

What do Pokemon Go and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein have in common? Why do some businesses survive, and others fail at the first sign of change? What gives the human brain the edge over computers?

The answer- Elastic Thinking. It's an ability we all possess, and one that we can all learn to hone in order to succeed, at work and in our everyday lives.

Here Mlodinow, whose own flexible thinking has taken him from physics professor to TV scriptwriter and bestselling author, takes us on a revelatory exploration of how elasticity works. He draws on cutting-edge neuroscience to show how, millennia ago, our brains developed an affinity for novelty. He discovers how flexible thinking enabled some of the greatest artists and innovators to create paradigm shifts. He investigates the organisations that have demonstrated an elastic ability to adapt to new technologies. And he shows you how you can test your brain power.

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice
One of LitHub's Most Anticipated Books of 2020
An expansive, radiant, and genre-defying investigation into bonding—and how we are shaped by forces we cannot fully know
Is love a force akin to gravity? A kind of invisible fabric which enables communications through space and time? Artist Harry Dodge finds himself contemplating such questions as his father declines from dementia and he rekindles a bewildering but powerful relationship with his birth mother. A meteorite Dodge orders on eBay becomes a mysterious catalyst for a reckoning with the vital forces of matter, the nature of consciousness, and the bafflements of belonging.
Structured around a series of formative, formidable coincidences in Dodge’s life, My Meteorite journeys with stylistic bravura from Barthes to Blade Runner, from punk to Pale Fire. It is a wild, incandescent book that creates a literary universe of its own. Blending the personal and the philosophical, the raw and the surreal, the transgressive and the heartbreaking, Harry Dodge revitalizes our world, illuminating the magic just under the surface of daily life.

The natural world is full of fascinating instances of convergence: phenomena like eyes and wings and tree-climbing lizards that have evolved independently, multiple times. Convergence suggests that evolution is predictable, and if we could replay the tape of life, we would get the same outcome. But there are also many examples of contingency, cases where the tiniest change – a random mutation or an ancient butterfly sneeze – caused evolution to take a completely different course.
So are we humans, and all the plants and animals in the world today, inevitabilities or evolutionary freaks? What role does chance play in evolution? And what could it tell us about life on other planets?
In Improbable Destinies, renowned researcher Jonathan Losos reveals what the latest breakthroughs in evolutionary biology tell us about one of the greatest ongoing debates in science. Evolution can occur far more rapidly than Darwin expected, which has opened the door to something that was previously thought impossible: experimental studies of evolution in nature. Drawing on his own work with anole lizards on the Caribbean islands, as well as studies of guppies, foxes, field mice and others being conducted around the world, Losos reveals just how rapid and predictable evolution can be.
By charting the discoveries of the scientists who are rewriting our understanding of evolutionary biology, Improbable Destinies will change the way we think and talk about evolution.

I don't know why I told this story. I could just as well have told another. Perhaps some other time I'll be able to tell another. Living souls, you will see how alike they are.' Remorseless and unnerving, but leavened with black humour and the brilliance of his writing, Beckett's work is some of the most important and distinctive of the last century. In these two stories, a vicious and pitiable vagrant narrator contends (without resolve or reliability) with all the aches of memory and companionship. This book contains "The Expelled" and "First Love".

Important and powerful...a rich tour of health care around the world."
-Nicholas Kristof, The New York Times
How is it that all other industrialized democracies provide health care for their citizens as a reasonable cost-something the United States has never managed to do? In The Healing of America , New York Times bestselling author T.S. Reid shows how they do it, bringing to bear his talent for explaining complex issues in a clear, engaging way. In his global quest to find a prescription for American health care, Reid finds that it's not all "socialized medicine" out there. Instead, many industrialized democracies rely on free-market models the U.S. could use to cure a health system that has failed us.

Niall Ferguson follows the money to tell the human story behind the evolution of our financial system, from its genesis in ancient Mesopotamia to the latest upheavals on what he calls Planet Finance. What's more, Ferguson reveals financial history as the essential backstory behind all history, arguing that the evolution of credit and debt was as important as any technological innovation in the rise of civilization. As Ferguson traces the crisis from ancient Egypt's Memphis to today's Chongqing, he offers bold and compelling new insights into the rise- and fall-of not just money but Western power as well.

