Bøger af Claire Harman

'All Sorts of Lives is a beautiful, fastidiously researched and fascinating exploration of Mansfield's life and work' A.L. KENNEDYPublished to celebrate Katherine Mansfield's centenary, this is a compact but comprehensive new portrait of her life, work, relevance and wonderfully inspiring personalityRestless outsider, masher-up of form and convention, Katherine Mansfield's short but dazzling career was characterised by struggle, insecurity and sacrifice - alongside a glorious, relentless creative drive and openness.She was the only writer Virginia Woolf admitted being jealous of, yet by the 1950s was so undervalued that Elizabeth Bowen was moved to ask, 'Where is she - our missing contemporary?' Now, looking back over the hundred years since her death, it is evident how vital Mansfield was to the Modernist movement and how strikingly relevant she is today, helping us to see differently, to savour and to notice things.In this dynamic and perceptive study, Claire Harman takes a fresh look at Mansfield's life and achievements side by side, through the form she did so much to revolutionise: the short story. Exploring ten pivotal works, we watch how Mansfield's desire to grow as a writer pushed her art into unknown territory, and how illness sharpened her extraordinary vitality: 'Would you not like to try all sorts of lives - one is so very small.'Inventive, intimate and informative, All Sorts of Lives is the perfect introduction for those who aren't familiar with Mansfield's work and, for those who are, it offers a new way of viewing and celebrating her and her legacy.

Jane's Fame tells the fascinating story of Jane Austen's renown, from the years of rejection the author faced during her lifetime to the global recognition and adoration she now enjoys. Almost two hundred years after her death, Austen remains a hot topic, constantly open to revival and reinterpretation and known to millions of people through film and television adaptations as much as through her books. In Jane's Fame, Claire Harman gives us the complete biography-of both the author and her lasting cultural influence-making this essential reading for anyone interested in Austen's life, works, and remarkably potent fame.

He thrilled readers the world over with breathtaking tales of pirates (Treasure Island) and monsters (The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde). But the short life of writer Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-94) was as adventurous as almost anything in his fiction. He was both engineer and aesthete, Covenanter and atheist, dutiful son and reckless lover. His travels, illnesses, creative struggles, volatile relationships, and titanic quarrels were the stuff of legend.Until now, no biography has done justice to the complex, brilliant, and troubled man who was responsible for so many remarkable literary creations, the least "Victorian" of Victorian writers. Claire Harman's Myself & the Other Fellow is a fascinating portrait of a man of humor, resilience, and strongly unconventional views, the most authoritative, comprehensive, and perceptive biography of Robert Louis Stevenson to date.

'All Sorts of Lives is a beautiful, fastidiously researched and fascinating exploration of Mansfield's life and work' A.L. KENNEDYPublished to celebrate Katherine Mansfield's centenary, this is a compact but comprehensive new portrait of her life, work, relevance and wonderfully inspiring personalityRestless outsider, masher-up of form and convention, Katherine Mansfield's short but dazzling career was characterised by struggle, insecurity and sacrifice - alongside a glorious, relentless creative drive and openness.She was the only writer Virginia Woolf admitted being jealous of, yet by the 1950s was so undervalued that Elizabeth Bowen was moved to ask, 'Where is she - our missing contemporary?' Now, looking back over the hundred years since her death, it is evident how vital Mansfield was to the Modernist movement and how strikingly relevant she is today, helping us to see differently, to savour and to notice things.In this dynamic and perceptive study, Claire Harman takes a fresh look at Mansfield's life and achievements side by side, through the form she did so much to revolutionise: the short story. Exploring ten pivotal works, we watch how Mansfield's desire to grow as a writer pushed her art into unknown territory, and how illness sharpened her extraordinary vitality: 'Would you not like to try all sorts of lives - one is so very small.'Inventive, intimate and informative, All Sorts of Lives is the perfect introduction for those who aren't familiar with Mansfield's work and, for those who are, it offers a new way of viewing and celebrating her and her legacy.

"e;Enthralling . . . A page-turner that can hold its own with any one of the many murder-minded podcasts out there."e;JezebelFrom the acclaimed biographer--the fascinating, little-known story of a Victorian-era murder that rocked literary London, leading Charles Dickens, William Thackeray, and Queen Victoria herself to wonder: Can a novel kill?In May 1840, Lord William Russell, well known in London's highest social circles, was found with his throat cut. The brutal murder had the whole city talking. The police suspected Russell's valet, Courvoisier, but the evidence was weak. The missing clue, it turned out, lay in the unlikeliest place: what Courvoisier had been reading. In the years just before the murder, new printing methods had made books cheap and abundant, the novel form was on the rise, and suddenly everyone was reading. The best-selling titles were the most sensational true-crime stories. Even Dickens and Thackeray, both at the beginning of their careers, fell under the spell of these tales--Dickens publicly admiring them, Thackeray rejecting them. One such phenomenon was William Harrison Ainsworth's Jack Sheppard, the story of an unrepentant criminal who escaped the gallows time and again. When Lord William's murderer finally confessed his guilt, he would cite this novel in his defense. Murder By the Book combines this thrilling true-crime story with an illuminating account of the rise of the novel form and the battle for its early soul among the most famous writers of the time. It is superbly researched, vividly written, and captivating from first to last.

Winner of the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize 'One of the most shamefully under-read great British authors of the past 100 years' Sarah WatersThe poet Sylvia Townsend Warner rose to sudden fame with the publication of her classic feminist novel Lolly Willowes in 1926, but never became a conventional member of London literary life, pursuing instead a long writing career in her own individualistic manner. Cheerfully defying social norms of the day, Warner lived in an openly homosexual relationship with the poet Valentine Ackland for almost forty years. Together, they were committed members of the Communist party and travelled twice to Spain during the Civil War, but Warner paid for her outspokenness with years of neglect, and channelled much of her emotional and intellectual energy into letters, poems and heart-breaking diaries that remained unpublished during her lifetime. In this enthralling and enlightening biography, Claire Harman tells the story of Warner's remarkable life and restores her to her rightful place as one of Britain's most unique and brilliant writers."e;As passionate and truthful, elegant and enchanting as its subject."e; George D Painter"e;Harman skilfully weaves Sylvia's stories and letters into the biography, and the brilliance of the samples on display constantly takes you aback... Outstanding"e; Sunday Times

Raised motherless on remote Yorkshire moors, watching five beloved siblings sicken and die, haunted by unrequited love: Charlotte Bronte's life has all the drama and tragedy of the great Gothic novels it inspired. This book presents an illuminating account of one of our best-loved novelists.