正如John Casti所写，“终于有了一本真正解释意识的书。” 丹麦著名科普作家的这部开创性著作利用心理学、进化生物学、信息论和其他学科来论证其革命性，即意识只代表我们处理信息的能力的极小一部分。尽管我们没有意识到，但我们的大脑会筛选并丢弃数十亿条数据，以便让我们了解周围的世界。事实上，我们所说的大部分思想实际上都是无意识地丢弃信息。我们的意识拒绝的东西构成了我们自己最有价值的部分，即“我”，“我”在我们的大部分行动中都利用了“我”——流利的演讲、骑自行车、任何涉及专业知识的事情。难怪在这个信息时代，我们很多人感到空虚和不满。这本重要的书既引人入胜又富有洞察力，它鼓励我们更多地依靠我们的直觉和感官告诉我们的信息，以便我们更好地欣赏人类生活的丰富性。

作者简介：

Tor Nørretranders 是一位丹麦科普作家。他的书籍和讲座主要关注轻科普科学及其在社会中的作用，经常提供 Nørretranders 自己关于社会应如何将新发现融入科普科学的建议。他在他的《The User Illusion》一书中引入了信息交换（明确丢弃的信息）的概念。

Sara Crewe, an exceptionally intelligent and imaginative student at Miss Minchin's Select Seminary for Young Ladies, is devastated when her adored, indulgent father dies. Now penniless and banished to a room in the attic, Sara is demeaned, abused, and forced to work as a servant. How this resourceful girl's fortunes change again is at the center of A Little Princess , one of the best-loved stories in all of children's literature.<br /><br />This unique and fully annotated edition appends excerpts from Frances Hodgson Burnett 's original 1888 novella Sara Crewe and the stage play that preceded the novel, as well as an early story, "Behind the White Brick," allowing readers to see how A Little Princess evolved. In his delightful introduction, U. C. Knoepflmacher considers the fairy-tale allusions and literary touchstones that place the book among the major works of Victorian literature, and shows it to be an exceptionally rich and resonant novel.

'The ultimate in immersive fiction . . . magnificent' Sunday Times 'Highly readable, entirely engaging and frequently funny' Observer 'Perfectly pitched . . . A deft and resonant alchemy of fact and fiction, of literary myth and imagination' Guardian Book of the Week Around the turn of the twentieth century young pianist Brodie Moncur quits Edinburgh's slate skies for the lights of Paris, his preacher father's words of denunciation ringing in his ears. There he joins forces with the fiery Irish virtuoso John Kilbarron and together the pair take Europe by storm. But when he falls for Kilbarron's lover - the mesmerizing Russian soprano Lika Blum - Brodie quickly realizes that the tide has turned and he must flee across a continent, haunted by his love for Lika, and pursued by the vengeful wrath of his rival. 'A giddying read . . . his most immersive historical novel to date' Daily Telegraph 'Elegant and affecting. A racing fin-de-siècle romance' The Times 'Boyd's talents as a rollicking storytelling [are] full on display in this historical blockbuster' Metro

'Football is a pleasure that hurts' This unashamedly emotional history of football is a homage to the romance and drama, spectacle and passion of a 'great pagan mass'. Through stories of superstition, heartbreak, tragedy, luck, heroes and villains, those who lived for football and those who died for it, Eduardo Galeano celebrates the glory of a game that - however much the rich and powerful try to control it - still retains its magic. 'The Uruguayan whose writing got right to the heart of football ... readers were never in doubt of the warmth of the blood running through his veins' Guardian 'Galeano can run rings round our glamorous football intelligentsia' When Saturday Comes 'Stands out like Pele on a field of second-stringers' New Yorker

For the first time, business journalist Janet Lowe provides a lively and lucid introduction to financial genius Benjamin Graham's investment theories, presented in terms of both his life and his work.

An introduction to the rise and fall of the British Empire A new addition to Penguin’s bestselling series of historical atlases, The Penguin Historical Atlas of the British Empire traces the emergence of the world’s greatest empire, from its earliest beginnings in the British Isles through its ascendancy in Victorian times to its ultimate collapse in the mid-twentieth century. It examines the impact of British dominance throughout the world and the legacy it has bestowed.
--Richly illustrated with photographs, artwork re-creations, and over 150 full-color maps
--Contains a timeline and a table of imperial territories